It's A Pleasure to Know You: My First Chautauqua, Part I

Photo credits: Me, Stephen Bent, Gillen Martin, Jon Crandell, Phina Pipia, Scarlett Trippsmith and assorted web finds since my phone was dead. Poster by Fiona Worcester. 

The Tour

The IAREmobile in Sandpoint, ID

“REASONS WHY I am going to take my car and drive over to Chautauqua this summer: 

Because I am sick of war, strikes and labor unrest. I want to hear, to discuss, to decide how to act… I want to get out of the rut. 

As in running my car, so in running my life, I do not want to get stuck on the road because of ”low clearance.”  I want to take in the relaxation that refresh and refine and inspire me to fuller speed ahead. 

Because I want the sociability of it all – old neighbors to chat with, new friends to shake hands with – human things of human interest that happen in humans’ lives to talk about.”

- 1922 advertising brochure for Circuit Chautauqua

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My route

Back in April, Paul Magid of the Flying Karamazov Brothers, one of my erstwhile theatrical collaborators, asked me if I was interested in doing Chautauqua this summer. The Ks were playing at Pepperdine that night. We were brunching in Santa Monica and taking turns cracking the waitress up, as always. I'd had a devastating month, having just lost my beloved 11-year old tuxedo cat, and was very much in need of a palate cleanser, a reset button - something that would get me out of my own head in a good way. Paul's knowing expression, and the testimony of good friends who'd done these summer tours convinced me this would indeed be a wonderful thing to do.

At first we thought I'd be doing a Fanny Brice thing... Eventually, the show became more about Chautauqua history, celebrating the late Faith Petric, who saw the original Chautauquas as a young girl in Orofino, ID. Paul asked me to write a number as a "singing suffragette" in 1920. Faith might have indeed seen one in her youth, as politics were often part of the show. I did some research at the Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center while in New York in June, and "Clara Tweaker" was born...

I knew this would be an adventure, and I love driving in the western United States... but I didn't know how truly moving an experience this would be.

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Sun 7/13 LA to Sacramento

I went from singing the last hymn at my church gig in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles directly to Albertson’s – grabbed a deli sandwich and some vitamin waters and headed directly onto the 5 North. Over the grapevine with the first of three audiobooks I got from the West LA library: NPR Driveway Stories. 

After a million trips up and down this boring-ass California corridor, all of the I-5 jokes I usually make with car companions have been transformed into big smiles – the Kettleman City Ein n Aus Burger, Cowalinga, Shafter, I hardly know 'er, Lerdo/Tardo/Yermo, etc. I pass the Gilroy cutoff with a heavy heart - no Garlic World for me this trip - and I zoom further north and east to Sacramento, grooving to Judith Owen's stunning, new Ebb and Flow album.

No pix from this leg, because.... why?

Mon 7/14 Sacramento, CA to Bend, OR

A quick coffee with my hosts, then the first of two conference calls with a New York theatre about a pending project... I scheduled these for early mornings not just because of the time difference, but because I don't know how good my Sprint service will be outside of actual cities on this trip! Afterwards, I find myself stalling over a lovely breakfast so as to delay having to get into the hot car…in which I will do the AC/non-AC tango all day since the terrain will be mountainous.  Shasta awaits!

The gorgeousness starts after about 90 minutes... but where the hell is Upper Shasta Lake?  Tabletop Drive is still gorgeous (lower lake), but the upper I-5 crossover is very, very not there. This is the California drought. I glance at the sides of the highway to see if a motel Alex and I stayed at a million years ago - in the snow - is still here and can't find it either.

Michael Moore's Here Comes Trouble is extremely amusing - my next audiobook. He's a tad too self-congratulatory at times in these short stories about his upbringing (which he reads), but very astute nonetheless. His loving portrait of Flint, Michigan in the 60s and how the politics of the era shaped his life is fascinating.

Hitting Klamath Falls on Oregon 97, I am immensely relieved to NOT have to deal with the yellow gnat-like bugs called midges that I know plague the huge lake here -  that will happen in August. As the gas attendant fills the tank (forgot what THAT's like, too - only in NJ and Oregon now), we talk about it. I remember being at a gas station just after sunset, futilely trying to wash off the millions of yellow/green corpses from the grill and lights of Alex's old Honda Civic during a Crater Lake excursion in the late 90s.

I alternate between Waze and Google maps for routing even though it's mainly long stretches. Which is new, since I am a map geek and actually have maps in the seat pocket... Between Upper Klamath Lake and Bend, 97 is absolutely magnificent. And I laugh, recalling the Crater Lake turnoffs in the snow, because it is damned hot right now.

A friend of a friend crapped out this morning on a Bend area crashpad, so I've pricelined a Quality Inn – which turns out to be a blessed icebox, and near a Target! The hotel's next to a scrubby wash in which I spot several stray cats among the volcanic grasses that are all over Eastern Oregon. "I would love to pet you," I think aloud, as the black one looks up at my window. Kitties always follow me. Do they know I am still grieving for my Sitka? Getting quite parched already on this trip, so I buy another bunch of vitamin waters at Target and toss them in the back.

Just before I nod off, the phone rings - and it's Lisa, of my Portland  family, the Sloans! A logistical near miss - they’re vacationing less than an hour away in Sisters. She just saw my FB posts. Gotta love the Internet! But now I have no time and am exhausted... ah well... I sleep very soundly in the near-freezing room....

Tue 7/15 Bend, OR to Sagle, ID - Into the Woods

After another conference call, I get an early start from Bend in order to make a 6pm dinner/7pm band rehearsal in Sandpoint, Idaho! (HA!). Route 97 is gorgeous, winding through volcanic vistas and high desert as Michael Moore talks about the Nixon election. After a breathtaking 3 hours or so, 97 North eventually spills onto I-84 at the epic Columbia Gorge. Memories of a long but stunning Portland to Spokane drive with The Bobs come flooding back as I pass up yet another chance to visit the mini-Stonehenge across the gorge in Maryhill, Washington. After miles of empty, I'm at a serious travelstop. I want ice cream, I get a Subway BMT (and eat ½ the bread). I will have to give up the whole low carb thing for chunks of time, I think...

A snort escapes as I pass the exit for Moses Lake in far Eastern Washington. The Bobs were slotted to play a city festival there sometime in the early 2000s, but were unceremoniously booted from the gig when a Moses Lake city council member trolling our website objected to a song on one of our 13 albums called "Hey Coach, Don't Call Me a Queer." (Which is, ironically, about tolerance.) Passing through Spokane, I think of the late Charles Schlesinger, local NPR DJ (Jazz with Chazz) who came to our holiday shows at the Triple Door in Seattle and subsequently helped us find a venue here. A great guy whose liver failed before he got a second transplant... RIP, Chazz. 

I pull into the first campsite in Sagle, ID, on Jerry and Becky Luther's land, and am immediately transported. The Luthers' house is full of stuffed animals and carefully crafted ducks and show puppets, which they perform with. The workshop where they build them is downstairs - Paul is using it as an office. The lawn and gardens are transformed into a mobile kitchen and meeting site. It's incredible, I add my camping chair to the mix, regretting I didn't bring our second one as I happily watch it become absorbed into the Chair Borg around the campfire site. I'm sad that several of my Seattle and Oregon Country Fair pals (Eben, Heather and Nancy) who usually do this tour aren’t here this year, but excited to meet a whole new tribe of amazing folks, who arrive in shifts from Seattle, Portland, Eugene, etc.

It is so great to see our band and choir leader, Young Stephen Bent (as I call him), with whom I last sang in New York, at Harry Shearer and Judith Owen's 2012 Holiday Show at City Winery. I'd put together a kind of faux Bobs quartet with original Rockapella bass Barry Carl, Blue Jupiter baritone Jonathan Minkoff and Stephen to sing the Beatles Chanukah parody I penned, 8 Days. This will be a little different! I'm also told there are no mosquitoes here. (This is a lie, but I am so hypmotized by the vibe, I kind of don't care...)

Stephen starts the first band rehearsal, on the Luther's huge front lawn

Wed 7/16 Sagle/Sandpoint

My new favorite stoopid pic,
with Young Stephen Bent

My first morning meeting (and probably the longest one of the tour) - everyone introduces themselves. Buckstops are assigned (who is responsible for what), the kitchen volunteer board is brought out, and the show committee is announced (Me, Stephen, Paul, my Port Townsend pal, "delusionist" Joey Pipia and sometime Karamazov/musician/promoter and Mud Bay Juggler Harry Levine, who I will come to know and love immensely). Paul’s first script is handed out, apparently the first real script in years after many summers of variety/vaudeville shows with emcees. I'm both happy to ad lib with Paul as one of the semi-scripted emcees AND happy to be back in one of his pun-filled extravanganzas of history and silliness. Rehearsals for basically everything go on all day, with costume consultations. NOW I get it! It's got the fun vibe and "hey, we're in the woods to have fun" sensibility of the Oregon Country Fair shows I did at Stage Left, but is MUCH quieter at night, and (blessedly) devoid of badge-wielding, path-blocking Nazis in tye-dye saying you can't access the back way through the woods to get to your own show because your "performer pass" doesn't allow it. (Did I say that or just think it? Hmmmmm.) These people are working together for one common cause. I sign up for four kitchen clean-up shifts and start learning my music.

Overheard at the vaudeville show committee meeting: "Which act's he gonna do?" "The glowing balls." "Oh yeah, that's good." I leave most of the decisions up to the guys since I am unfamiliar with most of these acts - I just met most of these performers and had no time to look at videos that were sent around in e-mails. But I will help with “Faith wrangling” - stage-managing all of the women who play Faith Petric at certain ages in the show - helping them get miked, making sure they know where to stand, etc. I also get to work with young Vivian, who plays Faith at age 9. She's nervous. I think I can help her. :)

The Vaudeville show finale

Stephen runs the band through the full arrangement of "Clara Tweaker's Battle Hymn." YES! I am really glad I lugged my craptastic keyboard up here and am happy to lug it from town to town. Bent has done a stellar job fleshing out the chart I gave him, and actually with ALL of the music - he's an incredible conductor/teacher. Aside from his juggling, singing, and songwriting talents. It's no surprise that he's so wonderfully funny, attentive and downright kind in these rehearsals. The choir (one of his additions this year), learns his “Amazing Grace” arrangement. He comments, “If you noticed that the choral parts for the second verse are the same as the choral parts for the first, you are correct. If you sang different notes in the second verse, you may wish to rethink your strategy.”

Stephen's also very excited about the "Anvil Chorus," which was done, anvil and all, in one of the original Chautauquas. John Cloud is pictured, below, diligently providing the Fisher Price version of the anvil slamming for rehearsals at the Luther compound.

Assorted pics from our Sagle rehearsals. (Clockwise from L: the horn section in the garage/rehearsal room, a evil costume, the kitchen crew prepping dinner, proof that I was at the rehearsal in the garage - the crazy kitteh notebook at bottom - Chautauquan dining, and John anvilling).

Thu 7/17 Sagle/Sandpoint

Clay Mazing rehearses "Shrapnel of Love"

Stephen and the band

More rehearsals at the Luther compound. The band has invaded the garage for maximization of shade. it's 15 degrees cooler here than in town (tall trees?) but the sun still packs a wallop.

I am drafted as a backup singer for the funky 70's tune "Car Wash.” Kym sings as Scramble juggles glow-in-the-dark balls!



Stephen, Daniel, Harry, Rod, Carey, Phina and Sophie Pipia (Joey's uber-talented daughters, who I last saw as teens when The Bobs played in Port Townsend, WA many years ago!) start work on the cool 8-part a cappella arrangement of Imogen Heap's "Hide and Seek" Stephen e-mailed us. His fiance Shannon will join later. It's really lovely. We're told that Ty is going to do a ridiculous and hysterical "interpretive dance" during our emo-somber singing. I look forward to seeing that!

I suggest we add all of the available women to sing the chorus of my suffragette song to involve more people in the show AND make it pack more of a wallup (it works!). Paul continues revising the script.

Tour graphic designer/flutist/uke player/singer Fiona and I have a driving adventure tracking down the flyers for the tour at the Ponderay (uh, yes, that's the Americanized version of Pend Oreille) Staples, we head over to the first community potluck of the tour. It's in the park along Lake Pend Oreille, just outside of the Bonner County Heritage Museum. Paul contributed material to their amazing exhibit on Chautauqua history.  


There's a teaser show... Friends from Seattle are there... and we hand out the flyers for the workshops and show as the crowd erupts in smiles. Scramble, the Three of Clubs jugglers, Drea-lusion and Joey Pipia perform, as does the marching band. We all buzz the museum and check out the exhibit.

Scrambled!

Three of Clubs

The view from the lobby of the museum

The view OF Daniel (stilt man)

Then, a choir rehearsal in the trees by the lake, with some singers from Sandpoint, who will join us in the show for Amazing Grace and the Anvil Chorus. Here's a video of what it's like to discover a rehearsal in the woods. Apologies for the pixellation!

Fri 7/18 Sagle/Sandpoint

Taking residents of the Sandpoint Assisted Living Facility
"Over the Rainbow" with Kym, Fiona and Somer Joe

The day I find out how an audience reacts when a marching band enters a care facility, or a supermarket... and how it feels to be part of that happy parade.

I head out to the first community shows of the tour at Evergreen Assisted Living and another care facility - this one with an aviary - in Sandpoint. Then we buzz two supermarkets. It's hysterical and amazing. I'm in the back of the parade, taking pix and handing out flyers to the most surprised, astonished and... sometimes dancing patrons, who can't wait to find out about the workshops and show. Seriously, this is OLD SCHOOL COOL..

Sandpoint selections (below): 

The band at a senior care facility we visited  -  What is a Vandeville Extravaganza?

Jerry and his ducks, escorted by Ty  -  Chloe, Josh, Skip and Clara are mesmerized by the aviary

Nate is the Squid Bass  -  Do not feed the band!

 

Rio ensnared  -  The ducks: Billy, Milly, Silly and... Sheriff John

Clay Mazing serenading an unsuspecting lady at a care facility... they always melted!

Pom and Kathy

I met Robin years ago at the Oregon Country Fair. She's one of the producers of Trash Fashion, a show featuring amazing clothing made from recyclable materials. We decide to take a lovely walk downhill from the Luther's land to a nearby beach on Lake Pend Oreille. It's gorgeous despite the eerie haze from fires burning in the Cascades and Eastern Washington. Ty takes a long dip in the lake, and his partner Carey comes down to rehearse her aerial act once he secures her trapeze from a nearby tree. It's all gorgeous. We head back uphill and I reach into my pocket to get my phone to take a picture screen of the wall of tall green in front of us and..... my phone cracks irreversibly when it tumbles onto an asphalt country road . I yell "FUCK!" very loudly, in the middle of Idaho. The touch-screen action is destroyed, and it's also locked, and I'm in the middle of Idaho, soon bound for the middle of western Montana. So whereas I have no service anyway... Damn all of you people for making me get a smartphone that I ended up USING and particularly loving for its camera/videos/etc.!


After I finish kicking myself, I plan to get a burner phone tomorrow at WalMart, forward my calls to it and not deal with this until I get back to Los Angeles in 10 days. Alex says I'll be just like Omar on The Wire. Except in my case, no one was harmed. LIFE'S RICH PAGEANT!

Sat 7/19 Sandpoint, ID

After the Marching Band parade lured them to our entertaining trap, Emcee Joey Pipia welcomed
the crowd at the Sandpoint Beach to our teaser show

Faeries did not magically restore my phone's screen overnight, but nonetheless I have the power to act in a way not entirely unlike a fairy today...

Today, I marched and danced through downtown Sandpoint, Idaho in a parade of jugglers, amazing cirque de soleil -like puppets, acrobats, clown-like persons (not "clowns" in the scary sense but astounding physical comedians), and The Fighting Instruments of Karma Marching Chamber Band/Orchestra. I am here to tell you, it was magical. In this era of screen-obsessed detachment and debatable digital "connection," this was really moving. And I don't just mean "moving down the street with a police escort." Among the many locals who joined us, a woman dressed in rainbows who couldn't contain her excitement grabbed my sunblock-drenched arm said, "I have ALWAYS wanted to do this!" The look on people's faces was something I will never forget. The unabashed joy... it made me well up...and would continue to do so the whole time.

Chautauqua offers free community workshops, too - for peeps aged 4-104. In Sandpoint, they were held in Farmin Park (where the, uh, Farmin Market is). During the tour, they included Acrobatics, Clowining, Drums and percussion, Face Balancing (?), "Everything is a Puppet," The History of the Chautauqua Movement (lecture by Paul Magid), Hula Hooping, Instrument Making, Juggling, Life Behind Barbed Wire (Joannie Murayama's presentation about her mother's experiences in a Japanese internment camp in WWII), Loving Your Watershed: Keeping your Lymphatic System Moving (Kym Trippsmith), Mask Making, Slacklining, Soft Shoe/Tap Dancing, Song Swap and Ukelele. The parade ended at the park, and the workshops began. I peeked into the lectures, held at a nearby coffee shop, and lingered at the park after snarfing one of the best bratwursts of my life from a food truck.

Our first show of the tour, at the historic Panida Theater...packed and full of wonderful. The line clear around the block made me really happy for all of the people in the show who don't normally do this - the kids, the non-performers. And what a way to kick this off.  My singing suffragette, Clara Tweaker was a big hit (pic by bandleader Stephen Bent). All of the kids did great. And the audience went nuts. Truly a great first Chatauqua show.


We sing one of Faith Petric's anthems as the finale, altogether. I heard Faith do "It's a Pleasure to Know You" at Stage Left at the Oregon Country Fair, where I first met the Karamazovs. I thought it was a nice tune and that's about it. Looking around onstage, I realize how truly unique this experience is - the song is about Chautauqua now - all of the incredible people on tour and in the towns. 

It's a pleasure to know you, a pleasure to see you smile/A comfort to know we'll share the road awhile/ Pleasure is fleeting, and comforts are far between/It's a pleasure to know you, and the comfort you bring.

I only wish I had my freakin' phone so I coulda taken pictures! None of the pix from this point on are mine. They are all stolen!  LOL... 

Sun 7/20/14 Sandpoint, ID to Libby, MT

An OOOH/AAAH drive w/Annie and Chloe – I am glad to share the experience with these two great gals from Arcata and they are glad to be in a private vehicle for awhile. The Green Bird and the Shiner Van, "official" tour vehicles are fun to ride in with a gang of goofballs - but for town to town excursions, this is likely a more comfortable deal. We yak about Northern California - Arcata is one of my favorite places. The Bobs played at Humboldt State in my last years with them, Alex and I have a huge history with the Samoa Cookhouse... but that's a blog in itself. And I have the first of many popcorns - $0.79 for a giant, fresh-popped bag at all of these gas stations! What the?!?!


We get to Libby before anyone else on a foggy day, and buzz the Pizza Hut. I am only interested in the internet at McDonald’s. Glad I still have a laptop since I still have to do editing work and maintain contact with the outside world.

People start showing up later, and we help unload the truck. The promoter has secured the huge Libby Memorial Hall building for the campsite. Part of a school complex, it has a huge real kitchen and... bathrooms! Tents go up on the huge lawn as the sun lingers long past 8pm, making an incredible backdrop for the Libby community potluck at sunset. It's breathtaking, and long as we are so far north - incredibly close to Canada. I lug the keyboard out and play along in a mini-jam as the food's set up. The local high school music teacher is here - she's bringing some students to sing in the choir. How cool is that?

Mon 7/21/14    Libby

Poor sleep – it was too hot - but the day awaits... 

At at the morning meeting, two women from the Center for Asbestos Related Disease come to talk to us about Libby, a Superfund cleanup site  once dubbed "The town left to die," by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. There is no danger now - the asbestos has mostly been removed, and you have to be exposed long-term to be affected. The town lost 15% of its population in the ensuing years, and many, many people who did not die from related poisonings are affected with chronic conditions that continue to surface, since this kind of poisoning can be dormant for decades. The PBS documentary, Libby, Montana tells the town's heartbreaking story, summed up by one of the directors here: "Libby is a hardworking, blue-collar community that personifies the American Dream, but the story we had to tell was about the dream gone horribly wrong. Industrialists, politicians, workers and ordinary citizens all play a role in this American tragedy."  It is our goal to bring some much-needed cheer and escape to these people, who welcome us with open arms.




We do community shows at the Libby Care Home and Log Cabin Building, followed by parades through the Ace Hardware and Rosauer’s Grocery. It's still pretty great.... why do I tear up each time? Alex and I once went to an event at a bookstore in Santa Monica where there were life-size Wild Things from the Maurice Sendak books. He and I have several kinds of these monsters at home. We were the only adults at the event who came without children (a normal occurrence for us). When the creatures appeared, I started crying and couldn't figure out why. It just made me happy.  This is kind of like that.

Tue 7/22/14     Libby

GREAT sleep – I figured out the best fan placement, so it was FINALLY nice and cool. Breakfast at 9. I'm signing up for a ton of breakfast cleanup shifts because I really like hearing people talk about the day ahead as we clean up, and it's not that hot out. People are excited to begin the day. Although eventually my hands will feel like they're falling off because there are no dishwashing gloves, I kind of don't care. : )


I do laundry at Moody’s, a place on the main drag as the skies open up, and it takes too long, so I miss the downtown parade - during which easy-ups are employed! Attendance isn't great, obviously, but we are undeterred. The market and hardware store parades were really effective. All workshops are moved inside Memorial Hall. Paul and the show committee meet to figure out notes and I help with teching onstage and sound stuff. Walking through the gym, I see Scramble’s glow-in-the-dark juggle balls plugged in, charging in a wall outlet. Now, THAT would be a funny picture... grrr

Time to do the show!

Paul and Harry and I wonder if we should tell folks who don’t do theatre to expect “second show syndrome.” We don’t do it. And the show is great! Much more packed than expected - the store parades paid off. And the Anvil bangers in the Anvil Chorus rise from below the stage on a scissor lift...  Ha!  It was Ty and Carey's last show, so there will be some show committee meeting and reshuffling.  They have to get back to Seattle for a gig. Hey, that'll be me on July 30... Chautauqua is an all-volunteer effort, and we do all have to make "a living."

We have a mini-jam session onstage, after the show and I head back to my host's quiet neighborhood lost in thought about this town. I'm only blocks from the river, which I think they said is still unsafe.  I haven't asked Jolene about her house or her friends or the tragedy at all. Tonight, I have to hope we brought Libby some major joy. Days later, someone posts to the Chautauqua's FB page:

From a member of the Kootenai Heritage Council in Libby, MT:

Wow, what a great show and what a way to reach a community that is in need. We felt a sense of community that lacks so greatly in our area. People are coming up to us and thanking us for having you perform. Wanting to know when you will be back and missing you already. We have racked out brains to try to bring something to this community that would generate the warmth and appreciation that you achieved. I can not even express what it meant to me to watch my grand daughter give a solid standing ovation to the juggling act through their entire performance. She was elated. I had an elderly lady grab my arm at the end of the show and state "I am so happy I don't want to leave and I don't want them to go"!
Thank you for this wonderful event and hopefully we can have more.
Bravo!!!!

CONTINUE THE TOUR WITH ME IN EUREKA, MT AND HOT SPRINGS, MT... HERE