- Dirk Powell performs as part of the Cap Global Roots Series, Saturday, Jan. 21 at 8 p.m. at the North Shore Credit Union Centre for the Performing Arts. Tickets: $30/$27, visit www.capilanou.ca/nscucentre.
DIRK Powell is grateful to have seen his grandfather for who he really was: a musician.
The Ohio-born roots musician recalls being profoundly influenced as a young teenager, the result of visits to his hero, James Clarence Hay, of Sandy Hook, Kentucky. While Hay worked for decades in a steel mill to support his family, he was a gifted musician, adept at fiddle, guitar and banjo, and endeavoured to pass on the art and his Appalachian heritage to his willing grandson.
"In that culture, in some ways, not everybody appreciated that gift to the degree that I did. . . ." says Powell. "I think I saw the beauty of what he did. When everybody else just thought of it as something secondary to who he was I guess I saw that that really was who he was, even if he hadn't gotten a chance to live that fully. He inspired me both musically and in terms of that connection, but also in terms of making music my life and not letting it take a secondary position, just following my heart with it."
Powell has achieved success as a solo musician (he plays guitar, banjo, fiddle, accordion and sings), and has appeared on stage with and on the albums of a variety of artists - Joan Baez, Steve Earle, Loretta Lynn, Sting, Jack White, T-Bone Burnett, Jewel and Linda Ronstadt included. He also runs his own studio, The Cypress House in his current hometown of Breaux Bridge, La., one of the "quintessential Cajun towns" in the state. Ronstadt and Baez have both recorded there. And, Powell is continuing to work in film, appearing in, scoring, or contributing works for soundtracks.
While Powell's grandfather passed away, he got to see the beginnings of his grandson's career in music.
"He got to see that his music was going to live on," he says. "I've said this before, but his spirit really does live on when I play his music because I believe the spirit means more than the physical body. I don't have a clear definition that I would impose on anybody else but I believe that. And to know that his spirit is something real and when I play that music I feel like he's there, I feel like he gets to share the things with me that he never got to share when he was alive and it really makes all the difference."
Powell is set to take the stage at Capilano University's North Shore Credit Union Centre for the Performing Arts Saturday,
Jan. 21 at 8 p.m. as part of the Cap Global Roots Series. Joining him for the performance is Portland's Foghorn Stringband.
While Powell's music is deeply rooted in the Appalachian and Cajun tradition - he's also a founding member of Cajun group Balfa Toujours with his wife Christine Balfa - he started out in music with a fascination for classical music.
"My first love, the first music that really struck me really was Bach. I just remember sitting in front of the stereo and listening to these records, that was kind of like a salvation for me. That music was just like an oasis, like a great place to be," he says.
However, his grandfather's influence eventually won him over, particularly Hay's interest in handing him a tradition to make his own.
When asked why he thinks traditional music continues to resonate so strongly with people, Powell says it harkens back to our long-held need to have an outlet for our creativity. In a lot of traditional cultures, everyone had a chance to put their stamp on a creative endeavour like crafting or cooking.
"In those kind of societies that were more traditional, there weren't these divides between 'You were an artist or you weren't, you were this or you were that,'" he says. "People did a wide variety of things in their lives and were more holistic in a way. I think that people respond to that."
In addition traditional music was and continues to be both accessible and social.
"You didn't have to have any kind of equipment or any kind of space or any kind of intent to succeed in some popular way to make music," he says. "You just made music because that was a beautiful way to share time with people and to experience people. I really think people respond to that, they like that in this day and age."
Powell's last solo album, was 2004's Time Again on Rounder Records. He's currently at work on its follow, having recorded it with The Raconteurs' drummer Patrick Keeler. It'll be released on Sugar Hill later this year.
"This record represents basically all of my musical worlds kind of combined," he says. "I wouldn't say it's a conceptualization of anything, it's more just like my world really does exist within all these walls. It's got drums on it, electric instruments and some of that old time accent, which is my accent that I would never shake, which I'm glad about."
Powell spent the fall on tour with Joan Baez and will head out again next month for a United Kingdom tour. Her widespread impact, particularly on women, whom she's inspired to pick up a guitar, makes him proud to be associated with her.
"You walk out on stage with her and people are responding already for what she's done for her 50-year long career," he says. "I'm just really proud to be up there with somebody who stood up for what she believed in for so long and took chances and is an amazing person and a really, creatively limitless person but has also stood up for her beliefs and went to jail for them as far as draft resistance and things like that and went and fought the hard fights in Mississippi in the civil rights era."
Powell is also continuing to work in the film industry. He got his start doing some film scores for Appalshop, a filmmaking organization in the mountains of eastern Kentucky, and has continued to branch out.
Dramatic films he's been involved with include Ang Lee's Ride with the Devil, Anthony Minghella's Cold Mountain, Spike Lee's Bamboozled, and Edward Burns' The Brothers McMullen.
"It's wonderful to have your own vision and try to reach that with your own music, but it's also great to say 'How can I give everything I have to support this other vision, this larger vision?'" he says. "That's a really satisfying way to work."
He also works in documentaries and his next project involves scoring a film about civil rights activist Anne Braden by Austin, Texas, director Ann Lewis, entitled Anne Braden: Southern Patriot.
In addition, Powell holds a variety of administrative roles, including artistic director of the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes and director of the Louisiana Crossroads concert series/ radio show at the Acadiana Center for the Arts.
"This is my passion and my love and who I am and it's good to remember that, it's good to remember that everybody has something that satisfies them and satisfies the world," he says. "I think the key to me is to find your passion and just live it fearlessly. . . . I just think it's good to live a fulfilling life and not wait to have a fulfilling life, just to do it every day. That's my passion and that's where my heart is so I'm going to keep doing it."
