Fyr Ball features Great Lakes music concert and singing workshop
with Lee Murdock
EPHRAIM, WI - Noted
as a fluent instrumentalist on the six and twelve string guitars, Lee Murdock's performances combine ragtime, Irish,
blues and folk styles with a distinctive flair for storytelling. Murdock, who has released eleven CDs of folk and
maritime music began his folk career in the Chicago area in the mid-1970s. He has traveled across the U.S. and
Canada for more than twenty years, chronicling the lives and lore of the sailors who worked above and died below
the waters of the five Great Lakes. You can find more about Lee, including an entire discography, at his Web site.
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On Fri., June 14, at 7
PM, Murdock performs at the Ephraim Village Hall. Tickets for
the concert are available at the door for $2 each, general admission. |
On Sat., June 15 at 10 AM a Sea Shanty Singing Workshop will feature Lee Murdock teaching not only the work songs of the Great Lakes,
but also the actual work! He demonstrates to participants how the music (often call-and-response) facilitated getting
work done on Great Lakes vessels throughout history. Saturday's
workshop at the Ephraim Village Hall is free and open to the public.
Some of the songs in Murdock's repertoire are linked directly to local stories and legends. St. Martin's Island
tells the tale of a group of shipwrecked sailors who find their way to safety on the island by following a lantern,
only to discover when they reach the lighthouse that the keeper has long been dead - though the lantern at his
side is still warm.
The Ephraim Foundation has received a grant from the Heartland Arts Fund
to bring Mr. Murdock to Ephraim's annual Fyr Bal celebration. The Heartland Arts Fund is a collaborative venture
of Mid-America Arts Alliance, Arts Midwest, their member state arts agencies, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa,
Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Texas, and Wisconsin
with primary funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, and support from private contributors.
The Ephraim Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated
to preserving and educating the public about Ephraim's history and character. For more information about this and
other programs, please call 920.854.9688. |
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