Foliasmusic Travels

The Mothers, Founders and the One

2009-03-18T12:44:00.008-05:00

From 2009 Ski UP Best Of

So its been a long hard Michigan winter...but it has been great for introspection! This last January I experienced some uncanny events that all linked together a kind of life philosophy for me about music and community.

In early January, Andrew and I were sitting at the bar at the best brewery in the country, Founders, when a Mothers of Invention song came on. We both started to nod our heads and have a conversation about The Mothers when the guy next to us (a twenty-something guy I never would have assumed knew anything about The Mothers, let alone think we had anything in common with) started to tell us a story about what he was doing the first time he ever heard The Mothers song "More Trouble Everyday" that was playing. I asked him if he knew "Live at the Filmore East" and he said that was his first Mothers album.

The next song "Concentration Moon" came on; we all sang along.

When Andrew and I were walking home, we talked about how crazy it was that we met some random guy at Founders that knew a lot about The Mothers and about Zappa. It makes sense to meet someone like that at Founders, but it is so rare that people our age are educated about The Mothers and Zappa. Then, we realized that there are so few places in the country period where you can drink fantastic beer, listen to The Mothers (in public) and actually run into someone who sings along.

A similar experience about how we are all connected happened a week later at the Week for Prayer and Christian Unity service that I played and sang for at St. Andrews. Rev Robert Schiesler from St. Mark's told a story in his sermon about helping a young homeless guy who came to his office one day while he was working on him sermon to ask for help. Schiesler explained that his initial response was one of annoyance (this was an interruption to his regular sermon writing routine), but realized that he was hungry and decided to take the young guy across the street to McDonald's for lunch.

The two ended up having a lively and unexpected conversation about life and faith. When they parted their ways Schiesler offered to buy the guy a dinner for the road. (The young guy was hitchhiking to make it to some friends in Chicago who could help him.) The young man explained that he had already stowed half of his hamburger for dinner that night and that was all he needed to get by. Bewildered, Schiesler dropped the young man off by the side of the road and then went back to the church to try to finish his sermon. Schiesler said all he could do was just sit there and cry.

Schiesler ended his story by explaining how we are all one, despite who we think we might connect with, or who is like us or not, we generally have more in common with one another than we think. He also explained that while the institution of the church can be good for setting structure and boundaries, the church is not alive. It is really only the people that matter, they are the ones that are alive and help us to remember that we are all one.

Compost, CSA, Raw Milk, and a Vineyard

2008-12-01T15:28:00.004-05:00

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

We had four huge successes this year for our health and for the well being of everyone in the world.

First, I built a compost pile in the backyard! I got angry one day at how much vegetable waste I was putting yet again in the garbage.

So, I walked over to the local ACE Hardware and bought chicken wire. I came home, not really knowing what I was doing as a first time compost pile designer, and made a circular enclosure with the wire. Voila, we have the beginnings of good dirt and a light garbage can.

The other two best things we did for us and the earth this year was to purchase a Community Supported Agriculture share from Goundswell Farm (pictured above, that is us playing for the farm potluck) and a 1/20th of a cow share for raw milk from Lubber's farm. To anyone who has never done a food share these two things don't mean much. But, for us it is just the beginning of understanding more about where our food comes from, who our neighbors are, and how much better food tastes and sustains us that is grown locally.

This year we also planted a vineyard in our backyard! Seval Blanc, a hybrid white wine grape variety that was developed to grow in northern climates. It was a good test of our marriage putting the vines and the trellis in this year!

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

Madison Milonga with the Band

2008-10-05T15:24:00.008-05:00

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

The first weekend in October we traveled with an entourage of friends to Madison, WI to play and sing for the Madison Tango Society's monthly milonga. Me, Andy, and Avik played with Gabriela Contreras and Daniel Castro who traded off singing with us. Sung Yi was our official roadie.

The milonga had a great energy and was well attended! Madison has been one of the strongest supporters of our tango group, and we always enjoy playing for their enthusiastic milongas.

Afterwards, we hung out with the tango bums. I got to try my first "car bomb" at the Irish Pub at the coercion of Avik and Gabriela who also (not for the first time) had car bombs.

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

On the drive home, Andy and I were super excited to pick up some local beer (New Glarus Rocks!) and seven different local raw milk cheeses, including Pleasant Ridge Reserve!

Isle Royale CD Release Concert

2008-08-24T14:48:00.001-05:00

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

We took a quick journey back to Isle Royale in late August. We stayed with our friends Pat and Liz who hosted us on Mott Island. We were a bit spoiled, eating fabulous food and tasty beverages brought over on the boat, but we figured we needed the rest after the long journey to Kansas City and back just the weekend before.

We spent our week on Isle Royale practicing and composing a little bit, and then gave a concert on Friday August 22. As usual, the concert was well attended and it was a beautiful warm night.

The only difficulty of the whole trip was the bumpy, sea-sick ride home on the Ranger III. We rode 6-9 foot waves all the way to Houghton (about a 7 hour boat ride...) THEN, we drove 9 hours home to make it back for our Sunday morning church gig. Just another 16 hour travel day...and I used to think that I wanted to be a full time touring musician...

Below is my attempt to catch one of the ferocious Lake Superior waves from the side of the boat.

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

Ann Arbor Community Milongas

2008-08-16T15:09:00.001-05:00

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

In July and August we played for community milongas in Ann Arbor. Both were outdoors in a beautiful setting on campus. We had a lot of fun jamming with a larger group, with Marco on guitar and Gabriela who sang with us. Making music outside is where its at!

Performance at the National Flute Convention

2008-08-11T12:40:00.002-05:00

In August we performed with Tess and Scott for the National Flute Convention in Kansas City, MO!

Our program was taken from our Latin Dance Project and included all original pieces and arrangements including a new piece by Scott called Tango Fantasy and stuff from our Maufo Vega CD.

It was a hell of a drive! We rented a van and drove down 12 hours on Wednesday and back 12 hours on Sunday!! Thankfully we stayed with our friends Stephanie and Eric who live out in Lawrence, KS. They cooked us fabulous food and took care of us with lots of tasty beverages while we rehearsed during the day and made trips back and forth to downtown KC.

Our performance was well received. I would say about 150 people attended and many of the friends from the West Michigan Flute Orchestra (who also performed on Saturday of the convention) where there to support us.

Northern Michigan Concerts

2008-07-31T11:15:00.003-05:00

The last weekend in July we played two concerts in northern Michigan on three different great lakes!

Our first concert was at a coffee shop and book store called Falling Rock Cafe in Munising, MI on the Lake Superior shoreline. We were pleasantly surprised with the well attended audience and the enthusiastic and informed response! We featured our new works from Waterway, and many of the folks were engaged with the music and had a lot to say to us afterwards about how the music affected them (every musician's dream right?)

Check out the video of us playing Gauntlet of Death:

We played a concert the next night with our friends Scott Harding and Tess Miller at St. Anne's Church on Mackinac Island. We featured Waterway in the first half of the concert and then works from our Latin Dance Project in preparation for our August performance at the National Flute Convention.

Check out the photo below. Now there is something you don't see everyday. Our Mackinac Island Roadie...on a bike.

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

She's Finally Here-Waterway

2008-07-22T14:38:00.005-05:00

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

After writing the first drafts in 2003, then touring in 2004-2006, and finally recording in 2007, we were able to self produce our own music on a new CD called Waterway.

It has been an incredible process of developing this music, most of which is about Lake Superior and all of which is about important waterways. We have worn many hats along the way: composers, editors, practicers (hey I think that is a new word), performers, and listeners. Andy and I have learned so much from putting ourselves in the position of having to believe in our own musical ideas, a scary process, but worth it.

You can read all about our new CD on a lovely little website I put together: WaterwayCD.com

Composing on the Appalachain Trail

2008-07-03T10:56:00.004-05:00

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

Andrew and I took our much needed nature time in June to clear our minds and get to work writing some music!

We spent a week hiking the 70 miles of the Appalachian trail that snake up and down through Smokey Mountain National Park. Our time in the smokies provided some much needed strenuous exercise and open space for brain flow. It was also a very social time as we spent every night eating and sleeping with different people in the community hiker shelters.

After the smokies we drove north and spent two days tasting wine in the Monticello wine region of Virgina before hiking into a rustic cabin in Shenandoah National Park where we stayed for a week.

We cooked a ton of good food, drank delicious wine (Barboursville Vineyards! got to check them out), hiked another 70 miles of day hikes, and slept in about 85 degree moist heat :(

We wrote music and practiced in the mornings. Andy ended up drafting a whole piece for his bell choir at Bethlehem Lutheran Church called Liberation, a three movement work inspired by the book of Job. I drafted a piece for two flutes, guitar, and percussion based on Ravel's piano work Gaspard de la nuit. Even with the heat, we didn't want to come home.

CD Recording at CMU

2008-05-23T13:54:00.004-05:00

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

Our friend Scott Harding wrote a successful grant to pay for a CD of our Latin Dance music to be recorded and released on the White Pine label at Central Michigan University!

We recorded in mid-May in a fabulous hall at Central Michigan University. We all learned how the recording process really brings out the polish in the music and makes subsequent performances seem a lot easier. We will play this music again on Mackinac Island and at the National Flute Convention in August!

Our sound engineer, Scott Burgess, was a hoot to work with and really made the whole process go by smoothly.

Albuquerque Anniversary Tango Fest

2008-03-10T09:30:00.004-05:00

From 2008-2009 Blog Photos

We had a fabulous spring break in New Mexico playing and teaching for the 10th Anniversary Tango Festival for the Tango Club of Albuquerque. Avik Basu joined me and Andy for the two festival milongas, making for a little trio band reunion. Yelena and Avik taught most of the classes on Friday and Saturday, while Andy and I gave two musicality based workshops for dancers, one on dancing to the off beat in tango and one on dancing to different beat structures in vals.

Luckily the weather was awesome, even for the backpacking trip that we took down in the Gila Wilderness after the festival was over. The only jam we had was during our hiking on one of the north facing slopes at the end of our hike. It was literally covered in ice...and after walking ten miles and meeting this steep slope, we really had to keep from crashing. I think our total fall count on the ice was at least ten times between all of us.

Thanks to William Gruner for the sweet shot of us playing for the Friday milonga, and for the ABQ tango club's support of live music!

Down With the OPP

2008-01-07T16:13:00.000-05:00

Over Christmas break Andrew and I went skiing in northern Ontario with our violinist friend Debbie. The trip was supposed to be a time for us to relax, get some exercise and have a chance to write some music!

We went to a great little provincial park called Silent Lake for a few days. They snowmobiled us into a yurt that by the end of our stay we called home. We spent our days skiing (where it snowed about 6 inches a day!!) and spent the evenings in our hot, 95 degree yurt making food and generating ideas for two new pieces.

Andrew began a draft of music for Holy Week, a ten minute Maundy Thursday piece for flute, guitar, and piano. I studied the score to "Ondine" the first movement of Maurice Ravel's solo piano masterpiece Gaspard de la nuit. I wanted to write a piece for flute and guitar based on structure and harmonic elements in "Ondine". Andrew and I had spent that fall listening to some awesome interpretations of Gaspard de la nuit : Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Angela Hewitt, and Raph Votapek.

After our Yurt stay we drove further north in Ontario to a town named Temagami and went to a place called Smoothwater, a eco-resort and recreation area owned byCaryn Colman and Francis Boyes.

We skied to two different rustic cabins out in the wilderness and covered around 20 kilometers in deep snow (again snowing no less than 6 inches a day), slushy lakes, with old growth red and white pine, spruce, cedar, and maple guiding shaping our path.

On the first night we were awakened by the sound of two snowmobiles at 3:15am! We were all worried instantly, especially since there were no snowmobiles allowed in the wilderness area. We heard loud male voices and swearing as the two machines tried to make it across the slushy lake snow packed lake where our cabin sat.

About thirty minutes later, we hear the snowmobiles approach the cabin again and then a knock at the door. Debbie and I stayed in our sleeping bags and Andrew nervously unzipped his sleeping bag.

After the knock we heard a man say, "this is the OPP, please open the door"

I have never been so thankful to hear someone say "please". Although, it took me a minute to figure out that OPP meant Ontario Provincial Police.

It turned out that the police were looking for a woman who was "lost out in the bush" and they wanted to know if they could bring her back to our cabin if they found her in the area. Soon after we heard the sound of a helicopter and it flew around our area for about 45 minutes.

We heard when we returned to the lodge that she was found about two lakes over on another person's property. While sking an expert run she lost track of time and when she tried to find her way back had got turned around. Luckily that night she found a fisherman's hut that she propped herself up against to wait out the cold.

The next night we thought of her in our cozy little cabin as we worked on our music and ate curry flavored popcorn that we made on the wood stove.

Wood Stove Popped Curry Popcorn

1/4 cup canola oil
1/2 cup popcorn
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon curry powder

1. put the oil in a camp pot with one kernel of popcorn in it and place on the stove
2. when the kernel pops the oil is ready
3. put the rest of the kernels in the oil and cover pot with a lid
4. using a pan grabber, move the pan on the surface of the stove in a counter-clockwise circle (this keeps the heat distributed evenly and ensures the kernels from burning)
5. Once there is more than three seconds between pops take the pan off the heat and let sit for 1 minutes until the kernels have stopped popping.
6. sprinkle with the salt and curry powder and toss to coat

YUMMY!

Water Water Everywhere

2007-08-11T15:42:00.000-05:00

And many drops to drink...

The daily comparison for maximum water usage in the Dassler Cabin on Isle Royale versus our home in Grand Rapids:

Drinking and Cooking
Home: 2 gallons
Dassler Cabin: 2 gallons

Washing Dishes
Home: 5 gallons (filled wash tub to wash, faucet running to rinse)
Dassler Cabin: 1 gallon (wash tub, rinse tub)

Bathing
Home: 30 gallons (two 10 min showers)
Dassler Cabin: 3 gallons (2.5 gallon solar bag, .5 gallon sponge bath for Andy)

Toilet Use
Home: 20 gallons (2 gallon tank flushed 5 times a day for 2 people)
Dassler Cabin: 0

Laundry
Home: 40 gallons (Maytag top loader)
Dassler Cabin: 10 gallons (2, 5 gallon buckets, one for rinsing, one for washing)

General Cleaning
Home: 1 gallon (washing hands, rinsing the sponge after doing dishes, brushing teeth etc.)
Dassler Cabin: 0

MiscelaneousHome: 1 gallon (watering the plants outside with the hose, car washing etc.)
Dassler Cabin: 0

Daily Total:
Home: 99 gallons per day
Dassler Cabin: 16 gallons per day

Life is different without a faucet and a running tap.

Concert 3 On Isle Royale

2007-08-10T16:06:00.000-05:00

A Program of Original Music Inspired by Lake Superior

High Tide, Andrew Bergeron
Walkabout Sparrow, Andrew Bergeron and Carmen Maret
Alpha's Last Dance, Carmen Maret (premier)
Waves and Waterfalls from Lake Superior Suite, Andrew Bergeron
Gauntlet of Death, Carmen Maret (premier)
Fog Break, Andrew Bergeron (premier)
Nineteen Knots, Carmen Maret (premier)
Fall, Winter, Spring, and Summer from Lake Superior Suite, Carmen Maret and Andrew Bergeron

Wildlife Sightings on Isle Royale

2007-08-10T14:43:00.000-05:00

western painted turtle (at hidden lake)
garter snake (all around)
bats (lots every night, especially around the bench, one flew in the house with me and we had to shew him out)
snowshoe hare
red squirrel
red fox (Scoville point resident)
river otters (Tobin Harbor visitors)
moose (6, all along Tobin Harbor)
loons galore (they nest in the harbor)
horned grebe
double crested cormorant
great blue heron (on Dick and Mary's Island)
wood duck
lesser scaup
goldeneye
mergansers
bald eagles (2, one adult perched in Tobin, one yearling on passage island)
merlin (passage island)
spotted sandpiper (seen from the canoe, on Tobin Harbor shore)
herring gulls
black capped chickadee (by Dassler)
red-breasted nuthatch (by Dassler)
winter wren
cedar waxwings (everywhere by Dassler, look up)
shrike (Rock Harbor spotting)
black and white warbler (by Dassler)
yellow-rumped warbler (by Dassler)
white-throated sparrow (can be heard everywhere along lake superior it seems)
song sparrow (all over)

Anniversary on Passage Island

2007-08-09T14:31:00.000-05:00

Today is me and Andrew's 4th year anniversary. We practiced till 3:00pm, then Pat Valencia, a musician and former park service employee friend took us out to passage island, a spooky but really wild place about 3 1/2 miles off the northeast shore of Isle Royale. Pat calls it "the real wilderness of Isle Royale."

Korena, another ranger friend on Isle Royale and botany expert told me she was jealous we got to go out there. She said the diversity it has for such a small island is amazing, something like 700 different species of plants.

We saw wild sundews for the first time, a carnivorous plant with sticky pads about the size of my index fingernail. We also saw lots of Canada yew and ash, "moose candy" that has almost vanished from the Isle Royale mainland.

We also saw a young bald eagle perched on a tree in the harbor on the south side of the Island.

Our last full day is tomorrow. We have internalized such a peaceful, relaxed and receptive way of being that it is hard to imagine our mental and physical states before arriving and of course our response when we return home.

Canada Yew

Sundew, carnivorous plant

Discovering Birds

2007-08-08T14:22:00.000-05:00

When I first arrived at the cabin, walking to the outhouse (about the length of a small city block) was a drudge that seemed to take too long. But, over the last weeks it has turned out to be one of my favorite activities.

I have learned to watch birds. I never go to the outhouse now without binoculars and my camera. Today I got a great photo of a cedar waxwing in the top dead branches of an ash growing along the shore.

I also watch for changes: water, boats, skyline, wind speed and direction, animals (including people).

I think the birds have warmed up to me over time. I notice they kind of loom around now, where it seems in the beginning they always quickly flew away. Maybe I walk and look slower now too.

Last Few Projects

2007-08-06T14:14:00.000-05:00

We finished our composition projects today. Andrew wrote a final hand copy of his piece "Fog Break". He swore a lot today, surely a sign of the intense process of copying music with a permanent pen. He said he used the leftover brownie that Dick gave us to keep him going. Andy would take a small bite of it after successfully writing each line of music.

I finished a poem and piece of music about the wolves based on a story in Rolf Peterson's book "The Wolves of Isle Royale" that tells a story of the Alpha Female in the East Pack that saved the wolf population on Isle Royale from extinction.

Concert 2 on Isle Royale

2007-08-02T15:59:00.000-05:00

Title: "Bach on the Water Part II"

Even more people came this time! 80 or more. So rewarding to have an attentive and packed audience to play for.

Prelude in A minor, J.S. Bach
Fall: Grape Stomp, from Lake Superior Suite, by Andrew Bergeron

Prelude in E minor, J.S. Bach
Walkabout Sparrow, Andrew Bergeron and Carmen Maret

Prelude in G major, J.S. Bach
High Tide, Andrew Bergeron

El Decameron Negro (The Black Ship), Leo Brouwer

Prelude in D minor, J.S. Bach
Footprints in the Snow from Preludes, Claude Debussy

Prelude in B minor, J.S. Bach
Silueta Portena, tango

Prelude in F# major, J.S. Bach
Waves and Waterfalls from Lake Superior Suite, by Andrew Bergeron

Wilderness Composing

2007-08-01T13:54:00.000-05:00

We worked hard again today. I am getting a neck ache from writing so much music by hand. It is a good thing we take a lot of breaks out in our wilderness backyard.

Andrew was like a mad scientist today scheming up a flute and guitar piece about our previous fog experience. He is writing it in 11/8 and wants to do a 3+3+3+2 division of the beats. He was out at the inspirational bench for about an hour thumping the side of it with his hand and then came in with a gleam in his eye.

I finished a draft of my solo piccolo piece called "Nineteen Knots" and started a piece about wolves called "Alpha's Last Dance."

The birds distracted and excited us today. I kept grabbing for the binoculars. Cedar waxwings, yellow-rumped warblers and black-throated warblers were all outside the dining table window where Andrew and I strew all of our papers, pencils and erasures.

After dinner Andrew came running in for the binoculars, "a cormorant is fishing just off the bench" he said quickly. Sure enough we saw him catch a fish too. (Cormorants, we later found out from talking to folks in Tobin Harbor, were actually a problem for a while because they were draining the fisheries in the small harbor areas around the island).

We walked the small loop around Scoville Point and I saw a shrike on a big spruce near the split. I heard it and then quickly spotted him in the binoculars, big body and hooked beak.

Dick and Mary Scheibe, our new caretakers for the end of our stay came over to the cabin, Mary calling a loud "whoo-hooo" before she was close to the cabin. Mary has been coming to the island since he was three. Mary and Dick are the official folks who drive the artists around, make sure they have everything they need, and show them a good time.

Other than Dick and Mary, we had no other human contact all day.

Rumbles of thunder over the lake tonight. Maybe we will receive a little cooling blessing tonight. It has been in the upper 80s. Bad for moose, who don't feel feel even the slightest bit cold until 25 degrees BELOW zero, and start to over heat about 56 degrees ABOVE zero!

Concert 1 on Isle Royale

2007-07-29T15:50:00.000-05:00

Chuck Volunteers to be Stage Manager

Our concerts took place in a little auditorium in Rock Harbor. It seats about 80. We were a little worried about who would show up for our first concert, but we ended up packing the place standing room only.

We decided to theme the first concert by calling it "Bach on the Water" which combined our own music about water with Bach works from the Well Tempered Clavier that Andrew transcribed for flute and guitar. It was an idea that we have had for a year, and we finally had a good environment to try it out. It worked well, the Bach pieces were like a short warm up for us and for the audience's ears before each of our own pieces.

Here was our program:

Prelude in D minor, J.S. Bach
Calm to Storm, from Lake Superior Suite, Andrew Bergeron

Prelude in E minor, J.S. Bach
Walkabout Sparrow, Carmen Maret and Andrew Bergeron (premier, written first five days of residency)

Prelude in A minor, J.S. Bach
The Night from Toward the Sea, Toru Takemitsu

Prelude in A minor (book II), J.S. Bach
Bachiana Brasileiras , Heitor Villa-Lobos

El Decameron Negro (The Black Ship), Leo Brouwer

Prelude in B minor, J.S. Bach
Silueta Portena, tango

Prelude in G major, J.S. Bach
Summer: Wedding Dance from Lake Superior Suite, Carmen Maret

The Inspirational Bench

2007-07-28T15:19:00.000-05:00

Bench by Morning

Bench by Day

Bench by Night

There is a wonderful bench just outside the cabin that offers views of the sunset, the water, Passage Island, and Tobin Harbor. Here is a poem that one of the rangers Paul handed me as we walked off the boat at the end of our trip. This is about the "old" bench before it was renovated.

The Bench

At the tip of Tobin Harbor
Perched high upon the rock
there's a weathered wooden bench
where artists like to flock
it's part of the Dassler cabin
a palace in this place
this land of Isle Royale
by Superior's ever changing face
the view from there is princely
majestic to say the least
from a little bench so humble
inspirations never cease
you have to be kind of careful
not to sit on some rusty old nail heads
if you sit right in the middle
you'll be comfortable instead
if you open up your senses
nature is everywhere
from a seagull flying by
to mare's tails up in the air
sounds of lapping waves
rushing against the shore
little biting black flies
nip at your feet and more
a part of me would like to fix it
spruce up that old beaten bench
yet, it's perfect just as it is
just like a white bearded old gent
I only worry that someday
someone not thin could fall through
in the mean time I know it'll continue
giving inspiration so true

Foxy Omen

2007-07-28T13:47:00.000-05:00

I slept in today--9am
Finally a clear, bright sunny day
Lake talk = "fair"
We worked on composing till 3:00pm
Revised drafts
Andrew finished a flute and guitar version of high tide

We practiced a few hours for our concert

Canoed to Duncan bay portage
the wind in our favor on the way back

Delectable dinner: cabin rice and beans with raw milk cheddar cheese and avocado tomato salad, all slathered in lime juice

We got into an argument on our nightly walk out on Scoville
as the moon rose

Always about music
what it means to us
what it means to other people
how to communicate in public about music

A fox popped out
walking the trail as we were
came right at us
the other direction, toward Rock Harbor

I made a "shooing" motion
Fox sat down, middle of the trail
biting his back legs--so skinny

Andy whispered, "I think he wants to pass"

We stepped off the trail a few feet
He got up
skipped past
down the rocky trail

What were we arguing about?

Moose Bones

2007-07-27T13:37:00.000-05:00

Today Chuck and Connie took us to meet Rolf and Candy Peterson, "the wolf people". Rolf started studying wolves on Isle Royale in 1958 while still a graduate student and next year is the 50th anniversary of the same study, the longest predator prey study in the world!

How to describe the Peterson's cabin?

LOTS OF MOOSE BONES!
Collecting moose bones is one of the main ways the Peterson's assess the health and interactions of the moose and consequently the wolves on Isle Royale. During our nice little picnic along the shore by their cabin, we were surrounded by 50 years worth of bones. Candy Peterson showed me the kinds of things they look for in the bones such as osteoporosis, and arthritis. Moose teeth also grow like trees, with visible rings, so Rolf Peterson takes out the front teeth from the jaw bones of the moose, grinds them down, and can then tell how old they were when they died. When the Peterson's started collecting bones back in the 1970s, the Peterson's did the dirty work themselves, walking off the trails throughout the island just waiting for the bones to appear. (Imagine in winter too, where Rolf went seven weeks at a time, carrying frozen moose bones across the island in below zero temperatures!) Now they have a wonderful system set up where volunteers from the Earthwatch Worldwide program pay to come to the island and walk through marshes and over downed trees to help pick up bones.

After visiting with the Peterson's we went back to Tobin Harbor and added a new experience to our life: canoed to a dinner party. Chuck had a little get together his cabin about a 1/2 mile row from ours. Menu: potato salad, ham, pesto pasta, cheddar dill cornbread and rhubarb pie.

Fog Poem

2007-07-25T13:33:00.000-05:00

Andy:

I awake with fog
play guitar with fog
Darjeeling tea with fog
compose and fog
fried rice and fog
hike in fog
Minestrone, fresh bread, Gruyere cheese, with fog
Sitting on rocks in fog
Inspirational bench, no view today, in fog
I talk with the fog
I listen to the water in the fog
fog with fog, in fog, and some more fog
now I will sleep
with
FOG

Fog and Soup

2007-07-25T13:18:00.000-05:00

Our bedside alarm woke us at five minutes till 8:00am, just a few seconds before we were instructed to catch the morning report over our National Park Service Radio. We could already predict the main attraction: FOG.

Chuck our faithful caretaker for the week walkie-talkied us soon after and asked us if we felt like a couple of kernels in a bowl of fresh popcorn.

We got up soon after (early for a couple of musicians), made tea and worked on composing our piece about birds until Andy made his nearly famous fried rice for lunch. Then, we worked more in the cabin until the first hints of cabin fever set in. It was 2:30pm, visibility--50 feet :) (See our foggy photos here)

I made some homemade three bean and legume minestrone when we got back from our foggy walk then we went to bed.

3 Bean and Legume Minestrone Soup

2 carrots, chopped
1/2 onion, chopped
2 potatoes, chopped
1 tsp dried dill
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1/2 cup each, garbanzo beans, black-eyed peas, and canelli beans, soaked overnight.
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 bay leaf
1/2 cup fresh parsley, chopped
1/4 cup lacinato kale leaves, thinly sliced
1 can diced tomatoes, "Muir Glen" is the best
2 TBS olive oil

1. Saute veggies in olive oil till soft, then add dried dill and oregano. Add soaked black-eye peas and canelli beans and 2 cups water. Boil 15 minutes. Then, add garbanzo beans, bay leaf and half the parsley, greens and tomatoes. Partially cover and cook 40-60 minutes.

2. Salt to taste, then serve with the rest of the fresh parsley over the top. If available drizzle with additional olive oil and a hand full of pine nuts scattered on top.

The Dassler Cabin - Our Home for 19 Days

2007-07-24T14:51:00.000-05:00

Andrew standing on Tobin Point at sunset, the Dassler cabin is hidden in the trees on the point

Located in the Tobin Harbor, the "Dassler Cabin" was named and owned by the Dassler family who built it in 1905. It finally became property of the park in 1991 and the next year became the Artists In Residence Cabin. There are only a half a dozen or so homes left in the Tobin Harbor that the park doesn't own. The families basically get to keep their cabins until the life leasee in the family passes away.

There is a lot of ambivalence between the life leasees and the park, and why not? Although it was the families on the island that ultimately decided to make Isle Royale a National Park, it is still not an easy decision to hand over a historic rustic cabin to "the government" where there are always a variety of interests involved. That and the added dilemma of "human" culture versus wilderness, which after all really aren't two different thing (Is there anything left on the planet that hasn't been messed with by humans?) makes it a tough situation for everyone.

The nice thing about the Artists in Residence Program is that we operated as a mediator between the friends and families that own property and the park employees. Technically , we were volunteers for the NPS (National Park Service) but we were taken care of and brought in as visitors to the Tobin Harbor family community. We supported the agenda of the National Park by celebrating its natural beauty, and at the same time supported the preservation and use of one of the cabins in the Tobin Harbor community.

Living in the cabins is literally like going back in time. Most don't have electricity, although some are working on getting approval from the NPS to use solar power. Almost all have a propane stove and propane powered lights, but only a few have propane refrigeration, a luxury in its own right. Many have ice boxes (for real!) The Peterson's ice box looked like a small top loading freezer with a compartment in the top for ice and the refrigerator goods below. It was inside a little open air outhouse looking structure built under a group of trees outside. There is also something called a "California Cooler" which is a cupboard that is built with screens that open to the outside so that the cool air from the lake can come in an settle in the cupboard. Connie Boyle keeps her eggs there.

Most people gather their water for cooking and washing in buckets or white ceramic basins straight from the lake. Everybody filters their water now, although Chuck Boyale said he drank the water straight out of the lake for 45 years without getting stick and only until his wife Besty was sick with cancer did they start filtering as a precaution. Everybody washes their dishes and bathes with straight lake water. We have a small 2.5 gallon solar shower bag that I used to "take a shower". I hung it on a nail that was hammered into a post supporting the back awning of the Dassler and luckily a spot that had a rocky area underneath and plenty of trees to obscure the view from the plethora of boaters that zoomed past our point every day.

The best showering device we saw on the whole trip was built by Dick Scheibe. He lined his small closet space off his cabin bedroom with a shower curtain and then cut a hole in the ceiling that would fit a five gallon bucket. He rigged a device to raise and lower the bucket, and then attached a shower head to the bucket. All he has to do is heat five gallons of water (which isn't exactly a quick job) and voila, he can have a nice 5 minute shower inside.

Privies are an important aspect of the cabins too. Ours was about a 1/8 mile walk from the cabin, a walk that at first seemed to take forever, but then became an enjoyable break time activity. Some of the cabins are on islands so small they don't have room to put a privy, such as the cabin Dick and Mary Scheibe stayed in. The people who have their own privies absolutely don't let any toilet paper go in the hole. They pack it out and have big signs instructing people to dispose of the paper in another container, usually nearby. This is so the holes don't fill up as fast, and probably to keep down the smell.

Fireplaces and wood are a necessity in all the cabins, even in July and August it can get down into the 50s. Wood is difficult to come by on the island too because all the trees on the north end are small, mostly because of weather and the moose population who have eaten almost everything in sight.

First Day on Isle Royale

2007-07-24T12:58:00.000-05:00

Today we woke up in the Super 8 in Houghton, MI and packed up the car for the Ranger III, a 165 foot boat that takes passengers to Isle Royale twice a week. We still had one straggling box that had to be loaded on the boat that was filled with lemons, limes, oranges, and avocados--very important items for the health and well being of two food hound vegetarians. It turned out that 45 minutes before was still a little late for loading, thought not at the "Greg Blust chew-out" level which a friend Doug received for trying to have the personnel load his kayak 10 minutes before departure.

Foggy, crystal calm waters took us all the way to Mott Island (just off the Isle Royale mainland where the park headquarters is) and then to Rock Harbor. After unloading the boat we had to cart our 7 boxes and three backpacks a half mile to another boat in Tobin Harbor that would then take us another 20 minute boat ride to the northeast end of the island where our little cabin affectionately know as "The Dassler" waited for us. After reaching the nearest dock by The Dassler, it was another 1/4 mile uphill to carry all of our stuff into the cabin.

Luckily we had a lot of help from the friends and family of the life leasese who still stay in the cabins around Tobin Harbor in the summer. John Snell helped up load our stuff, and the Connelly family helped us cart our stuff in four different trips up to the cabin.

Chuck and Connie Boyle would look after us for the week. Chuck has been to the island for about 50 years and knows most of the people and places in Tobin Harbor.

After unpacking for a few hours we walked around Scoville Point, the tip of the island where our cabin was. It was so foggy we could barely see the lake. But, we did notice how low the water was from the year before. Down 18 inches someone told us...global warming?

I transcribed some loon calls for the flute and guitar piece we planned to write about the birds. I took my junker flute outside and played in the harbor and listened to a great echo against the rocks.

Foggy, foggy night! We were talking about how it was a good thing we had been there before because otherwise we would be totally disoriented, not to mention kind of bummed not to know what things looked like.

Isle Royale Preparations

2007-07-23T12:55:00.000-05:00

We camped last night in Copper Harbor, MI at Fort Wilkins State Park which is at the tip of the Keweenaw Peninsula. We did our usual morning practice routines at the picnic table in our camp, but to no enjoyment thanks to the biting stable flies who burned my ankles right through my socks in between each Taffanel and Gaubert arpeggio.

We drove down to the Keweenaw Food Co-op in Houghton, MI to buy groceries for our 19 day stay on Isle Royale. Even though we wrote a menu for each day it still took us a LONG time to buy, an hour alone just in the bulk isle! We packed all our goods in boxes and went over the loading dock to load up for our ride to Isle Royale on the "Ranger III", all boats have names you know.

Greg Blust, our liaison and director of the Artist-In-Residence program showed us how to load our stuff, especially the stuff for the walk in refrigerator and freezer on the boat. He gave us our tickets and a key for the cabin, then he was back to work.

We hung out for a while along the channel between Houghton and Hancock, the old mining building on the side of the hill looming over us.

"Why are people so attached to place?" I asked Andy out of the blue.
"Why not?" he quickly replied, "place is so much about a person's environment and their memories."

This got me thinking about nature and how people attach meaning to their experiences with nature, which for so many of us is not part of our daily existence. "Nature" is usually reserved for vacations or special outings. I read an essay by Joyce Carol Oates called that week called "Against Nature" where she talks about human pitfalls in writing and talking about nature. She says nature by itself doesn't have meaning, it is we who attach sentiments such as "piety, serenity, awe" etc to it.

We are sitting on the banks of the Houghton-Hancock channel, sun setting, Andy says our last goodbyes to his mom, cell phone securely propped between cheek and neck. We will have no electricity or running water in our cabin on the island. Which of course also means, no conventional showers, no flush toilet, no wireless, no cell phone service. Some people's worst nightmare I am sure.

Wet Dry Wet Dry

2007-07-19T19:55:00.000-05:00

What a moody lake!
4 foot waves, started misty and fogy, now blue and shining

Today we saw iron juts from the soggy wood of a shipwreck

enjoyed the essence of oregano, garlic, rhubarb, cherry, and pine in the air

4 days without: cars, money, alcohol, music, inside, clocks

body feels good from each step of 13.3 miles

Lentil Potato Carrot Stew with Couscous and Coconut Cream
(the best thing you have ever tasted after a LONG hike)

1 tsp minced garlic
1 cup red lentils, rinsed
2 small potatoes
1 carrot
1/2 tsp cumin seeds
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp salt
4 dried birds eye chilies
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 tsp Bragg's liquid amino (funky health food item)
2TBS olive oil
1 small can of coconut milk, cream reserved

1 cup couscous
1/4 tsp minced ginger
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 shallot, minced

1. Saute spices and minced garlic in olive oil for 30 seconds, add potatoes and carrot, stir fry 2 minutes. Add salt and chilies then paprika and turmeric. Add 3 cups water and bring to a boil, then add red lentils. Cook 15 minutes, then cover and wrap in a towel or other heat resistant clothing and let stand while you prepare the couscous.

2. Saute minced ginger, chopped garlic, and shallot in olive oil. Then add the water from the coconut milk, plus 1 cup water. Bring to a boil, then add couscous. Stir, cover, and let stand 5 minutes.

3. Serve lentil mixture over couscous with dollops of the reserved coconut milk cream on top.

Waterbed for the Backcountry

2007-07-18T19:40:00.000-05:00

Our tent became a waterbed this morning. Lake Superior carried rain and the boom of thunder for many hours until Andrew finally sat up at about 6:00am and realized our tent was suspended in a 3 inch pool of water! We unzipped the flap and saw our boots and backpacks floating past!! The night before we had found a nice big hemlock to pitch the tent under, but had managed to put it in the only spot beneath the tree without good drainage. So, what left to do? "WE'VE GOT TO GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE" (The nice version of what Andy said when he realized our predicament.)

We carefully stepped out of the tent, rain still pouring, picked our home by the poles (with everything still in it) and walked it to the other side of the tree. Whew, it was going to be a long day, we had 8 miles to walk too. Luckily we were able to get back in the tent and find a couple inches of dry space where we hung out for a couple of hours, cramped, but moderately dry until it stopped raining.

Andy was a real sport to walk in the lead, which is usually my job, so that he could take the bulk of the water hits from the ferns onto his boots, instead of mine:) The most amazing thing that happened on the trail were two owls about the size of Andy's hands flew into a aspen branch directly over us about 5 feet away. They cocked their heads 180 degrees and stared at us as if they were looking into our souls.

The sun finally came out in the late afternoon and a lucky breeze kicked up before dusk! So thankful for a dry night.

Blue Flame Waters

2007-07-17T19:34:00.000-05:00

Lake Superior at dusk on Mosquito Beach
Fire pink sun ball
and blue flame water extending to the horizon

We watch this pink ball
light lazy enough through the clouds
for us to look at it with our eyes

I yoga pose on these old sedimentary rocks
My forward bends the deepest they have ever been
The rocks keep my extended legs propped up and relaxed

Despite our floors, the earth is not meant to feel flat!

Off to Pictured Rocks

2007-07-16T19:22:00.000-05:00

Andrew and I said goodbye to the band on Mackinac Island and headed up to four nights of backpacking along Pictured Rocks National Lake Shore. We arrived in Grand Marais to catch a shuttle van that would take up over to Munising so that we could walk the entire 45 mile stretch back to our car. The woman who drove our shuttle van talked a lot of politics and complained a lot about making a living up in the U.P. She said that she had driven the same van for 27 years and her pay was still only $11.00 an hour! It got me thinking a lot about the disparity between nature and class. In other words, why can't places rich in natural beauty also be rich in social justice?

We decided not to take our instruments for the four night, five day journey. It would be a time to clean out our musical selves, and a time to use our brains to come up with a concept for a piece that we would write together for our upcoming Artist-In-Residence stay on Isle Royale.

Sleep on the Shore

We are going to bed soon
before the sun
Under a canopy of, aspen, hemlock, and sugar maple
where birch grow in packs
invading the rocks that look over Lake Superior

I can still see the bald eagle that flew underneath us
Zoom bird
brown and white
big shadow passing over turquoise water

Mackinac Island Performance

2007-07-15T19:12:00.000-05:00

Today we woke up at 7:00am after a short night of sleep and drove to catch the 10:00am boat to Mackinac Island. After a getting our luggage and music equipment we took a nice mosey on the horse drawn taxi up to Sue and Bruce Miller's cottage (parent' s of our musician friends Tess Miller and Scott Harding). We had just enough time to get ready and practice a bit before the concert at 2:00pm at St. Anne's Church, the oldest and most visible church on the island.

It was a break through performance for our group, probably because it was our first time really playing in a concert setting. We usually play for dancers where a lot of other things are going on, and where the main goal is to keep bodies moving on the floor. It was so nice to have an attentive audience, there were about 50 people, and the acoustics in St. Anne's were great! We could really play with the dynamics of our pieces, especially with Desde el alma and Andrew's arrangement of Buenos Aires Hora Cero.

Milonga in Traverse City

2007-07-14T09:44:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

Today we woke up in the rain. We hung out until we could make a fire and then made breakfast. Homemade tortillas on the fire and curried pinto beans. After that we drove to a picnic shelter to practice for the gig at Gallerie Medici, a beautiful art gallery and tango studio owned by painter and tango dancer Cindy Carlton.

It was great to have lots of friends and family from out of town for the gig that night and Avik from Ann Arbor joined us on bandoneon! As a quintet it was lout and biting. Check us out below!

Tango, Wine, and Music

2007-07-13T09:15:00.000-05:00

Carmen:
Friday the 13th! Second day of the band retreat. Today we woke up to a sunny day, ate oatmeal and drank perfectly brewed loose leaf oolong made by Andy. We spent the good part of the morning playing: a new version of Felicia, Nueve de julio, Francia, Silueta portena, Andy's arrangement of Buenos Aires Hora Cero, and Oblivion, all pieces for our Mackinac Island Concert the following Sunday.

We went to Larry Mawby's for a sparkling wine tasting and ate a delicious goat cheese, avocado, arugula, tomato, red onion sandwich on the way. We ended up getting a flight at Mawby's with the best three of his sparklers: Cremant, Talismon, and Blanc de blanc.

After that we went to John and Jo Crampton's, friends of ours who own Willow Vineyards in Sutton's Bay. We ended up giving an impromptu concert in the tasting room for John and Jo and all the visitors that day. Everyone thought it was a real treat and we got some really good practice for our upcoming concert.

After we left Willow, we ate doughnut peaches that I had left sitting on the dash. There were hot from the sun. They tasted like warm peach pie! Then, we drove the back roads to get to Sleeping Bear Dunes and took a secret entrance to get up to the good views. As usual it was a strenuous hike up and a quick run down. We stopped for coffee in Glen Arbor and then listened to some awesome music in the car on the way back to camp. I was the DJ-- Assad Brothers with Najda Solerno-Sonnenberg, Dave Douglas, Andrew York, Radiohead, Stefon Harris, and Mike Stern.

A kitchen sink pasta dinner--tomato, shiitake, rainbow chard, arugula, onion, garlic sauce over rigatoni.

Beginning of the Retreat

2007-07-12T08:45:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

Today our Tango Folias band drove up to Traverse City for a 5 day band retreat. Dean, Debbie, me, and Andy packed more stuff that we did for a month long tango tour. We drove the short two hours to Interlochen State Park, our home for the next few days, and then went to the Traverse City Co-op to buy some serious goods for our camp meals. On the way home we stopped by Left Foot Charley's, a new winery in the Traverse area that is housed in a building on the old State Asylum! A lot of the old buildings are still there, white and abandoned. Kind of a spooky place for a tasting. Good thing the wine was so good!

When we got back to our campsite (#332, a very lucky number for tango musicians) it was about to rain. We quickly gathered our instruments and slid them into the tent along with ourselves. Within a few seconds it was absolutely pouring rain. We each found a sleeping bag to prop ourselves up on and then we practiced: Derecho viejo, Felicia, La cumparsita, Nueve de julio, Silueta portena, Desde el alma, Francia, Corazon de oro, and Oblivion. All from memory! Or course since we could barely even sit with our instruments, let alone find room for the music.

About halfway through Nueve de julio Debbie and I looked at each other at the same time and burst out laughing. A simultaneous recognition of how ridiculous the scene was. Debbie was all crunched up on her rolled up sleeping bag, he head titled almost 45 degrees so that when she moved her bow it wouldn't poke through the top of the tent. Accordingly her glasses where edging closer and closer to the end of her nose. I on the other hand played piccolo because my flute wouldn't fit in the space. Kind of a funny scene playing, especially the Piazzolla tunes on piccolo with thunder crashing down every minute.

Luckily it stopped raining and we were able to get out and make a delicious dinner:

Coconut Milk Stir Fry with Vegetables and Golden Tofu

16 oz locally made tofu (from Traverse Co-op), drained and cubed
1 red pepper, thinly sliced
3 garlic cloves, diced
1 inch fresh ginger, peeled and diced
1 tsp mustard seeds
1 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp paprika
1 tsp crushed coriander
1 can unsweetened coconut milk
1 package thick rice noodles

1. saute the cubes of tofu in olive oil, lightly salt to taste
2. Saute spices, garlic and ginger 30 seconds over high heat
3. Add pepper, stir fry 1 minute
4. Add coconut milk and heat
5. Meanwhile pour boiling water over rice noodles and let stand for 5 minutes
6. Before coconut milk mixture heats add rice noodles, then serve

The Folies - U.S Tango Tour Awards

2007-07-01T17:55:00.001-05:00

We've had an amazing journey and we thought it would be fun to recount some of the most memorable with our "Folies" Awards. Roll out the red carpet...

Best Alternative Music: Boulder, CO (thanks Tara and Nick!)

Best Downtown Milonga: St. Paul, MN (thanks Andrea, Elias, Janeen, Florencia, and Bob!)

Best Food and Coffee: Ciao Bella, San Diego, CA (thanks Daniel and Linda!)

Best Milonga View: China Harbor in Seattle, WA (thanks Arturo!)

Biggest Dance: (100+) Tuesday night at The Turnverein, Denver, CO (thanks Ellen, Patricia, and Tango Colorado!)

Biggest Lesson: (48) Wednesday night in Salt Lake City, UT (thanks Barbara!)

Hilarious Host Award: Jenny Debouzek, Albuquerque, NM (thanks for making us laugh so hard!)

Hipp(ie)est Tango: The Tango Center in Eugene, OR (thanks Greg and Liz!)

Inspiration Award: Madison, WI (thanks Jeff, Eilleen, Steve, and Krista!)

Jammiest Tango Jam: Peter's Pub, Pittsburgh, PA (thanks Trini and Sean and all the amazing musicians!)

Maiden Voyage: Above Slims in Northside of Cincinnati, OH (thanks Virginia!)

Most Fun in the Sun: San Diego, CA (thanks Linda, Teresa, Daniel, and Linda!)

Most Unique Tango Venue: Alegria, North Ridgeville, OH (thanks Timmy and Joanne!)

Rock Star Production and Design: Boise, ID (thanks Beth-Animal and Sarah!)

Supreme Social Dancing: Tango Berretin in Portland, OR (thanks Megan, Alex, Joe, Jenna, and Amie!)

"Sweetest" Milonga Venue: Emack and Bolios (famous ice cream shop), Columbus, OH (thank you CATS!)

Wildest Conversation: El Pulpo (ask us about Pulpo's rehashing of Troilo's run-in with the cops)

Thanks again to everyone who made our tour possible!

It was a huge success. We are counting our blessings:
1. No car trouble and no accidents (1 parking ticket though :)
2. Good weather throughout, no rain outs for camping
3. 100% success rate for performances, and good turn outs all around
4. No sicknesses or injuries
5. Nothing got stolen
6. No major equipment problems
7. NO BAND DRAMA!
8. No major delays
9. We came home with money!!

Lessons learned

2007-07-01T17:54:00.001-05:00

Andy:
1. Do not drink two glasses of wine right before bed when the drive you have the next day is longer than you have to sleep
2. Use equipment that you know how to use
3. Plug the DJ laptop into house sound equipment (so that the other equipment can be picked up before 1:00am!)
4. Take a day off
5. Mahler rocks
6. Do more jams next time
7. Edit guitar parts with fingerings before the tour
8. Skip the opportunity to eat greasy Mexican food at 1:00am
9. Next time, bring an extension cord

Carmen:
1. Pack light
2. Learn to wash clothes in other people's bath tubs
3. You can't control the waves but you can learn to surf
4. Following in tango is an elusive art
5. Practice music before recreational activities or it won't happen
6. Eat well (don't forget lots of dried cherries)
7. A written agreement is very helpful
8. Every place is more or less struggling with the same problems
9. Don't leave my stuff in people's showers
10. Its only about the people
11. Putting this tour together was like having a baby, it was easy to conceive, but it took 9 months to put together
12. Camping is the way to go
13. McDonalds, I'm NOT lovin' it
14. Everything is better with olive oil

Avik:
1. Practice every performance day even if it is only for 5 minutes
2. Tell friends I know in different cities about the tour beforehand
3. Next time spend more time in each place
4. Better to digest thy belly than thy "filet of fish" (McDonalds)
5. The great outdoors are indeed great
6. Tango people are extremely generous
7. People are more similar than they are different. Especially when they share a passion for tango.

Interesting Facts

2007-07-01T17:49:00.001-05:00

Total Tango stops: 15
Number of places that was a first time tango visit for all of us: 6

Biggest lesson turnout: 48, Salt Lake City, UT
Biggest dance turnout: 100+, Denver, CO

Number of people who graciously hosted us: 24
Number of musicians collaborated with: 22

Largest tango jam: Pittsburgh (8 others)

Tango stop with highest population: 1.2 million, San Diego, CO
Tango stop with lowest population: 94,000, Boulder, CO

Total miles traveled: 8.845 miles
Miles driven by Andy: 8,445 miles!
Number of states traversed: 20
Average gas cost: $0.12/mile
Longest single day of travel: 710 miles - North Ridgeville, OH to Lake Anita, IA
Average driving hours for the last week of the tour: 7 hours/day

Coldest: 30 degrees, Carson National Forest, Pecos Wilderness, NM
Hottest: ~100 degrees, Joshua Tree National Park

Highest Elevation: 9500ft, Carson National Forest, Pecos Wilderness, NM
Lowest Elevation: 0ft, San Diego, CA and Cape Lookout, OR

Furthest North: Seattle, WA
Furthest South: San Diego, CA
Furthest West: Cape Lookout, OR
Furthest East: Pittsburgh, PA

Number of camping nights: 7
Longest stay in one place: 3 days in Boise, ID
Number of non-caucasians in Boise: 1 (Avik)

Latest night: 3:45am in Pittsburgh with El Pulpo
Earliest morning: Seattle, 7:30am

Number of different places we stayed in 30 days: 20
Number of hotel stays: 0

Number of snakes observed: 2 (one in captivity)

Number of times we ate fast food: 6 (too many)
Number of times we ate fast food in the Midwest: 4 (3 in Ohio)

Number of times we did laundry: 8

Most expensive food: 1 tiny white truffle at $250/lb

Believe it or not, the following amounts are for all 3 of us combined...
Average amount spent on food: $42/day (watch out Rachael Ray)
Average amount spent on gas: $40/day
Average amount spent on lodging: $5/day (thanks to our gracious hosts)
Average amount spent on wine: $7/day
Average total expenses: $94/day

Food leftover: grapefruit, jar of peanut butter, bag of dried cherries, a bag of dried morels

And...
We started on June 1 with a full moon and ended on June 30 with a blue moon--the auspicious second full moon of the month.

Last Three Memorable Meals

2007-07-01T16:48:00.000-05:00

Carmen:
After we left Seattle we had a killer six days to complete our tour. We drove from Seattle to just south of Bozeman (680miles), then the next day from Bozeman to Theodore Roosevelt National Park (444 miles) and then from St. Paul to Madison to Cincinnati (Over the week an average of 7 hours a day of driving time, mostly by Andy).

At one point Avik said that now you know what it must be like to have cabin fever, he then grabbed his computer to find a video he downloaded that is a spoof on "The Shining".

In the end it was the food that made our time bearable and broke up the monotony.

Here are the last three homemade meals we had together on the road: (Thanks to the PCC Natural Food Market in Seattle for supplying us with four days of groceries.)

Montana Car Lunch:
Cucumber Salad with Blue Cheese Tomato Sandwiches

four cucumbers
dill
olive oil
balsalmic vinegar

ciabatta

blue cheese
four roma tomatoes

Dice cucumbers, toss with 1/4 chopped dill, 2 tsps olive oil and a teaspoon of balsalmic vinegar. I kept the dill in a glass filled with water over night. The cool temperatures up in the Montana mountains kept it nice and perky.

Slice bread lengthwise and layers hunks of blue cheese and slices of tomatoes. A nice light lunch in the hot Montana sun.

Montana Campsite Dinner:
Thai Rice Noodles with Curry Coconut Milk and Golden Tofu

Thai rice noodles, enough for 3 people, soaked in hot water for five minutes then rinsed with cold water
1 can unsweetened coconut milk

3 green onions, chopped
1 inch ginger slice, diced
1 eggplant, sliced
1/2 lb shiitake mushrooms
3 jalapenos

1 tsp turmeric
1tsp cumin
1tsp corriander, ground
1 tsp, mustard seeds
3 tablespoons soy sauce

1 lb tofu, cubed and fried in olive oil

Fry tofu first and then remove to a plate.

Fry the dried spices and hot peppers in olive oil. Add vegetables and mushrooms. Cook for 10 minutes. Add water if the veggies start to stick. Add coconut milk and turmeric then the soy sauce. Bring the stew up to a boil then remove from the heat. Season with salt as needed. Add tofu on the top and eat.

North Dakota Car Lunch:

Mixed Salad Beans Topped with Guacamole and
Herbed Couscous

Herbed couscous mix ( I think we had casbah brand)

1 can organic salad bean mix (kidneys, garbanzos, and great northerns)

fresh basil, chopped
fresh dill, chopped
3 roma tomatoes, chopped

2 avocados
1 tsp salt

juice from 3/4 of a lemon (save the other 1/4 for the guacamole)

1/8 cup olive oil

Combine olive oil and and 3/4 cup lemon juice with herbs, beans, and tomatoes. Add salt to taste.

Mash very ripe avocados in a bowl. Season with lemon and salt.

At a gas station, fill a thermos with hot water from the tap on the coffee machine.

Pour about 1 1/2 cups water on over the couscous.

Before eating, spoon guacamole over the bean salad.

Fifteenth Tango Stop - Cincinnati, OH

2007-07-01T16:46:00.001-05:00

Carmen:

We had a primo space last night for our last performance of the tour. It was a loft space above a Northside, Cincinnati restaurant and we were the first to use the space. How wonderful it is to dance on a brand new floor and be the first ones to use a sound system for the first time.

We also had a primo place to stay. Virginia Malton, our host, had us stay in her downtown Cincinnati condo that overlooked the river onto Newport, KY. She graciously gave us the whole place to stay!

It was a great way to end our tour. After a grueling 10 days, (averaging 7 hours a day of driving the last week alone) it was a relief to have an another enjoyable evening of dancing and a well received live music performance.

Notes From the Driver

2007-07-01T00:37:00.005-05:00

Andy:

Driving across the country so far I start to think of roads and cities in a different way. The cities are kind of like a giant heart. It sucks us in and we unload the tango circus, teach, play and dance tango. Then by the next morning it spits us out (with little sleep) and we enter the vein (highway). The heart pushes us along our way through the veins as we are sucked to the next city.

So then, what are we? Our red Buick is a blood cell fueled by really old fossils, pumped out of this heart with admittance from a credit car with a giant yellow M. When we are seated in our blood cell car we, the musicians and dancers, are not really moving inside the car. We are blogging on this computer for you.

Fourteenth Tango Stop - Madison, WI

2007-07-01T00:37:00.003-05:00

Carmen:

We got the idea for our tour last Fall 2006 when we traveled to Madison and Chicago for two weekend performances. Avik, Andrew and I had such a good time playing together at those two places, especially Madison, a place we have performed 8 times now, that we decided that we should plan a longer trip for the this summer. Avik brought the idea up, half jokingly. I ran with it. Nine months later our tour was finally set and ready to give birth to itself. (Hey, kind of like having a baby).

Last night we returned to Madison again, this time at a new downtown venue called The Brink Lounge, an upscale restaurant and bar that is connected to a complex of other restaurants and bars. The dance floor was cozy, actually it was smaller than the stage! (Don't worry we didn't let it go to our heads :)

Thanks Madison tango people for inspiring almost a year ago for our tour!!

It is now the beginning of the end. One performance in Cincinnati to go!

Thirteenth Tango Stop - St. Paul, MN

2007-07-01T00:37:00.001-05:00

Carmen:

The milonga was at a downtown St. Paul restaurant called Matty B's, a steakhouse with a nice bar, and an "L" shaped dance floor. It was a very social evening. A lot of the folks that came hung out, chatted, ate dinner, had their drinks and then danced a few tandas. It reminded me a lot of playing in our hometown Grand Rapids gigs at the Mezze Cafe, where we have our regular milongas.

It was great to meet up with members of Mandragora, Minnesota's premier tango orchestra. Bob Barnes, the accordionist and Scott Davies, the guitarist filled us in on the dynamics of their group, their new internet CD release that is coming out, and what arrangements they have been wor
king on. We shared common sentiments/challenges about playing in a tango band: managing band personalities, monitoring (paying for!) the alcohol consumption at restaurant gigs, holding back the tendency to turn everything into an up tempo Firpo style arrangement (aka. keeping the band from rushing!), finding the time to produce good arrangements.

Thanks to Andrea Ducane who made our performance possible. It was great to meet all of the Minnesota tango folks.

Twelfth Tango Stop - Seattle, WA

2007-07-01T00:36:00.003-05:00

Carmen:

What a gorgeous setting, a restaurant ballroom on the harbor with a view of the city. "It actually gets more beautiful as the sun goes down because the city lights illuminate through the windows," a couple told me as I was trying to get a photo at the start of the milonga.

Arturo Newman, the milonga host and our contact person for the gig told me he likes China Harbor (a Chinese restaurant in downtown Seattle) for his milonga because it is a lot like a Buenos Aires venue, a bit dingy and a funky sound system. However, he dresses it up with table cloths and candle light so that as the evening unfolds the atmosphere is just right for social dancing.

In the end it is the people that make the event. We had a really nice time; good dancing, good energy, it made our work easy!

Eleventh Tango Stop - Eugene, OR

2007-07-01T00:36:00.001-05:00

Carmen:

The Tango Center in Eugene Oregon is one of the few places in the country to have their own building devoted entirely to tango. The building is located right downtown and according to Greg Bryant, the caretaker and founder of the Tango Center, it is rare for tango to be seen so often in one place by the general public. Most places to tango around the country are found through knowing someone with inside information or from accessing a website or a paper that gives information about a space that is being rented for a tango event. It is no surprise that Greg can make it work, Eugene holds the largest cooperative festival in the country and has been addressing progressive social services such as offering community health insurance since the mid-60s. Eugene also has a thriving market and street vendor scene. It reminds me Madison, WI, in some ways (a town close to home) although in Eugene it is legal for women to be topless in public, and outside of Eugene there is a festival out in the mountains that involves a naked tango dance! (I am not sure if I want to go there....and I guess it is too damn cold in Wisconsin for such happenings).

According to Greg, there have been some recent struggles in downtown Eugene involving developers who want to tear down parts of downtown Eugene to rebuild a bigger and better town! Hmmmm, destroy people's homes and places of work to build new stuff. Sounds like the developers really have the well being of Eugene residents in their best interests. Urban development (or "sprawl" according to some) is not as clear cut as it may seem (no pun intended).

The good thing is that the Tango Center is still around, and even better is that since we were there the last time there are new dancers and more musicians including two tango bands :)

The Mahler Cycle

2007-06-29T02:22:00.001-05:00

Avik:

As we drove from Seattle to Bozeman, we heard the last notes from Mahler's Ninth and final completed Symphony (he started a tenth but died before finishing it). This marked the end of our cross-country Mahler cycle.

Consider for a moment that Mahler completed his First Symphony in 1886 and his Ninth in 1911. Imagine what the world must have been like without blogs, email, automobiles, and airplanes. Nature probably played a larger role in everyone's lives. It has been documented that nature, in particular the forests and mountains outside Vienna, played a great role in inspiring Mahler's music. In fact, many of the works were written in the composer's cabin in the Alps. Mahler references nature a great deal in his music, from birdcalls in his first symphony to the dying hearbeats in his last.

In high school and college, I listened to a lot of Mahler but rarely in settings outdoors. To hear all of Mahler's works while seeing some of the landscapes that might have inspired him was a unique and enlightening experience. Here is a sample of some of the landscapes which served as our Mahler backdrop:

Mahler 1: North Ridgeville, OH to Lake Anita State Park, IA

Mahler 2: Lake Anita State Park, IA to Denver, CO

Mahler 3: Denver, CO to Taos, NM

Mahler 4: Taos, NM to Albuquerque, NM

Mahler 5: Albuquerque, NM to Joshua Tree National Park, CA

Mahler 6: San Diego, CA to Zion National Park, UT

Mahler 7: Zion National Park to Salt Lake City, UT

Mahler 8: Boise, ID to Portland, OR

Mahler 9: Seattle, WA to Bozeman, MT

Of course, Mahler is not alone in taking inspiration from nature. Many modern day composers, such as Messian, take to the woods to write their works (as do authors, academics, and others). Later this summer, Carmen and Andrew will be spending two weeks as artists in resident on secluded Isle Royale thinking about, writing, and performing music.

Food, Wine, and Waves in the Northwest

2007-06-28T11:18:00.001-05:00

Carmen:

We had an excellent day of rest in between Eugene and Seattle. We spent the day tasting wine, shopping for food, and playing around on the Oregon coast. Before we left Eugene we went to a wonderful natural grocery store called Sundance Natural Foods. Amazing produce and even more amazing bulk section. I could probably get away with no packaging waste if I bought all of my food and toiletries from this store.

The best find were the fresh Oregon white truffles! Oregon is known around the country for its fabulous mushrooms anyway. in addition to one very small white truffle (about the size of my thumb nail, only $3.50) we bought the most beautiful blue tinged oyster mushrooms, and a half a dozen white trumpet mushrooms. We ended up making truffled mashed Yukons for dinner (mmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!! Anyone who know me, knows that I am the queen of yummy noises:)

After shopping, we stopped at two different vineyards outside of Salem, Bethel Heights and Stangeland, two places that specialize in Pinot Noir, which is of course what we ended up buying. The most interesting thing about Bethel Heights is that they have different blocks of their vineyards that are sectioned off individually so that different bottlings can be made. So, the block of Pinot Noir that is up on the hill ends of tasting completely different from the block that is down next to the road. We ended up buying "Southeast Block" which is was the vineyard with the lowest elevation. We thought it was the spiciest tasting, probably because it gets the most sun.

Stangeland (NOT STRANGEland) was completely different than Bethel Heights. Their Pinots were crazy and wild!

The Enlightened Northwest

2007-06-28T11:13:00.001-05:00

Avik:

Of all the places we've visited, I like the Northwest (Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana) the best. The landscape is lush with greenery, mountains, valleys, lakes, and rivers. The climate is mild year-round though it probably rains a bit more than I would like. By comparison, the Southwest (New Mexico, Nevada, Utah) has the beautiful terrain but lacks the greenery (at least in areas that aren't human irrigated). The Midwest (Michigan, Ohio, Iowa) has water and greens but lacks the interesting terrain. Plus it gets really friggin' cold in the winter!

Another great thing about the Northwest is the kind of people it attracts. At least when viewed from afar, people somehow seem enlightened. On our way from Eugene to Cape Lookout (Oregon), we stopped at a rest area to eat lunch. Halfway through, we saw a bicyclist with about 75 pounds of gear strapped to the front and back wheels of his bike. He came over to us and said that he had not talked to anyone in a couple days and asked if he could share our picnic table to eat lunch. We offered him some of our tuna and wine and he did the same with his food. His name was H.W. (yes, initials only) and he was biking from Seattle to Portland to meet up with his friends to go on a sustainability tour of the northwest where they would learn about sustainable food and housing development practices. It was really inspiring to meet a young college aged guy like this who was doing his small part to make the world a better place.

Another interesting person we met was Sarah, a teacher in the Boise tango scene. Over pizzas and wine, she was telling us about how she studied dance at the University of Oregon in Eugene and then ended up falling in love with mountain climbing. Her mountain climbing experience led her to become a frontline forest fire fighter, a job which required her to stay in the forest for an extended amount of time and make sure that any fires are contained. Mountain climbing also led her on a trip to Mendoza, Argentina where she was first introduced to Argentine Tango and the rest of the story you can all fill in. So now she lives in Boise making a living as a Yoga teacher (did i mention that?) and teaching Tango as well.

Sarah, I think, epitomizes the Bohemian spirit that I admire in my tango friends. She works at her crafts with intensity, whether it be mountain climbing, yoga, tango, or other dances. Though she realizes that she is taking the road less traveled (and probably the road less financially stable), she continues down it since her passion for her endeavours trumps the comforts of a more conventional lifestyle.

Tenth Tango Stop - Portland, OR and Building the Tango Forest Quiz

2007-06-28T11:09:00.001-05:00

Carmen:

Portland is one the places notorious in United States for tango dancing ("the creme-de-la-creme of tango dancing"). It was no surprise that our experience there was really great in terms of dancing, the crowds reception to our music, and to the social interactions we had with people at the milonga.

Megan Pingree, our host and contact for Portland, is one of the two people left who was part of the first Argentine tango classes in Portland started by Clay Nelson way back in 1993. We ended up chatting with her after an already late night (and soon to be very early morning) at her home after the milonga.

Megan talked about the way tango dancers in Portland work together, and how even some of the more difficult conflicts within the community have been repaired. It got me thinking about all of the stories we have heard on the trip from the organizers we have stayed with. For each place we have visited, we usually got the low down on all of the major conflicts within the first 15 minutes of sitting down to talk with the organizers, as if they needed to release the pressure that had built within their community. "ITS JUST A DANCE!!" one organizer commented in mid-stride of her story.

On the deepest level, tango community conflicts are almost all about struggles for power, popularity, or just plain monetary needs. However, on the surface I saw the conflicts manifested through some issues specific to tango: alternative music versus traditional music, open embrace versus close embrace, social dance style versus performance dance style, and interestingly for us, live music versus recorded music.

The healthiest communities can negotiate all of the these things, accommodating to many teachers, and opening up the possibilities for working together through many different approaches.

People can get really wrapped up into tango and with its conflicts. I think it is safe to say that the state of the friendships made through tango can dramatically affect the well being of a person and the feelings they have about a place. How many people have I heard ask when they are considering moving to a new town, "but do they have tango?" or as one dancer in Seattle asked me, "yeah, I am moving to Boise next month, what is the tango scene like?" ( I have also talked to many people who have flown all the way across the country to seek our a dance with a particular person that the only relationship they had to was from dancing tango. That is another story altogether. There are a lot of crazy tango dancers out there. Not me of course :)

Back to the community idea and conflict resolution....

Lets say that a tango community is like a forest (an appropriate image for the northwest!). The reality is that each tree (person/tango dancer) is struggling for light and nutrients so that they can grow taller, in dancer terms struggling to get better at dancing as well as for gaining acceptance within the social network of a tango community. Power struggles don't have to be violent, they are a fact of life. Very few people dance tango without some kind of struggle for knowledge, power, acceptance or inner peace, otherwise why would they do it?

Within the struggle for life a physical forest is made beautiful mostly through time: sunlight, water, growth and decay which over time makes for ecological diversity. Can't we all just get along?

I decided to make a little quiz for all of us tango fanatics and organizers out there to test how well we are contributing to our town's tango forest.

BUILDING THE TANGO FOREST QUIZ ( Inspired by Tango in Portland)

Do you cross promote events for the other tango teachers in your town?

1 pt distribute flyers promotion
1 pts email promotion
1 pts website promotion
2 pts regularly announcing someone else's event verbally at your own event

Have you ever personally invited someone to dance at your events that you know has bad talked you?

1 pt

Have you ever made your space available to other tango teachers at a substantially reduced rate?

1 pt

Have you ever encouraged a guest artist to perform with one of the local teachers?

1 pt

Have you ever set up a meeting or been a part of a meeting between all the teachers in one town to layout tango events so that they don't conflict with each other?

1 pt

Have you ever coordinated with the other tango teachers in your town to make sure there in about a 3 week gap in between guest artist visits or festivals?

1 pt

In the last 6 months have you refrained from participating in negative tango gossip or encouraged a group of people who were bad mouthing someone else to stop?

1 pt for each time

Have you ever invited another teacher to come to your class and sit in for free to just help out in the class?

1 pt

Have you ever (had the guts!) to speak to someone face to face (email doesn't count) in a diplomatic and respectful way about something you thought he or she was doing that was inappropriate at your event?

2 pts

SOME OF THE TANGO CLEAR CUTTING PRACTICES:

Have you ever closed your practica to everyone except those that were your students?

-2 pts

Have you ever intentionally scheduled an event that coincided with someone you didn't like or didn't agree with?

-2 pts

Have you ever unintentionally scheduled an event that coincided with another tango event in your town?

-1 pt

Have you ever intimidated or verbally confronted someone in an aggressive way because you don't agree with or don't like them with the hopes of them not returning to your events?

-1 pt

Have you ever grouped together with people to try an deny someone from attending your tango event?

-1 pt

Have you ever physically assaulted someone (I have heard about this!!!) at a tango dance over a petty conflict?

-5

TANGO FOREST RATINGS

14 to 10 You are on your way to growing an old growth forest (Lots of vegetation, tall trees, beautiful views)

9 to 5 The forest is growing, watch your logging practices (Soil and vegetation healthy but be open to better ways to manage the health of your inhabitants)

4 to 0 Forest in danger, your might be clear cutting or need to plant more seeds (Patches of the forest gone from poor long term planning)

-1 to -5 Clear cut, only a few trees hold it together (Tango community blinders on)

-5 to -12 Total erosion, there used to be (or could be) a tango forest here :( (Unbridled egotism, self-centeredness, greed)

Total:

How are your tango forest growing skills? Just something to think about.

My score for the community that Andrew and I started in Grand Rapids, MI two years ago: 4

(whew! I have got some growing to do)

Ninth Tango Stop - Boise, ID

2007-06-22T10:00:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

Tango started in Boise (my hometown) about one year ago with thanks to Beth-Anne Osborn who single handedly wielded that tango community together from what she calls tango "poaching" (a term definitely appropriate in Idaho) that refers to going to other dance events, especially ballroom events and unabashedly convincing dancers to try Argentine tango classes.

I think it might it worked. 80 people showed up for the event! and the energy was great!!

Andy:
Dance on Broadway in Boise
or
Spoon Rhythm

There we were to tango
Posters with fishnet stockings, candle-sticks, Eminem, a queen size bed, microphones hidden inside black rimmed glasses, and an enthusiastic crowd of pink and green colored wrist band dancers.
Green was for the new-bees, pink was for the enlightened.
Beer, wine, and vodka was served, but no empanada was to be found :(
It was our first time playing together in a week but after a few songs our synchronicity was back.
Marcattos and syncopas right in time
as if two friends were sitting together on a picnic table in Joshua Tree eating a curry stew and as they each finished they set their spoons down at the same time.

So, if you want your music to be tight first try and finish your meals at exactly the same time without plan.

Later on, the bed was moved to center stage and the champagne was un-corked.
Ganchos and boleos flew, some timely, some not.
All as our lady reappeared transformed into a real rock star before we said farewell and good night.

Reunited

2007-06-19T10:00:00.000-05:00

Avik:
After our gig in Salt Lake City, Debbie and I both returned to Michigan--Debbie (sadly) for the rest of the tour, and I for a weekend academic conference in Ann Arbor. The conference, which focused on a model of human behavior and motivations known as the Reasonable Person Model, was both educational and inspiring. The weekend in general was restful, but I must say that I was looking forward to getting on the plane to Boise to reunite with Carmen and Andrew. Which I finally did on Tuesday afternoon. Of course, I was envious when I heard they had been up to...

Carmen:
We spent the weekend with Mom and Dad Maret hiking, camping, and "shrooming" in the Sawtooth Mountains in central Idaho. We hiked and camped around Red Fish Lake, a body of water surrounded by steep snow covered granite mountains that spike up and out of a meadowed landscape. Red Fish Lake got its name from the thousands of sockeye salmon that used to travel to the ocean and back to spawn via the Salmon, Snake, and Columbia rivers. When sockeye spawn their backs turn bright red. According to my water biologist father, only five sockeye returned to Red Fish Lake last year, mostly due to the 14 dams that young fish must travel through on their way to the ocean and back.

On Sunday we went morel mushroom hunting in the burn areas north of Stanley, Idaho. We ended up picking about 15 lbs. of morels!! We have cooked everything from morel omlets, to fire roasted morels on the camp fire to morel pizza, and topped it off with a lasagne for Avik on his arrival back in Boise.

We are on our way tomorrow to Portland via the Columbia Gorge.

Eighth Tango Stop - Salt Lake City, UT

2007-06-14T10:00:00.000-05:00

Carmen:
It was dry, sunny, and hot when we arrive at Barbara Zakarian's house, a fellow tango dancer who lives a few blocks from the Mormon Temple in downtown Salt Lake city. She had a wonderful house for dancing and rehearsing, and we were treated to a delicious home cooked meal made by Barbara before we drove out to the milonga which was in a south suburb of Salt Lake City called Murray. Luckily for us, Barbara's son was going on a "vegan for a week" diet, so she treated us to a chick pea vegetable curry stew with couscous.

The milonga was at the Murray Dance Studio a two-sided dance center that we ended up sharing with a group of ballet dancers. (It was fun to see the chemistry when ballet dancers interact with tango dancers.) Salt Lake City was our first city on the tour where none of us had been before, so it was great to see so many people show up for the lesson, about 30 people, and for the milonga, about 50 people. Although tango has been going in Salt Lake about 10 years, there were many people new to tango, and it was great that we could be a part of so many people's first time dancing.

Barbara Zakarian's Saffron Curried Chick Pea Stew with Veggies

Julienne the following:
2 sweet potatoes
2 turnips
4 carrots
2 zucchini

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 onion, chopped
Saffron threads
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp salt
1 tsp curry powder
1 lemon halved and then quartered

1 can tomato juice
2 cans of chick peas

Saute turmeric and cumin seeds in olive oil, add onions, saute for 3 minutes, then add vegetables and saute for 5 minutes more. Add tomato sauce and cook for 10 minutes or until vegetables are soft but not mushy. Add chick peas and saffron threads. Season with salt to taste and serve with lemon wedges.

Serve over couscous.

The Pacific to Zion via Sin City

2007-06-13T10:00:00.000-05:00

Avik:

Yesterday we left San Diego on our way to Zion National Park.

After we passed through the San Bernardino Mountains, we were in desert country. After a few hours of driving through the desert, we started to see some strange sights for water starved country. Things like golf courses and water parks.

And then we started to see billboards advertising casinos, buffets, and ridiculous entertainment. Yes, we'd arrived to that desert oasis known as Las Vegas. Just for the novelty of it, we stopped in Vegas to get gas. I wanted to gamble away the change in my pocket but you couldn't play quarters in the slots anymore! And I was feeling lucky too...

Finally, we made it to Zion around 5pm.

We decided to take a hike before cooking our dinner. The trail we took was called the Watchman Trail. It started out pretty easy and we looked at all the desert sage, flora, lizards, and snake (only one). Eventually we started going up and pretty soon we were a few hundred feet higher. At the top of the ridge, the view was amazing. Words can't really do it justice, but Zion National Park had 26 million visitors last year. Now I know why. Pictures can't really do it justice either but we have a bunch in our Picasa album (just click on any of the pictures in this page).

One of the nice things about taking a trip like this is that you can get to know your travel mates. I've known Carmen for nearly 4 years now and we've always been very friendly. But I realized on the way back down the trail that our relationship had evolved. Whereas before the trip she used to ask me how school and tango were going, now she asked me: Would you eat me if we got trapped in the wilderness? I guess after such an amazing view people get contemplative. And hungry..

Carmen:

When we got back to the camp, I made an impromptu dip of avocados, green onions, tomatoes, lime, salt, and basil. Andy hooked up a delicious eggplant chili spiced with New Mexican chilies, cumin, and mustard seed. We washed it down with five bottles of Stone's Levitation Ales (we left the sixth for breakfast the next morning). Deb and I passed out with "The Guy" on a blanket we laid in the dirt while Andy and Avik set up the tents. Then Avik went into food coma while Carmen and Andy did all the dishes. It was a restful night in the land of milk and honey. Next stop Salt Lake City...

Tango Carnies

2007-06-12T10:00:00.001-05:00

Carmen and Deb:

The circus begins at 8PM

We unleash the music's engine

An electric powered mechanism of cables, sound board, lap top, mics, and speakers

Strings, bellows, and air keep the merry-go-rounds within a merry-go-round a spinning ronda

Every night a new city, with wooden-floored parking lots where dancers pay their $10 to coast on a counterclockwise carousel, riding beats up and down, embracing their black, white, and red colored ponies

Gated spaces, mirrored and dimly lit, we walk the centrifuge for miles and miles into the wee hours of the morning, all for the main attraction: the tango roller coaster's elusive high

Or is the biggest draw the hot chicks with their black lace and colored satins, painted lips, tawny shoulders, white pants, round seats and exposed thighs?

Seventh Tango Stop - San Diego, CA

2007-06-12T10:00:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

We drove three hours from Joshua Tree National Park down to San Diego, and picked up Debbie Crosser, our tango violinist friend from Grand Rapids at the San Diego airport. Our back seat was already bursting, but we managed to squeeze in her amp, violin, and bag. We met our hosts Linda and Daniel Escobedo along with Linda Garwood at Ciao Bella, an Italian cafe owned by the Escobedo's that hosts weekly tango events in La Mesa (a west suburb of San Diego). They completely refreshed us with Coffe drinks, smoothies, and a tomato, mozarella, basil salad with fresh bread. Andrew moaned about the coffee, "ohh, I can tell we're on the west coast now."

That night we taught the musicality class and played for the milonga at a dance studio called Dancefor2 in San Diego. As with all the other places we have played so far, the milonga was well attended, and people were excited about the live music. It was great to play as a quartet, Deb's violin filled out the sound and acted as a glue between the flute and the other two chordal instruments. When we played the first tango of our first set, Gallo ciego, everyone just sat there and listened attentively. Afterwards they clapped with enthusiasm and then Avik joked about their group being the first to just sit and really listen to us play without dancing. By the middle of the second song almost everyone was up and out of their seats dancing, about 70 people!

The next day Andrew, Debbie and I visited Pacific Beach while Avik taught private lessons. That night Avik and I taught a class on milonga, and then all four of us joined with 6 other San Diego musicians: Marzio, Mila, Justin, Clayton, Sabah, and Marcel for a workshop and jam on tango music. Many of the dancers from the community stayed to listen. We danced afterwards to recorded music, our feet still going even though we were beat!

Joshua Tree National Park

2007-06-10T20:15:00.001-05:00

Group Response:

Hot, dry, sandstone
Fear of snakes, scorpions, and tarantulas
I wasn't even really there, I was passed out on the ground
"Magnificent Desolation"
Endless stars...

Sixth Tango Stop - Alburquerque, NM

2007-06-10T16:09:00.001-05:00

Carmen:

New Mexico Tango Ramblings

We awoke in the wilderness at 9,500 feet
We wound down mountain roads with the thought of aspen groves, their dinosaur trunks and Dr. Seuss tufts reaching for the blue sheet of a sky

A neon lettered sign tied with twine to the back of a red mini-van read CAUTION! Pilgrimage
Men and women carried wooden crosses and bright red and yellow silk flowers
What if our lady of Guadalupe danced tango?

In the basement of another arts center, the floor newly polished. Her molinettes would float, in her velveteen slippers each step prancing with cobble stoned hips under the cream shawl. Moving not too close to bald heads or beef fated bellies.

If Gandhi danced tango he would have danced close. His embrace not only an act of compassion, but a personal test.

My room for the night is smooth around the edges, adobe style architecture, and sparsely decorated with only a few items: wicker furniture, some draped fabric, pink and gloosy, turquoise bracelets and beads.

If there is one thing in common between this house and our other tango hosts it is the placement of the TV, hidden or subdued by a larger social gathering space.

Jenny's TV sleeps under a native woven table cloth next to Sheba, the constrictor snake that has already coiled up her 8 foot body for the night.

Forget Gray's Anatomy, Law and Order, or even The Food Channel, the heat lamp above her cage is the pacifier.

The final pondering before I fall asleep:
If Helen Keller danced tango what type of music would she dance to? Traditional or alternative?
Her feet would take in the vibrations, but would the sound of a recorded bandoneons vibrate differently than live ones? Would they shake her heart? Turn its rhythm around into an up-beat?

We made it to New Mexico!

2007-06-08T10:00:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

What a drive from Denver to Taos! Amazing views: 14ers in the southern Colorado Rockies, desert plains at the New Mexico border filled with bushy white clumps of yuccas in bloom, and switch-backed mountain roads studded with small town adobe architecture. Each town had a local cemetery with small wooden crosses and bright silk flower bouquets adorning each gravestone.

We stopped at a local winery 10 miles southwest of Taos called Vivac, owned by two brothers native to Taos who specialize in working with wine varietals from North eastern Italy. We also stopped at Chimayo Trading in Ranchos de Taos to buy some Navajo and Hopi jewelry as gifts for friends back home.

We continued south on Highway 76 to the Santa Barbara campsite in the Carson National Forest and made a delicious sandwich with goat cheese, radishes, radish greens, avocado, tomato, and sprouts. We washed it down with the bottle of Nebbiolo from Vivac.

The trail head for the hike up to Truchas peak (the second highest peak in New Mexico) was right next to our campsite. We walked about 6 of the 32 miles round trip up and back form Truchas. The most striking feature of the hike was the aspen groves. The average aspen rose more than 40 feet and we walked over many with 4 feet girths that had fallen over the winter and were blocking the trail.

The sun was setting behind the mountains before we got back to camp, and we ended up eating our best camp meal yet, fire roasted pepper and tomato black bean stew with homemade corn tortillas and salsa verde in the dark! Luckily Andrew did his mountain man duty of gathering lots of wood to keep us warm by the fire before we crawled into our cold sleeping bags. It got down to 30 degrees at night!

Super New Mexico Lunch Sandwich

Loaf of Ciabatta
Small package of herbed goat cheese
2 slicing tomatoes
1 avocado
1 bunch radishes with their greens
1 box of sprouts

Cut ciabatta in half the long way. Spread goat cheese on the bottom half. Slice tomatoes, avocado, and radishes then layer each over the goat cheese. Wash radish greens carefully then add on top followed by the sprouts. Cut into thirds.

Black Bean Roasted Pepper and Tomato Stew

Roast the following over the fire grate:
5 roma tomatoes
3 bell peppers, 1 each color, red, yellow, and green
2 anaheim peppers
4 banana peppers
3 serrano peppers
1 whole red onion, un-peeled
1 whole garlic clove
Other ingredients:
1 can black beans
½ bunch cilantro
salt

Peel peppers, garlic, and onion. Then, finely chop all ingredients and add black beans with juice and then the chopped cilantro.

Fire Roasted Salsa Verde

1 lb tomatillos
3 green onions
½ bunch cilantro
salt

Fifth Tango Stop - Boulder, CO

2007-06-07T10:00:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

Yesterday, Ellen arranged for us to be a part of practica in Boulder hosted by Nick Jones and Tara Fortier. Before the practica we stopped by Nick's house in downtown Boulder for some hang out/tango nerdiness time. Nick showed us one of his strategies for developing his bandoneon technique. He plays Bach inventions, alternating bellows out then bellows in every other bar. He pointed out that the structure of Bach's music allows for a methodological way to learn the bandoneon's keyboard, which from what I can tell is like a mad man's typewriter, no logical order, which different notes for when the bellows are going out versus when they are going in.

Nick also brought out his 78s of different orchestra recordings that he bought in Buenos Aires. The first recording we listened to was Biagi's Quejas de bandoneon and it was like actually hearing Biagi on piano for the first time. The balance between the instruments was also different; we could hear the subtleties of the different attacks for each instrument, and the timbre of the bass and the piano were right there in the mix. After we listened to Pugliese's Malandraca Avik said that he wished he could play the 78 format for his students because the clarity of the sound would have a greater impact on them for understanding Pugliese's music.

At 8:30pm we participated in Nick and Tara's lesson which was on the ways a follower can negotiate back leading. There were about 40 people again, but in a much smaller space this time, which made for a really energetic night. After the lesson, we set up in the middle of the room and played four tandas of music unamplified (which is always nice) with Nick who joined us on bandoneon and Erica, a recent tango music convert on Double bass.

That night, exhausted again, we slept at a sweet downtown Denver pad owned by our lovely host and tango dancer Patricia Muscari. This morning, we were greeted by Ellen at 7:00am who sent us off with some amazing locally baked pastries.

Nick's Tango-Nerdiness-Time Pick-Me-Up Drink

Port Wine
Strong German Liquor (something similar to Everclear)
Raspberries
Red Apples
Blackberries

Soak 1/2 cup of each fruit in the Liquor for 2 days in the fridge. To serve fill a shot glass 1/3 full of the Port then top off with the fruit/liquor blend. Be sure to fish some of the fruit out of the bottom of the jug to have along with the drink.

Fourth Tango Stop - Denver, CO

2007-06-06T10:00:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

We met our liaison, Ellen Yong, for Japanese food in downtown Denver after a nine hour drive out of the plains and officially into "the west". Ellen, an organizer for Tom Stermitz gave us an in depth low down about Tango Colorado and what to expect that night. It ended up that 40 people participated in our musicality class and 100+ people danced during the practica. A lot of folks were still in town from the Denver Memorial Day tango festival, and overall there was a lot of enthusiasm for what we did.

It was exciting to build an energetic rapport with all the dancers through our music, and it was great fun dancing in between our sets. The only regrets I have for the night is that we were so engrossed that we forgot about taking photos!

Lake Anita, IA

2007-06-05T10:00:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

Yesterday we drove 10 and half hours from North Ridgeville, OH to Lake Anita State Park, about 10 miles south of I-80 in western Iowa. We found out that Monday night is an excellent night for camping; we had the place to ourselves. We enjoined wonderful weather, about 70 degrees and a balmy breeze that kept the bugs away.

Our night included a home cooked camp meal of penne pasta with shitake mushroom sauce, a bottle of Spanish wine, a walk around the lake with a view of the sun setting over the cow studded horizon, and a tango jam by the fire. We had no problems sleeping!

Whole Wheat Penne with Shiitake Mushroom Tomato Sauce

2 small leeks, chopped
2 baby onions, diced
2 cloves garlic, diced
1 yellow squash, chopped
! zucchini, chopped
1/2 lb Shitake Mushrooms, thinly sliced
1/3 cup wine
1 Large Can of Whole Peeled Tomatoes, juice reserved
Sea Salt
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 lb whole wheat penne

Saute leeks, onions, garlic in the olive oil for 2 minutes. Add zucchini. Saute for 2 more minutes. Add third cup wine and reduce by half. Then add the reserved tomato juice and reduce by half again. Add shitakes. Meanwhile, quarter the tomatoes and add them to the sauce. Cook 2 minutes more, remove from the heat and cover.

Meanwhile, fill the largest camp pan available with water and place over high heat (two quarts of water if possible). Add Salt to the water after it begins to boil and then add the pasta.

Cook about 7-10 minutes, drain, then portion the pasta out in bowls and spoon the sauce over the top.

Be sure to drink the rest of the wine that was used in the dish :)

Mahler and the Great Outdoors

2007-06-04T12:00:00.001-05:00

Avik:

In the summer after my junior year of high school (way back in 1994), I traveled to Europe with Blue Lake's International Youth Symphony Orchestra. One of the nicest things about the trip was that we were able to stay with host families instead of staying in hotels. It was a great way to go beyond stereotypes and experience France, Germany, Switzerland, Denmark, and Italy from a local perspective.

In a small town in Germany called Bad Kissingen I found something in common with one of my hosts--a love for the music of Gustav Mahler. I had started listening to Mahler during my sophomore year and though it took a little getting used to, he became my favorite composer. My host was so surprised that a high school kid from America had a passion for Mahler that he gave me my first Mahler CD, his first symphony recorded by the Royal Konzertgebouw Orchestra under Leonard Bernstein.

Now, almost exactly 13 years later, I'm going on the second music tour of my life. And though this tour is about tango music, Mahler is still playing a role. Turns out that Andrew is also a big Mahler fan too and we're planning on listening to all his symphonies during our many hours of driving. We started today with Zubin Mehta's recording of Mahler's First with the New York Philharmonic. I realized that I always listened to Mahler indoors and it was an interesting experience to listen to while watching the Ohio landscape pass by. I don't know how Mahler would feel about being consumed on a concrete superhighway, but it worked for me :)

The Joys of Car Cooking

2007-06-04T12:00:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

Andrew and I met five years ago, and it has been through traveling that we have learned our most important life lessons and life skills. We stumbled upon the joys of car cooking, an important life skill in its own right, in 2003 during a spring break trip down to Big Bend National Park where we drove 28 hours straight to get there. We realized that we could fill up our thermos from the hot water taps from gas station stops and make a lot of interesting things with couscous, tabouli, and other "Fantastic" brand dehydrated bean and grain mixes.

During our travels last summer we began to explore as many variations on the car sandwiches, especially on the coast of Northern California, Oregon, and Washington an area with delicious breads, beautiful produce, and hand-crafted locally made cheeses. The combination of vegetables and cheese is ideal for car travel because the cheese can be bought in small portions meant to be consumed right away and the veggies can keep up to a couple of days buried under towels in the trunk. We normally avoid bringing a cooler because there isn't room, (our music equipment takes up almost ALL of the space in our trunk) and second without a cooler we don't have to bother with the watery mess that often comes with a cooler, with constantly finding a source to create the cold, or problems with food spoilage!

Today during our drive from outside Cleveland to western Iowa we made our first car sandwich of the trip with food purchased at the Giant Eagle in North Ridgeville, OH:

Veggie and Cheese Sandwich on a Sourdough Baguette

Organic Monterey Sourdough Baguette
Fresh Radishes, still with the greens (save for later :)
Grape Tomatoes
Green Onions, white parts plus one-inch of the green parts
1 Avocado
Tillamook Medium Smoked Cheddar

Cut the baguette in half lengthwise then divide into three equal portions. Thinly slice the radishes, tomatoes, avocado, and cheese. Slice the green onion lengthwise. Layer in this order: radishes, avocado, tomatoes, cheese, and top with the long slices of green onion.

Some practical issues of car cooking:
Some essential car cooking equipment include: miniature cutting board, a compact light weight knife that has stability and sharpness (I use a cut-co paring knife) some small prep bowls (I use the small plastic soup bowls that you can find at Asian markets), a few lightweight plastic plates (can be found in some picnic sets) and a few towels that you don't mind getting a little messed up. Why use non-paper items? Well, isn't that the point, why spend all that effort to make my own food if I am going to throw away as many paper and plastic products as if I bought pre-made road food? It does, however, take some creativity and planning to keep the dishes clean!

Third Tango Stop - Cleveland, OH

2007-06-04T10:00:00.000-05:00

Carmen:

The class and milonga were at Timmy and Joanne Pogros' house, affectionately named Alegria. It is located in North Ridgeville, a west suburb of Cleveland Ohio. Dancers started showing up around 6:30 for the musicality class. It was our third run of the class and was the first time that the material really started to click. Andrew began the class with an explanation of what makes tango sound like tango music, and then we moved to talking about marcatto in 2 using Andrew's accompaniment and then Di Sarli's El Choclo as an example. Avik showed how to use slow walking beats and pauses for marcatto in 2. Next we moved to marcatto in 4, talking about how to use quick steps. Andrew and I played La Cumparsita and we used late 30s D'Arienzo's recording. Next, Avik explained syncopa rhythm, what it is, how to find it, and movement possibilities for dancing it. Andrew and I played La Cumparsita again, marking the first phrase change with a syncopa. Then, I suggested that we use Calo's Jamas Retornaras as another example of how to anticipate a phrase change/pause that if followed by a syncopa. One of the students in the class asked if every tango had syncopa and I realized for the first time that I couldn't think of a single tango that didn't have syncopa somewhere in it.

The milonga was lively, with some of Joanne's homemade food especially her stuffed pastries with cheese, ham, and spinach. It was the last night of traveling and dancing with the Ann Arbor posse, Alan, Gabriela, and Patricia before we are off toward Denver.

Second Tango Stop - Pittsburgh, PA

2007-06-03T10:00:00.001-05:00

Carmen:

The first place we went to in Pittsburgh was a neighborhood community center where Norberto "El Pulpo" Esbrez (or known as El Pulpo, the octopus) and his wife Luiza Paes were teaching a class in the basement. We decided to join in on their lesson which was right before our musicality class.

That night, the milonga was in the upstairs loft of Peter's Pub, a bar just off of downtown Pittsburgh. The upstairs was lined with booth seats and the floor was half wood and half tiled. We set on the edge of the tiled area as other musicians arrived for a tango jam session. Musicians from two different Pittsburgh tango groups showed up, Tangueros de ley, and Step. The instrumentation for the jam was a nine piece groups: piano, bass, two guitars, bandoneon, accordion, two clarinets and flute. From the first note of Nueve de Julio we could tell it was going to be a fun jam, the sound was full and each musician was doing a good job of listening and fitting their own part within the group. Jams are usually played "a la parrila" a term that translates literally "on the grill" which means that the music is arranged/improvised on the spot. The more musicians there are the harder it is to manage on the spot arranging. However, even though we had not played together as a group before, we managed to trade off sections between ourselves and fit in the variations that we knew.

The milonga went until 1:30am. We played two sets with Gabriela singing a tanda of tango (La Cumparsita, Garua, Malena) and a tanda of milonga (Silueta portena, Campo afuera, El Portenito) with us. The upstairs bar was full of people socializing and it took a while to get out of the milonga. We ended up shooting the breeze with Sean Cosgrove (our host with his wife Trini Regaspi) and Pulpo until after the bar closed at 2:00am, and we ended up staying awake until 4:00 back at Trini and Sean's listening to Pulpo play recordings of his father's group called Tango Trio, talking us about his birthday tango week in November, and telling ridiculous stories about Llamas.

Pulpo's Will to Power

2007-06-03T10:00:00.000-05:00

Andy:

This spring, I formed a philosophy book discussion group in Grand Rapids, Michigan that ended up consisting of 5 tango musicians and tango dancers from the Grand Rapids Tango Community. We met once a week to discuss our first book, Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche. After talking with Pulpo into the morning hours while in Pittsburgh I see some similarities in their approaches to life.

Nietzsche says that the greatest thing in life is a person's will. He says that each of us is to strive to do the greatest things we can with this life. In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche compares the power to do great things in the life through our will to climbing a mountain.

Pulpo told us that really great people in tango should not be removed from dancers or put on a pedestal so to speak because being up so high and so great does not allow others to learn from them. He told us that we should get together and meet and learn from those who we admire so that we can become great artists too. We make this possible though courage and through our will to become better dancers, musicians, and artists.

If we look at Pulpo, he has done this very thing through his life by using his will, his drive, and his environment to push him to a new ground of creative dancing. Nietzsche says that we cannot really on having great parents or being famous because of a name--that is fake. Riding solely on the fame of others is like a house that looks beautiful on the outside but has nothing in it. Instead Nietzsche and Pulpo are saying that one should use all of their resources to fill their house with great things and have a meager humble outside.

First Tango Stop - Columbus, OH

2007-06-02T18:50:00.001-05:00

Carmen:

We arrived to teach a 6:00pm class at Emack & Bolio's, an ice cream shop near downtown Columbus. Patricia Greve and Gabriela Contreras traveled with us from Ann Arbor, Patricia to demonstrate with Avik in the classes and Gabriela to sing with us. Inside the ice cream shop, the tables and couches were pushed to the back and to the right of the door leaving a dance space on the left about 40 feet long and 15 feet wide that was lined with cafe chairs. We set up our equipment in front of the window.

There 10 people in the class that we taught. We used a mix of live music to discuss contrasts in tango music: marcatto in 2 vs. marcatto in 4, marcatto in 4 versus syncopa, choppy versus smooth, and how to fit walking, quick steps, the follower's cross, and ocho cortado with them.

There were many folks from out of town at the milonga. Robin Thomas was in town for a workshop weekend through the Columbus Argentina Tango Society (CATS) and taught a class after us. There were people from Cleveland and Ann Arbor who came down for the milonga.

The temperature was a high of 94 degrees that day in Columbus so it was nice that the shop keepers kept serving ice cream until the end of the milonga at 1:00am.

Beginning!

2007-06-01T14:00:00.000-05:00

Avik:

The tour starts! Andrew and Carmen came and picked me up from Ann Arbor and we stuffed the car (or as Andrew likes to call it, our home) with our things and we hit the road. The 3 hour drive to Columbus seemed like nothing since I was settling into my new office (the backseat) and playing with all my gadgetry like my GPS device, FM transmitter, window shade, and cardboard box
turned laptop shade. We also searched through my tango music library to find the perfect examples of marcatto in 2, marcatto in 4, and syncopa. Hopefully, these will work out in the class...

June 2007: Trio Folias U.S. Tango Tour

2007-05-07T12:34:00.000-05:00

Trio Folias combines Avik Basu, Andrew Bergeron, and Carmen Maret, all with expertise in Argentine tango music performance and Argentine social tango dance instruction. The Trio Folias tour events will include live music at milongas, musicality focused dance lessons and workshops for dancers. In addition to founding and teaching tango in the Grand Rapids Tango Community, Carmen Maret and Andrew Bergeron of Folias flute and guitar duo have performed live social tango music throughout the United States for the past four years. They join with Avik Basu who is a key organizer and teacher in the Ann Arbor tango community which has developed into one of the most vibrant tango scenes in the country.