Ken Hunt News June 2000

Life is too short not to exclude the bizarre. In its 16 May 2000 edition, the Village Voice ran Eric WeisbardÔs review of something theatrical called Lay Me Down at the Theatorium on Stanton Street in New York. This play with book by Eric Winick and music and lyrics by Stephen Thirolle caught my eye because the strapline mentioned Richard and Linda Thompson and it had only been a couple of weeks since Linda Thompson finished in The Mysteries in the National Theatre in London. The reworked trilogy had enjoyed a lengthy run, including a free performance of an abridged Passion -- the middle play in the trilogy -- on the South Bank at Easter. (As the spoilers waggishly reveal, Jesus dies at the end of the play.) Lay Me Down, ãa musical that chronicles the commercial struggles of the ThompsonsÒ, grated a nerve. It just seemed so bizarre for somebody to go to the bother of re-running the demise of the Thompsons, not that their demise lacked drama. They bowed out amid considerable acrimony, as anyone who saw their farewell tours in Britain or North America will recall. Body language and barbed comments would have made it plain to even somebody not in the know that something was happening and being acted out on stage. Weisbard did not sound particularly moved by the play and lack of time prevented me getting to see the ups and downs of the Thompsons played out on stage. That was a shame. It would have been interesting to see a play about events and characters about which I have some passing experience. Another act in lifeÔs rich farce missed.

Speaking of farces, the antics of the so-called religious right in the United States regularly provide ample cause for contemplating oneÔs navel -- for fear of bursting out laughing and spoiling the solemnity of the occasion. Events in March reaffirmed this with attacks on a new cartoon series going out on stations affiliated to the American television giant NBC. Stations in Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi and Utah bowed to the pressure and withdrew the series created by Mathew Carlson. The series called God, the Devil and Bob was accused of trivialising religion. In a pricelessly delicious twist the Council on American-Islamic Relations launched attacks on the series as well. All of this stuff would have merely reaffirmed oneÔs worst fears about organised religion but for the fact that God, voiced by James Garner, bore a striking resemblance to Jerry Garcia. Regrettably it seems as if God, the Devil and BobÔs God has all his fingers intact. Unlike the Grateful DeadÔs Garcia who lacked the full complement of digits for most of his life a bit like God and ribs, one might suppose. And as is the norm in the Colonies the Devil is voiced by an English actor, in this case Alan Cummings. One can but hope that the series reaches Europe in due course.

Joachim-Ernst Berendt died on 4 February 2000 in the northern German city of Hamburg. Born in Berlin in 1922, this writer, broadcaster, record producer and musicologist authored over twenty books, several of which, such as Nada Brahma: The World is Sound and The Third Ear, were translated into English. Berendt was literally the son of a preacher man but, perhaps because the Devil gets the best tunes, he gravitated towards music, especially music with the soul of improvisation. Supposedly he made over 10,000 radio broadcasts over the course of his career. He wrote engagingly about jazz, non-western classical music and what would now be called world music. He also gave pointers on how to listen. Yehudi Menuhin, in the forward to the 1992 English-language edition of BerendtÔs The Third Ear paid him a lovely tribute and described him as ãa kindred spirit who corroborates my conviction that the magic of listening brings us closer to the central core of the universe.Ò Amen.

The Scots Gaelic folksinger and teacher Kitty Macleod died on 7 May 2000. She was born in 1914 in Kasauli near Simla (the cooler, hilly summer headquarters of the colonial civil service) in the Himalayas while her father was serving with the Seaforth Highlanders. Macleod was one of the singers who resuscitated a tradition that many prattled was in imminent danger of keeling over stone dead, not to say was fit only for keening over. Her heyday, or if not her heyday then her period of greatest visibility, was in the early 1950s but she had been planted in Gaelic soil from very early on, when her mother settled on the Isle of Lewis (while her father was in captivity, a prisoner in Mesopotamia, although posted missing in action, believed dead). Kitty Macleod went on to study at Edinburgh University on a scholarship, all the while pursuing her interest in music and singing. She won the gold medal for her singing in 1936 at a pre-eminent Gaelic music gathering. In 1938 she spent time on the Gaelic-speaking island of Barra, collecting and learning songs. (Barra would likewise teach Ray Fisher much about Gaelic song.) Contradicting that earlier remark about visibility, Kitty Macleod also appeared as a singer in the wartime film The Western Isles about the life and work of women on the Hebrides. In 1951 she was persuaded to sing on the fringe of the Edinburgh Festival. Although this festival would do great things for music, Hamish Henderson and Norman Buchan were intent on undermining the festivalÔs elitism. Macleod appeared as part of the PeopleÔs Festival Ceilidh events with her actress sister Marietta. Macleod had a natural, unforced style of singing in an era when British folksinging was still largely the preserve of trained voices and pianoforte accompaniments, as far as most people were concerned. Her rise to âfameÔ coincided with Alan LomaxÔs extended visit to Britain, where he based himself until 1957, and he recorded her as part of his work for Columbia (her singing appears in the collected Lomax releases for Rounder). Her and her sisterÔs mouth music featured in the film Rob Roy in 1953. Although film stardom beckoned to this photogenic woman, she kept singing and taught until 1974 when she retired from teaching but not music. Kitty Macleod was an early advocate for non-standard culture and her contribution to ScotlandÔs folk music heritage (as opposed to heritage industry) was immense.