The Wrigley tradition

Each morning as I'm getting ready for work, I tune in to ESPN's "Mike and Mike in the Morning." The hosts, Mike Greenberg and Mike Golic, have developed the radio personas of just a couple of regular guys who still are awed by the company they keep, even though they have become two of the best-known sports entertainment personalities in the business. Greeny is a best-selling author, to boot.

This morning, one of Mike and Mike's guests was Chicago Cubs Chairman Crane Kenney, who turned out to be a classmate of Golic at Notre Dame in the early '80s. They talked about the baseball team, then Kenney extended an invitation to the Mikes: Come sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" in the time-honored tradition at Wrigley Field.

Golic has been known to sing on the air and has a decent voice. He suggested Greeny's microphone be turned way down, or off. But either way, they seemed genuinely thrilled to follow in the footsteps of the late Cubs broadcaster Harry Caray, whose seventh-inning-stretch renditions of the song became legend.

Since Caray's passing the honor of leading the crowd in song has gone to various celebrities, not more than a few of whom have been ridiculed for their performances. Mike and Mike expressed some concern about how they'll be viewed. But they had little doubt that they'd do better than British rock singer Ozzy Osbourne, whose "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" at Wrigley really is the stuff of legend. See and hear for yourself:



He should have sung "Crazy Train"! Maybe he'd have known at least some of the lyrics.

Duck and cover!

On recent travels, I picked up a "Fallout Shelter" sign in a curiosity shop, and I nailed it to the fence up by the street in front of my house.

My kids started asking me what the deal was, and I started talking about how we grew up on the ’60s and ’70s (and for folks a bit older than me, the ’50s) under the constant threat of "commies" dropping atomic bombs on us. So much time has passed that we can laugh about it now, and I guess I consider the "Fallout Shelter" sign a bit of nostalgic kitsch. And if anyone wants to take the sign seriously and haul up in my basement, there are a lot of CDs down there to play.

I also mentioned the films they used to show via projector, about how to ostensibly protect yourself in the event of a nuclear attack. Almost immediately, one of my sons found this video, which brought back plent of memories:



What's up with the monkey holding the firecracker on a string? I didn't know they had suicide bombers back in the '50s!

And I don't know about that turtle surviving a nuclear blast, but those diligent, adult-obeying, all-American kids stood no chance whatsoever, unless they were ducking and covering inside a lead-lined room.

The powers that be obviously didn't want to tell us about the effects of radiation back then. I don't remember seeing any films about eyewitness accounts from Hiroshima or Nagasaki ...

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I spent lunchtime Tuesday in Pittsburgh at the Three Rivers Arts Festival, watching the Jason Kendall Band play a set. I'd heard (and really enjoyed) his CD "Cooper Doesn't Live Here Anymore," and I'd intended to see him play one night in California, PA, before Hillary Clinton decided to make a campaign stop at the local university and I had to film that.

Here's a video of "St. Augustine," which closed the show. I'll post more soon, including footage of Jason showing off his prowess on the saxophone.

And thanks to Ron, who was manning the soundboard for the festival's main stage and let me patch right into the soundboard!

Joy Ike in Washington

Music aficianados should be glad that Joy Ike has made Washington a "tour stop" the past two years, performing at the Main Street Farmers' Market.

Her visit Thursday coincided with the mercury shooting upward (do they even put mercury in thermometers anymore?), creating less-than-ideal conditions for playing music. But as Joy mentioned, it was better than playing in the rain!

Joy's set featured numerous songs from "Good Morning," her first full-length CD, which is scheduled to be out later this month. A CD release party is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Saturday, June 28, at the EastSide Borders and will feature a full band.

In Washington, she performed with her piano and her exceptional voice, which was fine with those who were listening. Often, there are requests for musicians to "turn it down" during the farmers' market; while I was out in the heat shooting video, I didn't hear anything of the sort during Joy's show.

Here's some biographical information about Joy:

The 24-year-old has been writing and performing only snce 2005, but already she has received acclaim from local and national media alike. She was voted second for "Best Solo Artist" by the Pittsburgh City Paper in 2007 and was featured on Allhiphop.com's "Alternatives" as "one of the artists [who] will ultimately be responsible for placing Pittsburgh's music scene firmly on the map.

Ike's music has earned a reputation for being lyrically challenging, addressing issues of social awareness, faith, loneliness and the complexity of relationships. "Good Morning" is an anthem to all four concepts and specifically tackles our human need for dependency and the growing obligation to realize that the world is bigger than our own individual problems.

Joy says: "This CD is especially good for Monday mornings. If you can't seem to wake up, just stick it in your player and turn it up. No coffee necessary!

I'll be giving "Good Morning" a good listen and let you know more about it. In the meantime, check out the video of Joy performing "Hey, Where Are the Kids?" at the farmer's market. We posted her playing this song last summer, but we've improved our equipment since then. I patched directly into the mixer, and I think the audio conveys Joy's voice particularly well.

Also, see her perform "City Lights."

Goodbye, Bo

The final album that Bo Diddley cut was called "A Man Amongst Men," and the title s descriptive of the impact he had on a generation of rock 'n' roll musicians.

Ellas Otha Bates McDaniel, who took his stage name from a song he composed – or maybe vice versa – died today in a year that would have seen his 80th birthday. His passing means that just a few pioneers of the early days of rock, roughly half a century ago, still are with us.

"A Man Amongst Men," released in 1996, features performances by some of the guitarists he influenced: the Rolling Stones' Keith Richards and Ron Wood, and Texas axeman Jimmie Vaughan, all of whom obviously held Bo in high esteem.

Bo Diddley never sold a ton of records, but he brought plenty to the table: a resolute self-assurance emulated by many of his predecessors; his trademark square-body guitar; and, of course, the "shave-and-a-haircut" cadence that became known as the Bo Diddley Beat.

His compositions turn up on countless albums of the rock era, many of which fail to spell his name properly. One of the more notable tributes to Mr. McDaniel's songwriting prowess is "Happy Trails," released by Quicksilver Messenger Service in 1969, a full two-thirds of which is based on a couple of Bo Diddley tunes, "Who Do You Love" and "Mona." (If you can find it, give it a listen, if nothing else for the transcendent guitar playing of the late John Cipollina.)

"Who Do You Love" is probably the most covered of Bo Diddley's songs, done by everyone from Ronnie & the Hawks – that's Ronnie Hawkins backed by musicians that later would form The Band – to George Thorogood & the Destroyers playing the version that's received the most airplay.

Around Pittsburgh, his "Bring It to Jerome" gained brief notoriety around Super Bowl XL, in relation to Steelers running back Jerome Bettis. In fact, the song was about Jerome Green, who accompanied Bo on maracas for decades.

If you're curious about Bo Diddley, your best bet is to locate "The Chess Box," which features most of his essential work on Chess Records from the '50s through the '70s.

No. 15: a milestone, of sorts

In the ever-changing world of newspapers, we're trying out new ideas that we never dreamed of doing as recently as a couple of years ago.

At the Observer-Reporter, we've come up with a concept called "What's Up With That?" The premise is self-explanatory: We find something we're wondering about, and do our best to impart ... what is up with that.

The tricky part about the series is that it requires a complementary video component. That's not a particularly easy concept to grasp for journalists who have worked strictly on the print side for decades. Nor for the person in charge of producing the videos (that's usually me), who worked strictly on the print side for a good 20 years.

The current video episode of "What's Up With That?" is our 15th. We hope that the individual episodes have gotten more polished and more entertaining as we've proceeded. We're learning all the time.

The latest episode is Scott Beveridge's "Mysteries of the courthouse," detailing some of the unusual stuff you'll find at the Washington County Courthouse. Scott was hesitant to appear in front of the camera, but he came across well. And I had a lot of fun programming the opening of Bach's "Toccata and Fugue in D Minor" (or some facsimile thereof) to use as theme music.

In case you want to catch up, or compare and contrast the various episodes, here they are so far:

• Episode 15: Mysteries of the courthouse


• Episode 14: 'Roman' around the Trust Building


• Episode 13: Cut me a deal


• Episode 12: The hot dog question


• Episode 11: 'Shoefiti'


• Episode 10: General Tso's chicken


• Episode 9: Red, white and blue barber poles


• Episode 8: Brave, Hero and other place names


• Episode 7: Where the clothes go


• Episode 6: What's with the wires?


• Episode 5: Size does matter


• Episode 4: Old dorms, new dorms


• Episode 3: Big church, little church


• Episode 2: Kids ponder frozen water


• Episode 1: Amanda ponders the hereafter

Submit your videos and pictures!

O-R Flix is live! We're still working out some of the kinks and design issues, but the system is ready to receive your submissions. Submit videos and pictures of almost anything you can think of so long as its pertinent to the readership of the Observer-Reporter or the Almanac. To get started, create an account and log in! View our channel listing to get a few ideas.

One great thing about this system is that it allows you to embed any video you see in our system on your web page. Example, our most recent What's Up With That:




Another interesting feature is that you can submit videos and pictures to us through your cell phone! Again, visit the site for more information. If you're at the site of an important event, YOU can be the one to break the story!

Main Street Artist Series: Ramblin' Ron Boone

This week's featured artist at the Main Street Farmers Market was Ron Boone, known as Ramblin' Ron to his fans. Ron specializes in folk style music and plays both the guitar and the banjo. We're featuring a few choices of him on the latter instrument.

Ron's performance of 'Greenland Whales Fishery' tells the story of fishermen on an Ahab-inspired journey. Following that we have 'Nine Hundred Miles'. Finally, Ron's quick rendition of 'Lonesome Traveler' which he used simply to warm up (but I thought it was pretty good and worth sharing anyway).

Also, the O-R will be debuting a new feature for our online readers tomorrow. This new addition to our website is called O-RFlix and it allows you to submit photos AND videos to us and in turn see them displayed on our pages. In a way, this will allow our readers to become a part of the journalistic process. Check it out tomorrow!

Putting the band back together

Some of them hadn't seen each other since they were high-school classmates, some three decades ago.

But once they started playing their instruments, it was just like the '70s again.

Alumni of the jazz band formed and led by the late Dave Pew, then the band director at Peters Township High School, have been rehearsing in preparation for a concert Saturday night. Their mission is to raise money toward a scholarship fund in honor of Mr. Pew, for a Peters student who plans to pursue a career in music.

I'll quote the information provided by Dave Sphar (Peters Twp. HS '77), who organized the effort and invited me to check out a rehearsal:

Before teaching, Dave played all over the country with several big bands, and he was selected to play lead trumpet in the San Francisco Air Force Band. At the end of his tour of duty, he studied music at Duquesne University and upon graduation began his teaching career at Peters Township.

His belief in the power of music was evident as he developed an award-winning program for the district.

The concert is at 7 p.m. Saturday, May 24 at Peters Township High School, also featuring the current high school jazz band. Tickets are $10 for adults and are available at the door.

Tax-deductible gifts directly to the Fund are also encouraged. Please make checks payable to “WCCF” with “Dave Pew” written on the memo line. Checks should be mailed to: Washington County Community Foundation Inc., 331 S. Main St., Washington, PA 15301.

For more about the concert, click here to see video.

Ramblin' Ron

The Main Street Farmers' Market in Washington is entering its fifth season, believe it or not.

The market has become a much-anticipated weekly event each Thursday afternoon from May through October, and those who attend can enjoy live performances by musicians.

The practice of featuring music at the market started rather informally, with people who cared to do so bringing their guitars and other instruments. Eventually, the market organizers started scheduling musicians as weekly features.

In 2006, the organizers came through with a professional amplification system, including four strategically placed speakers, so that the music could be heard throughout the market. And in June 2007, with the dedication of the Patriots Pavilion next to South Main Street, the musicians had a nice stage area on which to play.

Ramblin' Ron Boone, a South Strabane Township musician-author-traveler (hence the "Ramblin'" part), has been lending his talents to the farmers' market since the beginning, and he'll return Thursday with his laid-back folk songs, including a number of originals from his CD "Song Stories."

Ron is scheduled to play at the May 22 market, and we'll be there to film him as part of our Main Street Artists Series of videos.

Check out Ron's music on the Ramblin' Ron Boone site, including the humorous "Old Man's Rap."

Life's a long song

Some people like to hear a song that starts and ends in the space of three minutes. Short attention spans.

I certainly appreciate a concise, to-the-point tune. One of my favorites is Grace Slick's "White Rabbit," which in its Jefferson Airplane hit-single version lasts less than 2 1/2 minutes.

Then there's the other side of the equation.

I remember how excited I was to hear the full-length version of Peter Frampton's "Do You Feel Like We Do" – hey, I was 13 – when I helped propel "Frampton Comes Alive" to platinum status. Then I discovered that such songs as Iron Butterfly's "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" and the live version of Deep Purple's "Space Truckin'" took up entire sides of records.

And then … I was perusing albums in my favorite store when I came across one called "Live/Dead" by a group called the Grateful Dead. Although it contained two records, only half a dozen tracks were listed. To me, that meant some of those songs must have gone on forever, so I took the album to the counter.

Indeed, the first song, called "Dark Star," clocked in at 23-minutes plus. I put the disc on my turntable and started listening. It was like nothing I'd heard before, no fixed beat or chord changes, a free-flowing surge of instrumentation bookended by two brief vocal passages reciting thoroughly abstract lyrics.

Most listeners would have turned it off or left the room after a few minutes. I played it all the way through, then all the way through again.

Now that rock 'n' roll music has been around for half a century, historians can point to certain milestones, and "Dark Star" represents one of those: The Grateful Dead took the cue from John Coltrane and other masters of jazz improvisation, and adapted their methods to the rock idiom.

Critics at the time may have written off such sonic explorations as self-indulgent. But those who did apparently paid no attention to the effects of the music on the audience, particularly the Grateful Dead's audience.

I've been a big fan of "Dark Star" for more than three decades, and when I got the capability to do so, I downloaded dozens of versions of the Dead doing the song. The longest is 47-plus minutes in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in 1972.

So my ears perked up the other night during a show by the Pittsburgh Dead-influenced band theCAUSE when bass player David Tauberg launched into the run that introduces "Dark Star." After all, I was capturing it for posterity.

To see the resulting video, click here. I added some goodies for those who appreciate the type of music being performed.

And while you're at it, check out the medley of originals that the band One Gig at a Time performed back in March. That makes for a lengthy listening experience, too.

Just the way some of us like it.

Main Street Farmer's Market opens

The Main Street Farmer's Market is open again. Besides offering a range of locally produced goods, the Market (which operates on Thursday afternoons) features musical acts. The inaugural performer this year was Dan Baker who, with an assortment of other talented artists, played several jazz tunes for shoppers.

The O-R has decided to start a new video feature; the Main Street Artists Series. We will be featuring as many of the various artists that play at the Market as we can on our website in an ongoing series of videos. For our first week, I recorded Dan playing a couple of lighthearted numbers early in the afternoon.

The first is 'Summertime'. Dan is the guy with the awesome red dreads. Accompanying him were two tenor saxs (Bill Shadel and Sam Kearney), an alto sax (Mark Higgins), two drum sets (Curran McDowell and Joel Panian) and a trombone (Jim Cope). The same ensemble performed 'Black Orpheus'. Look for a new artist to be featured as often as every week.

Flyboy

I've never been averse to going up in airplanes. So when I received an invitation from John Klatt Airshows to take a trip, I didn't hesitate to accept.

Maj. Klatt, who hails from Minnesota, is in the Air National Guard and has been flying for the military for nearly 20 years. He is in town for the Wings Over Pittsburgh air show at the 911th Airlift Wing in Moon Township (Saturday and Sunday).

When he said we'd do some rolls, loops and the like, I figured, that sounds great! How many people get that opportunity. It certainly was exciting when we started flying upside down, then we twisted around a bit. What a view!

Al Serafini, the director of operations at the newspaper, was in a plane flying tandem with us, shooting photos through the open door. As Al later told it, he had more fun that I did.

That's because of the ol' stomach acting up on me. After a while, I had to ask Maj. Klatt to take it easy, so we headed for downtown Pittsburgh to see the sights from the sky. That was cool, too, but my gut was calming down only marginally. So I looked up at the blue sky and white clouds, thought about ginger ale, and managed to make it back to solid ground intact, so to speak.

I later put together a video/slideshow featuring Al's photos and portions of the commentary between myself and Maj. Klatt during the "mission."

Click here to check it out.

Monday, Monday

Monday mornings stink. You know the feeling. Aching muscles and joints from yard work all weekend. The prospect of another long haul at the office. Trying to get the kids out of bed to get 'em to school. Lousy performances in fantasy baseball. Etc., etc., etc., etc.

So I check my e-mails this morning, and there's one – among the tons of junk I have to wade through each day – labeled with a "". For some reason, I decided to open it. Wrong move.

A gentleman – let's call him Methuselah – provided some feedback with regard the video we shot last week to go along with the latest in our "What's Up With That?" series. (We're up to 11 episodes already!) The subject was the proliferation of footwear being tossed over wires, a phenomenon known as "shoefiti." I figured I'd give it a try and see if I could land my golf shoes.

Could I do it? Check out the video!

Anyhoo, here's what Methuselah typed:

Just one thought.......

You really gotta be hoping that when something bad happens (power outage, telephone or cable disruption.......injury..... worse...)

That nobody remembers this "instructional" video.

Oh I know..... It's gonna happen anyway. There will be no shortage of footwear on the the lines.

Just trying to sell soap, entertain.

Like I said,

Just a thought.

You're absolutely right, Meth. People are going to do it, anyway. And we are trying to entertain. Most folks enjoy being entertained. Please give it a try sometime.

I'm glad you put "instructional" in quotes. According to my kids, my technique wasn't any good, so no one should learn anything from what I was doing.

And by the way, we shot the video on the privacy of our company's own property. No public utility lines were involved.

But during my improvised dialog, I should've uttered this:

KIDS, DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME. OR UP ABOVE YOUR STREET.

There ya go, Meth. Happy Monday.

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We do enjoy receiving feedback, though, especially when it looks like this:

Dear Mr. Funk,

I think that you did a bang-up job producing the video about Mr. Davis’ production of the Music Experience at Trinity Middle School last week. It was a blast seeing the interior of the school again (I am a ’76 grad of TMS), and a current teacher and musician. Thanks for showing that there are good things happening in education.

Linda Sherwood

Unfortunately, my reply of thanks to Linda bounced right back to me for some reason. Probably our sometimes-cheesy e-mail system.

But if you're checking in, Linda, you succeeded in brightening my Monday!