The Tale of Mary Mac and The Drunken Sailor

[sleepy]

Well now.
I was exploring my past. Looking up long-forgotten nursery songs of childhood, and I somehow ended up finding this one.
I know what it was. I was trying to find a copy of the traditional Glengarry Stomp. The one that is always used. I have it on a hard drive in a now-dead computer. I'll have to pick up a USB HD dock for my drives someday.

This is the tale of Mary Mac, a sweetheart, and her would-be beau...
The Drunken Sailor, and it is a spirited rendition with only a slightly modern arrangement. Performed live at a club by The Albadukes:

[sleepy]

Hey, hit the Audio Player on this page, would 'ya?
It is the same duo.

http://johnandsofie.com/index/

[StevOz]

She plays damn fine fiddle mon..and he really does set da pace...liked it!

[sleepy]

Yeah, the audio player on their webpage is their new material. If you don't like the country-folk sounds, then hang on for the alt-rock.
I like everything that I hear there and I'll be back.

[Ike Savage]

i'm about to walk out the door, but this sounds right up my valley. will check it out later.

in the meantime, today's silly GIF is...

[sleepy]

Several of the songs on the EP are really growing on me.
Is anyone else finding this to be the case on replays?

[Ike Savage]

loved it. i'll be checking out more from the info you left. this is exactly the kind of modern celtic music i like, altho don't expect any band to ever edge out the pogues in my book. :P

[sleepy]

These folks get no comments at YouTube. Hmmm.
I've already commented on their Facebook page, so I don't want to come off as some kind of a stalking groupie.

[sleepy]

Has anyone given a listen to their EP on their website. "Leaving Carolina", "Haul Away", "Take Me Out Drinking Tonight", "Rise With the River", "Turning a Corner"?

That's okay. The following is a mix of the EP and others, and I am impressed with the instrumental "Through the Pines". And everything from them.
I'm gonna push it now. Four songs ahead:

[sleepy]

They bumped up their Playlist (the second YouTube video).

[sleepy]

I love the duo of John Mitchell and Sophie Jonsson. And I am pasting a reprint of an email which I received from Sophie. Terrible news.
I have tried contacting The White House and the U.S. Visa/waiver dept.
( 212ewaiver@state.gov ), doing what little I can to help, and I hope that Santa is listening and that, should this turn out to be a mere technicality, that John can soon return to his music studies and his mate in Nashville.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hi there,

First of all, hope you are well and are having a good Friday night!

However, we have some sad news to share with you.... John's dad, Peter, passed away last week. He'd been ill for a while and things went very quickly at the end. We have spent so many nice times with him over in Balintore in Scotland and we will miss him so much. He was a very funny man, always telling jokes, and he loved crosswords and game shows and speedway, and we used to sit in the front room together and watch TV and try to guess the value on the antiques roadshow. One of my best memories was when we had a Eurovision song contest night together in front of the TV and rated all the songs and had such a good laugh!

The funeral was organised for this Monday, four days ago, and me and John had a big stressful scramble to get John a plane ticket to go over to Scotland for the funeral. All went well, despite everything being very sad of course.

Then John was flying back to Nashville two days ago, and I was completely unprepared when John's mum skyped me to say that John had been stopped at Newark airport and would be sent back to Scotland..... She told me that he had been interrogated very harshly for two hours, he had been thrown into a jail cell, they took his phone and passport from him, and he would be escorted by armed guards onto the next plane back to Scotland.

So you are probably thinking "what would warrant this kind of harsh treatment" - well, John's "crime" is that he came to the USA in 2004 to play music with a band that he thought had organised a visa for him and when he found out that they hadn't, he left the country but he had overstayed by a month. We have entered the US twice since then without problems, we'd registered online this time as well, without any problems, and we thought everything was ok. But this time, at Newark, somebody really dug deep into their system and found the information from 2004.

So John had to fly back to Scotland where he got on a bus back north. He hadn't slept for two days and we were of course frantically trying to figure out what to do. Every day we spend in Nashville is important and valuable to us (read about our experiences here: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/johnandsofie), and we are now looking at a situation where John might be back here in the beginning of December, if we are lucky. His wonderful friend Debbie has helped him fill in the form to apply for a B-2 visa and he has an interview scheduled with the US embassy for the end of November.

John is very tired and upset, and all this trouble with being sent back to Scotland means that he hasn't even had a chance to process his dad's death and the funeral properly..... The staff at Newark airport paid no attention to the fact that he was in a fragile state due this his father's death and had just been to the funeral and treated him really badly. It was extremely stressful for John.

We are hoping that John will be back in Nashville in a few weeks, but until then we are hanging in midair.... I'm on my own in Nashville and will try to make the best of the situation. We haven't really told anyone about what's happened but we wanted to let you know first, because we really appreciate your support! We have been so excited about this trip and talked about it so much and we thought you might be wondering why we've suddenly gone so quiet...

This is an awful situation to be in and so sad on so many levels, but at the same time I try to tell myself that at least John is alive, he's in good hands, it could be worse (news is just coming in here about what's happened in Paris tonight.....), and there is a small chance that he can come back to Nashville for at least a week or two before we have to go back to Sweden.

Thank you for reading this long, sad letter, and take care!!

Lots of love from Sofie xx

PS. If you'd like to send John some words of encouragement - and I know he would appreciate it - the best way to reach him just now is through our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/johnandsofiemusic/



Maskinöversättning till svenska:

Hej!



Först av allt, hoppas du mår bra och har en trevlig fredag ​​kväll!



Men vi har några tråkiga nyheter att dela med dig.... Johns pappa, Peter, avled i förra veckan. Han hade varit sjuk ett tag och det gick mycket snabbt i slutet. Vi har tillbringat så många trevliga stunder med honom i Balintore i Skottland och vi kommer att sakna honom så mycket. Han var en mycket rolig man, han skämtade alltid, och han älskade korsord och frågesport och speedway och vi brukade sitta i vardagsrummet tillsammans och titta på TV och försöka gissa värdet på antikprogrammen. Ett av mina bästa minnen var när vi hade en Eurovision song contest kväll tillsammans framför TV: n och betygsatte alla låtarna och hade ett gott skratt!



Begravningen var i måndags, för fyra dagar sedan, och jag och John hade några stressiga dagar då vi försökte ordna en flygbiljett åt John så att han skulle kunna åka till Skottland på begravningen. Allt gick bra, trots att allt var mycket sorgligt förstås.



Sedan skulle John flyga tillbaka till Nashville för två dagar sedan, och jag var helt oförberedd när Johns mamma ringde mig för att säga att John hade stoppats på Newark flygplatsen och skulle skickas tillbaka till Skottland ..... Hon berättade att han hade förhörts mycket hårt i två timmar, hade han kastats i en fängelsecell, de tog hans telefon och pass från honom, och han skulle eskorteras av beväpnade vakter på nästa plan tillbaka till Skottland.



Så nu tänker du förmodligen ”vad motiverar en så hård behandling" - tja, Johns "brott" är att han åkte till USA 2004 för att spela musik med ett band som han trodde hade organiserat visum för honom och när han fick veta att de inte hade det så lämnade han landet men han hade stannat en månad för länge. Vi har kommit in i USA två gånger sedan dess utan problem, vi hade registrerat oss online även denna gång, utan några problem, och vi trodde allt var ok. Men den här gången, i Newark, grävde någon verkligen djupt i system och hittade informationen från 2004.



Så John var tvungen att flyga tillbaka till Skottland där han gick på en buss norrut. Han hade inte sovit på två dagar och vi var naturligtvis desperata och försökte lista ut vad vi skulle ta oss till. Varje dag vi tillbringar i Nashville är viktig och värdefull för oss (läs om våra erfarenheter här: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/johnandsofie), och vi har nu en situation där John kan vara tillbaka här i början av december, om vi har tur. Hans underbara vän Debbie har hjälpt honom att fylla i formuläret för att ansöka om ett B-2 visum och han har en intervju planerad med den amerikanska ambassaden i slutet av november.



John är mycket trött och ledsen, och allt detta problem med att skickas tillbaka till Skottland innebär att han inte ens har haft en chans att bearbeta sin pappas död och begravningen ordentligt ..... Personalen på Newark flygplats tog ingen hänsyn till det faktum att han var i en bräcklig tillstånd på grund av hans fars död och hade just varit på begravningen och de behandlade honom riktigt illa. Det var otroligt stressande för John.



Vi hoppas att John kommer att vara tillbaka i Nashville om några veckor, men tills dess hänger allt i luften .... Jag är ensam i Nashville och kommer att försöka göra det bästa av situationen. Vi har inte berättat för någon om vad som har hänt, men vi ville låta dig veta först, eftersom vi verkligen uppskattar ditt stöd! Vi har varit så glada åt denna resa och har talat om det så mycket och vi tänkte att du kanske undrar varför vi plötsligt har blivit så tysta…



Detta är en förskräcklig situation att vara i och så sorglig på så många sätt, men samtidigt försöker jag intala mig själv att John åtminstone lever, han är i goda händer, det kunde varit värre (hörde precis om det som hänt i Paris ikväll…..), och det finns en liten chans att han kan komma tillbaka till Nashville i minst en vecka eller två innan vi måste åka tillbaka till Sverige igen.



Tack för att du läste detta långa, sorgsna brev, och ta hand om dig!!



Stora kramar från Sofie xx



PS. Om du vill skicka John några uppmuntrande ord - och jag vet att han skulle uppskatta det - så är det bästa sättet att nå honom just nu genom vår Facebook-sida: https://www.facebook.com/johnandsofiemusic/

[Coil_Smoke]

And all we hear about is our porous boarders ...

[sleepy]

Porous borders all the time. But John filed the papers and declared them. I'm wondering how the hell the U.S. in 2004 didn't have a working online database?? It seems to me it's the U.S. fault here. If the U.S. has an issue, then it should have withheld the visa up front instead of penalizing an otherwise lawful visitor after the fact.

[sleepy]

Plugging my favorite troubadours. This is their cover of The Pogues' "Fairytale of New York". 'Tis a Christmas tune:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0Wv...ature=youtu.be