A very pleasant day

This morning, I'm having coffee, and reading about the winter storm stretching across the northern states from one end of the country to the other. Cold, snow, ice, and wind nearly as far as the eye can see. However, here in Southern Oregon, yesterday I spent all day outside working the property, where it was 65 degrees, sunny with bright blue skies, and a nice gentle breeze. I contemplated the total situation, and it didn't take me long to decide that I had...by far...the better end of the deal. While at times I have struggled with the move from Montana to Oregon, when I see pictures of those nasty storms that were so common, it makes the idea of being here much more palatable. There are a great many things I miss about Montana, but winter isn't one of them. 

The Music Bachs

For the last 30 years music has been a big part of our lives. I'm not talking about just listening, I'm talking about playing and producing. My wife and I got into bluegrass music in the mid 90s, and we've been going strong with that ever since. We began with listening, then moved to playing, and eventually that led to producing. My wife plays a rock solid stand up bass, and sings beautifully, while I play guitar, banjo, mandolin, harmonica and sing. We've been in a couple bluegrass band in the past, but for the last several years we've performed as a duet. In 2021 we began volunteering at a living history museum in Nevada City, Montana. The program centered around the years 1863-1865, and during the summer we would dress in period clothing, and we'd play 1860s music for the museum guests. The lady who ran the program called us "The Music Bachs": we liked the name and adopted it as our continuing stage name. 

For the museum gig we had to learn civil war era songs. My main instrument had always been the mandolin, but that didn't really fit in, so I switch the the banjo and played it the frailing style. I'll do a separate post on the museum at some point, but for today I'd like to post some videos/recordings of us. The recordings are professional quality, while the live videos are simply videos from museum attendees. Additionally I'll see if I can dredge up a video or two of our music from past bands.

Here's some songs we recorded in the studio last fall.

The Old Cane Press

We'll Fight for Uncle Sam

Nellie Bly

Cindy, Cindy

Here's a couple live videos from the museum

The Ship That Never Returned

Battle Hymn of the Republic

And finally a couple from past bands

Molly Rose (Whistlestop Band)

All Aboard (Klamath River Ramblers)

Wow, it's been a very long time since I've been here on "Blogspot", or is it "Blogger" these days? Doesn't matter really I guess. This is the first place I ever really did any kind of online journal type posting, and quite frankly, it's the place I enjoyed most of all. Here, I met a lot of really good folks, most of which are no longer around. I think the instant gratification aspect of Facebook ruined the more intimate climate of blogs, and that's a crying shame. Some of the folks I used to follow, like Sarge Charlie, no longer walk the earth, most simply gave up on this platform, but there's still a few around. Maybe I'll spend some more time in this neck of the woods, and walk through the forest a bit to see who's hanging out in the trees. 

It's odd that by simply coming here it feels like I stepped back in time to when things were much simpler. I just wish that the folks I used to hang out with here were still around. I did truly enjoy my interactions with them. In some cases change is the preferred option, but that isn't the case this time, at least not for me. 

Well, that's enough for "day 1", so I think I'll do a bit of exploring. See you soon.  

Goodbye Facebook

I have been on Facebook for at least a dozen years. I’ve met a lot of good people there in that time frame, but last night I made my last post on my page. In the past couple of years the entirety of Facebook has gone in the toilet and it’s become a giant political shit show. Now days FB is nothing but a place for people to make and post 2 sentence hate blurbs and then walk away laughing. It seems to me it’s nothing but a platform designed to push you in whatever direction its’ owners want you to go. I no longer get any enjoyment when I read it, I just get pissed off, so I decided to do something about it and leave it to all the keyboard warriors and they can do with it whatever they want. There’s a couple of non-political groups I’ll still check out, but as for my OWN page…the end.

We’re very close to being done with the building of our house in Montana. Good, because I’m sick of that project. All along the way folks have said how we’d look back and say it was all worth it. Nope, not for me it hasn’t. At this point I just consider it to have taken a year of my life. In all honesty I’d rather have gone fishing and the sooner we get this thing done the better. Just like the mighty Casey, there is no joy in Mudville.

So, what does the future hold? Well, I have no idea but I do know things have got to change or I’m going to melt into a blob of goo. That being the case I’ll just start hanging out and posting here, just like in the “good old days” before FB even existed.

Talk to you soon.

 

After 3 1/2 weeks of non-stop moving I'm back to blogging. You can check out the new post here:

http://turningthepagesoflife.com/