(Picture at left – Drew Smith, Tony Trishka and Mike Seeger at the Hurdy Gurdy on May 5, 2007)

This was a wonderful weekend for folk music. The Hurdy Gurdy Folk Music Club presented an evening with Mike Seeger on Saturday night.

Mike Seeger IS a national treasure. He treated the Hurdy Gurdy audience to an evening that explored American folk music of the 20th century – and earlier. He shared his skills on a number of instruments – banjo, fiddle, guitar, autharp, quills – and I am probably forgetting some!!

A special treat – Tony Trishka joined Mike onstage to share a few tunes during the second set. During Mike’s encore, an audience member requested “Wildwood Flower” and then Mike asked the audience if they would prefer to hear it on the autoharp or guitar. After the audience chose the autoharp, Mike started strumming the instrument and then stopped and asked Drew Smith to come on stage and join him. Drew has twice won the International Autoharp Championship as well as winning the National Autoharp Championship and the Mountain Laurel Championship. Many locals know Drew from his work with the Triple Play All Stars – a trio that also includes Rich Rainey and Robbie Weedeen.

Drew joined Mike and Tony came back as well for a version of “Wildwood Flower” that will not soon be forgotten!

Our thanks to Mike Seeger for an outstanding evening of music.

The Hurdy Gurdy concert will feature virtuoso Irish fiddler Kevin Burke and American guitarist Cal Scott. Kevin, a former member of the influential Bothy Band, Celtic Fiddle Festival and other groups has just released a CD with Cal Scott.

This show will be in our intimate Assembly room and seating is limited! Go to www.hurdygurdyfolk.org for ticket information.

Today I had the pleasure of emceeing a house concert – Joe Jenks a Borderline House concert in New City, NY. Joe Jencks is at the top of my list of favorite contemporary musicians. He is following in the tradition of artists like Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie, Phil Ochs and Joe Hill. He is the real deal – he lives his life following the lessons learned from his songs. (Joe is considering a bicycle tour in the next few years – going from venue to venue on a bike with special trailer to carry his instruments and necessitites! Talk about going green!!!) Don’t miss Joe Jencks whenever he is in the area. Keep checking this website – I will remind you when he comes around again!

It was a wonderful treat to visit this outsanding house concert series – run by former members of the Borderline Coffeehouse that presented concerts at the Green Meadow Waldorf School in Chestnut Ridge, NY during the late 80’s and early 90’s. It was an outstanding concert series that is surely missed. I wish them great success with this series and I would like to congratulate Sol & Fay Zeller, Steve Shapiro, Anne Crone, Maria Minchalla, Al Favoritio for putting on such a wonderful afternoon of music. We need more people like them to help perpetuate this kind of music. House concerts are becoming a way of survival for artists – and they represent an opportunity for artists to reach new audiences. Their next concert will be on Sudany August 12 when they present Jed Marum who will share his wealth of Irish and Civil War songs.

I thank them for inviting me to emcee and to share in such an enjoyable afternoon of music.