Having a folk club on a Friday which is also a national holiday
is always a bit of a risk, as there is a great temptation for Bonners to take a
long weekend break, as some may see fit, to travel to far- flung places, and
even if they decide to stay put, September had provided many „beer garden
evenings“ to enjoy before winter finally beckons everyone seasonally indoors.
Still, as it was not a religious holiday, music and dancing and singing were allowed, so
we went for it! Furthermore, we are very
glad that we did so!
German Unity Day is the National Day of Germany, celebrated
on the 3rd October as a public holiday. It commemorates German reunification in
1990 when the German Democratic Republic ceased to exist and joined the Federal
Republic of Germany, so that for the first time since 1945 there existed a
single German state. As ex-Chancellor Willy Brandt once famously said, „What
belongs together is now growing together.“
We certainly must thank Germany that this massive fusion
after 45 years of enforced separation occured so peacefully. The border troops
of East Germany were an elite military force and part of the National Peoples‘
army, they were responsible for border security in the GDR. They had spent
their active careers, literally „shooting to kill“ when needs must, as individual
escapees dared to chance their luck by escaping tot he West. Luckily, they were
better trained than the regular Volkspolizei (VoPos), the regular police force
responsible for law enforcement and public order there It would have only taken one or two nervous
border guards to have panicked and fired their weapons, for the cobbled
streeets of the GDR to be covered with torrents of gushing red blood, marooning everyone in
endless conflict, rather than the cobbles being merely covered with the
previous evening’s drops of pale off-white dried candle wax, still emitting peaceful future
hope.
This was a
truly wonderful, glorious and peaceful revolution, for which we should all be
eternally grateful, as the Berlin Wall peacefully fell on 09.11.1989.
We consiously and deliberately do not "do politics" at the folk club, but we do "do history in spades" and this would certainly the single most significant historical event in most of our lifetimes. So, where there is hope, there is music, and where there is music, there is hope.
Mario Dompke had already organised a Waldzither-themed evening at the folk club in March this year, but in October he excelled himself and managed to persuade Tim Liebert, aka "Doc Fritz" to grace our humble stage and Tim, from Jena in Thuringia is renown as the country's leading waldzither player. So this wonderful fact combined with our local folk titan Tom Kannmacher also playing on the evening, traditional German folkies were very well served indeed!
I started off the evening with a Leon Rosselson song "The World Turned Upside Down" which followed the revolutionary thoughts of Gerrard WInstanley, who was hoping to make 1649, following the execution of the monarch Charles I, a celebratuion of "English Unity", but alas, it was not to be. My song about Covid-19 was unforunately a bridge too far, and too soon, as come the following Tuesday I was to succumb to it once again, after a three year break since the last time. (On the bright side: at least I do not have to worry about a C-19 booster for the next twelve months!)
Mario's group "Fominader" were next up, ths time as a trio with Sonja Daniels on
vocals and ukelele and Karin Thomas on flute
Rick Fines from Canada came to visit us for the second time and graced us
with a floor sot of his own material
Playing bottleneck with some superb picking on a single cone cutaway metal resonator guitar, we are very fortunate to have Rick among our midst. With 14 albums already to his name, the average quality of our local artists just took a considerable boost upwards.
He might even be appearing in The Folker magazine soon, with their star photographer
and reporter Michael A. Schmiedel present on the evening.
Man of the match was undoubtably the bearded star from the east, "Doc Fritz"It was a great joy for the 80 odd souls present in the audience
A joy to behold Tim's Waldzither wizardry often accompanied by harmonica in a rack.
After the break Wolfgang Schriefer took us fishing.
Tom Kannmacher did not bring his Uillean pipes along this time but regaled us with his unusual German lute, which he referred to as a "bastard", which I think refered to the tuning thereof!?!
We were most fortunate to have two folk musocoans of the calibre of
Tom Kannmacher and Tim Liebert appearing on the same evening,
We were waiting almost a full year for meoneo to have a free first Friday of the month available in order for them to come along and do a floor spot again with us. Our colaboration with Werner Krotz.Vogel and Claudia Huisman goes back many years to our Graurheindorf days.
Werner is a wonderful jazz guitarist who has been influenced by many talented folk
guitarists such as John Martyn and Claudia treated us to some amzing Satchmo
umpression, not just of his deep dulcet voval tones, but also if his horn as well!
Please do not leave it so long before your next visit!
Gerd Schinkel who had recently played a concert in Bad Godesberg dedicated to the American singer/songwiriter John Prinem did an "Annette" of John Prone's song, "Summer's End"
which was well conform with the evening's theme.
Tim Liebert once more takes us on some wonderful Waldzither travels,
and beguiles us with his mastery of the instrument
Playig one of his especially tuned harmonicas in a rack to accompany himself on the waldzither is "Doc Fritz's" "piece de resistance" and of course Tim wouldn't be "Doc Fritz" if he did not play his harmonica "the other way around", just like Sonny Terry used to, with the
bass notes on the right hand side, rather than the left.
Tim enthralled us all!
What a wonderful evening it was, even if Jock Stewart had to put in some overtimes at the end,
and a special thanks to Mario for organising it so well.
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