Cathy & Marcy's Blog

July 17 & 18 we will celebrate the 4th Annual Old Time Banjo Festival in the greater Washington, DC. area. During the festival concerts and workshops, we will take time to remember our friend MIKE SEEGER. It’s no exaggeration that without Mike’s music collecting, documenting, teaching, recording & performing, the world’s interest in old time music, and banjo history and styles in particular, would be a lot smaller. Marcy has composed a new tune, “Rockbridge”, dedicated to Mike. Many songs and tunes will be performed in his honor. Read more about Mike Seeger on his website.

Mike was enthusiastic about “next generations” who embraced old time music from both traditional and innovative points of view. Two young players on this year’s festival are perfect examples. FRANK FAIRFIELD makes his first Washington, DC appearance. Hear him play “Nine Pound Hammer” like an old timer from the past on youtube.

ADAM HURT’s‘s elegantly innovative clawhammer style has made him a young star in today’s old time music scene. He’s won just about every significant contest, but more importantly brings a style all his own that still beautifully embraces the tradition.

TONY TRISCHKA’s contributions to banjo from minstrel sounds through contemporary bluegrass styles have influenced thousands of players from Bela Fleck to Steve Martin. His new TONY TRISCHKA SCHOOL OF BANJO continues the thread of exploring and teaching.

CHEICK HAMALA DIABATE plays the ngoni from his home country of Mali along with the banjo and guitar. A beautiful singer, composer and griot, his music will mesmerize.

What are Cathy & Marcy up to banjo-wise?
Cello Banjo, Tenor Banjo, Five String Banjo, Melody Banjo- we love them all and are practicing some new tunes/songs as well as our parts for the BIG BANJO ORCHESTRA, which will include TONY, CATHY, MARCY ADAM & hopefully even a BANJO BASS from the late 1800′s restored by Kevin Enoch.
Here’s a fun youtube video of Cathy & Marcy in BANJOLAND for all ages.

Join the BANJOFEST fun:
July 17
Old Time Banjo Contest- 11am @ Takoma Park, MD Gazebo
Contest and mini-concert free to audience. Winner gets a Kevin Enoch TRADESMAN Banjo. Sign up in advance or at the Gazebo at 11am.
Birchmere Music Hall @ 7:30pm- full concert
July 18: WORKSHOPS @ House of Musical Traditions with Tony, Adam, Cathy & Marcy
More info on the whole festival at www.oldtimebanjofestival.com

We hang with lots of musicians and music lovers. Here’s a friend you GOTTA know, (unless of course, you already know him!).
Robbie Schaefer has become a wonderful voice in family music – on the radio (Sirius XM’s Kids Place Live), on stage, on recording and now, through a new effort called OneVoice, linking US schools to schools abroad in music.
Catch him live at Wolf Trap Theater in the Woods July 6-10, or check his schedule at
www.robbieschaefer.com

Robbie also took the time to jam with us in the XM Parking lot! Watch the video clip at the end of the interview.

C&M – ROBBIE, YOU ARE PART OF A FABULOUS BAND, EDDIE FROM OHIO. GREAT SONGS, HARMONIES AND SPIRIT. YOUR SOLO WORK HAS FOCUSED MORE ON FAMILY MUSIC. CAN YOU TALK ABOUT ADDING THAT DIMENSION TO YOUR MUSICAL WORK?

Robbie- Hi Cathy and Marcy. I fell into family music a bit by “accident” (and there are no accidents). I had been teaching music once a week at my son’s preschool when Julie Wells, the lead singer in Eddie From Ohio, was diagnosed with breast cancer. All of a sudden, our winter tour was canceled, our future was uncertain, and I found myself wondering what I’d be when I grew up. I decided that it would be as good a time as any to try to record a children’s CD. I did, and that eventually led me to an on-air gig at Kids Place Live. I found that I really loved making and sharing music for and with families and kids. There’s a purity to it for me. It is so often less about performance and more about communication–sharing music and stories. For me it ends up being more about the essence of the thing. I still very much enjoy playing with EFO and performing my own “grown-up” solo material, but with music for kids and families there’s a lightness of being that comes with playing music at such an essential level that I’m really drawn to. By the way, Julie is fully recovered and doing well these days.

C&M – WHAT GAVE YOU THE IDEA FOR OneVoice AND WHAT EXACTLY ARE THE GOALS?

Robbie-OneVoice came about in June of 2009. I was sitting with Kenny Curtis, my boss at Sirius XM and he was saying, “so where do you want to move creatively with your show in the next year?”. Great question, right? And I told him I didn’t know for sure but I felt that as a channel that reaches anywhere from 500,000 to a million listeners per week, we had an incredible amount of power, and with that power an incredible responsibility to do more than just entertain. I wasn’t sure how to do that, but I had long wanted to play music with kids in Africa, having seen my friend (and fabulous musician) Samite do just that. Samite is from Uganda but has lived in the U.S. for about 25 years or so. He goes back and plays for kids in refugee camps and orphanages every now and then. Anyway, Kenny practically leapt out of his chair and said, “that’s what we should do–we should send you to Africa!”. I was shell-shocked. I mean, Sirius XM is a big corporation, but they don’t just send a kids’ DJ to Africa because he feels like it. The short of it is that within the next two weeks or so, a more specific idea revealed itself: to help to create and cultivate peace and cultural awareness through musical sister-school relationships between kids abroad and kids here in the U.S. Kind of like musical pen pals whose “conversation” would then be broadcast to our audience.

Talk about fun and energizing–this just lit me up! We still didn’t know how we’d do it, where we’d go, or where the money would come from, but you know, all that is really needed is to set your own intention and the rest will come. Sure enough, within a couple of weeks, I was headed to Uganda to visit with the Brain Tree school. I went with a freelance videographer, Tom Hommeyer, whom I had never met, and who donated his time and talents. It was, of course, an unforgettable experience. Upon returning I knew that I needed to continue this kind of work. It’s what I’m here for. And yet, I couldn’t expect Sirius XM to keep sending me all over the world. So, since then I’ve been working to create OneVoice as it’s own organization to support this work in the future.

PLEASE TELL US ABOUT 1 OR 2 OF YOUR EXPERIENCES IN UGANDA THAT HAVE INSPIRED YOU TO MAKE THE COMMITMENT TO CREATING AN ORGANIZATION THAT WILL SUPPORT THIS WORK.

Two that stand out are “The Avocado Tree” and “The Security Guard”. I’ll start with the latter. While at Brain Tree, I would gather separately with each class of kids in an unfinished schoolroom. The room had open squares in the walls for windows, a concrete floor, and not much else. The kids would come and sing their hearts out. But as each class would sing, other children would wander over from their classrooms or from the library and peek in the windows–even if their class had just been singing with me minutes earlier! They couldn’t help but be drawn to the music–in Uganda music is a very communal thing. Anyway, as at most schools over there, there was a gate and an armed security guard who, as you might imagine, never smiles and whose job is to look as imposing as possible. It’s quite noticeable since everyone else in Uganda seems to smile all the time. On my last day there I was teaching the kids “Do, Re, Mi” from The Sound of Music. They had never heard this music and were just loving it. We were going over it again and again so we could perform it for Muzzei Mukasa (who founded the school with his wife Agnes) when, out of the corner of my eye I saw the security guard, leaning in one of the open windows, mouthing the words to the song–learning Do, Re, Mi–with such intent and interest. It was so beautiful to see this tough imposing man inexorably drawn to the music. I think that’s when I realized that this music is for everyone. I know this is so trite, but the language is truly universal, not just across countries and cultures, but across generations.

Ok. Second story. I think it’s best told from the blog I wrote while I was there. This is at the end of our last day at Brain Tree . . . . They called us to the front of the school at about 5pm. The kids were all gathered and there were two holes in the ground and two baby avocado trees. To be planted in our names (mine and Tom the cameraman). Knock me over with a feather. I placed mine in the ground and filled it with dirt and watered it. The whole school was singing and cheering. They do this thing in Swahili where they rub their hands together and say “asanti asan to you” (or something like that) and clap six times. It’s their way of giving thanks to you. When they say “to you”, you are supposed to put out your hands with your palms up and bring them to your heart to receive the thanks. We did this over and over. And then we said goodbye to the kids. I choked up so many times I lost count. Some gave us colored pictures, some letters. I stood there not talking. Not even a little. There is so much to learn about living. Just as we, in the U.S., are certainly rich in ways that most Ugandans are not, they are rich in so many ways that we are not. This was not hospitality, it was love. Ugandans seem to live close to the essence of life, and while that can include violence and chaos rarely seen in our country, it also reveals itself in an outpouring of love–for people, the earth, and yes, music–that is equally rare. I think that if I can bring the richness of what I experienced and learned in Uganda to children literally halfway across the world in North America–and vice versa–then that’s a meaningful day’s work.

HOW CAN KIDS AND FAMILIES HERE GET INVOLVED, BOTH ON THEIR OWN, AND IN SUPPORT OF OneVoice?

Good question because I very much feel that this is and will be a collective creation. The more people investing their energy, the better. That said, since OneVoice, as an official organization, is still developing, the best thing to do would be to sign up on my mailing list (www.robbieschaefer.com) and I’ll keep everyone up to date on the shape of things. In the meantime, I say, SHARE MUSIC. Sing with your family, begin learning an instrument, make up a song in the car–do whatever you can to bring more music into your community and the world.

THANKS TO ROBBIE SCHAEFER for his music and inspiration. CATCH HIM THIS SUMMER LIVE, ON HIS RADIO SHOW, “ROBBIE SCHAEFER’S BANDWAGON” ON KIDS PLACE LIVE–SIRIUS XM CHANNEL 116, OR ON RECORDING. LET’S MAKE OUR WORLD BIGGER AND SMALLER AT THE SAME TIME!
Here we are having a lunchtime jam at XM’s parking lot.

BLACK BANJO GATHERING-April 24-26
As banjo players, banjo lovers and banjo-aholics, we attended the Black Banjo Gathering Reunion in Boone, NC. Five years ago, a large handful of banjo players and folklorists gathered to explore, discuss and and discover mutual interest in the early African roots of the banjo. The Carolina Chocolate Drops, now a major label touring group, met each other there and decided to start a band. We really enjoyed visiting with them and with Greg Adams, David Holt and a slew of cool new friends, young and old. We hope there may be annual gatherings in the future.

AND THEN-off to California. One of the highlights was a trip to the NATIONAL STEEL GUITAR COMPANY. Marcy met Don from National at the NAMM convention while she wowed the crowd at the Martin Guitar booth player “Little Ginger”, a vintage mahagony tenor (4 string). Don invited us to the National headquarters and we spent an energizing day playing EVERYTHING from steel ukes to steel mandolins and all kinds of guitars. She came home with a prototype steel tenor guitar-it’ll go back to National eventually with her ideas on setup. It was so cool to tour the factory and see how the instruments are made-bending the steel, creating the cones, building necks, fancy inlay and engraving. We loved every minute of it and gave the staff a concert on the instruments they made.

We threw in a photo of Cathy’s Songwriting Class at the Writers Center in Bethesda, MD with special guest for the last class, Tom Paxton. The students were inspiring and we look forward to another series of classes in the fall.

And, if you made it this far,we spent a day in Palm Springs, CA, where we experienced the earthquake on Easter Sunday. 7.2 shook the houses, made the water in the pool splash, swung the chandelier, and luckily, did no more local damage than a big scare. We know how lucky we are and if you are still active in helping out victims of the devastating quake in Haiti, CLICK HERE

Out with the old, in with the new. But how did we spend 2009? It’s amazingly difficult to choose 1 highlight per month but it beats writing a whole book, so here we go:

JANUARY: We performed at the Smithsonian’s American Indian Museum the day before Obama’s inauguration in a pre-inaugural multi-cultural party.
Marcy produced a CD by Kellie Allen & Pete Peterson

FEBRUARY- At the GRAMMY Awards we announced about 20 awards, handed the GRAMMY to 2 friends (Bill Harley and Art Rosenbaum) and Cathy had her photo taken with Paul McCartney, REALLY.

MARCH- We launch the Brownie Troop of Kensington, MD Ukulele Orchestra

APRIL- BANJO TO BEATBOX plays Philly kids fest and CD is released on our SongShop™ label

MAY- Can’t do just 1. Birchmere Mother’s Day show with Deborah Tannen (NY Times Best selling author), Peggy Seeger & the dynamic duo AND
While in Maui for business (ha, ha, ha) we meet the HULA HONEYS, jam for days on end with them and vow to produce their next CD
Film JUBILATION MUSIC VIDEO
JUNE- Perform tribute to ELLA JENKINS at Smithsonian Folklife Festival’s Ralph Rinzler Memorial Concert

JULY- gotta do 4
*Old time Banjo Festival at the Birchmere includes Cathy & Marcy, Bruce Molsky, Mike Seeger, Adam Hurt, The Old 78′s- Mike’s last Washington DC performance
*Ukulele Festival- James Hill, Victoria Vox, Cathy, Marcy, local friends & 3 uke orchestras-WOW
*Wolf Trap Theater in the Woods w/ Chris Bacon & BANJO TO BEATBOX
*Kennedy Center Millenium Stage w/ James Hill & Adam Hurt

AUGUST- Clifftop Appalachian String Band Festival gives a chance to chill & play old time music with friends from all over the country. BUT, we lost good friend and old time music torch bearer Mike Seeger to cancer.

September- Record 2 DVD’s (Meet the Instruments) and a CD (Michele Valeri’s “Little Ditties for Itty Bitties”) for our SONGSHOP™ label. February releases.

October- Favorite show was the Tribute to Utah Phillips celebrating the 2 CD set, “Singing Through The Hard Times” honoring his music & raising $ for the homeless shelter he helped build.

NOVEMBER- The dynamic duo sold 110 ukuleles to pre-school teachers at the National Association for the Education of Young Children Conference in Washington DC, plus plenty of C&M CD’s & DVD’s, but most importantly, loved hanging out with pre-school teachers and teaching ukulele at our booth. 2 chords makes you ready to sing 100 songs! 3 chords=500+ songs

DECEMBER- gotta mention a few
*BANJO TO BEATBOX becomes our 14th consecutive GRAMMY nominated CD, for Best Musical Recording for Children
*24th Annual Winter Family concert including Scottish fiddle virtuoso Bonnie Rideout and the Rockville High School Bagpipe Band. Some families bring 3 generations of Cathy & Marcy fans
*Then a memorial & music party in honor of Mike Seeger
Then- Marcy’s mom has major surgery and lives to tell the tale
Then- 17th Annual Gingerbread House decorating party
Then- Xmas party at rehap center for Marcy’s mom with musical friends
Then- Xmas dinner & music party
Then- Hank Williams Tribute nights at the Birchmere Music Hall & Court Square Theater (Harrisonburg, VA)
Then- HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Someplace in there we also contributed to the National Geographic’s new Documentary on the Appalchian Trail on dulcimer, banjo, guitar and mandolin. Cathy got a new bike in trade for banjo lessons. Marcy collected a few tenor guitars and we each rescued some special instruments from gloom and doom on ebay and elsewhere. Cathy became more active with the Washington Area Women’s Foundation and Marcy built up the Girls with Guitars and Ukulele Social Network social websites. There’s always more, but now that it’s 2010, we’ve got new work & projects to get to.

Here’s to a year of CHANGE, HEALTH CARE FOR ALL AT AFFORDABLE PRICES, GOOD HEALTH, SONGS, PEACE, HAPPINESS, PEACE and ever expanding hat collections. Keep your sense of humor-you’re gonna need it. Get up and do something and it’ll get done!
Cathy & Marcy

Today’s Hats
Dust Collector, Human Snow Plow, Bookkeeper, Philosopher, Mosaic Artist, Buddy, Shipping Clerk, Secretary, Label Manager, Artist Rep., Grammy Winner, Banjo Player, Pro Bono Advisor, Satirist, Content Creator, Dishwasher, Songwriter, Activist, God-Mother, Aunt, Chameleon

Cathy & Marcy’s HEARTSTRINGS program is a way for us to help you find the musical instrument of your dreams within your budget and to inspire you to give the gift of music to a child who doesn’t otherwise have the opportunity.GUITARS NOT GUNS of the National Capital Area Area is a local nonprofit whose mission is to inspire at-risk and underprivileged youth to succeed by providing them music education opportunities through the use of volunteers and partnerships in our community. They help instill in these youth the confidence and character necessary for them to grow into productive members of society and responsible adults. The program provides free guitar lessons with the belief that the art of music connects the child to higher life goals and ambition. Students are loaned a guitar to use for the beginner’s class; once they complete the class they are awarded that guitar; it is theirs to keep. Read HERE.

Our goal is to raise at least $2500 for GUITARS NOT GUNS this holiday season. By setting the example of us giving our time to you, we hope you will donate some of your $ to this wonderful program. The process is quick and simple.

First: Make a tax deductible contribution of $25 or more to Guitars Not Guns by going to their web site www.gngnca.org – and clicking on the “Donate Now” button in the upper right corner of any page. Specify the amount you want to give and in the “Dedication” section, write:“HEARTSTRINGS”.
Second: You will receive a Thank You from Guitars Not Guns that includes a request form for you to fill out.
Third: Complete the request form and e-mail it to us at info@cathymarcy.com
Fourth: You’ll hear back from us within a few days. We will suggest up to 3 instruments within your budget as well as recommendations of convenient, friendly and reasonably priced places to buy online or near you, depending on where you live.

Then: as you make more music in your life, you’ll enjoy it more knowing that you helped provide that same opportunity to a deserving kid in the metropolitan Washington D.C. area.

We will be helping people find electric & acoustic guitars, banjos of all kinds, ukuleles, mandolins, whistles and folk flutes, dulcimers and more.

We teach Marcy’s song, “SHARING” in sign language. The sign for “sharing” shows that you give some away and you take some for yourself. Click on song to LISTEN.
The song is from the CD, “CHANGING CHANNELS“.
SHARING

PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD. The program will run from November 1- December 20, 2009

It is hard to say goodbye to a friend. In our lives Mike began as a musical icon and hero, a master musician whose recordings we listened to over and over. We studied, emulated, learned songs and instrumental techniques. We followed the path of the traditional musicians he recorded and toured with. We listened to and learned from them. That was Mike’s mission, to keep the old music alive and to enjoy it’s continued breadth and breath.

In the past ten or so years, our casual friendship through folk festivals and jam sessions became a deeper one. Longer visits, longer talks, more music. Mike introduced Marcy to the cello banjo of the 1910′s and it was a life-changer. He enjoyed hearing her take the old instrument to new places that honor tradition and stretch it as far as it will go. He gave credibility to our Old Time Banjo Festival with brilliant performances, all the while, listening to and appreciating every note and song played by the other musicians.

Mike passed peacefully on August 7 after living with lymphoma for 8 years. He had time to say beautiful goodbyes to family and friends and he used it well. His influence in traditional and popular music is immeasurable from artists such as Bob Dylan to Ry Cooder to the Grateful Dead. We can’t even name the thousands of old time musicians and stringbands that are in his debt, crediting much of  their musical passion to him.  Mike was humble-a regular guy, and an incredible tree with branches of “True Vine” as he titled one of his recordings.

Mike wants us all to carry on-keep real music alive, let it grow and let it enrich our lives. And so we will. To Mike we say thank you and goodbye. To you, we recommend some wonderful listening.

Especially For Kids and Families:
AMERICAN FOLKSONGS FOR CHILDREN- Mike & Peggy Seeger, 3 CD set of delightful songs compiled in book of same name by their mother, Ruth Crawford Seeger
ANIMAL FOLKSONGS FOR CHILDREN- All 4 siblings- Mike, Peggy, Penny & Barbara

For Old Time Music Lovers
SOUTHERN BANJO SOUNDS – an amazing solo CD of diverse old time banjo music
EARLY SOUTHERN GUITAR SOUNDS – an amazing CD of diverse old time guitar music
And, if you have a good sense of humor, have a listen to RETROGRASS with Mike, David Grisman and John Hartford.

A full discography is available at www.mikeseeger.info
A wonderful tribute can be heard by Mike’s friend, Paul Brown, on NPR at: http://ow.ly/jrA0

Mike performs DARLIN COREY ON YOUTUBE: http://ow.ly/jtHu

There’s tons more reading and listening you can do with a simple google search.

Are we movie stars? Not yet, but we have taken the adventure of making our first official “music video” of the song “JUBILATION” from the new BANJO TO BEATBOX EP. Hard to say if we are the stars or if our puppets are the stars. OK, so how’d it happen? Read on!

When we decided to make a music video it began with the planning stage. Our first goal was that every aspect would be fun and that all the people working together would enjoy it. So we started with planning and brought together a great team of people of various ages and skills. Brad Tehaan was a film student that Cathy met in a film editing class. At 22 he is the brightest and best and we fully expect him to be making major movies in the future. We hope he includes us.

Ingrid Crepeau makes puppets that equal the genius of Jim Henson (we don’t take this compliment lightly) and she was excited about making puppets of Cathy, Marcy, Chris and Trevor, our recording engineer. She took photos of each of us and even looked at what clothing we would wear in the video shoot. Then Ingrid disappeared to her puppet making workshop.

Meantime, we created a script following each line in the song, and Brad turned it into a storyboard so that he’d know every camera shot that he needed to cover. We decided to make some of it look like live concert and to shoot some of it on green screen. Our friend Michelle Valeri would create Photoshop backgrounds so whatever we shot on green screen would have a location that could tickle the imagination. We all had a lot to learn and everyone was up for the experiments.

Cathy & Marcy assembled all of the props which included scuba gear, beach ball, clock, glow sticks, fun sunglasses, toy piano, beach hats, lounge chair, raincoat, windup toys, confetti, and more.

During the 2 day video shoot we had puppeteers ranging in age from 11 to 63. We also had a six year old apprentice, an expert at toy trains. The song JUBILATION played constantly as we performed and filmed each scene. Ingrid created shadow puppets for the audience and we started by filming the shadow puppets on the green screen. Then we filmed performance scenes, and then we went through every scene Brad had listed and more that we made up on the spot. The goal was that during the show each of us would meet our puppet with surprise and glee and by the end everyone would be singing JUBILATION. It was a giant team effort that included plenty of jokes, laughter and after hearing the song JUBILATION 1000 times, new rhymes and verses!

Once the filming was done Brad had the job of assembling all of the footage, editing, syncing the music to the film, creating animation, incorporating Photoshop pictures, and even learning about new animation techniques with one of our puppeteers, Barry Gordimer. It took about four week’s of Brad’s free time to pull the video together. He showed it to us every once in a while and we would get to comment and make suggestions.

The JUBILATION MUSIC VIDEO was a jubilant and fun process that brought together friends who love being goofy, creative, artistic and joyful together. When were done, after 100 hours of work between everyone involved (which does not include the making of the puppets) you’ve got almost 5 minutes to look at. We may not be movie stars, but we hope every time you watch it will tickle your funnybone, encourage you to sing-along and enjoy the fun for the sake of fun.

Comment on this blog to let us know your thoughts. Should we star in another movie?

For more on Chrisstylez Bacon visit www.Christylez.com

For more on Ingrid & Michelle’s puppet and song magic visit www.dinorock.com

And for all things Cathy & Marcy you know where to go www.CathyMarcy.com

FOR LYRICS & LINER NOTES TO THE BANJO TO BEATBOX CD TO HERE:

TO ORDER YOUR OWN DIGITAL OR CD COPY OF THE BANJO TO BEATBOX CD,GO HERE

Upcoming shows with Cathy, Marcy & Christylez Bacon:

June 27: Smithsonian Folklife Festival with ELLA JENKNS

July 22-25: Wolf Trap 11:15am

August 15: Blackrock Center for the Arts, Germantown, MD 7:30pm

August 16: Philadelphia Folk Festival

See CALENDAR for more date info.

Thanks for being here!