Hello —

Music — not verbiage — expresses what the events of this week have left me wanting to share with my friends this morning.

Sorrow (allayed with moments of hope and beauty): 1st movement, “Passacaglia,” from my Trio #13 for clarinet, cello and piano

… and Anger (allayed with moments of humor and joy): 2nd movement, “Fugue,” from the same piece of music.

To hear both movements played by clarinetist Joe Rosen and friends, click on the links above.

To see PDFs of the scores, click on the links above.

Rick Sowash
Cincinnati, OH
Nov. 13, 2016

🎶 🎶 🎶 🎶 🎶

Good Scout that I am, I play by the rules. I obey the law.

Still, even for me, every once in while comes the while it’s a once in ...

Not content with wreaking havoc in Louisiana, Hurricane Ida, blew north to Philadelphia, New York City and beyond, inflicting deluges, high winds, even tornadoes.

As luck would have it, we had to drive from Cincinnati to Washington DC last Wednesday when Ida was at her worst.

It made for hellish driving. Our little Honda Fit was buffeted by gusts and pelted by oversized, mean-spirited raindrops. Our windshield wiper frayed.

My poor little auto could only manage 50 mph while ascending the steep sides of the rain-swept mountains of western Maryland. Many a sociopath took it upon himself that day to communicate his displeasure with my slow pace, expressing his disgruntlement in ways unoriginal and easily imagined.

My nerves strained. Somewhat subject to the Heebie Jeebies at the best of times, I grew ever more grouchy as the day wore on.

On her cell phone, Jo found mention of a Hampton Inn in Frederick, MD. It was a little out of our way but there was vacancy and it had a hot tub! Ah! The thought of that hot tub was a comfort.

We checked in, suppered at a nearby Thai restaurant, dashed back through the diminishing rain, slipped on our bathing suits and made for the indoor pool.

Oh, that hot tub! How good it would feel to slide down into it. How unclenched I would shortly be!

When we entered the pool room, empty except for us, we saw that the hot tub, which was square, had four ballards posted around it like sentries, one at each corner. A strip of bright yellow plastic stretched from each one to the next, enclosing the hot tub.

Jo was crestfallen. I was angry. We’d gone out of our way and paid good money for the room. The advertised hot tub was the main reason why.

“I wonder if the water is hot,” I said, dipping my hand into it. It was hot. “This is ridiculous,” I observed. “I’m going in.”

“But we’re not allowed. It’s closed. That’s what the yellow plastic ribbon is for.”

I examined said ribbon. Every ten inches came the word CAUTION in big, black ALL-CAP letters.

“It doesn’t say ‘crime scene.’ It doesn’t even say, ‘keep out.’ It only says ‘caution.’”

“But it means ‘keep out.’”

“Nonsense. In we go.”

“What if some hotel employee sees us on the security camera and comes round?”

“What if he does? I’ll point out that the plastic ribbon only advocates ”Caution.” I will assure him that I am the soul of caution.”

“This isn’t like you. How many times have you said, ”Scouts play by the rules?” What if they call the police? What will you say?”

“I will say, ”And a very good evening to YOU, Officer.” Anyway, what law am I breaking? With what crime could I be charged? It doesn’t say ‘No Trespassing.’ It only says ‘Caution.’”

“Oh, alright,” she said. We ducked under the ribbon and Jo waded in. After a quick dip, I was content to sit on the edge, dangling my feet. Jo, neck deep, Jo positioned herself so that she would be concealed behind my hulking form, should I an employee be watching through the security camera.

We both enjoyed it but Jo kept looking around, expecting “the House Dick” -- as these guys are termed in film noir -- to intrude.

“What will he say?” Jo wanted to know.

“I know exactly what he will say. And I know how I will reply:

He will say, ”Excuse me, sir, but it is my duty to inform you that guests are not allowed in the hot tub.”

Then I will reply, “If it is your duty to inform me then you may return to your post with the satisfaction of having done your duty to the best of your ability. Tonight, when your head hits the pillow, you may say to yourself and whoever else may be listening, ”Ah! I did my duty today!” You will sleep the sleep of the Just.”

Then he will say, “I must ask you to get out of the hot tub.”

And I will reply, “You say you MUST ask me? Well, you have done so. And I politely refuse to exit the hot tub prior to a time of my own choosing. What do you propose to do about it? Are you going to wade in and secure me, a 71-year-old man, in a full Nelson and drag me out, kicking and screaming?”

He will, at that point, I predict, fall silent and make his exit.”

She was amused, bless her. Jo likes my style.

Fifteen minutes in a hot tub is plenty. We emerged, toweled ourselves dry and returned to our room, relaxed.

There is a time for breaking rules. Even for old Scouts.

In writing a fugue, the hard-and-fast rule is that the second voice must state the fugue subject at the interval of a perfect fifth higher than the key in which the first voice stated it.

When I wrote the Fugue in my Trio #13 for clarinet, cello & piano, I broke that rule. In my fugue, the second voice enters a TRI-TONE higher than the first, a pattern that continues as more voices enter and the subject is developed.

Who enforces these rules? The Fugue Troopers? The House Dick?

To hear it played by friend, fan and clarinetist Joe Rosen and friends, click on the link above.

To see a PDF of the score, click on the link above.

🎶 🎶 🎶 🎶 🎶

Last Sunday, one of my oldest friends, Dick “Grippy” Ferrell, passed.

You know Dick, slightly, because I have often mentioned him in these emails you kindly permit me to send. I dedicated my book, “Was That Your Piece?” to him and featured some of his poems in that book’s introduction and conclusion. And he appeared in some of the best stories.

Since 1961, when he was my Patrol Leader in Lexington Boy Scout Troop 152, Dick was one of my best friends. I always looked up to him. He and I were among five Scouts who received our Eagle badges in the same Court of Honor in 1966. Now, only two of us are still living.

Always funny, Dick emailed me a month ago to say, “Bald Eagle Scouts are an endangered species.”

We kept in touch via email and the occasional phone call. I had a good two-hour in-person visit with him last August, in his condo in Delaware, Ohio.

Over sixty years, we had a thousand laughs together, more even. Some were at my expense as he loved teasing me. When Dick, a retired plumber, observed my email ’signature’:

“There can only be a few great composers, but there can be many sincere composers.”
— Ralph Vaughan Williams

he replied with an email which ended thus:

“There can only be a few great plumbers, but there can be many sincere plumbers.”
— Sir Thomas Crapper, inventor of the flush toilet

I will miss just knowing that he was still going, still writing poems, up in central Ohio. We were a sort of comedy team; now I’m Stan Laurel without his Ollie. Dick Ferrell was a blessing.

My new book, The Blue Rock, cheers me and it will cheer you. It staves off, for a little while, the January doldrums. Dick Ferrell, who loved the book, I’m proud to say, makes a cameo appearance in the Introduction; it was he who helped me retrieve the Blue Rock from the deep, dark woods, a half century ago.

It’s a lift and a comfort for me to know that many of you are reading that book now. I’ve given away 500 copies, either in person or by mail. (If you haven’t gotten one, it’s only because I don’t know your mailing address. Reply with your address and I’ll mail your copy to you, free.)

Free? That’s right. Isn’t that expensive? Well, it’s not cheap.

Why do this? Because a certain kind of humor and a certain kind of book, while it is being read, while the reader lingers in the ‘world’ of the book, can be a nourishing environment for that person.

Creating nourishing environments is my ‘thing,’ the common denominator connecting all the chapters of my long career. It is the aspiration that shapes my books, my music, my emails, my home, my garden, my very presence, be it at church, school, the grocery, the post office, the bank, the public library, anywhere I find myself.

Wherever I go, “here, there or thither” (as Oliver Hardy says), I try to engender sweetness and light. It’s my mission, purpose, my destiny.

Humor broadcasts sweetness and light. Strangely, another way is to “compassionate” others (a lovely, archaic verb) by offering full expression to the gloom … and then rising from the gloom to glimpse the gleam.

A very dark passacaglia, in the deep indigo key of E flat minor, opens my Trio #13 for clarinet, cello & piano.

I fear that, listening to the gloomy opening, you might too hastily say to yourself, “January is dark enough; the last thing I need is twelve minutes of sad music to pull me down even further.”

I urge you to “bear with.” As with winter itself, beneath the gloom of this music a certain energy or puissance can be felt; the music turns over in its sleep; it dreams of beauty.

At 8:33 beauty briefly transcends the darkness. You have to wait for it, but when it comes, it’s like the sun beaming through a break in the gray clouds of a winter sky. The cello moves the tune from the darkness of E flat minor to the brightness of A major and the piano writing turns Impressionistic, almost Debussy-like.

It doesn’t last long. Such moments in music, as in our lives, are poignant partly because they cannot be sustained. At 9:47 the clouds close in again and we return to E flat minor … but with new strength, a wiser perspective, and sustained by the lingering effect of a receding passage of great beauty. It’s a metaphor.

Please allow me to say that I think this is one of my most deeply felt works and among my very best. I am glad to have it on hand, to share here as a tribute to Dick Ferrell and our long, warm, funny friendship.

It seems fitting to close with one of Dick’s best poems:

I will rest for yet another winter.
Books I'll read
Words I'll write
Brandy sip.

And I will place a log upon the fire.
Glowing coals
Pop and crackle
Ashes deep.

I'll follow the aroma to the kitchen.
Sugar cookies
Pumpkin pie
Coffee rich.

And I will lie down snugly on the sofa.
Warmest blanket
Darkest night
Deepest sleep.

To hear the Passacaglia from Trio #13 played by clarinetist Joe Rosen and friends, click on the link above.

To see a PDF of the score, click on the link above.