Oh, brother, where art thou been?
They were all professional musicians -- men and women who made a living at their art. From jazz to swing to rock to klezmer and polka, we had it all, and we had it good. There has not been a regular live televised venue for local musicians since.
One of our guests -- I believe it was a Valentine's Day show in 1996 or 1997 -- was Mark Brine, a shy and gifted American roots guitar player, singer and song-writer -- something like Hank Williams and something like Bob Dylan. I am no expert, but I thought there was something, like, special about his guy.
We got him on the show to sing a song I really liked, one with sweet country charm: "Shy Boys Always Dance With the Big Girls." Laurie DeYoung of WPOC-FM was guest co-host on the show that day, and she was quite taken with Mark's music and his style, though it was about as far from country-western as Appalachia from Austin. Mark was one of those extremely modest musicians who aren't good at self-promotion but who soon realize that you got to knock on doors to get some attention.
He went away for a while, leaving the Baltimore area some time after my TV show was cancelled, and I did not hear from him again, though occassionally there would be a notice of a CD.
Well, the boy's back in the Baltimore area. I got a message from him this morning: "Was in Boston a year and a half, until January '06, and back for a spell. Got some new property in Tennessee that I'm hopin' to move into asap, good Lord willin'."
Brine has a new CD, "I Deliver," of country bluesy stuff, and already one on-line critic has hailed it. "Mark Brine does the best traditional American roots music that I have heard in quite a while," writes John Shelton Ivany.
I look forward to hearing Mark's latest CD, and if the shy boy gets a date around Baltimore, I'll be sure to let y'all know.
