ME = Michael Everett GC = Interviewer
ME: One of my kinda requirements—and this is going to sound a little odd—you’ve got your list of big players across the top, I want to be on the “also ran’s” page. No, seriously, those are the people that really have it and are driving it and have seriously got the skills. And I’m kind of an accompanist or fill-in or whatever, and being on that would have me very uncomfortable.
GC: I’ll see what I can do to put you last. (laughs)
ME: That’s kind of the same reason I don’t usually get involved in the money aspects of it. I do paid gigs with various groups, but I’m not usually involved in any of the—I may be the one negotiating the thing, which is not uncommon, but I don’t usually get involved in the money. I mean, it’s not my motivation, it’s not—any intersection I’ve seen between
GC: That being said, can a person in Corvallis make a living playing music?
ME: (pause) If you’re really good and really driven and can live for really, really cheap, then maybe. I mean, if you’re thinking average, middle class expense structure, then no, I don’t think so. And partially because of people like me that are willing to go out and do it for free. Or very low. And I’m sort of actively—maybe not promoting that, but trying to keep that thought process—that type of thing—since my approach to it does not involve what it’s worth in terms of dollars, because I’m not really driven in that direction, and partially because just because I’m not starving. But I can see how other people are motivated differently. There’s so much music in this area; I mean, we sat down and talked about it—I don’t remember what group it was with one time—and the term that we had within like a 20-30 mile radius, we have nine current or former national fiddle champions. In an area of 50-60,000 people. It’s ridiculous, that concentration. You’ve digging in the mother lode! (laughs)
GC: That is truly amazing.
ME: And I don’t know that that’s true, because it’s a bunch of anecdotal—I know such and so or such and so and they did this.
GC: It seems like I forever see a sign that says, winner of this, winner of that.
ME: Yes! And you know, there’s a lot of different things out there, but Rebecca Lomnicky is a national junior Scottish fiddle champion. There’s a kind of convocation of whatever once a year, and she quite deservedly won that one time. So that puts her on the list, but it’s kind of a niche thing.
GC: Right. Have you ever won anything like that?
ME: (pause) In my musical early days—which there wasn’t really very much—I ended up being one of the city-wide finalists or top two or something like that in some solo competition when I was . . nine? Ten? Something like that. I had just started that year and everybody else was doing these very slow numbers, and I had something that was fast, so you could screw up and it wouldn’t be noticeable. And that got me to whatever the two final people were.
GC: Well, that’s—next step Ted Mack. Remember Ted Mack?
ME: Mm-mm.
GC: Ted Mack’s Amateur Hour on TV? (laughs)
ME: Well, I’m afraid I never really did a lot of TV.
GC: So where were you born?
ME: Eugene.
GC: So you’re a product of the area. And you’ve lived elsewhere, or—?
ME: A month in Atlanta, a month in San Diego. Not for any extended period of time.
GC: What instrument do you play?
ME: What ever’s sitting around. (laughs) Um. Well, that’s kind of a—that’s a larger question. (laughs) For most people it’s pretty obvious: they pick up a particular thing and they go at it and that’s their thing. I just never really thought limiting yourself that—some people are driven to excellence. I’m sort of driven to whatever fits in or whatever works in a given situation. So various fiddles and mandolins are the things that I’m most comfortable with.
GC: Formal music lesson type thing, or did you learn by yourself?
ME: I had—we sat down and totaled it up one time—there was an argument going on about something else. Along the way, in with orchestras or smaller groups or, you know, et cetera, et cetera like that, I had a total of like 18 or 19 months when I was growing up. So it’s not one of these things when they took music lessons until they were x number of years. And that was all in between—I have a tendency to put my hand in the way of things and break parts till they don’t work very well, and that serves as a kind of limiting factor. So I’m kind of one of those re-entrant musicians.
GC: Well, I have to say you’re the first person I’ve talked to that has paused at the question of “what do I play?”
ME: Yeah, most of them know what they’re focused on and I like the sound of that octave mandolin that I play. But part of the reason for doing that is that we already have, in various things I’ve been out to, lots of regular mandolin players and lots of fiddlers. So this kind of fit in below that, and you know, it had its own attraction too, but the main fiddle that I’ll drag out—I’m kind of attracted to weird instruments is part of it—so the main fiddle I’ll tend to drag out is a five-string octave. Which, I mean, there might be one other in the state, you know, that’s arranged that way. And that’s mostly because of Darol Anger’s fiddle project up in Portland, that there would be others. But I wasn’t really depending on that to find this. And this started out as a five-string viola or something like that; it was beat up and it didn’t work right. I have a tendency to take in instruments that are interesting and non-functional in some way and get them—
GC: I can see it’s a challenge. Kind of a jack-of-all-trades type of approach to things, I guess, to see how many you can master.
ME: Mm-hm. Yeah, that isn’t really—that certainly isn’t consciously one of the goals. It’s kind of whatever works, whatever fits. I started out fussing with electric violins. And that’s actually how I got back into the whole music thing. Part of it was Shari Ame, who you’ve probably come across. She’s another one of your national champion caliber Celtic fiddlers, who teaches. And I’d had four classes with Kent, to sort of determine that guitar wasn’t my thing. And Shannon went too. And so she, you know, OK, guitar’s not really the thing, part of it is just that they depend on a number of things that my fingers really won’t do very well anymore. But his approach to it involves sort of listening and feeling what you’re doing, and—stay away from those nasty dots on the page. And Shari Ame was kind of an outgrowth of that too, where she won’t even show you music until after you’ve mastered the tune.
GC: Interesting.
ME: And for me, listening to how it’s going and where you’re at in a piece and things like that, and trying to work out how you fit into that, is very fascinating. And being the player piano that turns out this tune by rote based on whatever’s been written down since 1730 is just not very compelling. I had enough of the classical orchestra thing—which is glorious when you’re in the middle of it, but it’s kind of—ew. (laughs) And that’s something, and I tend to gravitate towards this whole “get in the middle of whatever it is” genre. I don’t care. There are certain kinds of weepy country that I’m not too keen about—my dog left me after my wife dumped me after I crashed my pickup truck—that I’m not too excited about, but other than that, whatever.
GC: I know what you were saying about the genre and so on, and one of my pet peeves is when I go and listen to a group, and when they’re new, they want every song to be meaningful. And by the fourth meaningful song, I’m ready to go take a nap. And pacing I find is such a—they have no idea how important it was.
ME: Mixing it up.
GC: I know exactly what you’re talking about there, I believe. Do you remember any of your first musical experiences? It sounds like you caught on later in life that you enjoyed it, but did you put it aside—?
ME: Well, I kind of enjoyed it all along, I just had various mishaps of one sort or another that prevented moving forward.
GC: Were they physical, or?
ME: Oh, mostly stuff that—well, some of it was other stuff going on, some of it was changes in what was available at a school, or you know. It was one orchestra instructor type that I really strongly disliked. But no, either I broke, dislocated, or otherwise mangled fingers on this hand like three different times in situations that caused you to be pretty much out for a year, and then eventually you’d reconnect to it for some reason or another and go at it for awhile.
GC: Music was the constant.
ME: It was a constant, but it wasn’t something that I was constantly with.
GC: Fair enough.
ME: Yeah. Most of the early memories are sitting in front of a radio, humming along, bopping along, whatever. Kingston Trio and whatever.
GC: You were talking before about not paying attention to the dots on the scale there and so on. Do you have any thoughts about what makes a good technician or an artist in terms of playing an instrument? Do you have any thoughts on that, or do you come down one way—right brain, left brain, or whatever?
ME: I’ve seen people that can start with classical training, notes on the page, and then develop a feel for what they’re playing and produce something that sounds like art to me. I’ve seen lots of others who went to music lessons, learned to hit the right key, hit the right finger, or whatever, and can reliable reproduce—those are the ones I call the player pianos—that can reliably reproduce, but they don’t seem to have much in the way of music in them. (laughs) It’s great for situations when you need to be able to turn out a particular tune—there’s an enormous utility for that. Or be able to fit in with a particular thing, or play something you’ve never played before, or whatever. But it doesn’t get me going. I mean, there’s a number of people I’ve talked to that are basically terrified of being in the middle of a tune they don’t know. Of course, I’m very used to that. If you don’t end up in a performance in front of a lot of people and then they throw out something you’ve never heard before, and then you solo on it, you know. After being in that tune for about a minute and a half, that’s fun. Terrifying, sort of, but fun. (laughs)
GC: I can’t imagine that. (laughs)
ME: Yeah. So there’s some—that can be a real hoot. And it—there’s been this progression, and it’s almost like standing outside yourself and watching yourself move through it. ’Cause I started playing just over five years ago. At that time, you now, to even have a shot at getting half of the notes more or less right or in the right key or whatever was taking every bit of concentration I could muster. That’s been progressing. And then a little over a year ago when I started trying to sing too, uhh. (laughs) I get regular comments back about—oh, you look so serious! Oh no, this is taking ever bit of concentration I’ve got just to stay with it. And it’s only just recently, on some of these past things that I’ve done that I’ve been able to notice, oh, okay, there’s people out there, or such and so just stepped on their cord, or whatever. You know, where not being completely in the moment is possible. And to me that’s part of the positive of the whole thing, that’s one of these incredibly immersive things to do. Plus you get to meet people from a really broad variety of life. Doctors—well, you don’t get lawyers and accountants.
GC: Is that the other side of the brain?
ME: Or something. I don’t know. But teachers, artists of other sorts, professors obviously, current or recovering drug addicts, you know, just a really broad variety.
GC: Do you have other artistic endeavors? Do you write any of your music?
ME: Mm. No. Occasionally I’ll string together bits of other things that I’ve heard into something that sort of more or less ties together as a set, but that’s about as far as I’ll go with that.
GC: Do you remember any of your first experiences—like first songs, or anything that influenced you in the beginning, when you were a kid? I guess the radio, you were telling me. Were you supported by your family about playing?
ME: Well, the—once I kind of had said, oh, I’d like to do—and I think at the time it was probably—the thing that got me going was Paganini’s violin concert in D minor. That’s like—ooh, that’s cool! And that’s kind of what led me to violin. And my dad was supportive of that, as far as getting one and trying to stay on my case about practicing, which never worked.
GC: Practice is. . . .
ME: I like going out and playing. I literally go out and play three, four times a week.
GC: Who wants to practice when you can play it every day?
ME: Or something. It’s not that I don’t practice ever, but it’s pretty rare.
GC: Do the groups you play with get together to practice every week?
ME: Well, you know about River Rocks. So they do. For me that’s very much the exception. That’s the only one that I’m at all associated with that gets together regularly and practices. In fact, that’s one of the—that’s been one of the fun interactions with Laurie, is that she likes to have the set list arranged, and who’s going to play what, and of course I’m just like let’s get together and play! And yeah, the intersection of those two ideas—I definitely see some of the benefits of how she goes about it, in terms of the performances coming out right and stuff like that. This last go-around over at the Beanery, when it was just kind of ad hoc whoever showed up, you know, playing, just like—wow, that was really fun! And it’s like, okay, there’s some cross-learning going on here.
GC: Have you ever had any embarrassing moments, with being on stage and forgetting things, or just with fan interactions?
ME: Not too much in terms of fan interaction, other than the occasional drunk who’s falling on your monitors or whatever; that’s pretty much a given for bar bands. But yeah, completely flubbing solos.
GC: (laughs)
ME: But I’m pretty used to that idea, so it doesn’t bother me all that much. It’s just like, okay, I’ll do better next time.
GC: You’re with friends up there.
ME: Yeah. I’ve learned not to stop. And if you can pick out what’s going on in terms of harmonic structure so you’re doing something that’s pretty close, and most of the time, they’re either not paying attention or they can’t tell. So if you fake it well enough—but since pretty much all my performances involve faking it well enough, that’s not a new concept.
GC: Do you have any thoughts about today’s internet in terms of CDs—2011 digital sales outstripped physical sales of CDs for the first time, and what with filesharing and digital songs and—do you have any thoughts on the pros and cons, or—?
ME: It strikes me as incredibly freeing to have this stuff available anywhere. I mean, the idea that you were limited to, you know, in your rinky-dink town to whatever your rinky-dink music store happened to carry, that always struck me as very narrow. So I’m a big fan.
GC: Who do you listen to? Popular-wise or somebody, when you’re just trying to relax. What do you go to, musically?
ME: Kind of whatever happens. It’ll tend to be more the first thing I grab, rather than something I’m looking for specifically. Or you know, such and so sends you a link to this and that on YouTube and then you branch out from there.
GC: That easily happens, I know.
ME: Eclectic ambiguity.
GC: Good phrase.
ME: That should be my motto. (laughs)
GC: Is there anybody out there in the popular scene that you think is overrated? I know that some people get a great reputation as being a great drummer or guitar player, and they’re really not held in esteem by their own peers. (pause) I’m not talking locally, I’m talking about—
ME: Yeah, I see what you’re getting at. I see a lot of things that are done in ways that I wouldn’t necessarily have done them. But I don’t remember thinking, oh, big name—wow, they really suck. Usually that thought process has to do with the fact that I’m not a Sex Pistols fan. Not that they don’t actually have some fairly good tunes, but overall the genre is kind of —most of it doesn’t do much for me. So it’s not that those performances aren’t necessarily done well within their—and most of these big names actually do play pretty well. They may have off nights or whatever, if you’ve ever seen bootleg tapes of the Grateful Dead sort of melting down on the job.
GC: They’re not exactly noted for their tightness, either.
ME: Yeah. But I tend to value that. (laughs)
GC: That being so, is there anybody dead or alive that you’d love to just sit down and play with?
ME: (pause) Never really thought about that before. Hm. Since for me it’s so much about the interaction with whoever you’re playing with, and playing off of what they’re doing or filling in between what they’re doing or whatever—I’m not the leader guy in any of these things. I mean, every once in a while you see a performance of something like that and it would have been fun to be in there, but I’m not thinking of it specifically, that it’s Emmylou Harris is a god. So yeah, I’m drawing a blank.
GC: That’s fine. So let me play a little word association and I can get you out of here, and you can finish your sandwich. What I’ve been asking people is just typically—“Music is . . . “?
ME: Fun!
GC: “Music makes me feel . . .”?
ME: (pause) Involved. Um. One of the words that came to mind was subliminated, but that’s not—(laughs) Involved, inclusive, something in the middle of. There’s a better term for that. I’m not coming up with it.
GC: Okay. Is there—what reason would you give—why should people support music?
ME: Because they like listening to it. You know, if we’re going to play somewhere and there’s somebody who didn’t want to be there, why are you here?
GC: Makes sense to me.
ME: Most of this from my perspective—it’s really pretty simple. (laughs) Well, I greatly enjoy fussing with the instruments too. There’s always—I do have a link to the Zoobone project on the website. But that’s—John Donahue, who’s another of the name that you’ve just got to—basically all these names show up on the Musical Adventures blog somewhere. He’s one of the primaries for Wild Hog in the Woods. He’s the one who kind of got me going on this idea of various Dr. Seuss-like brass instruments with kazoos at the middle of them. And I have a project that’s going kind of like that.
GC: Do you have any other projects you want to mention?
ME: Umm, no I don’t think there’s anything I’ve got. There’s stuff that’s kind of mulling around —like how could a guitar be restructured so it’s easier for me to play? And that’s actually one of the threads that goes through all instruments that I fuss with is okay, given this set of limitations or this set of goals, or the fact that there’s already eleven people that I’m with that are playing this particular thing, what can I do that’s below it, that fits in with what I can physically do, that also sounds reasonably good. Almost none of my instruments are stock. They tend to get bent, fussed with. (laughs) Part of the creative process from my end. And that’s what I don’t understand about a lot people—they put an enormous amount of effort into trying to master the limitations of their instruments, rather than, you know, lowering the action, changing the strings, do this, do that so that it fits your body, reshape the neck, I mean. Morph the tool so it works for you, rather than trying to wrap yourself around this tool that doesn’t work for you. One of my pet peeves. (laughs)
GC: That’s great. That’s great. I’m going to stop you there.
