Oak: Farewell to Mary Kate's

I've been trying to write a eulogy for the session at Mary Kate's (link still works for now), or at least a detailed report on the farewell session (last Sunday, March 21st), and I find that I can't do it justice. I just get all blubbery or all long-winded and pontificating about how great it was. Sessions have a life span, and this one lasted a good five years; it was cut short by the venue changing hands, but five years is a darn good run, and it went out in a swell of poignant pride and affection and laughter. Then again, I could have seen the session lasting another decade or more. I wish it had that chance. I wish I could do better by it than this short summation.

Maybe twenty musicians showed up, which was a lot for that space. Sessions grow like trees, adding rings with each new set of arrivals as they pull up chairs around the periphery, and this was a grand, broad, vibrant oak. Mary Kate spoke with firm, tearful, and humorous eloquence, despite her aversion to microphones ("I can go talk to every table in the place, but put a mike in front of me and it's a different story"). Jo-Ellen, as she has done for five years, guided the starting of tunes and songs with a sure hand, and sang "Caledonia," "Danny Boy," and "The Parting Glass" as beautifully as I've ever heard them sung, as well as a couple of sweet and haunting songs I don't have names for. The place was packed, and the appreciative audience energized the musicians and singers. It was a terrific night.

I'll play music with those people again, at house parties and if an alternative venue is found, but that particular synergy of music-fostering host, cottage-cum-roadhouse-cum-pub ambience, and available local musicians was unique. I grieve its end.