The Jam in Zaandam

Since we knew we were going to run late, Rudo had offered to drop me at the train station to meet Juliane. So we drove in and when it wasn't easy to find a place to park, he stopped at a convenient curb to drop me and my stuff (I had my luggage with me)...right across a tram track. Whoops!! Fortunately the tram driver wasn't in too much of a hurry so Rudo and the car and me and my luggage both came away unscathed.

Juliane and I had arranged to meet at the meeting point....but I couldn't find it and I'm not sure if she ever did. I finally found an info desk and the nice man there suggested the taxi stand at the end of the station. Thank goodness for phone texting! I texted Julie and she appeared out of the crowd. It was good to see her after a year and a half. Next task: find our bed and breakfast place and check in. Fortunately our hosts, Wimmo and Godwin had emailed me excellent instructions so we oriented ourselves and set out to cross the broad plain of tram tracks, brave the bike parks with maybe a thousand bicycles waiting for their owners to return, and cross the canal. We found ourselves in a quiet street in front of one of those pretty Amsterdam houses that looked like all the others.

From Europe 2008

The reason I always look for a bed and breakfast rather than an ordinary hotel when I'm traveling is that it's always a pretty good bet that the people you meet will be interesting. Wimmo and Godwin certainly did not disappoint us in this respect -- they were completely charming, ushering us into the living room and sitting us down to chat as we had coffee. We got a complete orientation to the city (including a map marked with XXXXX over the tourist areas where we shouldn't bother wasting our time and highlighted in orange in the places that the locals go instead) and then a ride over to a second house they owned which was where we were actually staying. This one sat right on the canal, with a tiny Italian restaurant on one side and a fish market on the other. Julie doesn't eat fish so wasn't fond of the fish market, but Wimmo had mentioned when we asked about good places to eat that the Italian restaurant was probably the best in the city, so we filed that information for later use.

Inside the Double Dutch lived up to its name -- it was decorated in a very Holland motif that included tulips, wooden shoes...you get the idea. But cute, and our room was very comfortable. The biggest trick was hauling my rolling luggage up the winding staircase, but we managed and settled ourselves in. Then since neither of us had had time for lunch, we set out to walk around for a bit with a vague idea of stopping for coffee or food when we saw something good.

As I already knew, Julie is a city kid -- she grew up in Berlin and now lives in Frankfurt. So her idea of getting to know a city is to take a map and start walking. So that's what we did, crossing the Nieuwmarkt and wandering down a twisty little street through "Little Chinatown." About halfway down the street we encountered a bakery window from which the most amazing aroma of baking bread was emanating. We weren't quite ready to stop for just bread (we wanted real food) but we marked the place as a prime opportunity for breakfast the next morning (our "bed and breakfast" was actually just "bed" this time).

Through Little China, down along the canal, up another street or two....after a while we found ourselves in front of a Thai restaurant that looked pretty good, so we stopped for food. And talk. I think neither of us was really sure how it would be to spend so much time together after not seeing each other for nearly two years, but we needn't have worried. We both had lots to talk about so we ate and talked and ate and talked...it was very good. And we still hadn't planned what we were actually going to SEE by the time we were ready to leave :-)

After dinner, another adventure: we had to take the bus out to Rudo's place in Zaandam. Fortunately I had an idea of where to go to find out about this, so we headed for the information booth at the central station, managed to figure out what line to get in for information, bought some "strippen"(multi-zone tickets used on busses and trams) and ran to find the 91 bus. Easier said than done....once again we had been definitely pointed towards a vague location and had to bumble around a bit crossing all those tram tracks into the bus pickup area and eventually down to the last bus stand to catch our bus. The friendly bus driver was a welcome bonus, explained with mock seriousness how to properly pronounce the name of our stop ("Fife-hook"and don't ask me how to spell it!), and promised that "she"(the electronic announcer) would tell us when we had arrived. Of course when we got there, I realized that when Rudo had pointed out the bus stop to me as we were going into Amsterdam that it had been light outside, and now it was dark, and we were on the opposite side of the street facing in a different direction. But not to worry: I managed to get myself oriented, turned down the right street, and we found Rudo's place with no trouble.

From Europe 2008

Alex was already waiting for us, and Monique arrived soon after with Hans and Sevgin and we started setting up to play. Monique and I had talked several times about putting together a set list, but somehow that never happened. So there we were, Bulgarian accordian player, Romanian clarinetist, American autoharper, bass player and fiddler playing Irish, American and old-time, klezmer/Balkan fiddler and bass player, Greek guitarist -- five fairly distinct repertoires and really no time playing together ready to play a live concert.

From Europe 2008

And Rudo, who acted as our engineer and announcer, madly setting up mics, twiddling dials, and operating three computers to stream us out onto the internet and into Second Life. By 8pm there were 20 or so people...um, avatars....literally from all over the world gathered in the Old Bowl, an outdoor amphitheater in Alpine Meadow. I chatted with the group as Rudo continued to check connections and twiddle dials...and then we were ready. Because Monique and I had already played some of my Israeli repertoire together, we started with that, and the others joined in. And magic happened: these were musicans who could hear a tune once or twice through and just pick it up by ear and play along. So they did, and we did. There was some Balkan stuff in there that didn't fit on my autoharp, so I picked up the bass. Then Alex played some Greek songs. Then someone in the Old Bowl asked if we could play an Irish jig, so I started one on autoharp and it turned out that Hans knew it on accordian and Monique played it on fiddle. After a couple of times through, Hans took the lead and started another jig that I knew and I think we went from there to a reel....anyway it went on for a while. We played some American tunes and I called a square dance while playing along on bass, then switched to fiddle and started Cluck Old Hen, which I'd taught Monique earlier. That one threw Hans a curve -- he didn't realize right away that it was modal, so we had some really interesting backup for a while. But it didn't really matter...whatever we were playing it was fun for us (we literally steamed up the windows) and interesting enough to listen to that the audience stuck around and kept growing. The funniest moment was when Monique was improvising something with a kind of klezmer sound and the rest of us were just following along and someone who was listening asked whether we were still live or whether it was a recording. I wish we had recorded it...it must have been something. Fortunately Juliane and others took pictures, so hopefully I'll have some up here sooner or later.

From Europe 2008

So that was our live jam in Zaandam, streamed onto the internet and into Second Life. I said to Monique later that I was jealous that she and the others could get together to do this whenever they wanted. Monique just laughed and told me that they'd never done anything like this and probably wouldn't again -- I had been the catalyst, and without me there they wouldn't have bothered. That was an astounding idea to me -- I had thought that I was just an outsider joining in with something that already existed before I showed up. But in reality, without me that group process didn't really exist. I'm not sure what to make of that, but it certainly was a satisfying musical experience for both those of us who made the music and those who heard the music. So I think I'll just leave it at that.

I'm writing this from Zaandam again (Saturday evening, 11/8), having spent most of the week in Denmark and being on my way to Tel Aviv tomorrow morning. More soon, I hope -- I imagine it shouldn't be difficult to find internet access in Israel :-)