Roots of Special Concert Run Deep into the Soil of Marquette County
611 North Front Street Marquette, MI | 7 PM | www.kaufmanauditorium.org | $10 for adults / $5 for ages 13-17 / 12 and under are free | available at doors & in advance at Marquette Food Co-op & Shady Grove Farm U.P. | Open violin master class set at 2pm for $5 per person | sponsored by local farms & food groups with four short talks throughout the night
What would life be like without farmers or musicians? What would Marquette County be like today?
Bob Bernard is a Marquette native, and his parents, Ted and Jeanette Bernard, fell in love playing their fiddles together at square dances around the Marquette area in the 1930s. Many of the waltzes on this album are tunes that Ted and Jeanette played together.
Seth Bernard and May Erlewine are both treasured Michigan songwriters and a happily married couple.
Kailin Yong is a native of Singapore, a resident of Boulder, Colorado, a world-class musician, a cultural bridge builder, and now an aspiring farmer! He was a guest of honor at the 11th annual Earthwork Harvest Gathering on the Bernard’s family farm last September. Kailin and Bob stayed up until the wee hours of the morning playing waltzes in the farmhouse all weekend long! May’s father Michael Erlewine (founder of the All-Music Guide) was also staying in the farmhouse. He was deeply moved by what he heard and offered and encouraged that the two make an album at his studio together. In December, Kailin and Bob recorded an album in Big Rapids with Bob’s son Seth Bernard accompanying them on guitar. They recorded beautiful waltzes for two full days, and on the second day they celebrated the completion of the tracking and Bob’s 67th birthday together on a full moon eclipse.
At the Earthwork Harvest Gathering, a celebration of food and music on Earthwork Farm, Kailin also met and bonded with a number of farmers and artisans from the Marquette area, especially Randy Buchler and his family in Gwinn. Randy, a close friend of the Bernard and Erlewine families, was able to attend some of the recording session and during that time, Kailin Yong asked if he might be able to come to Shady Grove Farm in the spring to learn how to grow food from the Buchler family.
Fast forward to the present. The spring has sprung! The album is finished and ready to be released to the world! Harvest Queen is its title, after Bob’s mother Jeanette Bernard, who was Marquette’s Harvest Queen in 1931. She was born in Marquette county in 1913, she was a fiddler and a farmer and she still lives on her own in South Marquette. Kailin is coming early to learn how to grow his own food, opportunity he views to be as valuable as playing classical music on his violin in the ornate halls of Europe, North America and Asia, and a skill he see to be as important. And so on June 1st, music and agriculture will be celebrated with “Crossing Paths”, a dynamic and inspiring evening of excellent, eclectic music featuring brief spotlights on the local heroes of local farms and foods. This concert will celebrate the release of “Harvest Queen” in the place of her origin. It will celebrate and advocate for local farms and local food systems. And it will feature a violin master class from Kailin at 2pm that is open to the public for only $5 per person!
Local sponsor list includes:
Hiawatha Music Co-op
Downtown Marquette Farmers Market
Marquette Food Co-op
Shady Grove Farm U.P.
Seeds & Spores Family Farm
Green Garden 4H
Dalman Pottery Farm
Gwinn Farmers Market
Transition Marquette County
Cloverland Farm
Earthwork Music
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