Re: Fahey, was Re: Nature of Reality

["Miko Biffle" <biffoz@arczip.com>]

>    I think Fahey ws relly significant .We certainly would never hve hd
> Hedges without Fhey brekingt the trail...

Even with the massive progression in tricky technical playing that followed
Hedges, there were few who could so clearly and elegantly float out
understated melody and harmony like Fahey. I had the luck to catch him at
Kuumbwa in Santa Cruz in the mid 90's or so? Anyone else catch that show?

Anyway... his playing was so slow and floating, that some members of the
audience visibly believed it was a joke of some sort... and I can remember
John making his own funny comments in the *huge* gaps between passages, 
that
caused me to slowly start giggling, then progressively busting up as he 
took
it to extremes. My wife was nonplussed and trying to shush me... (not many
others were laughing).

At one point he was playing a sort of Hawaiian tune named after some lady,
(he had given a long intro/story about the woman), and in one of the gaps
the phone in the club rang loudly, prompting him to say, "Maybe that's
her?... "  He was so tuned into the audience and his surroundings, yet
completely on another level as well. It was *awesome*. I've tried slowing 
my
acoustic playing down like that, and it's amazingly hard to really pull it
off. Anyway... I'm thankful I had that last chance to see him. He lived up
to every story of him I've heard.

Long live the legacy of John Fahey...