Open Church / Dunn Meadow

Open Church (mp3) (pdf)
Dunn Meadow (mp3) (pdf)

A busy summer so far. Here are a couple of older tunes titled for places real and imaginary.

On a recent trip back from a visit to the old homestead we stopped for a couple of hours at one of my favorite places, New Harmony, Indiana. A place full of history and spirit, I always find it inspiring.

I rarely wake from a dream with a tune in my head but Open Church was an exception. It even had its title in the dream. Later I remembered the Roofless Church in New Harmony. It's a slightly quirky waltz because the first strain has only six measures.



Dunn Meadow on the Indiana University campus in Bloomington is where I spent many happy hours in the 1970s. I heard a lot of great music there in the meadow and even more in the IU Memorial Union that sits next to it. Amazing local musicians like Mark Bingham, Caroline Peyton, Bill Schwartz and Bob Lucas played frequently. I heard the original New Grass Revival in 1972 in the Union and I'm pretty sure I heard Ali Akbar Khan in the same room a few years later. Woody Shaw played a great concert there sometime in the 80s as well.

I hesitated to call this tune Dunn Meadow because I was sure someone must have already written a really great tune with this title. I confess I didn't write the tune while actually sitting near the tiny creek known as the Jordan River. Instead I was in a motel room out on the bypass but this title came immediately to mind. To me it seems like a very English tune.