June 28 This week Berkeley bob's was named Cullman's Best Coffee for 2008 by the Cullman Times Readers Poll. I forgot to even fill out a nomination form and I don't think Gerri or Erin did, so we didn't try to work the system to get this award like some. So thanks to all of you who voted for us.

June 28 Jerry Ryan was back for an encore performance. He was hot and the house was full. It was a great show. He did something unusual I thought: he let a member f the audience sing several songs with him. It was Jamie Weathersby, a regular here. The did Proud Mary, Ride Sally Ride and Who Stopped the Rain. They met before the show she asked him if she could sing and they practiced and it worked out well. Jerry was having some voice problems and I think the break was helpful. I will refer the reader to my April 12 blog for a critique of Jerry's show "Me and Blue" this was as good or better. i am thankful to have wonderful professional talent like Jerry Ryan who enjoy coming here and a customer base who appreciates them. That is the only reason we can continue these venues. Jerry says he will be back.

June 28 The Coffee House Gang: me, John Lott and Dennis Kaylor played at the Festhalle Market Platz, the Cullman Farmers Market, as part of their summer music program. We had a good time. Jimmy Simms the Festhalle Manager said it was the best crowd yet. He wants us to play once o month, we will see. John Lott and Susan Vaughn and maybe Dennis will play their next Saturday.

June 27 Michael Walworth showed up early, around lunch time, and hung out until the show so I got to know him and his wife Amy a little better than I might have other wise. They are both students living in Nebraska, however Michael has an Alabama connection, he was born and raised through Middle School just down the road in Warrior. He had played a successful gig at Rojo's in Birmingham the night before and had been on the road almost a month. They are music majors, Amy is working on her Master's and they do a lot of music teaching back home and want to open a music school one day. While hanging out I was able to introduce them to Martin Murray, an Irishman who used to have a music school in Dublin, and has at least two of his kids involved in music here. They had a real animated conversation, I just love it when the coffee house connects people like that and it does a lot.

I realized that we had something special on our hands when Michael changed into his stage clothes, a black suit with gray shirt and blue tie and a felt hat. He stood barefoot on stage on a rug. He turned out to be a real showman. At show time the crowd wasn't very big, I was pretty disappointed, we probably never had more than 25 in attendance at any given time, but that didn't effect Michael. He put on one of the most unique shows we have had here. If you ask him what style of music he plays he won't say, his come back is "You tell me when its over, I'd like to know" He is a singer songwriter who plays a really nice guitar and has an unusual style which borders on blues, but isn't deep blues, more of a bluesy Americana I guess. He only played for an hour, I was surprised when he was done, but it was enough to showcase himself and I certainly would have him back. The highlight of the night for me was a duo between him and his wife Amy, she played clarinet on two numbers. On this one she played a bluesy rift and Michael scatted (Ella Fitzgerald style) in a high tenor or falsetto and the harmonies and emotion of that was astounding to me. I had never heard anything like that. Michael is an emotional or passionate singer, he puts everything into his work and because of that it really carries to the audience. Everyone who was there that I talked to later was very impressed by the performance.

He started off with an Alabama connection an unusual version of Hank Williams "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry". It was slower and had a different rhythm than the original and most people could not have pulled that off but he did. There were a lot of nuances there as in everything he does. That set the stage for the whole show, this guy is an original. Next was an original Summer Don't Go a lament with great guitar and scats. A lot of his songs seem to be about personal failings and trying to find good relationships with God and others. His song I Wonder Why has the words "I wonder why we kill each other, I wonder why we lie..." He closed with "You Are My Sunshine" complete with ad libs, scats, improvs... It was great. Don't miss Michael Wolworth and the World's Tallest People if you have a chance to see him. By the way, he says that the World's Tallest People" refers to his audience, we are them.

June 25 I was monitoring Blevins Creek in western Cullman County this week, as part of my regular creek monitoring duties for the Cullman County Soil and Water Conservation District, I work there part time, when I saw something unusual in the water. It was about two inches long and moved so fast from cover to cover that it was a blur. At first I thought it was a crawdad, but it acted more like a fish. I never was able to get a really good look at it. After consulting Auburn fisheries who my data goes to, we decided it must be a darter. So in the near future I will need to net and photograph it to see if it is a new species or an endangered one. Darters are neat fish, very colorful and unique and they can be very range specific, living in one creek system only. There are common darters and very rare darters, so I will need to find out what this one is. But in general where darters are found the water is clean. Blevins may be the most pristine creek in the county, as least where I sample it. At the Alabama Water Watch picnic two weeks ago I was named Alabama Water Monitor of the Year. I am very appreciative of this award I really enjoy my work as a creek monitor.

June 25 Here is a quick recap of our June concerts to date. Time has really slipped away and I have gotten way behind on this blog. We have had several concerts this month, some really good music, that I want to review. Unfortunately I lost some of my notes so I may not be able to be as thorough as I would like.

June started with an open mike, another of a series of open mikes that have exhibited a broad range of talent. It seems like every open mike we get some new talent along with the regulars. On this night I had about 19 who wanted to perform and we went over time. Most were local performers but at least two were from Birmingham, Susan Vaughn and Bruce Jones. Bruce is a newcomer who does a lot of 60's folk revival stuff in a nice fingerpickeinfg style. He will be playing a concert here in August.

I am trying something different in June I have booked both Friday and Saturday concerts back to back on three weekends. We have a lot of local folks who want to play here and there aren't enough Saturday nights to go around. On June 6th we had Ivory Coast a jazz combo. They were a hit from the first note. Mike Lunsford played keyboard and was MC, Dave Dubberly was on drums, Shelly Keaton on base and Rob Wright on sax and guitar. They had a really neat, powerful sound and did a lot of improvising. When they played Fly Me To The Moon, a song I emember from 1965 sung by April Stevens as I recall(a really sexy version), I was hooked. We had a full house and it was a great show. Mike gave a brief history of jazz at one point and explained how they interpreted the songs. These were very accomplished musicians, this was only the third time they had played together, and they put together a very entertaining evening. Some other songs that were highlights included Georgia On My Mind, Girl from Ipanema and Yesterday. I was disappointed that they didn't know Never On Sunday it would have been ideal for theiir style. I hope they will come back.

The following night Saturday, June 7, Gregg Rowell and Dawn Osborne came and put together a great show featuring Americana and blues. Gregg is on of the best guitar pickers around, he plays classical, blues, bluegrass, etc and Dawn has one of those great bluesy voices that you won't forget. She sang to Gregg's accompaniment and it was a perfect match. They started off featuring Dawn's powerful voice on Don't Go Shakin That Sugar Tree, Pallet On The Floor, as good a version as I have heard, I'll Never Do You No Harm and then they did a Carter Family song, not a well known one, When The Roses Bloom Again. Dawn did a knock out job on St James Infirmary and then a medley of Over The Rainbow and What A Wonderful World and finished up with Summertime. That gal has a great future ahead of her. Gregg did a set starting off with his instrumental Pink Panther Theme and a nice version of one of my favorites Big Rock Candy Mountain. This was probably the best I have ever heard him, he was at one with his guitar. Dawn came back for Blue Bayou, House of the Rising Sun, Harvest Moon, Working In Tall Building and others. These guys work hard at what they do, they are extremely talented and it comes across, couldn't ask for more. A really good night, a great concert, a good appreciative crowd, all I had expected it to be and more.

The next Week end Mike Patton played on Friday night. He was supposed to play with his band, After The Rain, but they were unable to come, so it was just him and his guitar. And that was a good combination. This was coffee house music at its best. The crowd was light and Mike just relaxed and did his thing, very pleasant and laid back. I really like his style, he has a good easy voice and is a proficient guitar player. Some of his stuff is Christian soft rock, he had some really meaningful songs of faith, some popular covers and originals. This was just a really good concert unfortunately a lot of folks who could have, didn't get to enjoy it.

On Saturday night, June 14, Karren Pell and her band Southern Tradition was scheduled to play. Karren has been here several times before, I bill her as The Alabama Troubadour, she has a great book out by that name. Karren is a wonderful songwriter and has written many fine songs about places in Alabama. Unfortunately her band broke up just prior to the concert and so she asked John Lott's band Double Shot (minus Julie)to play for her. John's band is really good, see my writeup in May about their concert, but I think it was too much sound for Karren. I think for Karren to be most effective she needs a acoustic background so you can hear her lyrics. She opened the show with she and her husband Tim playing 5 songs, including one my favorites, Brother Joseph, and it was very effective. But then when John's band came on stage, I thought John's band overwhelmed her during some of her stuff. John has a really hot guitar picker, Jason, a drummer, an electric bass, and they are used to playing an in your face style country rock, which is a lot of sound for Karren's folksy sound. Tim's mandolin and fiddle fit in well during the whole performance, he has really come out on those instruments. All and all it was another really good concert in a series of them. I particularly enjoyed the Cowboy set, when they all put on cowboy hats and other paraphanelia and sang Cool Water, Coyote Moon, John's Cowboy Song and Ghost Riders. Later when Karren did her signature Coon Dog song, an original about Alabama's Coon Dog Cemetery, the crowd got into it howling like coon dogs, it was a lot of fun. They closed with the appropriate What A Time We Had. It was a good concert, had Karren and John been able to spend more time working together, it could have been even better.