For love of the music

June 14, 2005

Lynsea Garrison/Frontiersman

PALMER - Carrie Newcomer, a folk singer and songwriter, asked herself why she would want to write lyrics and sing for a living during her performance Sunday night at Vagabond Blues.

"I think I do it for love," she said in a soft voice. "If you do it for love, it will take you where you need to go, which is oftentimes a place you didn't think you would be."

As of the last three days, that place is in the musty, wooden barns and small houses of the Alaska Fairgrounds in Palm where 16 musicians from throughout Alaska have gathered for the annual Midnight Sun Songwriting Camp.

Anchorage residents Rick and Sheila Miller started the camp eight years ago when their former partners, Mike and Tawmmie Miller, attended a songwriting camp in Colorado. The four decided to put together their own songwriting camp in Alaska.

"It's become a labor of love for us," Rick said. "Some people have boats and some people have motorcycles, but part of what we do is put together this."

Three national musicians, including Newcomer, have been highlights of this year's camp, as they have led and instructed various workshops on topics such as writing lyrics and basic guitar-playing, while later performing at Vagabond Blues.

Stephen Fearing, who grew up in Canada, has toured throughout the United States and Canada playing folk music and is a four-time nominee for the Canadian music award JUNO. Geoff Muldaur, a folk, blues and folk-rock musician, has played in several areas in the United States with various artists including Bonnie Raitt, Eric Von Schmidt and Jerry Garcia. Newcomer has also played with Bonnie Raitt, along with Alison Krauss and Mary Chapin Carpenter. She has toured through the United States, Europe and Alaska, and the string band Nickel Creek even covered her song, "I Should've Known Better" on their 2003 Grammy Award-winning CD.

Each day of the camp began at 8:30 a.m. and participants divided into small groups to attend seminars throughout the day.

In one session about song-crafting, Newcomer quietly sat with eight musicians on the wooden planks next to several guitars inside a barn. The wind made the sideboards creak and blow against the rope of the flag pole, creating an appropriate background sound that to them, sounded like a slap bass guitar. Individuals took turns reading descriptive stories on where they came from, an exercise to help with song writing, and Newcomer would often sing out sentences from the camper's stories.

In another session, all background noise was drowned out, as Peggy Monoghan, a voice teacher and musician from Anchorage, gave vocal lessons to the musicians. Individuals in the group took turns playing songs they wrote and singing to them, while Monoghan advised them on how to improve vocally.

Muldaur spent his time in a little cabin listening to songs that campers were working on or struggling with. On Sunday, sunshine poured into the room while artists took turns plucking and strumming their instruments and singing lyrics about topics such as a missed grandmother, evolution or "filling up a jar with bent nails." One woman had been working on a song for years, while another man had written humorous lyrics to a song the night before on paper towels.

Each night at 7:30 p.m., one of the national musicians performed at Vagabond Blues, while campers and other local residents watched and listened. Fearing filled the coffee shop with his deep voice and bluesy rhythm, as he bobbed his head and dipped his guitar during many of his songs. Before he played a song, he would tell the audience why it was created and share stories of his childhood in Canada and Ireland. One time, he recalled when his mother fell in love with her sister's husband's best man at their wedding in Dublin.

"It was a lavish affair," he said. "A year later, we left Canada when I was six. I remember the train would stop and he would always find the nearest officer and he would say, 'Arrest this woman, she's stolen my heart.' We took a Polaroid picture, and I came across it in the attic of mom's house in Dublin. That picture brought it all back."

Newcomer said during her performance said she was having a good experience in the camp and visiting Alaska.

"This is so much fun, this songwriting camp," she said. "I'm so inspired by all these people in Alaska writing songs."

Newcomer, who spent the day climbing Hatcher's Pass, went on to tell the audience about her experiencing.

"I went climbing today, and I felt like a goat," she said. "You guys live in paradise, but you guys know that."

Eagle River resident Eric Braendel has attended the camp for six years, but said this camp was especially good.

"These instructors are so good at expressing themselves and that helps with gaining new insights and different ways of looking at things," he said. "It gives you more tools to work with."

Susan Mumma, a resident of Seldovia, said she felt comfortable with the camp's atmosphere and participants.

"I actually have the confidence to even try it (attend camp)," she said. "It's helped, the interaction and just knowing people. I've met so many friends. The first time I came, I felt like I went home."

The camp ends tonight with a potluck songshare at the Old Colony Church with family, guests and alumni.

Rick hopes to continue the camp for several more

years.

"Every year we try to produce a very supportive atmosphere, because we want to encourage people to sing and write," he said. "And I've had a lot of instructors who come from outside have said the level of talent here seems to be higher. It's amazing; we have some really talented, superior writers in Alaska. I want to keep encouraging that."

Contact Lynsea Garrison at 352-2250 or llgwc2@

mizzou.edu