From: owner-lucy-list-digest@smoe.org (lucy-list-digest) To: lucy-list-digest@smoe.org Subject: lucy-list-digest V6 #78 Reply-To: lucy-list@smoe.org Sender: owner-lucy-list-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-lucy-list-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk lucy-list-digest Saturday, April 10 2004 Volume 06 : Number 078 In this issue: [lucy-list] literary Lucy [lucy-list] MA and CT shows ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 9 Apr 2004 20:08:04 -0400 From: Benay Bubar Subject: [lucy-list] literary Lucy Well, first of all, I can emphatically state that Lucy was NOT on today's All Things Considered on NPR. There was a story on an Easter hat shop, which was neat...and a whole lot on Iraq, which was not neat...but no Lucy at all. So maybe next week---and next week could be a busy radio-broadcast week for Lucy in that the Mountain Stage she recorded in February is finally going to air. It won't be on until next Friday here in NY, but other places might broadcast it earlier...perhaps as soon as tomorrow, if I'm interpreting the scheduling right. Meanwhile, I finally got a chance to look up Walt Whitman's "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry." Lucy has been introducing Brooklyn Train at shows as partially inspired by Walt Whitman's "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry," and the fact that she's been throwing the Whitman reference in there at the end of the intro every time intrigued me because it's not a common Lucy-like thing to do. I mean, Lucy and Rick probably are well read---in the Q & A on her website, Lucy gives an impressive little list of her favorite books, all well-regarded classics (and hence books _I_ haven't read, busy as I always am reading books about stuff like professional Scrabble competitions!). But as a fan of her music, one just doesn't necessarily assume, "Oh, Lucy Kaplansky! Direct literary allusions galore!" So I was interested in this "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry" mention. Though I was once an English major, I hadn't read that poem in years---it's here if anybody else wants to read it: http://www.vasudevaserver.com/home/sites/poetseers.org/html/ earlyamericans/walt_whitman/index/crossing_brooklyn_ferry One CAN see how it relates to Brooklyn Train and why Lucy mentions it...though Lucy and Rick sure didn't simply steal the poem from Whitman, put it to music, and change the vehicle from a boat to a train! For Brooklyn Train to be REALLY like Walt Whitman's poem, it would need to be about a 20-minute song (the poem goes on for ages) and they'd probably have had to throw Dad's Alphabet Song right in the middle of it, since Whitman, after starting off all happy about being connected to everybody past and present, puts this whole MAJOR stanza about evil smack in the middle of his poem and lists all this awful character-based stuff that connects him to others as well before things get all calm and happy again and he's back to really liking boats and New York and especially boats IN New York. (At least that's my little Cliffs Notes version of the poem...yes, it was my reverent and nuanced analysis of the poetry that made me a standout in my college class on Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson...yes, I DID probably give my professors nightmares...how they ever allowed me to graduate with half my major being in English remains slightly beyond me.) Honestly, I really did get what "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry" was saying, though, just as I got what Brooklyn Train was saying...or at least I got what the poem and the song were saying to ME, which is the most I can really claim. And I was glad to have been inspired, however quirkily, to actually read the poem again. Hey, is anybody from the list seeing Lucy in Bryn Athyn, PA tonight? Guess we'll find out later...or not. Benay ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 9 Apr 2004 22:48:58 -0400 From: "Doug Fuller" Subject: [lucy-list] MA and CT shows Has anyone been to either Club Helsinki in Great Barrington, MA or the Pilgrim Covenant Church in Granby, CT? I'm considering catching one of Lucy's shows at one of these venues and if anyone has feedback that might help me decide. Both are within stricking distance for me but I can probably only fit in one. Thanks, Doug Fuller Boston ------------------------------ End of lucy-list-digest V6 #78 ****************************** This has been a posting from the Lucy Kaplansky mail list digest To unsubscribe send mail to Majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe lucy-list-digest" in the body of the message