{"id":4412,"date":"2018-02-26T21:58:06","date_gmt":"2018-02-27T03:58:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stevetibbetts.com\/?p=4412"},"modified":"2022-06-11T20:43:47","modified_gmt":"2022-06-12T01:43:47","slug":"press-page-for-life-of","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevetibbetts.com\/press-page-for-life-of\/","title":{"rendered":"Life Of–Press page"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n
Dave Ray was a big influence, not so much because of his legendary guitar chops or his storied career in music, but because he kept the rent on my studio low. Dave Ray was my landlord. He died in 2002. A street close to my studio has been renamed Dave Ray Avenue.\u00a0 I think St. Paul itself should be renamed “Dave Ray.”<\/p>\r\n
<\/a><\/p>\r\n Because Dave kept my rent low I could waste time with impunity.<\/p>\r\n davesnakerray.com\/mantra\/<\/a><\/p>\r\n Once I pulled up to my studio in a hurry and parked at an obtuse angle and Dave, who was parked next to me, left this note on my dashboard before he pulled out of the parking lot. It was my girlfriend’s car, so he didn’t know it was my “park job.”<\/p>\r\n <\/a><\/p>\r\n Chuck Brown, my CPA, was also a big influence. Chuck taught me how to manage my money so I could work part time. That way I could spend hours waiting for musical plots to reveal themselves (see “musical plots,” below).<\/p>\r\n Pete Seeger was a big influence because of a record he made called “The Folksinger’s Guitar Guide<\/a>.” His voice was soothing, like Mr. Rogers’ voice. He was my vinyl companion. I played the record over and over and practiced along. Vinyl Pete was very patient.\u00a0 Pete would help you get tuned up and show you something called the “church lick.” Once my dad shouted from the kitchen, “Can you play something else please?”<\/p>\r\n Then my dad brought home a Kingston Trio album and I let go of Pete Seeger and gave myself over to the almighty E minor chord that starts “Greenback Dollar<\/a>.”<\/p>\r\n We had the uncensored version in our Madison house, making us untamed, wild, and free, in our own suburban way. Radio played the censored<\/a> version.<\/p>\r\n After some time the focus turned to album photos: the front cover of “Electric Warrior,” the back cover of “Johnny Winter And Live.” I didn’t listen to the music on those albums that much. I just wanted to be one of those guys<\/a>.\u00a0 I wanted to have an album on the front racks Victor Music in the Hilldale mall that had a cover as cool as Electric Warrior<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n My dad worked for the University of Wisconsin School for Workers. He drove around the state teaching labor law. When he’d break out his 12-string at a meeting of fatigued Boot and Shoe Union workers in Steven’s Point everyone would perk up. Guitar is an attention-getting device.\u00a0 Everyone would sing from the Joe Hill songbook, or whatever passed for an AFL songbook. (My dad considered himself an IWW<\/a> guy, not exactly a Wobbly, definitely not a CIO man. He said, “It was a sad day in 1955 when the AFL hyphenated itself to the CIO.”)<\/p>\r\n My dad helped organizers and union workers network by inviting them over to our house. 20 people would come over, eat, and then break out an assortment of instruments: guitars, banjos, flutes, recorders, autoharps, psalteries. Everyone smoked. I could stand up slowly and move through gradated layers of smoke.<\/p>\r\n <\/a><\/p>\r\n In 2013 I met a French clown in a caf\u00e9 in Lhasa. I was in a restaurant called “Tashi 2<\/a>” when I heard a voice switching effortlessly between French, English, and Tibetan. Marion was a juggler, translator, and one of three westerners with a permit to live in Lhasa. She’d already summited Everest, the trip financed by a French bank (Milestone Capital). The bank wanted a photo of its logo at the highest point<\/a> in the world.<\/p>\r\n In 2014 Marion and I and a small group took a bus from Kathmandu to Lambagar and walked north to Lapchi, over very challenging terrain. After a hard day trekking I asked Namgyal, our guide, if we would ever hike high enough to leave the leeches behind. He said, “Yes, tomorrow. Tomorrow we go higher and leave the black leeches behind.” He paused. “But then we walk through the yellow leech area, higher up. They drop from the trees.”<\/p>\r\n Marion chimed in, “Yes, sorry, monsoon is not the best season for this, but it was the only time we all had free.”<\/p>\r\n <\/a><\/p>\r\n After arriving in Lapchi my more energetic traveling companions took a day to climb to remote retreat caves. I spent that day wandering around the lower part of the mountain. I’d brought recordings of loops and beds of sound, thinking that if I walked in the spectacular landscape and listened without much agenda that sounds could be encouraged to assemble themselves.<\/p>\r\n When I played around with the music back in St. Paul the images returned: here is a crevasse in Lapchi, here is a stupa.<\/p>\r\n We walked back to Lambagar and then east, to Bedung. We bivouacked in the village of Na<\/a>. From there we made two higher camps and failed to make a technical ascent of Mt. Ramdung<\/a>.<\/p>\r\nWobblies<\/h4>\r\n
Some Background<\/h3>\r\n
Walking and Assembling Sound<\/h4>\r\n