It is getting late.  I need to get some rest.  I am excited.

I looked up the last day that I did any proper recording in the studio with Jeff Carpenter and discovered it was October 21, 2014.  That was 4 days before I found out the prognosis of what would be my Grandmother’s quick demise.  I was primed and ready to make some music then.  I didn’t.  My tune changed quickly when Granny got sick and died a month later.

I feel I am musically back.

I am going to see The Moody Blues again this Wednesday night at The Louisville Palace.  Thirty years later, I get to see them in the town I first saw them.  And this is perfect timing.

I saw The Moodies in 1999 and did not see them again until 2003.  I took a break from The Moodies at bit.  I was so busy at the time developing a style of my own musically.  I could not hear much more than the tunes I was chasing down in my head.  I am there again…somewhat.

Carrie, my dear wife, and I have seen The Moodies at least once a year since 2003.  Those guys are hard working musicians.  AI am blessed that the Midwest has been so good to them.

For better or worse, I have style that is mine and I know what it sounds like.  15 years ago I was trying to figure that out.  I feel good knowing, two cds and a great deal of playing later, that I can bring it.  In fact, I feel some of these new songs are very strong and willful.  There is some years behind them.  I am no longer hoping something sounds good.  I think it does sound good.  But…that doesn’t mean someone will want to listen to it over and over again.

I called Jefferson Carpenter and told him it was time.  It is time to record another one.  The time is now.  It will start with demos.  That means I sit there with a guitar and sing my songs while I am playing.  That is the first foundation.  Jeff will then pass these along to the guys that will help me musically.  John Burgard, Barry King, John Hayse, and Rod Wurtele are the guys I hope will work with me again.  I know their playing and they can make this songwriter feel pretty small in a hurry when they start throwing around a musical vocab I have no idea of.  I just write the songs and sing them.  Yes…I do write the words and the music.  That is a gift.  I will give you that.  For me, though, the fun is seeing true virtuoso guys take my songs to another level.  That is special.

That is where we are.  I am going to see The Moody Blues this Wednesday and I will say goodbye to them for a while.  Right now I am writing songs, putting chords to them, playing them over and over again and saying…”I hear that sound once more.”

I am blessed to have the ability…a friend with a GREAT studio…and guys that want to work with me.  It is as simple as that.  The best thing I have going for me is that I am a songwriter who feels smaller than anyone in the studio.  I know…I know…I write the material.  But I don’t really.  It feels more like this stuff was just given to me in and at the time I need it the most.   I’m excited.  To put those headphones on and hear drums and cymbals crash and guitars wail and I reach to turn the headphones up louder and louder!!!!  It is all too cool and it goes by way too fast.  That I certainly remember.

I will keep things updated here.  I certainly will try…as I….

Speak the Rights.

Danny Johnson

In honor of Dr. Millard Dunn, I bring forth a few images to share of Topsail and Wilmington.

He enjoyed the post I dedicated to him some time ago and asked that I share some photos on this trip.  It is my pleasure.

Soon after we arrived.

Sunrise

Carrie and I before heading to Wilmington for The Moody Blues concert.

Market Street approaching downtown Wilmington.

New Hanover High School is on Spring Break too.

A classic looking place.

Graeme Edge of The Moody Blues getting some fresh air before the show.

The Moodies.  Cameras and phones were not on display.  This was the last song.

This morning before I went out to get my papers.

Heading into the South of Topsail Island…the town of Topsail Beach.

The putt putt course.

Godwin’s Store and the new water tower.

The swing bridge in Surf City to the Island.  Since 1955, this thing still turns to make way for sea going craft.

So I didn’t speak the rights too much here.  I hope I photographed them.

Danny Johnson

I just finished one of the finest meals I have ever partaken.

My dear wife, Carrie, made flounder, fried shrimp, onion rings, and hush puppies.  We bought the flounder and the shrimp from nearby Thomas’ Seafood Market.  We are looking at the Atlantic Ocean right now.  The fish is as fresh as it is going to be.

I am a fortunate man.  My dear Carrie likes to cook on occasion.  I am glad tonight was one of those special occasions.  These vittles were unreal.

Kids, these were the leftovers.  Am I gonna have a nice sandwich tomorrow, or what?

This morning Carrie and I were ready to head to the NC Aquarium at Fort Fisher.  you could look it up.  We had a good time and we saw some strange sea critters and met some very nice people.

The wind was blowing as we took this picture near the Swing Bridge in Surf City, NC.

This is a good shot of the bridge.  It raises up and swings sideways to let large boats pass through the canal below it.  There is talk of doing away with it and making something more modern.  I hope it remains talk.

This evening I don’t know if I have ever seen such lovely shades of blue before.

The moon trying to make progress over the water.  That is him, that little speck on the right.

So yes, I am thankful for such a great day to be able to spend with my sweet Carrie.

Like I am not sure why Nolan Ryan was able to throw as baseball over 100 mph, I am not sure why I have been so blessed when it comes to so many things.  What do I mean?  Well, tomorrow night The Moody Blues are playing a concert just a few miles down the road from where I took these pictures today.  Carrie and I will be there.  We just happened to be on Spring Break when the Moodies scheduled a show here.  I don’t think it is a coincidence.  I will call myself thankful.  And along the way, I hope to…

Speak the Rights.

Danny Johnson

My dear wife, Carrie, made me the best pan of grits ever consumed today around noon.  I ate them for “brunch”?  I don’t know if I have ever had brunch before today.  If I have, no one ever told me that was what I was eating.  Brunch, that is.

Carrie and I got up about 6 AM this morning.  Neither one of us was hungry.  Looking at the Atlantic Ocean churning at 7:16 when the sun rose, I am sure, behind miles of clouds and darkness.  It was not a great sun rise.  It was a great morning nonetheless.

I wasn’t hungry this morning because before I went to bed last night I ate a bowl of ice cream.  I don’t do that very often.  I think the last time I did was along this very coast the last time we were here.  Before the ice cream I ate some barbecued ribs.  The crab dip was good too.  Should I go on?

So we didn’t eat breakfast.  I filled up on the Star-News of Wilmington, The News-Observer from Raleigh, and the Jacksonville Daily News.  Three good Sunday papers.  So I just got through one of them before we went to church.

Our church away from home, Faith Harbor United Methodist Church.  Rev. Duke Lackey is the pastor.  He spoke this Palm Sunday.  He reminded us of Jesus’ edict :COME, FOLLOW ME. Kids came through the sanctuary carrying palms.  The songs we sang we awesome.  We celebrated confirmations of about ten young people.  The service lasted nearly two hours and it seemed like we had to leave about them time we sat down.  That is some good worship.  Amen indeed.  When we walked out we lamented that it would be a long time before we would be back for another service.  The place is special to us.

We came back to our place and it was time for breakfast.  Carrie poached me an egg.  We had toast, ham, and my awesome grits.  It was a great morning.  It may be 47 degrees along this piece of North Carolina coast right now…but our hearts our warm and thankful.  Having a home away from home is a special thing to be a part of.  Carrie and I found that here many years ago.  Thanks in part to our old friend, Tim Krekel, we found this little strip of “Happy Town” that we are blessed and fortunate to get to visit now and again.

So what gives the rest of the day?  NCAA basketball tourney watching is probably out.  Anything after watching the Hoosiers defeat the Wildcats yesterday afternoon is anti-climactic.  I have a John Fogerty autobiography to read.  I have a great deal to write about.  And thankfully, I will be checking in here again sooner rather than later.

Grits for breakfast in the morning, to be sure.

Speak the Rights.

Danny Johnson

First the not so good.

Whilst I was motivating upon the elliptical this afternoon, I was mashing through more useless television stations than one could ever imagine really does exist until one wants to watch something meaningful.  Being the political season of presidential persuasion, I do check in on the bastions of political polarization that are CNN and Fox News (not in any particular order).  I saw a pathetic presence on Fox News speaking with former presidential candidate Carly Fiorina.  The Fox lady, Maria Bartiromo asked terrible questions, was quick to cut off Ms. Fiorina and really seemed to wish she was somewhere else.  I suppose what startled me more than anything was the newsperson’s casual tone and attitude toward someone whom has faced more music and needed to be a good sport more than the reporter ever will in ten years of television.

The media folks have seemingly taken a turn for the worse.  Respect, reverence, and civility must be passe.  I suppose they have been made to reflect on values with a hard medicinal swallow.  The political jockeys sure have lost it.  I never thought I would live to see the axiom of one step up and two steps back be recalled as one step up and three steps back when it applies to the presidential campaigning going on this year.  How can a candidate talk about values when they can’t display any values that are worth holding on to?

I don’t know.  Call me old fashioned.  I miss John Chancellor.

Yesterday I bought a Commodores CD.  The guys that met at Tuskegee.  What a sound was on that campus in 1968.  I have always had a soft spot for their sound.  It is smooth stuff.  I am a fan of block harmonies and you can hear some great unity and natural ease in their singing together.  When I was a senior in high school they, minus Lionel Richie who was making hit after hit as a solo artist, hit the charts with the Grammy-winning song “Nightshift”  which was a tribute to the late Marvin Gaye and the late Jackie Wilson.  I remember hearing it on WLS The Rock of Chicago.  It was played there much more than the local market.  I thought it was great. I still do.

My Mother and I have had fun singing “Sail On” together too.  She likes that tune.  The song “Three Times a Lady” is great whether they are singing it or Buckwheat is singing it.  Great music.

I suppose it is time for March Madness.  I do enjoy the Tourney.  I hope the Indiana Hoosiers win it.  They are not difficult to root for.

ON A SAD NOTE…

I just heard that noted author Pat Conroy died March 4th.  What a shock.  He had pancreatic cancer.  A few years ago my dear wife, Carrie, and I were face to face and having speaks with Conroy.  Carrie is quite the fan…and I like him too.  “The Prince of Tides” turned into a movie was awesome.  Conroy, who was a teacher for a brief time, held out his hand to me and introduced himself.  He knew we knew who he was.  He was being polite.  When I told him I was an English teacher, he looked at me intently with a bit of a wry smile and said “I wanted to be you.”  He was a genuine article.  I will miss him.

Have a good week and every now and then…Speak the Rights.

Danny Johnson

One for the ages.  That is a phrase that is thrown around like a corn hole bag during the 4th of July.  “That is one for the ages” is an overused saying.  I would venture that the last time you said that phrase you don’t remember what you were talking about when you said it.  I intend to buck that trend here today and encourage you to join me in remembering something special for a very long time…for the ages.

A week and a day ago I witnessed something I am so glad I was able to attend and enjoy.  The North Harrison Lady Cats high school basketball team played in the Class 3A championship against a loaded private school team in a game that reminded me why the state of Mississippi has private school champions and public school champions.  That is all of that kind of commentary I will deliver here.  You feel free to fill in whatever gaps you feel need to be filled in.

What a wonderful night that was in Indianapolis’ Bankers Life Fieldhouse, the former Conseco Fieldhouse, and the basketball mecca of all of the thousands of kids playing on high school teams from Evansville to Ft. Wayne.  Our team from Ramsey, you have to look close on a map, made it.

I grew up the son of a football coach.  I played the game every chance I had to do so.  Baseball was something I enjoyed playing also.  The 1979 Little League Trophy is my most prized possession of an athletic persuasion.  I like basketball.  I really do.  I love the smell of popcorn in the gym and the hardwood floors.  The band playing the school song is great.  The band playing Chicago’s “25 or 6 to 4”, a song that my old school’s band played when I was in grade school, is a thing of auditory bliss.  I like basketball.   I really do. But,  I don’t love it.  When the season is over, I am usually glad that it is over.  After all, they play over twenty games!

When the 2015-2016 basketball season began, no one told me our girls would be playing for a state championship.  There is a team to our west, Princeton, that was the odds on favorite to run through all their opponents in the sectional, regional, and semi-state en route to the big dance at Bankers Life Fieldhouse.  A funny thing happened on the way to the regional.  Princeton got beat in the sectional.  Suddenly, with one lonely defeat of Goliath, there was a hopeful spark in the hearts of teams all over the state that would rival that of a Chicago Cubs fan.  Is it possible?  Could it be?  Do you think?  Why, yes…it could happen.  And it did for one team…The North Harrison Lady Cats.

Why did it happen?  Well, it didn’t just happen.  It worked out.  The emphasis on the word “work” in its most literal sense.  This team worked hard and it worked smart.  The team is filled with a bunch of coachable, unselfish, hardworking, don’t care who gets the credit as long as we win, hot dogs need not apply mustard, that rivals any other great team that I have ever seen.  That was the beauty of it all for me.  Sure it was great the Lady Cats made it to the state tournament.  They did it because we had a great team to root for.  No offense to any one player, but there was no one on our side that scared the other team.  Worried about them doing well? Yes.  Of course.  Scared to face?  No.  Little did they know.  This team would be respected in a hurry by its opponents.  All of them.

There was a story I read and alluded to one Sunday as I did the preaching during Youth Sunday when I was in high school.  The story was called “The Ship that Found Herself” by Rudyard Kipling.  It was about an embattled and faltering old ship that was falling apart and ready to give up.  The parts of the ship found it within themselves to “get it together” as it were.  They collectively grew stronger.  They found a way to finish what they started.  So did this high school basketball team.

Know that these young ladies are some of the most fortunate basketball players to have ever lived, given what they have been bestowed upon with the coaching staff on their bench.  Head Coach Missy Voyles is as solid as a rock.  She did an outstanding job of pushing buttons and pulling levers that needed to be pulled and had the wisdom to recognize times when she needed to keep her finger off the button and not grip any levers and let the players play out what they needed to in order to maintain that “found” attitude they discovered early in the team’s chemistry.  Missy would probably look at me and ask “What do you know?”  I would tell her I do know people.  I know teams.  I know a good one when I see one and I know ones that don’t have any business trying to play together.  Both scenarios are possible with any group.  This team had the “it” factor.  Not scared of it.  Not phased by it. They had “it”.  The girls on the team moving forward hope to keep “it”.  They will have to work hard to do so.

Assistant Coach Angie Hinton is an asset not many head coaches would have at hand.  Angie is a great math teacher and a great person.  I have known her for a very long time.  She is also a fantastic basketball coach.  She was the head coach at New Albany High School when that team won a state championship in 1999.  The last high school championship played at Market Square Arena (a round venue).

Assistant Coach Joe Hinton is in the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame.  His name is on the court at Floyd Central High School.  He won nearly 600 games as a boys high school basketball coach.  To say that his input is worthy would be like saying gold might be valuable.

Assistant Coach Alisha Briner is the newby.  I have enjoyed getting to know her this school year.  I have no doubt she provides an insight to players that can only come from the persona of a younger coach.  While I won’t pretend to know, I would venture to say that she played the role of “good cop” now and again when she wasn’t playing the other role.

You won’t find a greater coaching staff on a high school bench in America.

And the team.  Well, I will just refer to them as “The Team”.  I have not seen a more impressive group make such an improbable run than the 1980 USA Olympic Hockey Team.  That is what I think of “The Team”.  I won’t single out anyone left behind.  Carlie Burson and Jourdan McAfee are the only two seniors.  I gave them a ceremonial “good luck” before every step of the tourney.  I hope to acquire their autographs when the time is right.

This “Team” won 28 games and lost three.  One of those losses was at Seymour in early January on a Saturday afternoon.  They lost by one point.  One of the field goal attempts that did not go in got stuck on the orange rectangle that is between the rim and the board.  It just sat there…and did not come down.  I remember looking at that shot and thinking it was a sign that was meant to be.  I had never seen a ball sit back there like that before.  I have seen over a thousand basketball games.  I have never seen that before.  Perhaps that was a good loss.  Those do exist when you play twenty games in a season and you are not playing a conference foe or a great rival.

IMAGES

I leave you with some images and thoughts about the tourney run this team made.  The pictures are from my Canon Powershot Elph.  Don’t expect too much.

The Sectional was won on the NHHS home court.

Cutting down the net must be a fantastic feeling.

The regional was won at Charlestown.  What a nice facility they have there.

The crowd of BLUE was great at the Jeffersonville Semi-State game.

Lebanon was a formidable opponent.  They were, however, a one dimensional team that proves it helps to have five working together instead of four working to get the ball to one.

Cutting down a net at the semi-state.  Just look at the blue!

Last Saturday morning I found this on my television screen.  It was worth a photo.  Carrie, my dear wife, and I went over to my Mom and Dad’s house soon after I took this shot.  We met up with my sister and my niece and my brother and his wife.  We all headed to Indy.

I met up with my dear friend and former radio partner, Gus Stephenson.  Two old codgers holding their glasses while the picture is being taken.  Gus was in his customary short pants.  I would not have recognized him without them.  At least not until he would yell out my name like only he can.

And so it began.  The quest for a 3A title.

Not a bad shot and a nice score in the early going.

For the second half I needed to move to a vantage point, although on a larger scale, that was much more familiar and comfortable.  I don’t sit very well.  Not that I can’t.  I don’t want to.

Carrie and I will never forget what a great time we had that night.  Thanks goes out to a group that got us there.  The Team.

There was a ton of GoBigBlue in the house.  Thanks too goes to the band.  You sounded awesome.

Game action

Our fans on the BIG BOARD.

Tied with 5:13 left in the game.

Carlie Burson was named the Mental Attitude Award winner.

Carlie represented herself, her family, and NH with grace, dignity, and pride.

Jourdan McAfee holds the runner-up trophy.

And so it goes.

What a grand experience for so many people.  Count me among those very fortunate to have been there.

In closing, thanks to The Team and their coaches.  Your efforts gave the rest of us a moment in the sun.  Thanks…it was truly one for the ages.

Speaking the rights.

Danny Johnson

Tomorrow night I am going to Charlestown to witness an Indiana phenomena.  It is called the high school basketball sectional.  Every high school team has its place in the tourney.  The boys tournament starts tomorrow.

Sectionals are first.  Regionals are next.  Semi-State follows.  If you make it out of there you play in Indianapolis for a State Championship.

This past weekend I saw one of those state title games.  Our school, North Harrison, was represented by the Lady Cats in the girls 3A State Title Game.  We did not win.  We didn’t lose either.  It was a wonderful experience.  I will write about it at length when it is time to do so.

I was spoiled as a child when it came to Sectional Tourney action.  When I was a kid I lived in Brownstown, Indiana.  We played ten miles up the road in the Seymour Sectional.  It was and still is played in a gym that hold over 8000 people.  I believe it is the third largest high school gym in the United States.  Our sectional tickets were perforated.  There was a different piece of ticket for every night the games were held.  That document in your hand was like gold.  Today I bout a ticket in our high school office and was handed one ticket good for the entire tourney.  It gets punched at each session I choose to attend.

Is there irony here somewhere?  Well, yes, there is.  My school’s team the North Harrison Cougars will play the Brownstown Central Braves tomorrow night.  The Braves don’t play in Seymour anymore.  Something called “class basketball” came into play over twenty years ago.  There are champs in 4 classes that are based on school size (enrollment).  I am not a fan.  With class basketball came the restructuring of the Sectional.  Brownstown no longer plays ten miles up the road.  Folks in Brownstown don’t like that.  I don’t either.  Next to the fabled Jackson County Fair, the Seymour Sectional was the premiere social event of the year.  It was a great deal of fun.  I am glad I was there to witness it.

Playing in a State Title game like the Lady Cats did over the weekend was awesome and almost makes me embrace the class system.  I wasn’t there, but when Damon bailey led his Bedford North Lawrence team to the state title, the one class, one champ state title, there were over 40,000 people in the Hoosier Dome watching it.  That will never happen again.

So be it.  It is today.  We are in the here and now.  I am going to show up rooting for the North Harrison Cougars tomorrow night.  But I am sure someone I meet up with from Brownstown will be pining about the good old Seymour Sectional.  I will probably join them.

Speaking the Rights.

Danny Johnson