How does one blog Falcon Ridge? I’ve been going to Falcon Ridge since 1994 and hadn’t really thought about that. Even in 2004 when I rushed off from Falcon Ridge to blog the Democratic National Convention, I didn’t think a lot about blogging Falcon Ridge. It is an event that takes place outside, in the mud, without a lot of computers around.

Yet as I wandered around Falcon Ridge, I saw the “Press Trailer” and I wondered, what sort of press releases were available. Did they have internet connectivity so people could file stories? I decided not to check it out and instead to enjoy the event and maybe send in a few pictures from my cellphone, or Twitter a few different thoughts.

On the one hand, Falcon Ridge is a music festival. I imagine that you could blog it by writing up reports of different performers and the songs they song. I’ll do a little bit of that. However, that doesn’t capture the spirit of Falcon Ridge.

There is the dance tent and the family tent. Some people attend Falcon Ridge and rarely leave the dance tent or family tent. I’ll touch on these as well.

Then, there is the midway. There are many food vendors there, and a good food writer could probably write a few blog posts about the food at Falcon Ridge. I’ll touch on that as well. Then, there is the other shopping. You can buy bumperstickers, tie died dresses, toys, musical instruments and much more. You can get a massage, get your face painted, or have a henna design draw on you. I’ll write less about the shopping aspect.

Yet all of this doesn’t come close to capturing what Falcon Ridge is really all about. On the midway, we ran into Dan Navarro. Fiona went up and told him that “Teacher, Teacher” was one of her favorite songs, and he sang a brief phrase from it for her.

No, to write about Falcon Ridge, you need to capture the sense of magic, community, empathy, and friendship that pervades the experience. Hopefully, I’ll be able to capture some of this as well.

We arrived Thursday afternoon, too late for the Contra Workshop for Novices and too late to get the best camping sites. However, we drove around the 10 Acre pasture and found what appeared to be a decent spot. We rolled down our window and asked the people camping next to it to see if someone was camping there and hadn’t set up their tents yet. They said the space was available and so we sent up our tents and spent some time getting to know the people that would be our neighbors for the next few days.

By neighbors, I mean it with all the wonderful connotations. We talked and found that Lisa had gone to college with a good friend of Kim’s. They shared their food with use and we shared stories about other trips to Falcon Ridge.

As evening approached, we headed down to the Main Stage. Sitting on a tarp in front of us was a woman with a squirrel tattoo on her left shoulder. It is a running joke in our family. There is a T-shirt that says, “Some say I have A.D.D. but they don’t under… Hey Look! A squirrel”. We often point out squirrels. At Falcon Ridge, you often see interesting tattoos and costumes.

Squirrel Tattoo, originally uploaded by Aldon.

Thursday evening, The Rowan Brothers did a set that included a song entitled “Winkleman’s Farm”. It was the story of a bunch of young boys who were afraid of visiting the farm of a strange old man. They sneak into the farm, get caught, and are terrified about what will happen to them. The old man shares root beer with them and tells him fascinating stories of his life when he was younger. They learned that the frightening old man was actually someone that was fun and interesting. That captures part of the Falcon Ridge experience. We run into people that are not like us, and instead of being afraid, we can learn that they are fun and interesting. It happens at Falcon Ridge, and we would be better off if would could take these sort of experiences into our interactions with people who are different from us in our daily life.

We went to bed relatively early Thursday and tried to get what we could for sleep. In the distance the music played on. Friday morning, we arose to our Falcon Ridge rituals. Early in the morning, we placed our blankets in front of the main stage. I went and got some coffee to take back to the tent. Later, we went down to the dance tent for the “Morning Glory Contra Dance for Beginners”. Before hand, various people did their stretches and Yoga on the dance floor. Fiona saw an old friend from last year and did a little stretching.

Because of the flare up Kim’s Lyme disease, Kim decided not to dance this set. It would be too easy for a person to accidentally try and swing Kim around by the arm with the IV port. This upset Fiona and we ended up not dancing Friday morning.

At noon, we settled in front of the Main Stage for the Emerging Artist Showcase. Over four hundred artists apply to be emerging artists at Falcon Ridge each year, and the group gets narrowed down to a group of twenty four selected by a panel of judges. These are some of the best emerging folk musicians from around the world.

During breakfast, Sandy Cash who was visiting from Israel handed out a leaflet about her music, and I looked forward to hearing her She sang a humorous song about therapy, and an intriguing song about Giorgio Perlasca. Instead of recounting his story here, let me simply encourage you to follow the link and read his story.

Yet before Sandy sang, there were several other great musicians. Starting off the showcase was Vienna Teng. She sang a wonderful song entitled “City Hall” about driving five hundred miles to get married in San Francisco after having been a couple for ten years without a chance to get married.

After Vienna was Randall Williams. He was supposed to sing later in the day but had to head off to Austin, so they bumped him early into the schedule. He sang a song about “Harry Stone”, a soldier in World War II that fell in love with a woman in Belgium. They had a child, whom he never met until she was sixty years old.

Other performers that particularly jumped out at me included Derek Aramburu who did a great cover of John Prine’s Mulhenberg County as well as a song of his own about Casco Bay and relationships, and Ryan Fitzsimmons who sang a great song about a town he grew up in.

Anthony DeCosta sang a funny song about Pluto losing its status as a planet and relating it to the losers in high school.

It is a great chance for emerging artists to get noticed, and several like Bob Sima and Zoe Mulford encouraged the audience to visit their websites.

We took a break from the emerging artists to go hear Lowen and Navarro. Eric is battling amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. He gets around in a wheelchair and this year held his guitar but rarely played it. His voice and spirit remains incredibly strong and he had wonderful things to say about just being happy to be at Falcon Ridge. At the family tent, he invited his kids to join him on the stage to sing Baby Bumblebee

Lowen and Navarro and family, originally uploaded by Aldon.

Again, we tried to get to bed early on Friday night. Saturday was going to be the big day.

Saturday started off with the family dance. Kim’s parents attended Falcon Ridge for the first time this year and they danced some of the family dances, some of the time with Fiona, but they continued even after Fiona was pooped out.

Dick and Leanne at the Family Dance, originally uploaded by Aldon.

Afterwards, they took Fiona to get her face painted.

Dick and Leanne at the Family Dance, originally uploaded by Aldon.

The heat can be exhausting for performers and audience a like. I think this picture captures some of the spirit of Falcon Ridge:

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Unknown Father and child, originally uploaded by Aldon.

Maura Kennedy also suffered from the heat and we were initially told that their set at the family tent would be cancelled. However, in the end, they showed up. At the family stage, like all the stages, they have sign language interpreters. The signer for The Snacks set, started off signing holding a baby in one hand. It must have made the signing difficult. Soon enough, however, the mother appeared and the father got to sign with both hands.

Later, Pete and Maura also preformed on the Workshop Stage in a session entitled Just Gimme Some Truth. Pete made a reference to a quote from Joseph Campbell: “When the world seems to be falling apart, stick to your own trajectory; hang onto you own ideals and find kindred spirits.” He spoke about meeting Donovan and Donovan making a comment about it all coming together. That too is an important part of the Falcon Ridge spirit. It is a spirit that Dave Carter captured in his songs and Mary Gauthier sang her song, wheel inside the wheel, which I’ve often listened to on the radio, but I didn’t know was a tribute to Dave Carter. As I lay on my back looking at the clouds, I saw a large bird circling high overhead and thought of Dave Carter looking down on Falcon Ridge.

Tracy Grammer was also part of that workshop and performed “Travis John”. Corporal Travis John was killed by a land mine in Iraq on July 2, 2003. As I listened to the song, I thought of Eric Bogle’s great song, Willie McBride, also known as Green Fields of France or No Man’s Land.

Ah, young Willie McBride, I can't help wonder why,
Did all those who lay here really know why they died?
And did they believe when they answered the call,
Did they really believe that this war would end war?
For the sorrow, the suffering, the glory, the pain,
The killing and dying were all done in vain,
For, young Willie McBride, it all happened again,
And again and again and again and again.

Yet as I thought of Willie and Travis, I thought that Eric had it slightly wrong in the last verse. Willie, Travis and so many other did not die in vain. Yes, it does happen again and again and again and again. Yet it is when the artist takes this and reminds us of our interconnectedness that we can bring about start to bring meaning to these horrible losses. Kate Power wrote about Travis John,

We are all connected in the fabric of life. When we heard of Travis' death, it felt like the death of one of our own. He joined the marines to be the best he could be in troubled times. The oldest boy in his family with his mother, Lynn and his brother, Nic, Travis had everything a parent could hope for in a son. It was terrible to lose him with his whole life still waiting for him.

Tracy Grammer knows something about unexpected loses as well. July 19th was the fifth anniversary of Dave Carter’s unexpected death. Tracy finished up the album they had been working on at the time, “seven is the number” and had it available at Falcon Ridge.

The message of peace continued on the main stage when Gandalf Murphy and the Slambovian Circus of Dreams invited Dar Williams and others on the stage to sing Cat Steven’s “Peace Train”. A few people dressed up as giant doves walked around the crowd on stilts as beach balls provided by Outpost in the burbs bounced around the audience.

Doves and beach balls on the Peace Train, originally uploaded by Aldon.

Yet for me, one of the most magical moments was when Dar Williams performed the song Iowa.

Once I had everything, I gave it up for the shoulder of your driveway and the words Ive never felt.
And so for you, I came this far across the tracks, ten miles above the limit, and with no seatbelt, and Id do it again,
For tonight I went running through the screen doors of discretion,
For I woke up from a nightmare that I could not stand to see,
You were a-wandering out on the hills of Iowa and you were not thinking of me.

She had been talking about the importance of creating magical moments for our children, a thing that she felt sure that parents at Falcon Ridge truly understood. She had talked about bringing her son to the concern.

When she sang Iowa, everyone got out their lighters, their flash lights, their cellphones; any light producing device to wave in the air as she sang.

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Then, she asked everyone to sit on their lights for a moment. The hill, which had looked like an overbooked firefly convention went suddenly dark. Then, she brought her son onto the stage and all the lights reappeared and even more so. For the final chorus, her three year old son, and all of us, got to see the sort of magic that all of us can make when we work together to create something beautiful. That is the spirit of Falcon Ridge.

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Soon, Fiona fell asleep on the hill next to us. Mairead, who was not feeling well, left with Amy and we settled into listen to Eddie from Ohio and Lowen and Navarro. Julie Murphy Wells, from Eddie from Ohio is a breast cancer survivor. I am sorry I didn’t get a video of Julie singing on stage with the band. It would be a wonderful clip with the caption, this is what a cancer survivor looks like.

Kim and I stayed up to listen to Lowen and Navarro. They ended their set with “If I was the rain”, off of their All The Time In The World album.

Sunday morning, we got up, packed, and headed down to the Gospel Wake Up Call. It is a Falcon Ridge tradition that honors all religious beliefs, perhaps best summed up in the Kennedy’s song “Stand”.

By Sunday, we were pretty wiped out, so I don’t have a lot to add about Sunday’s performances. As I look back at this long post, I don’t find any reference about the thunderstorms. They are another tradition of Falcon Ridge. The mud, the rain, and the undampened spirits. I find that I didn’t manage to work in anything about the wonderful food, other than the coffee. All of this weaves into a small snapshot of what Falcon Ridge is. You can see more pictures that I took on Flickr.

Yet it is only a small snapshot. Please, follow some of the links and purchase CDs from the wonderful musicians that attend, and see if you can work a trip to Twentieth Annual Falcon Ridge next summer in Hillsdale, NY.