Varg’s Jazzfest Must-Sees

Posted on January 26, 2007 by Varg

So the line-up was released and here is my must-see-if-I-have-enough-money list…

Gillian Welch
T-Bone Burnett
Jill Scott
The Killer
Irma Thomas
Van Morrison
Lucinda Williams
Calexico
Rebirf
Galactic
Shannon McNally
Trombone Shorty
Dirty Dozen
Kermit
Ellis
NewBirth Brass Band
Theresa Andersson
Hot 8
Morning 40
The Jazz Vipers

And because every yang deserves a yin (or is it the other way around?) … here’s some acts you won’t find me in the crowd for …

Rod Stewart
Counting Crows
Brad Paisley
Thorogood
New Edition

Also, I was perusing the acts and the name Alexa Ray Joel popped out at me. Is this the demon child of Billy and his Uptown Girl? Didn’t even know she went the music route. I just assumed she would go the model route. Well, I went to her MySpace page made the deduction that a girl can’t go the model route when she is the spitting image of Billy Joel. Whoa! Hey!

6 thoughts on “Varg’s Jazzfest Must-Sees”

ashley says:

January 26, 2007 at 3:59 pm

You sound like Burma Jones.
Jimmy Riot says:

January 26, 2007 at 5:23 pm

Fuck you asshole. Woah! Hey! to you too you fucking douche bag. Watch your mouth when commenting on other people’s looks.
Varg says:

January 26, 2007 at 6:12 pm

Must be a friend of hers. What a riot.
Jeff says:

January 26, 2007 at 9:05 pm

Calexico is the only one in that group that would have me even considering doing an outdoor, too expensive, only get to see shitty short sets festivals. But I’m old and set in my ways.
Varg says:

January 26, 2007 at 11:29 pm

You’ve been to Jazzfest?
Jeff says:

January 27, 2007 at 7:33 pm

Nope. I’m sure it’s better than your average “fest” but I don’t enjoy going to music festivals so much or any place where hippies might be allowed to dance around in the mud. Just a vow I took years ago.

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Rejoice!

I say that a lot. I sign many pieces with it. I do this because I believe our lives are a true happenstance. A brilliant occurence from nothingness. We are so rare. We are so unlikely. And simply being born isn’t enough. From there we must survive, endure. So each morning, after our Sun departs and is reborn again. Please, for the sake of your ancestors and the Universe in general, hoist that cup of joe up and say, “Rejoice.”

Ours is a soulful existence. No matter how many McMansions, polyester fabrics, auto-tunes, modified foods and social networks we surround ourselves with, we are all still native, passionate beings made of ancient matter. We are organic and we have soul.

Wood also has a warm, soulful quality. Wood has a memory. It retains smells, traumas, events. It even has a calendar. This is why I have chosen it as my medium, for its old soul. I like to think the wood in my work is in its third incarnation. First a tree, then a home and now art. If you have a room that needs a little soul, get a piece. A room can never have enough soul.

My inspiration and subject matter comes from many sources, among them: Humanism, old ballads, trickster tales, flora and fauna, science, myths and folklore, stringed instruments, brass bands, amber spirits, lady vocalists, general relativity and quantum mechanics. Some of my pieces are there just to make a short, simple statement about what’s important in life. Some are more diffuse and abstract in meaning. A personal drama, an enduring line from a poem or novel, a poignant song lyric, the legacy of an important person, a fleeting thought … these are the subjects of my art.

I use hearts often because they are a very abstract way of depicting the human soul without also employing the very subjective human form. The symbolic heart is an apt representation for a person’s experience and essence. A body can immediatly conjure happiness, sorrow, youth, age, anger, bliss. These emotions can get in the way. Sometimes it’s simply about the experience.

I am the son of a sailor and a social worker, the grandson of a gypsy, a dancer and a nurse. I spent my youth moving from port city to port city, watching a lot of road go by and reading World Book Encyclopedia. After my parents settled down on the Gulf Coast, I was a miscreant youth, destroying cars and taking the wrongs things too seriously and the right things not serious enough. Eventually I began replacing my imagination with experience.

I will use any salvaged wood but prefer swamp cypress and longleaf heartwood pine.

I despise waste. Particularly the waste of organic matter. Trees are magnificent. They were here before we arrived and they’ll be around after we are gone. I’m making an effort to save as much wood as possible. Creating art is fun too. But beyond communicating with folks, but beyond making money ad providing for myself, beyond rescuing flooded parts, beyond reveling in the ethereal aroma of heartpine that hasn’t seen the light of day in 400 years, beyond all that, I am trying to make a simple comment on waste.