Episode 21 - Mary Lea

The intro and interstitial tracks from today's episode are Jules Verret/Reel de Mattawa (Richard Forest)/La Belle Gaspésie from Green Mountain by Mary Cay Brass and Friends, Levi Jackson Rag and la Partida, from Heatin’ Up the Hall by Yankee Ingenuity, and Goodbye My Lady Love from the album Full Swing.

See the Contra Pulse website for transcripts and more.

And the Country Dance and Song Society for information about Contra and English country dance across the continent.

See and hear Mary Lea in action:

• Bare Necessities is Kate Barnes (Episode 9 interviewee), Earl Gaddis, Mary, and Jacqueline Schwab.
• Playing for a ball in Nashville in 2017
• Listen to their albums on bandcamp
• Childsplay
• A memorial page for Donna Grossman has some sound clips, photographs, and information on Ladies Chain, the 5-women band Mary started out with
• Yankee Ingenuity is Kate Barnes (Episode 9 interviewee), Cal Howard, Mary, and Jack O’Connor
• Their album, Heatin’ Up the Hall
• Playing for a square in 1992, with Tony Parkes calling
• A 2008 recording from the Monday night dance
• This page has info on all of Mary’s current bands, including:
• BLT playing for vintage dancing in 2017
• Crazy Quilt, whose other members Julie has also chatted with for this podcast (Anna Patton in Episode 5 and Peter Siegel in Episode 15)
• Dark Carnival plays the graveyard shift at the Brattleboro Dawn Dance in 2008
• Here’s a video of the moment Mary described playing Brasilerinho at the Ann Arbor Dawn Dance in 2015

Some people mentioned in this interview:

• Ruthie Dornfeld lives in Seattle now and has several musical projects. Here’s a video of her playing with Morten Alfred Høirup
• Arthur Davis also mentions playing with Laurie Indenbaumin Episode 6 of this podcast
• Julie chats with Audrey Knuth in Episode 16 of this podcast
• George Marshall knows Richard Powers and talks some about his experiences with vintage dance in Episode 13 of this podcast

Some odds and ends mentioned in this interview:

• The tune list Mary mentioned.
• Wikipedia has a pretty good article on choro/chorinho
• The Brattleboro Dawn Dance has a great history page