sprite writes
broodings from the burrow

May 28, 2005


a hearty thank you to phillip
posted by soe 11:52 pm

As mentioned in an earlier post, our friend Phillip had to go to Afghanistan for a month for work, which, ultimately, meant that he had spare tickets to see tonight’s recording of A Prairie Home Companion at Wolf Trap. Being a generous friend, he asked me and Rudi if we wanted to go. We said yes.

So this evening we set off with our friend Susan to see the show. We knew Odetta was going to perform, but we didn’t know any of the others. Garrison Keillor’s other guests included bluesgrass group Doyle Lawson and Quicksilver, Norwegian siblings and classical strings duet Mari and HÃ¥kon Samuelson, mandolin player Peter Ostroushko, and jazz chanteuse Prudence Johnson.

Keillor was in fine form. Odetta was good, but drop-dead excellent like the last time we saw her at the New Haven Folk Festival. I really liked mandolin player Lawson and his band — I meant to look for a cd at the souvenir stand on our way out, but I forgot. The Samuelson siblings were good on violin and cello (I’m not educated enough to say they were excellent, but people in the audience seemed awed by them).

The main skit mocked George Bush, the sound effect guy did a terradactyl sound so well early on Keillor incorporated it into the rest of the program, and the Lake Woebegon story featured baseball — who can argue with that?

Keillor had us join him in singing the National Anthem, “Summertime” by Gershwin (it would have been useful if he’d prompted us on the lyrics, but the audience seemed to do decently well regardless; I only knew “Summertime, and the living is easy”), and “Shall the Circle Be Unbroken.”

We finished the night with Thai food at a restaurant in Bailey’s Crossroads. The plantain tempura was the highlight of the meal for me — firm plantains with just a hint of coconut. Yum!

It was a lovely evening all around. And I really appreciate Phillip asking us to partake of his tickets. Phillip, we had a fantastic time. Have a safe flight home.

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