Return to SCA Combat...With One Hand!

While I cannot say I have truly "returned" to SCA combat because, as the armored combat marshal of the Crown Province of Ostgardr (Greater NYC area), I run a fighter practice and oversee most local tournaments and demo fighting. But I did put on my armor and fight in one battle at Pennsic, and I did spar at the Brooklyn fighter practice last week.

First,  just a little background: About two years ago I hurt my arm throwing a football. The pain went away soon, and I didn't think much of it. I did not fight much after that because there were not many opportunities to fight (the fighter practice, having no indoor site that year, was closed for the winter). Even in the spring, with fighter practice and an event or two, I must not have gotten enough hard fighting in to notice the true nature of my arm, injury.

Then I went to the East Kingdom 50-year anniversary event.

I got as much fighting in as I could. I had not been working out much, so I was in pretty poor physical shape compared to some recent years, but I fought my heart out anyway. At the end of each day, though. I simply could not raise my right arm (my sword arm). I had to literally pick it up with my left arm to enable it to do anything (have you ever tried brushing your teeth with two hands?).

I had started training for the TV show "Knight Fight," to which I had been invited to participate, and wanted to push myself. My body, and my arm, paid the price. When I went to the doctor after getting back to the city, it was determined that I had a torn rotator cuff.

I didn't let this stop me from training. After a few days my arm would recover, and I would be swinging a sword again. I even went to Sword Class NYC where the Armored Combat League's NY Sentinels trained and got in some of the full-contact action that I expected in Knight Fight. I can't say that this did my arm any favors. I got a couple of cortisone shots, and that helped me move my arm without pain, but several people have told me that cortisone is actually bad for you. Unfortunately, the producers had a change of heard at the last minute and cut me from the show before I got to fight. But the damage to my arm remained.

Then I went to the Pennsic War.

I figured I would stay out of most of the battles and only get into the bridge battle, where I could stand at the edge of the bridge with my 7-foot polearm and spear people as they came,a and take a knee if it looked like I would hurt my arm any more. That plan lasted wright up until the first time the enemy hit our line. you can see in videos of that battle me rushing to the front line to stop every charge against us, and join every charge by us.

Even so, I only felt the pain in my arm twice, when I moved  m my arm in exactly the way my torn rotator cuff wouldn't let me.

The worst pain at Pennsic actually came on two occasions:
1. I slipped in the mud
2. I slipped on some water at the pool in the hotel in which we stayed on the way back.
In both instances my body made a quick jerk in one direction while my arm kept going in another. This must have aggravated the tear in my rotator cuff, because it hurt o bad I could not sleep unless I put my arm over my head.

So I went back to the doctor and started some physical therapy. While it helped restore a lot of function, there were still things I just could not do, like swing a sword properly. So I decided to get the surgery to repair it. the trouble was, my insurance wouldn't cover it from the particular doctor I was seeing.

Fortunately, my lady works at a very highly regarded surgical hospital in NYC, and knows the best doctor for this kind of surgery. He agreed to see me, they took my insurance, and I look forward to having a surgery date set up soon.

In the meantime, however, I had been running the SCA fighter practice in Brooklyn. I have also been doing Insanity workouts 2-4 times a week (see my fitness blog for how that's going). I have included some conditioning training in the program at fighter practice, and have taken to wearing my armor, though I was not actually fighting in it (I needed to re-do the helmet padding, anyway). I was using my left arm to demonstrate the sword techniques. I was watching the mostly-brand-new fighters grown and improve every week. I was thrilled by their progress. One of them eve got authorized in July!

I decided to go back to the Armored Combat League practice at SCNYC. I got through the fitness and technique drills without any problems. Then came the time for free sparing with padded weapons and gear.

Now, it had been years since I fought in one-on-one matches in this sport. Not since my knee injury, back when most of the fighters in the game were mid-life crisis SCA duke-knights, had I truly banged it out by these rules. Now the NYC team was almost entirely younger, never-SCA types whose primary fight training was at SCNYC. I honestly wanted to test my mettle against them

I fought four one-minute rounds, each against a different person. I struck each of them with my sword in my left hand at least twice as often as they struck me, beating all of them on points except the last guy, who only beat me by hitting me on the head so hard I decided to stop before the round was over (no need to risk concussion or spine injury in a practice). And I did all this with my right arm holding a shield close to my chest and not moving it to defend myself.

Then came this year's Pennsic.

Again, I said I would only fight in the bridge battle. Unlike last year however, the bridge battle was not a 90-minuter resurrection battle where you could go back in after ever "death," it was just four rounds of battle with one death each. I managed to make each death count, and even killed a few in the process. No pain or discomfort in the arm at all.I never had to use it in a manner in which I was not able.

So when I got back home, I figured, "why don't I put my sword in my left hand, hold a shield against my body like I did at SCNYC, and see how I do?

So at the next fighter practice I did just that, fighting against all three of the fighters who showed up in succession.

And I kicked a little ass.

This is not to say that these fighters did poorly. I was actually quite proud of how they were able to stay out of my range and defend against a lot of my shots. They scored a good number of good blows on my head and body. But I was able to strike and make blows count. I was able to control my attack and maintain my own pace. There was a blow or two that a couple of them had been not executing to their greatest benefit, and I was able to use that blow against them by doing it as I meant it to be done.

One interesting thing I discovered was that it was not difficult at all to learn good technique with my left arm. I had been teaching folks how to strike with an SCA sword for some time now, so I knew  the mechanics, and it all just transferred quite easily. Thus, when it came time to fight, all the technique in the arm was already there.

This is probably why I did so well against the ACL folks. The rules of the duels only scored points for weapon strikes, takedowns, and disarms, and I stayed away from hand-to-hand clinching as much as possible. Like MMA fighters, ACL fighters must learn punching, kicking, and grappling as well as weapon technique for the melees, so they can't focus as much time on the weapons as SCA fighters do. Meanwhile, folks in the SCA have spent the past 50  + years figuring out how to hit people in the head with a stick, so we literally have it down to a science.

This is sort of why MMA fighters and boxers tend to not do so well in each others' sport. The main reason I was doing so well was the particular ruleset for the sparring rewarded what I had just spent months training for (with my left arm). I am sure that, just as the extremely hard blow to the head put me out, I would not have done so well had the fight come to wrestling or more punching and kicking.

So I will continue to train this way until my surgery, take the necessary time off, then get back in the game with a vengeance!

Civil War Songs: The Confederacy

Continuing from our previous post, here are some songs from the Confederacy that you may hear in the upcoming play "Honorable Distinction," produced by and performed at the Mount Pisgah Baptist Church in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, May 30, 31, and June 1, 2019.

The play is about the experience, struggles, and victories of the 54th Massachusetts Infantry and other famous and should-be-famous black heroes of the Civil War period, including Frederick Douglas, Harriet Tubman, Robert Smalls, and Martin Delaney. It is being done in salute to our veterans the weekend after Memorial Day. Tickets are available at Eventbrite.

This is the second time I am a part of this production, having played General William Tecumseh Sherman last year. This time I am playing President Abraham Lincoln, the second time I am playing that character for Mt. Pisgah, though the previous time was in a different play, "Emancipated Glory."

I am playing with the band in this show, and advising them on the period music that is selected for various parts of the show. In the previous post I linked to YouTube videos of various union songs. Here are links to some Confederate songs, and some that may have been sung by both sides.

The Bonnie Blue Flag
Almost an anthem of the South, this ode to the first, unofficial flag of the Confederacy, adapted from an Irish tune subsequently re-used for Unions versions of the song and other songs, outlines the formation of the rebel union:

Note that in this version, form the movie "Gods and Generals, The singer recites in the first verse "...We're fighting for our liberty / With famine , war, and toil," though the subtitles read the better-known lyric"..."With treasure, blood, and toil." In fact, historians believe the original version was "...Fighting for our property / We gained through honest toil."

This campfire version has all the lyrics:

Dixie

The unofficial anthem of the South, this song was quite popular nationwide. Even Abraham Lincoln liked it. All the ironies in the world come home when you discover it was originally written for a blackface minstrel show.

Goober Peas:
Both armies had food shortages during the war. The Rebels even made up a song about what they had to eat: peanuts.

Lorena:
This song is perhaps the saddest song to have been sung during the Civil War. It was immensely popular but made the men so homesick that some officers banned it because of the desertions it caused. This particular version was a hit  in the 20th century:

Here is another version with different instrumentation and harmonic vocals. The song was popular on both  the Union and Confederate sides:

I hope you have enjoyed these Civil War Songs. Please come and enjoy Emancipated Glory at Mount Pisgah Baptist Church running from Thursday through Saturday, May 30, 31, and June 1, 2019

Civil War Songs: The Union

As some of you may know, I am playing President Abraham Lincoln in "Honorable Distinction," a play produced by and performed at the Mount Pisgah Baptist Church in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn.

The play is about the experience, struggles, and victories of the 54th Massachusetts Infantry and other famous and should-be-famous black heroes of the Civil War period, including Frederick Douglas, Harriet Tubman, Robert Smalls, and Martin Delaney. It is being done in salute to our veterans the weekend after Memorial Day. Tickets are available at Eventbrite.

This is my second year doing this show, and the second time playing Lincoln (though not in the same show). I played General William Tecumseh Sherman the last time I was in this play), and again, in addition to playing a major role, I am also supplying a number of costumes and playing in the band. As part of the band-playing, I have am advising the band and the production on certain songs that may fit into the show.

Here are YouTube videos of several Civil War songs that you may hear during the show, in one manner or another. This list is of Union songs only. Confederate songs are in the following post.

You can hear most of these songs performed in bombastic style by US military orchestras (you may search if you like), but I have tried to find versions that sound more like they are being sung by real people. One amazing thing about these songs is how adaptable they are to different arrangements, accents, instruments, and rhythms!

A second post will follow of Confederate songs

UNION SONGS
The Battle Cry of Freedom (Rally 'Round the Flag):
Perhaps the best-known song from the Union side after "Battle Hymn of the Republic." It was a big deal because it both glorified the Union and stated the cause of ending slavery.

This "parlor version" gives a sense of how it might have been sung by a gathering of family and friends around the piano in a well-to-do family's home (Not a dynamic you find often in modern recordings of Civil War songs):

The Battle Hymn of the Republic (John Brown's Body; Glory, Glory Hallelujah):
Like many folk songs, the lyrics have been changed and misinterpreted and adapted for different causes. Here are three different arrangements, each with a different mood:

March:
(Mid 20th century Mich Miller version)

Gospel:

Campfire:

Tramp Tramp, Tramp the Boys Go Marching:
This was about men in prisoner of war camps looking forward to rescue by their comrades. The melody is used for the Christian song, "Jesus Loves the Little Children," and apparently other songs all over  the world.

This version is probably sounds more like it might have been heard back in the day and has some great civil war pics in the video:

This version is played on a music box from 1904!

When Johnny Comes Marching Home:
Adapted from an old Irish tune, you might know this as "The Ants Go Marching One by One..."
Note the strength of the "Hurrah!" each time it comes around. This was a thing back in the day.

This song probably has the most fascinatingly adaptable melody of all Civil War songs.

As an example, this instrumental version is a fascinating progression from modest marching tune to the very definition of bombastic orchestral excess, and then ends in a haunting melody on a single fife.

My Old Kentucky Home:

It was not until I did the research for this show that I actually heard this whole song and learned that it is actually an anti-slavery song. Of it, Frederick Douglas himself wrote that the song "awakens sympathies for the slave, in which antislavery principles take root, grow, and flourish": 

And here is a contemporary acapella vocal group doing their version, proving what Dave Alvin says, "It's all folk music."

The lyrics you hear at the Kentucky  Dereby are not the original ones, which is why the abolitionist heritage of this song my be surprising. But I found (thanks to the internet) those lyrick. Modern eyes and ears my find them quite stunning:

Original Lyrics (composed by Stephen Foster in 1853):

Verse 1:
The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home,
‘Tis summer, the darkies are gay;
The corn-top’s ripe and the meadow’s in the bloom,
While the birds make music all the day.
The young folks roll on the little cabin floor,
All merry, all happy and bright;
By ‘n’ by Hard Times comes a-knocking at the door,
Then my old Kentucky home, goodnight.

Chorus:
Weep no more my lady
Oh! weep no more today!
We will sing one song for the old Kentucky home,
For the Old Kentucky Home far away.

Verse 2:
They hunt no more for the possum and the coon,
On meadow, the hill and the shore,
They sing no more by the glimmer of the moon,
On the bench by the old cabin door.
The day goes by like a shadow o’er the heart,
With sorrow, where all was delight,
The time has come when the darkies have to part,
Then my old Kentucky home, goodnight.

Chorus

Verse 3:
The head must bow and the back will have to bend,
Wherever the darky may go;
A few more days, and the trouble all will end,
In the field where the sugar-canes grow;
A few more days for to tote the weary load,
No matter, ’twill never be light;
A few more days till we totter on the road,
Then my old Kentucky home, goodnight.

So some see the show, hear the music, learn the history, and enjoy the acting, singing., an dancing talents at Mt Pisgah Baptist Church this Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, May 30, 31, and June 1.

Next: CONFEDERATE TUNES!

BONUS!

Marching Through Georgia:
We are not actually doing this song anywhere in the play, but it is too important to leave out of a collection of Civil War songs.

This is the version of which I am most familiar. I love the spirit of the vocalists in this band! It does use a word or two that are no longer in common parlance among polite company, and some may consider it insensitive towards the sufferings of the South. But the event it describes did shorten the war. Not to get too political, I wonder how many such people complain about the atomic bombs being dropped on Japan? Would they object to a song called "Flying over Hiroshima?"

Tennessee Ernie Ford was part of the mid 20th-Century movement that sanitized and glorified the Civil War and its participants, particularly the Confederates. This version carefully omits any part of the song that might be politically sensitive or relates the suffering of the victims and the aggressive nature of the event.

Being as I sing this song as part of my "Time Travelling Bard" act, I was tickled to be able to actually play General Sherman in last year's version of this play!

P.S. There is a reenactment regiment of the 54th Mass in Washington D.C.!

The Burning of Notre Dame de Paris

The United States of America is less than 250 years old. We simply do not have anything to compare with Notre Dame de Paris that combines historical, cultural, and architectural significance and aesthetic beauty. We had 9/11 and the burning of the White House in the War of 1812, but without reducing their impact and meaning one iota, the significance of the destruction of those buildings was different, and we will not understand what it means to the French to see that 900+ year-old building so damaged by fire.


I hear that many relics had been removed as the building was being restored and many more were removed before the fire got to them, most of the stone structure, including the two famous towers, still stand, and that only one person, a firefighter, was seriously injured. I am certain that the French have documented and measured every inch of that structure and computer-analysed the colors and constructional materials of everything in it, but rebuilding a perfect copy is not the same as actually having the original wooden beams in the roof, for which an entire forest is said to have been cut down, or those original stained glass windows from the 1200's.


A few years ago I was in Paris and shot extensive photos and videos of the building, inside and out. But I failed to save the digital files in my camera from that day. More recently, I returned to that city, but did not take the time to re-shoot it. Now much of what I saw will only remain in my memory and other people's pictures.


This building, and France, have survived longer than many nations, and they both have seen greater share of victories and losses, damage and recovery, revolution and evolution, than an American who does not trace their roots beyond this nation's history can conceive. As a person of mostly-French descent and a student of history, my heart goes out to France, my French relatives and friends, and the French people for whom this building means so much, and grieve for the loss, but look forward to the French spirit that will rebuild it.

The Burning of Notre Dame de Paris.

The United States of America is less than 250 years old. We simply do not have anything to compare with Notre Dame de Paris that combines historical, cultural, and architectural significance and aesthetic beauty. We had 9/11 and the burning of the White House in the War of 1812, but without reducing their impact and meaning one iota, the significance of the destruction of those buildings was different, and we will not understand what it means to the French to see that 900+ year-old building so damaged by fire.

I hear that many relics had been removed as the building was being restored and many more were removed before the fire got to them, most of the stone structure, including the two famous towers, still stand, and that only one person, a firefighter, was seriously injured. I am certain that the French have documented and measured every inch of that structure and computer-analysed the colors and constructional materials of everything in it, but rebuilding a perfect copy is not the same as actually having the original wooden beams in the roof, for which an entire forest is said to have been cut down, or those original stained glass windows from the 1200's.

A few years ago I was in Paris and shot extensive photos and videos of the building, inside and out. But I failed to save the digital files in my camera from that day. More recently, I returned to that city, but did not take the time to re-shoot it. Now much of what I saw will only remain in my memory and other people's pictures.

This building, and France, have survived longer than many nations, and they both have seen greater share of victories and losses, damage and recovery, revolution and evolution, than an American who does not trace their roots beyond this nation's history can conceive. As a person of mostly-French descent and a student of history, my heart goes out to France, my French relatives and friends, and the French people for whom this building means so much, and grieve for the loss, but look forward to the French spirit that will rebuild it.

Thoguhts for our National Holiday Today (Super Bowl)

Taking just a few moments here to share a little of the joy and meaning of our National Holiday today:

This remarkably erudite, fast-talking, fast-paced review of how the collapse of everybody else led to the Patriots and Rams meeting in the Super Bowl again truly encapsulates the hyperbolic, overblown nature of the sport, its outsized impact on our culture, economy, and daily life (please note the serial comma and use it), its potential for distraction from Real Issues, and ultimate irrelevance to anything important, except as a distraction from the boring mundanities of economic imbalance, ecological disaster, and social injustice.

Yes, I said social injustice. Hate me.

Except for one thing: This game, and this sport, can be used as an inspiration. When watching it today, think to yourself: If these guys are willing to work so hard and risk so much for something whose recorded, objective outcome is so meaningless, how hard con you work to achieve something that is truly important and meaningful to you?

I'm playing Abraham Lincoln in a play about the Emancipation Proclamation!

I don't have time to do full justice to this announcement, but I wanted to make sure I put it in a permanent place (as permanent, anyway, as the Internet can be).

Earlier this year, Boria Entertainment sent me to an audition for a play titled "Human Cargo," produced by the INCARN ministry of the Mount Pisgah Baptist Church in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, NY. It was about the history and experience of African slaves brought to America. I wound up getting cast as a slave ship captain and a slave hunter. It was a very intense play and my characters were among the worst people I have ever known. I was proud to be a part of it, though, as it was an important part of history and a very moving play. I also got a lot of good work knocking the rust off of my acting chops, being in a bitchin' fight, and even doing a little dance work in the rehearsals.

This was followed by my role as General William Tecumseh Sherman in this organization's next play, "Honorable distinction. This wa about the Black experience in the American Civil War. In addition to playing the general who conceived the plan that came to be characterized as "40 Acres and a Mule," I also played harmonica with the keyboardist during the musical numbers,as background, and during interludes. I also got to teach the actors playing the 54th Mass. "The Battle Cry of Freedom" and the rebel soldiers "Bonnie Blue Flag" and sing it with them.

Now, in the third play of this trilogy, "Emancipated Glory," I play the great emancipator himself in the months leading up to the enactment of the Emancipation Proclamation.

The play is being performed on December 30th and 31st at the Mt. Pisgah Baptist Church. Details and a brief diary of the experience to follow.