Night at the Opera: SONG OF THE LAKES Unveils their New CD at City Opera House Opening

Dec. 1, 2004

This week Northern Michigan celebrates two of its long time treasures – one that has required nearly a $10 million facelift to preserve it and another that has preserved itself in the annals of musical folklore by delighting audiences for the past 22 years with a sound that they can call their own.
The City Opera House in Traverse City has completed over $5 million of its renovations and will commemorate the completion of the first phase of its restoration with a “Re-Opening Celebration” December 1 through December 4. The highlight of the four-day ceremony will be Friday, December 3, when Song of the Lakes hosts a CD Release Party for “Poets Say,” their fifth release and first in eight years. The group will perform with several special guests as they perform tracks from their new CD as well as several songs that have become crowd favorites.
Song of the Lakes’ popularity has come from the group’s ability to capture the melting pot sounds of the area’s early Nordic and Celtic settlers while infusing it with modern day Great Lakes living. The band’s music defines the Northern Michigan lifestyle at its best, reflecting on the past, preserving the future and savoring the moment. “Poets Say” captures this and more. It is an album made by friends for friends.
It was friendship that created the band and friendship that has kept it together.

CAMPFIRE DAYS
“In the late ’70s and early ’80s there was the usual bunch of suspects gathering by the weekly campfire in Benzie for jam sessions,” said Rick Jones, the group’s antler and bodhran player. “In the early days some of those who jammed with us included Kurt Jones of the Benzie Playboz and Jim Clapp, owner of the Cabbage Shed in Elberta. Eventually, one by one people stopped showing up and soon it was the four of us, so in 1983 we became Song of the Lakes.”
The four remaining include Lisa
Johansson, flute and whistle player; her husband Ingemar on the mandolin and Swedish nyckelharpa; Michael Sullivan on guitars and the bouzouki, and Jones squaring off the quartet.
All four members share vocal respon-sibilities. Locally, few bands last more than a year and bands with five years or more under their belts seldom have all of the original members. Song of the Lakes’ longevity is unheard of in musical circles and may be attributed to their ability to fight fairly.
“We are like siblings and, yeah, we have had our share of arguments,” said Jones. “But at the end of the day we are a family. We learned about 15 years ago that we had to check our egos at the door because they were getting in the way.”
For the Johansson’s, they see the fact that the members have interests and careers outside of the band as a contributing factor in the group’s longevity. Lisa teaches music at Montessori as well as giving private flute lessons. Ingemar and Michael work in the world of social work/counseling, while Rick considers himself a “Benzie County Boy” working as a laborer, sculptor, sawmill hand and whatever else to keep “the ebb and flow of the green coming in.”

MARRIED TO THE BAND
“Being in a band is like adding another marriage to your life,” said Ingemar Johansson. “Having day jobs takes some of the pressure off and allows us to do this for fun.”
Johansson says that poses another question.
“Where would we be today if we had chosen to do this full time?” asked Johansson. “It is a question that will never be answered.”
Despite this being a “part-time gig,” Song of Lakes seems to work as hard if not harder than many bands that consider themselves full-time. They have built a following around the Midwest playing festivals and events. The popularity of the group has reached as far as Switzerland where they now play regularly at the Montreux Jazz Festival.
“We fit in at that festival,” said Lisa. “Thousands of people have responded to our sound and we have been invited back three times now.”
Defining the style of Song of the Lakes music is challenged only because radio stations and music stores like to classify music in neat categories. The group blends a Celtic, Scandinavian and Great Lakes sound to create their own genre. While they are comfortable on the stage at any folk-oriented festival, ironically, the group isn’t “Celtic” enough for some Irish festivals or “maritime” enough for traditional maritime festivals.

TOUGH FIT
“We have never played the Milwaukee Irish Festival because we are not classified as a traditional Irish band,” said Sullivan. “There are some maritime festivals we would like to play at as well. In fact, we have had a hard time getting a gig at the National Cherry Festival; you would have thought the year my daughter was the Cherry Queen we would have had an inside track.”
Sullivan isn’t complaining – he is just speaking to the realities of the music business, where little makes sense, so there is no use trying to figure it out. What may be figured out is that “Poets Say” is proof that Song of the Lakes is getting better with age. By 1969 the Rolling Stones had given us the best that they ever would be able to give. It is obvious that with Song of the Lakes, however, the best is still to come.
“I think it is our best effort yet,” said Lisa Johansson. “I think one thing that this project does is try and get us out of the box. We touch on a whole bunch of different genres and flavors to shake that notion that we are just a maritime band. This album is a celebration of the poetry of each song and touches on several of the things that we are as a band.”
The title of the CD comes from the sixth track written by Sullivan in honor of his niece’s wedding.
“The song was written as a gift for my niece and her husband, it was their wedding song,” said Sullivan. “I write biographical ceremonial songs for all my relatives. This song in particular defines their relationship, and they are still married so the song must have worked.”

PEDAL STEEL GUITAR
If the CD has a country sound to it, it is probably the pedal steel guitar work of Jerry Hendrix. Hendrix was born and raised in Traverse City, but ended up going to college near Bakersfield, California where he played steel guitar with Buck Owens and Merle Haggard during the development of “The Bakersfield Sound” of the late ’50s/early ’60s. Hendrix was just selected into the Pedal Steel Guitar Hall of Fame.
“I have played with a lot a great musicians in my day but this was a real honor,” said Hendrix, who is retired and lives in Manistee and often jams at the Hayloft on Wednesday nights. “I was surprised they asked me, but glad they did.”
Hendrix isn’t the only celebrity involved with “Poets Say.”
“Yes, the cover caricature was done by the legendary Claude DeRib,” said Jones. “We met him while at Montreaux and he has done several drawings of the band.”
DeRib is one of Europe’s all-time great cartoonists and illustrators. He was the first cartoonist in the world to develop a whole series around a character with AIDS. In the 1970’s DeRib was one of the artists responsible for “Les Schtroumpfs” or as they were known in the States, “The Smurfs.” DeRib also made another contribution to the CD.
“His daughters Diane and Noemi sing the vocals on the song ‘Montreux,’” said Sullivan. “They are both just coming onto the music scene. I met them when I went to Montreux with my son’s band a few years ago. We were invited to stay at their father’s house and it turns out this guy owns a villa at the foothills of the Alps with a pool overlooking Lake Geneva, and his neighbor is Shania Twain who bought what was an old college for a getaway and recording studio. The DeRib daughters are both coming in for the CD release party to perform.”

WHAT NEXT?
“Poets Say” shows the group’s versatility and talents as musicians, songwriters and composers. Each track captures the journey the band has traveled, a journey that we have traveled with them. Whether it is the haunting lyrics of “Old Testament Sky” that deals with sudden loss or “Bossman Joe,” the perfect anthem after being “bullwhipped” at work. The connectivity of Irish, Polish and Scandinavian music is clearly heard in “Ambretta,” a song where Ingemar showcases the nyckelharpa.
The CD burner is still hot from “Poet’s Say,” yet the group is already planning their next release.
“We have enough music for at least one if not two more CDs,” said Ingemar. “The challenge was not what we were going to put on this album but rather what we were going to leave off.”
So will the group wait another eight years before releasing another CD?
“Money has always been the delay in recording,” said Jones. “We are hoping to not let that get in our way. It costs a lot of money to record. We are basically on the verge of being a rumor after 23 years, so we are not going to wait as long between this CD and the next one.”
Song of the Lakes creates a celebra-tory atmosphere with each performance. Audience participation is required; bring dancing shoes, two hands, vocal chords and a smile.


The City Opera House
“Re-Opening” ceremonies will include:

• A Comic Concert Night on December 1 at 7 p.m., featuring the 1927 Buster Keaton classic “The General,” with a live performance of an original film score by nationally acclaimed pianist-arranger Kevin Cole.

• On Thursday night “Voices of the Season,” at 7 p.m., will feature several local choral groups including Trillium, The Overtones, T.C. West High School Choral-Aires, Interlochen Chamber Singers, Sweet Adelines and The Cherry Capital Chorus.

• The Song of the Lakes CD Release Party on Friday starts at 8 p.m.. For ticket information on all performances visit www.cityoperahouse.com or call the office at (231) 941-8082. Additional information
on Song of the Lakes may be found at www.songofthelakes.com.