Politics, Poetry and Pub Music

Starting at church apparently leads me down the path to vaudeville.

Tonight the Virginia Historical Society presented its 20th annual J. Harvie Wilkinson, Jr. lecture by journalist Juan Williams at First Baptist church.

Last time I'd been there had been for "South Pacific," a romance but also a story of racial prejudice.

Tonight's offering was less musical, but had a lot to do with his book "Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years 1956-65."

Different mediums, similar topics.

The actual topic was "Virginia and the Characteristics of American Leadership," a platform from which Williams shared all kinds of interesting stories.

First he cracked wise, though. "As someone who writes books about history, I am just happy that all of you showed up. And I'm happy to speak in any venue where Charles Krauthammer can't interrupt me."

He went on to observe, "You are an older, mostly white audience. Many younger people don't know the history of the civil rights movement like this audience."

Isn't that the truth?

I would make a similar analogy that many younger women don't know the history of the women's movement.

But enough of my soapbox.

He told anecdotes of having afternoon tea with Thurgood Marshall after the judge had returned his phone call only to have the Washington Post's receptionist think it was a prank call.

After Marshall called back, speaking to publisher Katherine Graham and editor Ben Bradlee, Williams eventually made contact and set up the meeting.

He talked mostly about how ordinary Virginians had stood on principle despite not always having the law on their side.

"It's a time of tremendous change in Virginia," he told us. "There's a pride in what's possible."

I couldn't have put it any better myself.

Forsaking history for poetry, I went to meet a fiend at the Grace Street Theater for poet Katherine Larson, winner of the VCU Levis Reading Award.

Before he arrived, I chatted up a woman a few seats away, noting about the students in the theater, "They look like babies, don't they?"

"Yes, they do. I can't believe I ever looked that young, " she agreed. "But you look like a baby, too."

Presently my friend arrived so I didn't have to talk to a woman with vision issues any more.

"I've never seen this many people at a poetry reading," he observed looking around.

It was an unusually large poetry crowd, I'd agree.

A large-scale painting of Larry Levis stood by the stage in honor of the VCU poet for whom the prize is named.

Larson read her poetry not from her book, "Radical Symmetry," but from sheets of paper, saying, "I'm still not used to the way my poems look in the book."

She didn't have a strong reading voice and I wondered if everyone in the room could always hear her.

Because of her work as a scientist, there was sometimes a noticeably logical/observational side to her poetry.

And some of it was just beautiful phrasing.

In "Low Tide, Evening" she writes, "She is suddenly aware of her desire for him across the table."

"Love at 32 Degrees" was part of a long-form poem with some very scientific references as well as the evocative, "As white and quiet as a woman's slip on wooden floorboards."

I was struck by "Every time I make love for love's sake alone, I betray you," a turn of phrase I'm still chewing on.

She dedicated her last poem "Risk" to her husband, at home with their teething baby, and it provided my favorite line of the reading.

"You haven't much time. Risk it all."

Advice for the ages.

Poetry yielded to conversation and then music at Balliceaux.

Over an unnamed drink created by the bartender for him, my friend told me of his latest dating adventure as we waited for entry to the back room.

We agreed that sometimes it's better to focus on what someone brings to the relationship and not on what they don't bring.

Finally admitted to the back, we were joined by a third, making two musicians and me for an eclectic night of music.

First up were the Richmanian Ramblers, those masters of gypsy-flavored Romanian music.

They'd even brought lyric sheets for those of us who wanted to sing along in Romanian.

It could also be called "pub music" (in fact, it said that on the Facebook invitation) and it wasn't long before one of my two musicians noted, "I wish all music made me feel this good."

How can you not feel good with songs of sheep and drinking?

The combination of upright bass, accordion, clarinet, violin and guitar doing folks songs both profound and hilarious impressed both my first-timer companions.

Listening to Antonia's exquisite voice and Jason's clarinet, the two dominant sounds of the group, is enough to make a person want to start dancing Romanian-style, hands clasped on each other's shoulders.

Their set was too short, but even so I knew it was way past Antonia's bedtime, so I understood.

The Two Man Gentlemen Band took the stage with banter, enthusiasm and a whole lot of outstanding musicianship.

Oh, yes, and seersucker suits.

According to a friend I talked to during the break who'd already seen them, "They're the real deal."

With only upright bass and tenor guitar, they made, as they pointed out, enough sound to be two and a half men ("Would you believe it's just two guys up here?").

My bass-playing friend attributed that to the multitude of notes coming from the bass player's flying fingers, saying, "That's the charmer."

The guitar player on my other side was just as impressed with what the guitar player did with only four strings.

Me, I just loved their oddball lyrics, things like, "I love you but your feet's too big."

There was a song about reefer and one about how they liked to party with girls.

Another was about pig ("My girl tastes like pork chops"), after which Andy, the guitar player inquired, "You girls didn't appreciate that?"

Sure we did.

"You make me swoon when you cross the room" got a background chorus of ahhs that made the song for me.

A swing dancing couple got right up front and tore up the floor as the band got looser.

"Chocolate Milk," as good a song topic as any I guess, got an a cappella treatment at one point.

By the time their set was winding down, everyone was a fan of their retro vaudeville swinging sound and they knew it.

"We're the only authorized dealer of two-man music," they told us, tongues firmly in cheeks.

Before the final song, "Fancy Beer," Andy asked of the crowd, "Do you want the big finish with the John Mellencamp flourish and the samurai finish?"

We did, resulting in leg kicks and overblown arm gestures befitting the close of a show that had won over everyone in the room, including the musician to my right who'd stayed only because of how impressive the band's musical chops were.

By the end, he was hooting and hollering with the rest of the room, including my friend the bass player, who kept thanking me for bringing him out to see two such wonderful bands.

The way I see it, we haven't much time.

Better to be out risking it all with history, poetry, gypsy music and vaudeville while we can.

Let us not forget, it's all about the pride of what's possible.