Mid-Winter's Play

That's yours truly as Old Dame Jane, my wife as the Horse Doctor, daughter as Billy Pud, second daughter as Bold Slasher, making our salutes after our mummers play has ended at a recent holiday party. We sneaked down to the basement mostly unnoticed, donned costumes, then exited the side door to ring our own doorbell. We knew it was working when our dog, Romeo, didn't recognize us and set to barking at us (that's him in lower right).

Wikipedia says these death and resurrection folk plays, dating from medieval Europe are not to be confused with earlier mystery plays, but there seems to be some mystery in them.

What we know about this has come from maybe 25 years of participation, mostly as the visited, but also as players, with the Lowry Hill Players and the Ritual Drama Team, led by Rudd Rayfield. As in Europe a long time ago, mummers in strange costume traipse the streets during the Christmas holiday season, looking for good parties to crash. They start singing when the owner answers their knock on the door, and, in sung verse, they ask to be let in to perform their short play. Afterward, to song and dance, the players pass their purse for replenishment and gladly accept any offers to join the holiday party and table. It is a way to turn social norms up-side-down at least for one evening a year.

As a player, it is a nervy thing to knock on a stranger's door and ask to be admitted, especially in times of fear-mongering. Some homeowners blanch, scowl and shut their doors. Others are caught in the wonder, and slowly trust and come to joy and revelry with the strangers in their midst. Sometimes, guests at the party have the most difficulty, as they see their social status suddenly change right in the moment and they are suddenly made peers with a strange rabble that has been admitted by their host.

After the party one year, a friend who attended and who saw the mummers for the first time, confided in me that he was ready to grab them and haul them back outside. I know my first impulse can be to scream, run or want to fight when I encounter something strange and wild.

Here there is the thrill that comes after having taken such risks, both as players and as the admitting host, and having engaged the play-making that frames both life and that essential part of life – death – and then we recognize ourselves as still being alive and in the presence of good friends, and the smells and tastes of good food and drink. Ahhh!

Permission

The woman in the mink coat slumped down in her wheelchair in front of me is 101 years old. “Louise” has come with other elders from area nursing homes this December afternoon to watch the dress rehearsal of Kairos Dance Theatre’s recent show at Intermedia Arts in Minneapolis, Take Me Back to Hip Harlem. She is someone I’ve come to know through participating in my wife Maria and Kairos’ Dancing Heart™ program for elders.

When I first met Louise in a Dancing Heart session, I heard that she is a former violinist who had played in the orchestra that preceded and became the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. She seemed slight, birdlike and old. At the end of our session, I went to her and asked if she wanted to hold my violin. She said, “No.” I asked again, and she again demurred. Then I handed it to her. With a look of horror, she accepted it, held it for as long as she thought she had to, then quickly gave it back to me, as if I had just done something terribly clumsy and stupid.

I became embarrassed, suddenly seeing my – until then – unconscious condescension and patronizing attitude toward her.

In subsequent sessions, I took more time to approach her, ask permission and wait until permission was granted. I came to experience her as very sensitive, precise, nuanced and heartfelt. She told me how she loved music and played it all her life. She could only listen now, she said, and her son sometimes brought her violin to her so she could hold it and smell it. She liked my playing in the group. I told her how I had come back to music about six years ago, loved playing the folk music, and was just feeling my way back into the music world. At the end of the sessions, I asked again if she wanted to hold my violin. She would say yes and I would hand it to her. She held it to herself expertly, cradling it, then drew it to her nose, and inhaled slowly and deeply the wood, varnish and rosin smells. Then, she would kiss my violin, hand it back to me and say, “Keep playing…”

Now, at the rehearsal, she is right at the edge of the apron of the stage in this intimate theater, twenty feet away from these powerful jazz cats – Peter Schimke, Kevin Washington, Douglas White and Fred Steele to be joined by Irv Williams. The musicians are feeling their way into working with each other, getting their groove on, and laying out elegant and impassioned tunes and songs for the inter-generational dancers, ages 4-100, who also are right here – in solos, duets and ensemble work of humor, sorrow, dignity and moments of redemption.

During a pause in the rehearsal, I had gone down and greeted Louise, kneeling down beside her. Once she recognized me, she asked if I had my violin with me. No, I said. I wasn’t in the show. “You should have it,” she replied.

Now, at the end of the rehearsal, in the ring-out of the richness of the show and after the applause, with the musicians packing up and the dancers getting their parting instructions, I kneel down again in front of her, extending my hand and thanking her for coming. She holds my hand and takes that tone with me that she sometimes has. Her eyes are molten, coal black and fierce, she holds her jaw and mouth in resolve, and from her is coming this fire, framed by elegantly teased red hair and the mink of her coat over her smart understated dress. No need to thank her, she is telling me. “This is me…I love this!” she says.

It’s as if I’ve put myself between the lover and what she loves, and I see her as a young woman in love with music, and imagine how a young man, seeing her like this, would fall for her. Flaring her lip and drawing out the word “love,” she says, again, as if I need to be tutored, “I love this…”

© 2010 Cristopher Anderson

All Rights Reserved

Medal from the King

In these photos, Paul Dahlin, folk fiddler and founder of the American Swedish Institute Spelmanslag, is being awarded the Knight First Class of the Polar Star by The Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Kingdom of Sweden to the United States of America Jonas Hafstrom. The ceremony was held at the ASI castle in Minneapolis a few weeks ago in front of a hundred guests and performers. The Polar Star is the highest honor bestowed by H.M. King Carl XVI Gustave on a non-Swede.

Paul accepted the medal in recognition for his many years of service with the Spelmanslag since its founding in 1985, and for continuing the tradition of this folk music from Rattvik, Sweden, that came down from his immigrant grandfather Edwin Johnson. Other family members that play with Paul in the Spelmanslag are his mother (daughter of Edwin) Nancy Johnson Dahlin, uncle Bruce Johnson, wife Marikay and son Daniel. The Spelmanslag is a folk orchestra of 30 fiddles, a bass, guitar, viola and a cittra, a Swedish table harp. I found them about three years ago, fell in love with the syncopated melodies and uncanny harmonies, and their gracious hospitality, and joined the group. We play concerts, and at dances, festivals and other events.

I also fell for Paul's clear, humble and gracious heart. I think I can say that all of us in the Spelmanslag admire and trust this man. He is another introvert who does very fine work as a luthier at House of Note violin shop, and who is quietly and persistently in love with this music. He has now turned over artistic direction of the Spelmanslag to the able Mary Hegge, but he is still a major part of the group. We always look forward to his parable-like stories of fiddlers and tunes and playing, his gentle wit, his deft knowledge and instruction, and his overall generosity sharing what he loves.

In our rehearsal on the Thursday following the medal ceremony, Paul noted, in his quiet way, that the award he received was for all of us and that it acknowledged that in which all of us were a part. This is typical Paul. And it engenders in us great loyalty and enthusiasm. We'd do anything for him – even practice, or show up before dawn to play a Lucia festival.

Right now, in addition to the music, I'm enjoying three things:

1. The simplicity, graciousness, heart and power of Paul's personality - like that 3rd brother in the folk tales who has the humility to share his food with the most humble person or creature he meets on the road, and who, unlike his prideful brothers, is the Knight who goes on to inherit the kingdom.
2. The verticality that Dr. Robert Moore talks about in his splendid book on masculine psychology, King, Warrior, Magician, Lover, that goes from His Majesty the King of Sweden, through the Ambassador, to Paul the Knight, and then to me and others in the Spelmanslag. I feel it and it is lovely to be associated with this line of power and be acknowledged for our service.
3. And, that incredible title for the Ambassador - "extraordinary and plenipotentiary"! I think it evokes that old European image of the green man, the masculine figure intent on encouraging, planting and husbanding in many different ways. According to Wikipedia, plenipotentiary, in this context, means that the Ambassador has full authority to represent his government. It is interesting how the word plenipotentiary has the word potent inside it. And, here, it seems to come from the king. Moore, in his book The King Within: Accessing the King in the Male Psyche, explores how men can come into relationship with the king structure in their personality, while being responsible for what he calls the "shadow king." What person doesn't want to have his or her own full authority to do what he or she needs or wants to do? Move over, Powdermilk Biscuits.
   

So, now it is great fun to encounter this experience with the energy of the king externally as it actually comes from a temporal king, through his Ambassador to a humble Knight, and thus to all of us in the Spelmanslag, and to imagine how a similar experience might play out internally inside my psyche. Or, you can imagine how it might play out inside yours.

Paul previously received a 1996 National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship for his work. Check the Spelmanslag web site for performance info. One hot tip – don't miss the Nordic Ball, scheduled for January 29, 2011. Spelmanslag recordings are available at the ASI book store and other outlets.


Top photo, Virginia Windschitl. 2nd photo, Jenn Stromberg. Used with permission.

© 2010 Cristopher Anderson

All Rights Reserved

Attractive Weirdness of the Elder

I was thrilled to be asked to offer a tune on my fiddle and a poem during one of two evening presentations by author and healer Malidoma Somé last month, presented by local organizer and men's work leader Dan Gorbunow in association with Mankind Project Minnesota. If you don't follow Somé's work, I recommend him highly. He has two PhD's and is initiated as an elder in his village in Burkino Faso, and is in the west, acting as a conduit between his somewhat mythologically intact culture and contemporary post-modern society. He has thrilled, perplexed and inspired us for many years up at the Minnesota Men's Conference.

Somé's society puts the initiation of youth into adulthood at the center of village life in order to maintain that life. Elders of his village are the "guardrails" for this work, he says, that allows youth to "bloom" and learn to use their gifts.

During his presentation, I was struck by his description of the worthy elder, and realized that these are the ones that I meet that I trust. Somé says the elder should seek an authenticity that is not self-assigned, and one that youth will immediately recognize. This authenticity is based in humility, my own lived experience, is not about seeking my own benefit, and is seen as a potential helping tool for everyone. As he said that, I realized these are the elders I trust and am immediately drawn toward. Somé says, "Our culture doesn't need old people, but we do need elders." Boy, do we ever!

Somé went on to say that the elder should seek an aesthetic that is an "attractive weirdness" that is true to ourselves, and that immediately communicates to the youth that where they are headed is just fine.

Working with elders in Kairos Dance Theatre's Dancing Heart™ program, I try to be vulnerable to their "blessing," even if it is a fleeting smile, to show them that they have this power. And, as I seek to develop my own capability and visibility as an elder, I start to pay more attention to what the world and people in the world want from me, and less attention to what I think I want.

It is humbling and touching to be asked to do something or be someone for a younger person, so that he or she might navigate some narrow passageway and blossom into someone and something bigger that might serve our community. That trust that he or she can extend to me is precious and I try to be worthy of it.

(Don't) Push the Red Button

We're in the heat of acting out a moment in a Dancing Heart™ session at the Fairview Seminary Home in Red Wing, Minnesota. The Dancing Heart™ – Vital Elders Moving in Community is my wife Maria Genné’s and Kairos Dance Theatre's pioneering, national award winning, evidence-based performing arts program for elders that is improving quality of life and reducing costs of healthcare.

"Emily" is telling a story from her childhood, when her family lived in and were caretakers of an old mansion, and the kids liked to sneak off and play on the elevator, being careful not to push the red button, which would set off the alarm. DH Teaching Artist Carla Vogel is interviewing Emily and prompting the telling of the story. As a Teaching Artist, I've jumped in to act out the moment and involve others in the group of about twenty-five elders, caregivers and volunteers. And Teaching Artist Peter Podulke is seeded in the group – with his big voice, in this moment he is like a one person Greek Chorus, warning, "Oh...the parents better not find out..."

I beckon around the room and ask, “Anyone want to play with me on the elevator? C’mon, let’s go!” Peter wheels “Anne” over in her wheelchair to join the elevator play. He asks her, “Do you want to play on the elevator?” She responds, “Why would I want to do that?” We know her well enough to know she still wants to play. We find out later this situation has made her remember a moment in her childhood when she got caught doing something “wrong.” I ask “Bill,” one of the young men from the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Red Wing, to join us in this play. He is with a group that comes to the nursing home to volunteer as an integrative experience prior to release. Dressed in the institution blue polo shirt and khaki slacks, he shrinks back and shakes his head ‘no.’

I’m acting as if the whole room is crowded with me in the little elevator. Then, I notice how enticing is the red button. I make a large slow gesture of going to push the button, saying, “Oh…look at that red button…I think we should push the red button…” Peter and Anne in the wheel chair right next to me, and just about everyone in the room holler, “No…not the red button!” “But I want to...” I say and continue moving toward it. “No, not the red button!” the group booms. “But…” I say. “No…” “Okay,” I relent, “I’ll push one of these other buttons…”

After we disband the play, as the laughs and talking subside, we quickly note that this was just innocent child’s play, no one got hurt, but by not hitting the red button, we’ve made it so we might be able to come back and play on the elevator again. “Don’t you think that’s true?” Emily, Anne and Bill all look relieved and as if they’ve enjoyed all of this. A few moments of mischief, potential conflict and play have been successfully negotiated, with great pleasure. And, we’re all in it, together.

Carl Jung said, “the symbol itself heals.” He also said that there is a “natural gradient within the psyche toward healing and wholeness.” We can simply jump into these moments of play that arise, no matter how humble they look, knowing there is value in fully living in this moment, and trusting and affording sovereignty to individuals involved to have their own experience and make their own meaning from it.

During this play, I think the job of the Teaching Artist is to hold the place I call the ‘ideal parent’ – creating safety to take risks, encouraging involvement and the expression of emotion, and neutralizing and metabolizing shame. And, above all, to encourage the thrill of making and experiencing performance art.

This kind of improvisational play, based in biography, in a trusting creative process, using dance, theater, story, poetry and music, creates “vital engagement” with and between participants – patients, caregivers, and volunteers. This is positively changing institutional cultures and providing enhanced quality of life. It means fewer falls, less medicines and fewer doctor visits, and more laughter and enjoyment for residents. It means more enjoyment for families. It means more satisfaction for staff.

Current institutional partners of Kairos and the Dancing Heart™ include the Wilder, Ebenezer Fairview, Thorp, Phillips, George and Larson Foundations. The program is for elders in various settings, including long-term care, and including elders with Alzheimer's disease.

On Vimeo, you can watch a little mini-documentary I produced on the program, called Dancing Heart™ – Power to Nuture and Heal. And, you can learn more about the program and research findings on the Kairos web site.

New Book - Seasons

Two of my poems are included in the just released anthology, Seasons, from the Southwest Journal Poetry Project, published by Trolley Car Press. It is a handsome book. There is something special about buying a poetry book at the local hardware store.

Here is the blurb from the Trolley Car Press web site:

Over 100 poems representing more than 40 poets, with illustrations by WACSO. A fascinating (and gorgeous) book!

Here are poems set in Minnesota’s four seasons, love poems for all seasons, poems about children, whimsical notions, unusual characters and the transitions we experience as we travel life’s pathways... with delightful illustrations throughout.

Available now at retailers listed below. Or you can order directly from Trolley Car Press. Cost is $21, including taxes and shipping.

Available at: Bibelot, Bayers Hardware, Linden Hills Florist, Gallery 360.

Nine of my poems were included in the previous Trolley Car Press anthology, Between the Lakes: The Poets of Linden Hills, still available from the publisher.

Medicine

I thought I'd put my little poem here, Medicine, that is the one that I get requests for the most. I started this poem after I was driving to my office one day and noticed how I just had to listen to the Johnny Cash song on the radio. I tried to figure out why he was so compelling. The poem is included in my manuscript, Folk Remedies. In the poem, I've changed the gender of the singer. I think it might be true.

Here it is:


Medicine

The singer has our hearts because
we know she's been to the other side.

How do you make a healer? Hurt him and
then let the trees put him back together.

So, why do I tremble?
I'm being made useful.

This medicine only works
for the believer.

© 2002 Cristopher Anderson
All Rights Reserved

Believing in the Bride and Groom

It was a great adventure and delight to serve as officiant at the wedding of Anne and Aaron this past August. Anne and her family are dear friends of my family for many years.

The bride was beautiful, the groom handsome, and both of their families were celebrating these two as they made their vows and committed their lives to each other. They are mad for each other and it is easy to believe in their love.

I think it is honorable to just disappear with your sweetheart, elope and get married on your own, but families are usually so eager to celebrate the occasion. While a wedding can be an experience of a lifetime for the couple, also it can be a deeply meaningful experience for the families. It can be a crucible where memory is evoked, kinship ties are felt more deeply, and aches and longings of the heart are more poignant for everyone. The hunger for relationship can be vivid, and our loneliness sharpened at such times.

During these days of the wedding preparation and celebration, the bride and groom, being at the center of the spectacle as they are, have more power than they usually have to encourage and bless (small "b") others, I think. And these blessings can fall on and nourish the recipients like spring rain on hungry dry ground.

There is a beloved old Irish folk song, the Kerry Dance, with the lyrics,

Was there a sweeter Colleen in the dance than Eily More, Or a prouder lad than Thady as he boldly took the floor?

In this case, both the bride and groom probably have sweetness, pride and boldness in equal measure, as they should. It is a sweet honor and delight to behold the lovers, remembering and reliving our own loves, perhaps shedding a tear at the passing of time and our losses, and shining our smiles of belief and celebration back toward the couple.

© 2010 Cristopher Anderson

All Rights Reserved

Playing for Open Hearts

My dear friend and fellow fiddler Ruth joined me to play at the funeral service for the mother of a friend of a friend a few weeks ago. Ruth has a open stout heart I trust, and I love her harmonies.

We could see the spire of the old country church above the July tall cornfields south of Minneapolis. A rainstorm had gone through the night before and washed everything fresh, making the air moist. Everything green seemed to be breathing deep breaths.

It was an honor to be in the presence of the dignity and deep feeling as the minister led the service outside at graveside, and family members spoke to their memories of their beloved mother, aunt and mother-in-law.

We started the service with three Swedish folk tunes as people were settling into chairs that had been set up on the grass. Their mother was Swedish, and her family members had farmed nearby and were some of the founders of the church.

I ventured a poignant Finnish funeral march I love at a moment in the middle of the service, and then Ruth and I finished up with a florid Swedish tune, the harmonies twining around each other.

Then, we went ahead, down to the church basement, and played another set of folk tunes in front of the piano as family and friends came down for the lunch that was prepared.

Afterward, the son who asked us to be there said we were “the glue that held it all together.” Another man came up to us at the lunch and said our playing and the setting reminded him of the film, Sweet Land. If you haven't seen this film, you are in for a real treat. It is a beloved first feature from Minnesota director Ali Selim. I've seen it three times and I'd go back again.

Again, it was an utter honor to be in the presence of such dignity and tenderness, and to serve at these moments of family transition and meaning. For the musician, it is a treat to play for the love of the music to such tender hearts.

Little Woman on the Run and Other Fragments of the Gone World

Chrissie Mahaffy – Folk Fiddles – Hearsay – Dance

Saturday, March 27^th, 8pm, Twin Cities Friends Meeting, 1725 Grand Avenue, Saint Paul, suggested contribution: $12 adults, $6 children

I think you’ll enjoy this evening of stories, hearsay, folk fiddles and dance at one of the Twin Cities favorite and intimate performance arts venues.

• Chrissie Mahaffy is a charming autodidact who is writing a book about her adventures with children in her home daycare (my daughters attended), Greenspoon, in Uptown Minneapolis. She has great stories about children, their dramas, foibles and culture, and is a pleasure to listen to.

• Some of the best fiddlers from the American Swedish Institute Spelmanslag (http://www.asispelmanslag.org/) will be playing. If you’ve never heard flat-out folk fiddling like this, with the harmonies and chording, you’re in for a treat. This is a living tradition, passed down from family members, from Rattvik, Sweden. Fiddlers planning to appear include Daniel Dahlin, Bruce Johnson, Jennifer Olsen Loayza, Kristen Ottoson Niehaus and Jamie Harris.

• All the music played is dance music. Gifted folk dancers Mary Hegge and Craig Johnson will model Scandinavian dances and invite us to participate. Mary is also a fiddler and Artistic Director of the ASI Spelmanslag. Craig is active in the local Scandinavian folk dance scene.

• I will contribute hearsay, and the feature story, "Little Woman..." which is about a troubling encounter I had a few years ago.

• In addition, I will explore a few small bits of folk culture that I think have compelling social and psychological relevance (the "Fragments of the Gone World"), and that might represent what poet Derek Walcott called, in his 1992 Nobel Prize acceptance speech, “fragments of epic memory.”

Come prepared to have a good time. I look forward to seeing you!

 (Photo above © Victor Medina of his dog, Flaco -- thank you, Victor!)

–      Stofer