Grievous Angel: The Legend of Gram Parsons - NAC 4th Stage in Ottawa

[Booche]

Just read about it.

[Big Wooly Mammoth]

this looks very cool. I googled it to see if I could find who was playing and came upon this:

http://www.jambands.ca/sanctuary/showtopic.php?tid/254387/

I defintely want to see this. Friday night isn't great for me, and Saturday is the Kruger Brothers show. I think that the Sunday afternoon show at the Black Sheep might be the way to go. Can go with the whole family to that one. The only catch is the potential for a bad weather day making it difficult to get out to Wakefield.

[Big Wooly Mammoth]

Grievous Angel: The Legend of Gram Parsons

When: Friday and Saturday, 8 p.m.

Where: NAC Fourth Stage

Tickets: NAC box office, Ticketmaster at 613-755-1111, nac-cna.ca

- - -

In a classic career-enhancing move, 26-year-old musician Gram Parsons died of a morphine and tequila overdose in a cheap California motel in 1973. The alt-country pioneer has since grown to near-mythic status among his countless fans.

An unusually truthful singer and gifted songwriter who left us country rockers like Luxury Liner and haunting numbers like Hickory Wind (co-written with Bob Buchanan), Parsons has been celebrated in special concerts, including one at Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest in 2004. Elvis Costello, among others, has covered his songs. Two tribute albums featuring the likes of Sheryl Crow and Beck have helped keep him fresh in our memories. Parsons -- or at least the bizarre theft of his corpse by friends who, believing they were following his wishes, subsequently tried to cremate him at Joshua Tree, California -- was even the inspiration for a film, Grand Theft Parsons.

Without a single hit record, he was named one of the hundred most influential artists of all time by Rolling Stone in 2004. Parsons was sweet and shy, spoiled and impossible to work with, starting or playing with multiple bands, including The Flying Burrito Bros. and, briefly, the Byrds, as well as performing solo over his short musical career.

Now the musician is spotlighted in a theatrical concert produced and directed by Ottawa journalist, musician and Parsons aficionado Michael Bate and co-written by David McDonald. Grievous Angel: The Legend of Gram Parsons takes place at the NAC Fourth Stage this weekend and the Black Sheep Inn in January.

In tackling Parsons, Bate says he's dealing with a "complicated guy."

Bate met and interviewed the singer just months before his death and reports Parsons was simultaneously consumed with a death wish, once saying he'd welcome his own demise as he would a warm cloak, and yet hungry for musical recognition.

As if underscoring his complexity, an iconic photo of Parsons finds him sporting a Nudie-style jacket emblazoned with marijuana leaves on the front and, across the back, a red crucifix. There's nothing in Parsons' glance over his shoulder to suggest mockery, although the message that he spent a lifetime ping-ponging between sin and salvation rings loud and clear.

To portray his perplexing subject, Bate settled on a format that's roughly 70 per cent Parsons' musical repertoire and 30 per cent monologue and dialogue. He credits Sneezy Waters' Hank Williams: The Show He Never Gave as a structural model for the show, and says he was selective in how he presents Parsons.

"If we just portray him as he really was, this falling-down, stupid drunk (that he became), nobody's going to buy a ticket," Bate says. "So we start when he was at the peak of his game and tell the story of the downward spiral. In that sense, it is a more romantic view, a side of him I prefer to remember."

Bate, who organized that 2004 Bluesfest tribute and presented a snippet of Grievous Angel at this summer's festival, says it was his long-ago interview with Parsons that inspired the show. However, until recently, he was kept occupied by his long-time job as publisher of the satire and gossip magazine Frank. As well, he had no one to play Parsons or Emmylou Harris, who was Parsons' duet partner toward the end of his life.

Then Bate met Anders Drerup, an Ottawa musician and self-confessed Parsons addict, and snapped him up. For Harris, he chose Kelly Prescott, a third-generation musician from the Family Brown and Prescott clans.

When he heard the two sing Love Hurts, immortalized by the real Parsons and Harris, Bate says he was sold.

For Drerup, who had never acted before, the role has been a steep learning curve. "It's quite a thing, man; the workload is staggering," he says. Staggering, indeed. Although the show focuses on the period between 1968 and 1973, when the adult Parsons was working as a musician, Drerup is playing a man whose youthful baggage reads pure southern gothic.

Raised mostly in Waycross, Georgia, Parsons was born into both wealth and an emotional black hole. His father, "Coon Dog" Connor, killed himself when Parsons was 12. His mother Avis, heiress to a citrus fortune, died of alcohol poisoning the day Parsons graduated from high school. His stepfather Bob Parsons died of cirrhosis of the liver, but not before committing Parsons' younger sister Avis to a mental institution. Small wonder, says Bate, that Parsons' home life -- or lack thereof -- sparked the sense of betrayal that courses through his music.

A piano player and guitarist from a young age, Parsons abandoned Harvard University to pursue music. He eventually discovered country music and, crossing it with rock, established himself as one of the fathers of alt-country and country-rock. He also discovered substance abuse, and it fast became a toss-up which he preferred more -- drugs or music. Even the Rolling Stones, with whom Parsons partied hard, wearied of him.

All this, including the constant war between his old-fashioned southern moral code and the siren call of the corrupt, modern world, informs Parsons' writing and his often harrowing, oddly innocent vocals.

In the end, says Bate, there was a sad inevitability to Parsons' life. Money, women, drugs -- nothing could shield him from whatever black thing gnawed at his insides.

Even so, Parsons merits celebration, his music a critical part of the American popular canon and the man himself intriguingly contradictory.

As Drerup says of his first full dress rehearsal, "I got home and just stared at the wall and smiled for about 20 minutes."

© The Ottawa Citizen 2009

The 2004 Bluesfest Tribute was great.

[Northern Wish]

You can also catch this at the Black Sheep Inn over 4 different nights in March.

[Big Wooly Mammoth]

You can also catch this at the Black Sheep Inn over 4 different nights in March.

good to know. I'll aim for the January Sunday, and if that doesn't pan out March will be the backup.

[Northern Wish]

Sorry BWM just checked my notes and the dates have been moved to January.... 21st to 23rd.

[Big Wooly Mammoth]

oh, okay. the blacksheep has the january dates already listed. i'll just hope for good weather.

are you going to the NAC?

[Northern Wish]

Still working on getting comped. If I can then yes, if not then no....

I think this could be amazing, but part of me fears its going to be more hokey acting than cosmic country.

[Booche]

Quite sure I will be at the Friday night showing so I'll let ya'll know if I think it is worth checking out.

[Northern Wish]

Thanks B!

[Booche]

Booooooooo. I just tried to buy 2 tickets for either night and there were none available.

[Northern Wish]

I AM SHOCKED!

[Booche]

Why?

Its on the 4th stage, which is a fairly small room if I remember correctly.

[Northern Wish]

Yes its small.... I said that for a few reasons:

1) Not much promo, if at all

2) Gram wasn't exactly a superstar

3) There are 6 scheduled dates for this in the area until January

4) Its Ottawa

[Big Wooly Mammoth]

Gram wasn't a superstar, but we have seem to have a decent community of alt-country supporters. The turnout at the Gram Parsons tribute show at the 2004 Bluesfest had a decent sized crowd for what I though was a pretty low appeal show.

Booche - go see the Krugers instead on Saturday night.

[Booche]

To be honest, I searched for Saturday tickets out of curiosity more than anything........but we'll see about the Krugers that night. We'll see.

Dont get me wrong, I loved the show we did catch but our schedule is tight during the late afternoon/early evening. It will be a game time decision at best.

[Esau.]

Sadly, Gram's popularity after his death has been huge in comparison to when he was alive. Regardless what McGuinn has said in the past about Gram's involvement, many believe it was Gram that pushed the Byrds to their level of popularity at the time, and that was before the formation of the Burritos in 69. Definitely one of the true pioneers of country-rock/alt.country as we know it now-a-days, at least in my opinion.

Although, I'm not really surprised a play would have a better turnout then a tribute show, sad but true.

[Booche]

To be fair, a 50-50 music/dialogue thing wouldnt have got me excited but this is apparently a 70-30 music/dialogue thingie so I saw it more concert oriented and that's why I was hoping to be there.

[NewRider]

Wish I could catch this...

Wish I was cast as the part of Gram... unless they're doing a scene where his gf is shoving ice cubes up his ass trying to revive him. That would kinda suck.

[Davey Boy 2.0]

that's actually quite pleasant on a hot summer day

[Booche]

Dude, those werent ice cubes and it wasnt no chick but we were trying to revive you. Again.

[Davey Boy 2.0]

all's well that ends well, right?

right?

RIGHT?????