This week I've been reading an old book - Blue Highways, by William Least Heat Moon - which details a road trip around the U.S. in 1978. In an early chapter he describes an encounter with a man who "plays the bones." I searched for a video (if you stay to the 2:00 mark, you can also learn how to play a paper bag), and I found this at Wikipedia:
A critical element to playing the bones is not trying to force them to make contact with one another through finger manipulation but allowing their momentum to do the work. By moving the hand back and forth across the chest, with just enough force on the bones to keep them from falling out of the hand, a patient learner can produce a triple click. This "click-it-y" sound is the essential ingredient to playing the bones. A double-click can be produced by the same movement of the hand with the addition of a bit of pressure to the bones to suppress the third click. Once these elemental triple and double figures have been mastered, they can be combined to create complex combinations of rhythmic sounds. The effect is further enhanced by the use of two pairs of bones, one in each hand. A skilled practitioner can produce a wide variety of percussive sounds reminiscent of those made by a tap dancer.So far this has been a surprisingly entertaining and well-written book; I may review it later when I finish if I have time.
Yep. I enjoyed Blue Highways. PrairyErth, also by the same author, is a different kind of travel book. He doesn't go anywhere. Instead he explores 1 county in Kansas thoroughly right down to its grassland roots.
ReplyDeleteI would recommend you read all of his books. Very thoughtful writing.
ReplyDeleteTOTALLY gonna read all his books. They are flat out wonderful. I wish I had an uncle like him, or a brother or anything.
DeleteYou will never look at a road map or diner the same way. I actually ate in a five-calendar diner in Arkansas in the mid-1980s. I ended up breaking my trip early that day just so I could have the pleasure of breakfast there the next day.
ReplyDeleteI keep that book on my "empty this shelf before you ruin out ahead of the fllames" bookcase by the front door.
I concur in these recommendations, especially PrairyErth.
ReplyDeleteCheck out Don Flemons of Carolina Chocolate Drops - amazing artists
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/iMokBr9cTxM
One more - wonderful performance with the bones. I've seen this live and the audience was awestruck.
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/bNaK_nBp2Yc
Ah, yes, Blue Highways is a wonderful book.
ReplyDeleteI took you recomendation on Blue Highways. I am just loving it.Only a few chapters in, and couldn't wait to show my husband a couple of the photos. Madison Wheeler looks so much like my mothers second husband, we're still not sure that it may be him, in his younger years.The resemblance isn't just striking, it's exact!
ReplyDeleteThurmond Watts looks like my brother in law. And his mothers maiden name is Watts. Hmmm.
I am in Missouri, down in the Cherokee with a splash of Heinz 57 parts.
Beautiful writing and observation in this book. I only wish my mother could still make good sense of a book, she would just love this.
Thank-you for bringing things I wouldn't have known without you, into my life:)
I'm very glad to hear that. May I suggest you try browsing this category of the blog -
Deletehttp://tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com/search/label/recommended%20books
Explore depending on your interests, but I would guess that you might enjoy the Iditarod one and the Hard Road West and the cartoons of HT Webster.
And Roads by Larry McMurtry.
ReplyDeleteI will check out all these books Stan.
ReplyDeleteDid you know W. Least Heat Moon did a follow up to Blue Hiways?
Published in 2009.
Road to Quoz is Heat-Moon's long-awaited return to America's back roads. It is a lyrical, funny, and magisterially told chronicle of American passage, a journey into the heart of a nation almost desperate for meaning beyond consumerism and self-absorption, a book that invites readers to "discover America anew."
Unfortunately I have a small boxful of other books that have been patiently waiting in line to be read. But thanks anyway.
DeleteLoved Blue Highways, too! Definitely keeping an eye out for PrairyErth.
ReplyDelete