New Book Recalls Ellenville Music Fest

GreyCore Press will release its first nonfiction title in February 2001. The Saga of the Empire State Music Festival: A Personal Recollection, by Harold Harris, is a charming account of how the village of Ellenville (Ulster Co.) was transformed when it came to host one of the world's most important musical events for four years running, beginning in 1955.

Says Joan Schweighardt, publisher at GreyCore, "The Saga of the Empire State Music Festival not only faithfully reconstructs the day-to-day dynamics of a highly significant historical event, but it also brings to life the people who participated in it."

Replete with photographs, The Saga of the Empire State Music Festival chronicles a time of innocence in American history. It is a catalog of both stunning musical performance sand the offstage shenanigans of their principal players; its pages are graced not only with musical masters such as Leonard Bernstein, Morton Gould, Arthur Fielder, Carlos Chavez and Elain Malbin but also with some of our best-loved music critics and such well-known personalities as Red Buttons, Mike Wallace and Rocky Marciano.

In addition to The Saga of the Empire State Music Festival, Harris is the author of Treasure Tales of the Shawangunks and Catskills, a collection of area legends and folktales, many of which had never appeared in print before.

The Saga of the Empire State Music Festival: A Personal Recollection will be available in hardcover in February 2001 for $29.95. It can be purchased at area bookstores, on the Internet, or at the Ellenville Public Library. All proceeds from the sale of the book will be donated to the library.

Is There Life After the Kingston Trio?

by Lyn Burnstine

Throughout a thirty-three year long career of introducing traditional folk music to general audiences who are unaware of its impressive range and depth, I repeatedly find that people think this music existed only in the Appalachian Mountains or as a temporary aberration in the '50s and '60s.

As a very minor folklorist, priviledged to have been in a room with several major folklorists unable to agree on a definition of folk music, I would be presumptuous to try and define it. However, I will. Traditional folk music is the music that sums up the thoughts and values of a culture; it is music that reflects universal concerns and thereby speaks to us all. Because of its unique characteristic of surviving by the oral process rather than the printed work, this music has undergone the shaping of community preference.

Common sense tells us that wherever people gathered in communities they told their stories, some set to tunes. These stories, besides being the "illiterature" of the the ordinary and often uneducated people, were part of their worship, their work, and their infrequent leisure. This sense of the role of homemade music in everyone's lives tells us that the Hudson Valley could have had a folk life as rich as those well-known treasure troves of tradition, the Appalachian Mountains and the Georgia Sea Islands. Fortunately, we don't have to rely on common sense alone, but have the important collecting work of folklorists in the '20s and '30s. These collectors, including our own Herb Haufrecht of Woodstock and Constance Varney Ring of Vassar College, confirmed for us the universality of ballads and songs which were sung in every region of our country, albeit in changed forms, "folk processed" by generations and travel.

In the early days of our country, there were no buttons to push for ready-made music -- no singing, dancing , moving pictures in our living rooms. Our only contemporary musical experience that can compare is singing around the campfire on a primitive camping trip (and I don't mean one in an RV with a TV). What is the appeal of that experience? What causes a growing number of us to birng that experience to gatherings in meeting halls all over the Hudson Valley on most Saturday nights and on a few weeknights?

Maybe it's for the same reason that children who have had only coloring books before delight in being given blank pieces of paper and paints. Maybe we're tired of having it done for us (or to us, as I often think when my ears are besieged by music I haven't or wouldn't have chosen- in elevators, supermarkets and on telephone hold). Maybe it's as simple as in the comment from a 4th-grader at one of my in-school concerts: "I wasn't having such a nice day until I heard you sing. I gues folk music really cheers me up."

If you would like to see if it cheers you up, there are lots of opportunities to do so, whether you are a performer or just a devout listener. I refer you to your local newspapers for calendar listings of coffeehouses and open stages, where you will hear amateur and professional performers side by side. The three communities that host the Hudson Valley Folk Guild open stages are Kingston, Patterson and Poughkeepsie. (Editor's Note: See our newsletter for dates and directions!) The Friends of Fiddler's Green, the newest chapter of the Folk Guild, presents national, international and regional performers in concert at the Hyde Park Methodist Church on two Friday nights a month. This is the only chapter that does not have an open stage, but chooses excellent and entertaining folk artists that inspire us to learn new and wonderful songs.

A few years ago, we devoted traditional music fans and performers were told that folk music was dead. We should have had faith in the strength of its appeal. Such music survives because its basic truth speaks to all generations. It will die when it no longer speaks to the human condition. Only then will the song end.

The Importance of a Correct Neck Angle

The angle at which an instrument's neck is affixed to its body is the single most important factor in determining how well the instrument will play and sound. Those instruments which play and sound the best have a correct neck angle. Yet, no two instruments share the exact same geometry. The neck angle must be determined for each individual instrument including instruments of the same make and model with consecutive serial numbers.

The force produced by a correct neck angle and a proper set up determine how much string energy is transmitted to the soundboard. If the neck angle is too shallow, the bridge saddle won't be tall enough to create the correct angle of downbearing. Formed where the strings break across the bridge saddle, the angle of downbearing determines how much string energy is applied to the soundboard. A significant loss of tone and volume along with a string action that feels rubbery result when a soundboard isn't driven by as much string energy as it should be. Yet, when the neck angle and resulting angle of downbearing are too great, the soundboard, overloaded with string tension, can't vibrate as freely as it should, inhibiting the production of sound.

The neck angle is the primary factor which determines an instrument's playability. When setting an instrument's action, the adjustments of the truss rod, saddle height, and depth of the nut slots are all made relative to the neck angle. Assuming that the fretboard and frets are as they should be, with the correct neck angle, the action can be set very low.

To check a guitar's neck angle you'll need a 24" precision straightedge. A wooden yardstick lacks the accuracy to do the job. With the neck relief correctly set and the instrument tuned to pitch and hold in playing position, place the straightedge in the middle of the fretboard between the 3rd and 4th strings. The bottom of the straitedge should just kiss the top of the wooden bridge. This indicates that the top of the bridge and the tops of the frets are aligned at the same height. This insures that the strings and saddle will have the right height to create close action and the right angle of downbearing. However, in most cases the end of the straightedge will bump the front of the bridge indicating too shallow a neck angle.

Depending on where the straightedge contacts the bridge, there are two repair procedures. One is called a neck reset. The angle of the neck to the body is altered by removing a calculated amount from the foot of the heel, tapering to zero at the neck/ fingerboard joint. That calculation must be made with the instrument tuned to concert pitch before the neck is removed. After the required amount has been shaved from the heel, the neck is reglued at the correct angle. While that all sounds fairly straightforward, the neck's angle, centerline, height, twist and the fit of the dovetail joint and of the heel to the body must be worked simultaneously. A ramp is then created in the soundboard beneath the fretboard tongue so that the fretboard will mate to the body without an extreme downward turn of the tongue.

When the neck angle is within tolerance at the heel but not within tolerance close to the nut, a plane and refret is the solution. That procedure, detailed in my article "Tension Rods and Neck Relief", involves removing the lower frets and planing the fretboard back to with tolerance before new frets are installed.

In my previous articles I've spoken about the importance of having the set up and bridging correct. Having the correct neck angle is even more important.

** Your Questions & Comments about this series are welcomed**