Well, it was a quiet week at Stony Brook, my hometown, here in this old island that so many of us have come to call home. It rained a lot these past few days, a lot for the folks here, something that takes a bit of getting used to, I suppose; for one of the benefits of living on an island, especially this one, is a temperate sort of weather that you come to expect over time. That’s why New Yorkers live in New York as opposed to, say, Minnesota. We’re a touchy people, a people who seem to take the weather personally, and a harsh few days of rain are enough to get us down in a bad way.
But this past Monday, the clouds parted for a bit, and the weather cleared up just in time to see the Staller stage graced by the signature red sneakers and socks of a certain Mr. Keillor, with his black stool and bottled water in the middle of a very large, very empty stage.
Garrison himself is a large man who sort of stoops a bit. As if his low mellow voice isn’t quite soothing enough to put his audience at ease, he has to do that in a physical way, too. He’s a radio man, with a show that plays Saturdays on public radio. A few million listeners tune in each week to hear his folksy music and tales, colored with the biting wit of a former New Yorker writer.
He walked on stage in his worn, red kicks and old blue jeans covering his lower half, with a sport jacket, crisp white shirt and power-tie up top. He looked out to the people in the crowd and saw his aged peers, with a few young folks, like us, scattered about.
He casually took the microphone from its stand, ignoring the two stage props that serve little more than as testament to his minimalism. The air filled with a serenade of life and love, sung to a hymn-like tune, for a surprisingly long and engaging time. When he finished, after the applause died down, he looked back and forth from the first few rows to his sneakers, and in an even mellower voice than before, told us that he had grown up in that part of the country you pass when you fly out to California or Canada, and that us New Yorkers were probably interested in what goes on out there. “I flew out here to tell you,” he told us in that wry, hushed tone, familiar to so many of us in the crowd.
He didn’t disappoint us, though the performance did have the feel of a “Best Of” collection, or perhaps a farewell tour; his fans surely recognized many of the stories that night from his radio show, reformatted and combined in a unique way for this performance. Some might call him an anachronism, standing up there alone on stage, spinning tales of love, death, intrigue, and humility, all through the lens of small town America, and with a deftly light humor.
It was effortless, really — even the intricate and several minute long hymn tailored to New York. Never once did his face betray any wasted energy, there was no palpable sense that he was even trying too hard, and yet his performance was masterful and rich. Watching an experienced, practiced hand who has built upon his immense talents for more years that we have been alive is a real spectacle all too rare these days, especially among our demographic. Dane Cook, he is not.
We sat there enrapt, for 90 minutes, by Mr. Keillor’s reflective commentary on the simple pleasures of life. He sang old Lutheran hymns throughout, weaving them into his narrative that described the beauty in the mundanity of both coming of age and what happens when you get there. When he was finished, had told all the stories that he was prepared to that night, he stopped, looked down, uttered his goodbye, and left. Because all good things must come to an end, including an evening of moving introspection.
