March 22, 2022
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Billy the Kid

Listen to the latest from The Agency right here or find it at all the best podcast places.

We are super excited to talk with author Dennis McCarthy about his 2021 novel THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO BILLY THE KID.

Music found on this episode for educational purposes is the French national anthem on fiddle performed by Charles Morey. Also “Goodbye Old Paint” performed by Harry McClintock and “Captain O Keane” on harp by Paul Hardwick of a Torlough O Carlan piece.

Thank you for listening and please email us anytime.

March 20, 2022
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King of the Nine String

I think I was in my first year of university when I came across the music of Big Joe Williams for the first time. This is Big Joe Williams, the so-called king of the 9-string guitar I’m talking about, not the other fabulous Joe Williams who sang for the Basie band. I had started studying Fine Arts at York University at that time. There was a pretty good library at the University and I started spending study time in there. I soon discovered they had a listening room which gave students access to a truly fabulous collection of 33rpm blues recordings. The room was made up of many little cubbies, each equipped with turntable.

I don’t remember how they indexed the collection but I think there was a counter or a window and there you could request anything they had. Out would come the record you wanted to hear and a set of headphones. I began doing much of my studying in the listening room, where I discovered a world of fairly obscure blues material, which I loved so much. That included Big Joe Williams. The first song I heard by him was Sloppy Drunk Blues, with the first Sonny Boy Williamson on harmonica. It stopped me in my tracks.

Here’s Ry Cooder talking about his first experience hearing Sloppy Drunk Blues by Big Joe Williams.

Mr. Williams doubled up 3 of the strings on his guitar, creating a very percussive 9-stringed instrument of which he was the king (and only practitioner).

On occasions when I hear Big Joe Williams music these days, I still love it, though for the most part, I listen to fiddle music these days. When I stumbled across the Ry Cooder video, it brought back a flood of memories of my university days, when I spent hours in that listening room lost in another time and place.

March 17, 2022
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Mouth of the Tobique

I’ve been listening to a few versions of this wonderful New Brunswick fiddle tune. I want to learn this one, and I think the first order of business is to get that melody firmly planted in my ever-so-tiny brain.

Sarah Loughran and Paul Young

March 14, 2022
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Kubasonified

Listen to the latest from the agents right here of find it at the usual spots.

Special guest: Brian Cherwick from The Kubasonics!

Also this week:
FIRE
Vitrectomy
Jack Whitehall – Travels with my father
Turning Red
Love is Blind
…and more

Email us anytime. We love mail and we might read your email on the program.

March 13, 2022
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The Edge of Town (or life imitates art)

Yesterday I was out and about doing some shopping both here in South Etobicoke and into Mississauga to the west. Twice I saw the same angry character driving around with upside-down Canadian flags in his car windows. I saw plenty of those upside-down flags, along with Confederate flags and swastikas, not very long ago during the ugly occupation of Ottawa and the Ambassador Bridge at Windsor. This guy was alone in the car, scowling and smoking as he barrelled around the burbs. I guess he was looking for a fight, trying to cause some trouble. The scene reminded me of The Edge of Town, the 1969 Philip Guston painting, featuring his “hoods” driving around town, a car full of hate, cartoonish conspirators on the move. Maybe this guy was lonely, with nobody to conspire with since the convoy of crybabies dispersed. I’m sure he has some sad and twisted idea he is a “freedom fighter”. I wonder if he helped fund the truckload of guns and ammo seized in Alberta? Maybe he’s part of the group of convoy people who wrote the manifesto about suspending democracy and taking over all levels of government? In any case, he’s making sure he’s going to show us just how much hate he has in his soul.

While I was out (same afternoon), masked up, shopping in a local grocery store, I saw 4 middle aged men wandering the store without masks. Like the guy with the upside-down flags, they were scowling, their anger with the universe apparent to all. Here in our part of the world, the provincial government has announced an upcoming end to mask mandates later this month, but these guys decided to hurry things along a little. I don’t think they were even shopping. What they were doing was getting close to people. The scowls on their faces sent a clear message. Just say something. You wanna start somthing? As I was waiting for service at a food counter, one of them sidled up right beside me. I backed away a few feet. He moved closer. I backed away. He moved closer. He was clearly trying to provoke conflict. I was not going to give this asshole what he wanted. I abandoned the counter and moved to another part of the store and cleared out of there as quickly as I could. I have to admit, I was freaked out by the behavior of these men.

Between the pandemic, the Trumpers, the haters, the racists, and the senseless killing in Ukraine, it seems the wheel is in spin. I guess I naively thought we here in Toronto the Good were somehow insulated from extremism. I feel like I’m hanging on tight, hoping the roof stays on.

March 11, 2022
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Strings

This morning I changed my fiddle strings, and while it will take a while for the strings to settle down, the difference seems huge. I guess it was a good time to change them. It’s hard to say when is the right time. Eventually they begin to sound dull, but the change is very gradual but it’s costly if you change them too often because fiddle strings range from expensive to very expensive. I’ve been working on improving my intonation. It’s a big challenge when you learn this instrument because you have a short, fretless fingerboard and you have to learn accuracy to get the correct pitch. I was having problems playing a particular note with any kind of decent tone, and by that it seemed as if I was getting worse, particularly for that particular note. I thought perhaps a new set of strings would help.

As with just about everything violin-related, there is a big price difference between brands of strings and strings made from different materials. Strings that sound great on one instrument may sound mediocre on another (price doesn’t necessarily matter) and as near as I can tell, trying a set is about the only way to find out. I’ve tried some different brands. This time out, I opted for Prim mediums for my G, D and A strings and a Pirastro Gold E string. Prims are moderately priced steel strings, and they sound really good on my fiddle. I added a Pirastro Gold E string because I read that many players use them because with that string they experience less instances of a whistling E string. I don’t know if it is so, but it seemed worth the investment to find out.

I’ve used Prims before and I liked the way they responded on my fiddle. Last time out I tried Tonica strings, which have a synthetic core. I found they did not hold their tuning as well as the Prims I previously used and as well I thought the sound I was getting was comparatively mushy. I found myself immediately happy with the new ones, but I’ll know better after a couple days.