Ethan Lind, Busker-Etcher on banjo.

See Ethan most Wednesdays and Thursdays at the Pike Place Market, printing copper etchings on a Mini Etching Press. Sorry - the Agitated Strings Band demo disk is not ready to share.

Bluegrass Emeralda

These are songs inspired by my work with Ethan Lind and the Agitated String Band—a bluegrass band in Seattle. Ethan is a painter and etcher, too, besides a banjo player.

Emeralda is a mythical ship I imagined brought the design of the Halfwood Press to me, and after ten years of making these presses it happened that Ethan Lind stopped by my shop. Together we made a plan: If he could get a spot at the Pike Place Market, I would loan him a Halfwood Press so he could get more exposure. In addition, I would give him pointers in the art of etching and printing.

I knew he had a bluegrass band, and this interested me because Peter Rowan, world-renowned bluegrass musician had bought two Halfwood Presses. My secret desire was that I would find musicians to collaborate in the Emeralda songbook. After all, what is a story without music?

The difficulty was that I never thought the bluegrass genre had a connection with the Emeralda story. The first Emeralda, a ship of the frigate type, was made in Spain. It was lost in the failed Spanish Armada. A copy was made a century and half later, which carried the Halfwood Press to our part of the world in the mid-18^th Century. It was bound for China, but was sunk by a giant rogue wave in Puget Sound.

Bluegrass music may have originated in Europe, and it may be related to sea shanties—but that’s only conjecture. Clearly, bluegrass music is no more connected to the elements of the Emeralda myth than, say, hip hop.

However, I noticed that the most recent version of Hunger Games (or was it Game of Thrones?) was going to have a hip hop sound track. Then, maybe bluegrass could serve the Emeralda saga.

I always think the people who have been interest in the Halfwood Press are like “gifts” on my pathway. What they contribute is anybody’s guess. Money, yes, but there are more important things in art—and art is what I find in common Peter Rowan and also Ethan Lind and the Agitated Strings Band.

Practice session – April 8, 2014

Ethan invited me to listen in on a practice session. I recorded on my pocket camera—a very old camcorder with a broken sound system. The next day I made a DVD for it, thinking it would be a useful experience. Also, I want our daughter and son-in-law to consider hiring the Agitated Strings for their Wedding vow renewal, coming up.

I also wanted to continue to solve the riddle, “How could Bluegrass music serve my Emeralda story?” Besides these, which are my personal interests, I have a dream to bring Peter Rowan to Seattle for a fundraising concert to support the Seattle Printmaking Center development, and have Ethan’s band open for him.

Structure

It is common in bluegrass to hear stories of love, heartbreak, and other kinds of personal relationships. Sometimes animals, sometimes old pickups or guns—anything that people love. So maybe there is a clue in this love element. You can love a printing press, can’t you?

You can love a ship – even if it’s a made-up ship like the Emeralda. You can love a vision. Look at what the Gibbs brothers did.

Another element is the hero’s journey—common in books, screenplays and sagas in every kind of artistic creation.