Tonight I’d like to feature a remarkable Old Time musician named Kilby Snow. Mr. Snow lived from 1905 to 1980. He was a master of the autoharp. I first became aware of him when I saw a banjo tab for a non-modal version of Shady Grove that credited the version to Snow.
We’re so fortunate these days that we have instant access to so much music on YouTube. I did a search for Kilby Snow and came up with some treasure. Thank you to GtrWorkShp for uploading this amazing piece.
Here is Troubles
Somebody landed on this blog today after searching “best mushroom field guide for Ontario”. I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned this before. I use two.
They are the Audubon guide by Gary Lincoff and Mushrooms of Ontario and Eastern Canada by George Barron. They’re organized differently and depending what I’m looking for I use one or the other. Normally I have both in my car when I’m out chasing mushrooms. I’ve been told the Barron guide is the most accurate, but I have no way of validating that (except that the statement came from a fellow who knows more about mushrooms than I’m ever likely to know).
I’d like to ask the rest of you Ontario mushroom hounds, what guide do you use?
In my mind, summer starts when the peonies burst into bloom. This began today. This morning, they were tight little balls – on her arrival home from work this afternoon, Tuffy P announced they had burst, and rushed out with the camera. Our peonies start blooming several days after our neighbours’ flowers do – maybe because we have less sun, or maybe these are a slightly later variety. I really don’t know.
We’re working on a grackle mosaic – a commission. We’re having a lot of fun with this one. As I’m sure you’ve all seen, various blackbirds have a wonderful irridecence in their feathers. We’re trying various ways to catch this – including various irridecent glass tiles, a broken gold teacup and some translucent glass tiles as well. This material is so dependent on light and the viewer’s position in relation to the bird. It’s very difficult to photograph. I tried with some lower light, but you can’t really see the visual effects in the photo at all. The branches the bird is sitting on have everything but the kitchen sink glued in there. We hope to finish this one next week.
The other day I posted a picture of Imagination Station #2, which has been taken over by some kind of vine. Here is the first imagination station. With a little help from me, this one has a honeysuckle growing on it. The plant originates in the so-called shovel garden directly in front of the structure or shelter or sculpture or whatever you want to call the thing (I just keep calling them imagination stations…..works for me).
You can see some of the original structure and on the right side, some of the honeysuckle flowers. Around the back, I’ve layered on sod I’ve taken from the front yard when I created a new garden. Maybe one day this will be a living imagination station. I can tell you that I think after this season this one is going to need a renovation to shore it up and add structural and dimensional stability. Kind of like an engineering project but without the engineering.
In another area of the garden, I created a path last year and under the path I laid some landscape cloth. Georgie discovered the landscape cloth under a few inches of soil and cedar mulch and has proceeded to pull quite a bit of it out so I could see it was under there. Thanks George. Now that it’s up, I’m thinking that the next imagination station is somehow going to incorporate that landscape cloth…..
I thought tonight I would feature Joe Newberry here on 27th Street. I had the good fortune to meet Mr. Newberry at the Midwest Banjo Camp. I took one of his classes, all about a maneuver called the Galax Lick, along with its applications.
Joe Newberry is a fine teacher. There were perhaps 15-18 people in the class and in the first 5 minutes he learned everyone’s name. “I hate teaching from a name tag”, he said. He teaches by ear. He demonstrates it, talks about it, demonstrates it, talks and demonstrates some more and then he plays it and you play it and he plays it and you play it and again, and he walks the class and if anyone isn’t getting it, he plays it close up and you play it. In less than an hours and a half I had learned a technique and it’s application in a tune, which I also learned. Great teaching. “Watch mother”, he’d say, “watch mother”. It was impressive.
Mr. Newberry is a fine player too, on banjo and on guitar. Here’s one of his performances I found on the YouTube machine – Rocky Island.
Back at our old place in the St. Clair and Caledonia neighbourhood, we had a small garden but because it was very sunny, I grew great tomatoes and hot chiles. Here at 27th Street we have many beautiful mature trees but we don’t have enough sun to be really successful with the sun-loving veggies.
However, my little raised box garden is great for lettuce and herbs. I’ve been making salads from the garden for some time.
Back Gardens
The Alphabet Garden
Imagination Station #2
Regular readers of this blog know about the Imagination Stations. These are lean-to or shelter-type structures – two of them – out in the back yard. I built them from materials from the garden and since I made them (I build the first one two years ago and the second one last year), I’ve been occasionally adding to the structures.
Along the way, a vine appeared. I think it came from next door but I’m not really sure. It grew along the fence and when it found Imagination Station #2, it did a little homesteading. Almost all of the structure is covered in this vine now, making the Station look like something that has been in the yard for many years.
The first Imagination Station is becoming obscured as well. I grew a honeysuckle in the shovel garden and trained it across. As well, where I’ve taken out sod for gardens in the front, I’ve added it to the structure.
Now I’m thinking about making a third one. There are a few possible locations. Perhaps I’ll build it around the old apple tree or in the back corner. Next time I have a few days off work, I think I’ll get going on this project. The first two have been totally improvisational – no plans, no drawings – and I’m going to continue to approach them that way. I’m going to cut back some old shrubs in the back and this will provide lots of raw materials.
27th Street 