view archived music Lamb's Retreat: Where Songwriters Meet: Powerhouse Folk Concerts to Wrap up next two Weekends Robert Downes
Getting back to his roots was the motivation for songwriter/performer John D. Lamb when he launched Lamb’s Retreat for Songwriters 10 years ago at the Birchwood Inn in Harbor Springs. “My rock band was playing up north quite a bit and we were quite successful there, but the more I played the clubs, the less I was playing my own original songs,” he recalls. “I started looking for inspiration and a way to get back to playing the songs I had written.” That journey led Lamb to establish what has become one of the most prestigious retreats for songwriters in the country. The retreat has become so successful that Lamb decided to add a second weekend this year. And the good news for local music lovers is that both weekends, Nov. 4-7 and Nov. 11-14, wind up with Saturday night concerts featuring some of the best folk and acoustic players around in the 125-seat Birchwood Inn. It’s as if the Ann Arbor Folk Festival were transported 250 miles north, with Joel Mabus, Michael Smith, Bob Franke, Claudia Schmidt and Michael Camp performing at 9 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 6, and Edie Carey, Anne Heaton, Teddy Goldstein, Chuck Brodsky and Rachael Davis performing Saturday, Nov. 13.
BACKGROUND CHECK A resident of Royal Oak, Lamb has been a pillar and mainstay of the Detroit music scene for the past 25 years, carrying the torch for acoustic folk rock in the metro area and spending his summers performing up north. Lamb graduated from Farmington Harrison High School in 1976 and studied journalism at Central Michigan University. While living in Mt. Pleasant, he began performing with a local rock group and discovered he had a talent for songwriting and a yearning for the stage. As noted in the Detroit Metro Times, Lamb plays Midwestern roots rock, and with something like 200 performances per year, he’s generated a lot of fans in the past quarter century. Former Detroiters might recall him as Johnny D back in the early ‘80s, playing at venues such as Marcel’s (formerly Trainer’s) and the Detroit Saloon. In ‘85, he changed his stage name to John D. Lamb, an anglicized spin on his real name, D’Agnillo, which is Italian for “of Lamb.” Back to the future: 10 years ago, searching for a way to recapture his songwriting roots, Lamb hit upon a synchronicity of influences to launch his Retreat. At the time, he and dj Dave Dixon were hosting a popular TV variety show in the Detroit area called “Ferndale Tonight,” which showcased local musicians and personalities. Lamb had also acquired a reservoir of songwriting acquaintances from his years of hosting open mics and performing with a slew of Motor City musicians. “I wanted to stay in Michigan and raise my family rather than move to New York or L.A. and try to make it there,” he recalls. “There were big songwriting scenes going on in West Texas, Boston and Seattle, and I wondered why we couldn’t have the same thing in Michigan.” Around that time, Lamb also picked up on the popularity of the Detroit Tigers baseball fantasy camps. Fans were flying to Florida and suiting up to play ball with Tigers stars such as Mickey Lolich. “I thought that if I could do that with songwriters where everyone would be equal and there would be all kinds of support for each other, a retreat would probably work.”
BIRCHWOOD INN The picturesque Birchwood Inn seemed the ideal setting. “I had stayed at the Birchwood Inn a lot, sometimes in the off-season. It’s a beautiful place with a lake view and a scenic drive. It’s an inspiring place to write songs.” During his first year, Lamb attracted 26 songwriters to his retreat, then 45 and 56 in succeeding years. Since then, he’s been full-up with 65 attendees each year, and has added a second Retreat for the 10th anniversary. Initially, he didn’t know whether the Retreat would appeal to a largely folk/acoustic crowd, since his credentials were largely in Michigan’s rock community. He got a boost from Rod Kennedy, however, who is one of the founders of the prestigious Kerrville Folk Festival in Texas. “He gave us instant credibility,” Lamb says, adding that Kennedy has been on staff every year but one thus far. This year, Kennedy’s input is augmented by that of Dalis Allen, who is the producer of the Kerrville festival. What draws ‘em in? Lamb says that Retreat attendees all gather together on Friday afternoon and each is given a songwriting assignment. After completing a weekend of workshops (and no doubt, some feverish late-night woodshedding and scribbling), the songwriters get back together to perform their new works on Sunday. Last year, they wrote an entire opera, based on the fictional characters of a subdivision called Forest Hills. “It’s quite a way to finish the weekend,” Lamb says. “There’s a lot of laughing, a lot of crying -- it’s very emotional when everyone plays their song.” In fact, the songwriting assignment has become a big draw for the Retreat, with many attendees returning year after year. Participants spend $445 for the three-day event ($240 if they stay elsewhere), which includes meals, workshops and the Inn, not to mention cameraderie with some of the nation’s most noteworthy folk players. “You have to make it reasonable because how else would you be able to get musicians who depend on weekend gigs to turn up for this?” Lamb muses. “Now, it has become a very important thing, because everyone comes away from the Retreat with a new song, and you’ll hear them played and discussed all over the country, with stories of how they got these assignments and how they were written.”
Lamb’s Retreat concerts on Saturday, Nov. 6 and Nov. 11 begin at 9 p.m. at the Birchwood Inn in Harbor Springs, with donations at the door of $10-$12. For info, check out www.springfed.org.
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