Making Memory Cloths: August 2021

Friday, August 27, 2021

Songs We Love - Oakwood Village West - 2021

Songs We Love

Memory Cloth Circle

August 17 - October 31

Oakwood Village West

6205 Mineral Point Road

Madison, WI 53705

(608) 230-4699

Terry Lichtenfelt - Respect

Respect

Cottons, cotton napkin, embroidery thread, beads, buttons, jewelry finding

Terry Lichtenfelt

We dearly miss Terry who passed on August 6, 2021.

The back says that she made it for the Songs We Love exhibit by the Memory Cloth Circle.

Thank you to her husband of 40 years, Neal Roehm, for making sure it was included.

Bobbie Malone - Bill’s Favorite Songs

Bill’s Favorite Songs

Hand-pieced and hand quilted nap quilt made from Bill’s old summer cotton shirts, commercial embroidery floss, and cotton thread hand dyed by Leslee Nelson

Bobbie Malone

My husband, Bill C. Malone, is a historian and ardent fan of American country music. His selections range from those he heard his mother singing to more contemporary works, all chosen for being beautifully written and, in many cases, have proven personally meaningful over the many years of his life.

BILL’S FAVORITE SONGS

1 I’ll Be All Smiles Tonight - Louvin Brothers

2 My Mary - Merle Haggard

3 Pictures from Life’s Other Side - Blue Sky Boys

4 Til I Can Gain Control Again - Rodney Crowell

5 What About You? - Johnny and Jack

6 The Last Letter - Rex Griffin

7 Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald - Gordon Lightfoot

8 They’ll Never Take Her Love from Me - Hank Williams

9 Jack and May (Lovers Quarrel) - Stanley Brothers

10 Hungry Eyes - Merle Haggard

11 Teardrops Falling in the Snow - Molly O’Day

12 Drifting Too Far from the Shore - Boone Creek

13 Pretty Polly - Ralph Stanley & Patty Loveless

14 It Makes No Difference Now - Gene Autry

15 Little Green Valley - Dalhart & Robison

16 Take Me as I Am - Jimmy Dickens

17 No One Will Ever Know - Roy Acuff

18 Waiting for a Train - Jimmie Rodgers

19 Night Rider’s Lament - Suzy Bogguss

20 Empty Cot in the Bunk House - Gene Autry

You can hear all these songs on WORT Archive until Sept 7, 2021

Scroll to August 25 - Back to the Country (celebrating his 87th Birthday)

https://archive.wortfm.org

Suzy Roth - Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

Recorded by Pete Seeger

Vintage napkin and coaster, dimensional fabric flowers by my friend Terry, tatting, lace, beads, buttons, and sequins

Suzy Roth

The year was 1971 and I loved my second grade teacher. She was a beautiful hippie who played the ukulele. She taught us to sing popular folk songs of the era. As a young child, I did not understand the countercultural significance of the lyrics.

Maureen Griffin - Popularity Ranking of Well-Known “Don’t” Songs

Popularity Ranking of Well-Known “Don’t” Songs

Felted wool, perle cotton, button

Maureen Griffin

Linda Check - Cole Porter Favorites: Night and Day, Anything Goes, I Get a Kick Out of You

Cole Porter Favorites: Night and Day, Anything Goes, I Get a Kick Out of You

Bead embroidery

Linda Check

Ann Engelman - How Great Thou Art

How Great Thou Art

Embroidery on vintage linen

Ann Engelman

This hymn was a favorite of my grandmother, Reka Jeckel, Delevan, Illinois.

“How Great Thou Art” is a hymn based on a Swedish melody and a poem written by Carl Boberg in Sweden in 1885. The inspiration for the poem came when Boberg was walking home from church listening to church bells. A sudden storm got Boberg’s attention, and then just as suddenly as it had made its appearance, it subsided to a peaceful calm.

O Lord, my God, when I in awesome wonder

Consider all the worlds Thy Hands have madeI see the stars,

I hear the rolling thunder

Thy power throughout the universe displayed

Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee

How great Thou art, how great Thou art

Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee

How great Thou art, how great Thou art.

Donna Sereda-DeNovo - My Way

My Way

Cotton fibers, Ecofelt

Donna Sereda-DeNovo

I completed this embroidery back in the early 1970s, but it never had a title and was never properly finished. Preparing for this show spurred me to remedy that situation. “My Way” seemed like the perfect title. Everyone is familiar with the song popularized by Frank Sinatra in 1969. But did you know that the lyrics were written by Paul Anka? He set those lyrics to music written by Frenchmen Claude François and Jacques Revaux in 1967 (“Comme d’habitude”). Anka never sang the song; he gave it to Sinatra, whom he felt was the right person to record it.

Donna Sereda-DeNovo - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

Cotton and linen, metallic thread, metal and plastic embellishments, wool felt

Donna Sereda-DeNovo

“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” was composed by Hugh Martin and lyricist Ralph Blane for Judy Garland in MGM’s 1944 musical “Meet Me in St. Louis.” It has remained hugely popular ever since. One of my favorite songs at Christmas time, I particularly likeslow, jazzy, instrumental versions. Note that the rabbit and chickadee have spelled “Peace” using seeds and twigs. The image attempts to capture the gentle, sweet nostalgic feeling of the song.

Laurie Hall - Blackbird

Blackbird

Embroidery and found objects

Laurie Hall

I was not ready for much of The White Album. But the sweet sound of the guitar and solo voice in “Blackbird” really touched me.

Laurie Hall - Hello Stranger

Hello Stranger

Collage on canvas, embroidery, beads, and found object

Laurie Hall

The first time he invited me to his home to cook for me, he had Barbara Lewis’ song cued up to play as I came through the door. When I heard”...seems like a mighty long time”, I knew he was the one.

Marsha Alderman - Feelin’ Groovy

Feelin’ Groovy

Denim, Sharpie dyed cotton, beads, metallic and cotton embroidery floss

Marsha Alderman

I have a very distinct memory of dancing “The Freddie” to this song with my next door neighbor. The song and dance came out in the mid 60’s, before the Summer of Love. We were preteens but very into hip- pie culture. (Yes, we wore embroidered bell bottoms, tie-dyed shirts and bandana belts.) This piece is a tribute to innocence and youthful exuberance.

Marsha Alderman - Juls

Juls

Vintage linens

Marsha Alderman

My parents had a trivet which said “Wherever you wander, wherever you roam, be happy and healthy and glad to come home.” As kids, my BFF (pictured) and I made a song out of it and would take her boat out to the middle of the lake and sing it at the top of our lungs. This piece is an homage to Juls and the idyllic summers of our youth.

Evelyn Kain - Good Vibrations

Good Vibrations
Composed by Brian Wilson, lyrics by Mike Love,

released by the Beach Boys, 1966

Fabrics and machine embroidery

Evelyn Kain

An example of psychedelic, sunshine pop, Wilson spliced the song together from over 90 hours of magnetic recording tape. It features the Electro-Theremin played by its inventor Paul Tanner.

The preprogrammed embroidery patterns on my mother’s Singer Touch-Tronic 2010 Memory Machine of 1984, one of the first computerized sewing machines, make perfect vibrations.

Evelyn Kain - You’ve Got a Friend

You’ve Got a Friend

Written by Carole King, 1971

Fabrics and embroidery threads

Evelyn Kain

You just call out my name, and you know wherever I am,

I’ll come running to see you again.

The isolation of the Covid Era and nostalgia for the Before Times makes many of us long for the assurance of warm, deep, loyal, long- lived friendships.

Australian Aborigine painting inspired the embroidered ovals. They bring me back to when my son Nico and his friends, Tom, Pete and Joe, were inseparable, as only kids in early grade school can be.

Evelyn Kain - We Are the World

We Are the World
Written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, recorded by USA for Africa, 1985

Fabrics, embroidery thread and polyester fiber fill

Evelyn Kain

The song is a charity single performed by dozens of singers. The over-lapping “children” suggest the layering of voices as well as the idea of world unity expressed in the lyrics. Varied shapes, lively patterns and bright colors support the idea that diversity can “make a better day for you and me.”

Richie, along with others, created a Covid-19 video version for the season finale of American Idol that features singers’ faces superimposed on once crowded American landmarks emptied by the pandemic in 2020.

Evelyn Kain - YMCA

YMCA
Written by Jacques Morali and Victor Willis,

released by the Village People, 1978

Fabrics and polyester fiber fill

Evelyn Kain

YMCA stands for Young Men’s Christian Association which provided affordable hotel rooms for men in big cities in the 1960s and 1970s.
A disco dance tune, it became an anthem for the gay community, and then for sports fans: in 2008, 44,000 people acted out the letters in arm movements at a live performance at the Sun Bowl. These letters are dancing to the tune, too!

Evelyn Kain - Happy

Happy
Written, produced and performed on video by Pharrell Williams

Fabrics, embroidery thread, fabric paint and polyester fiber fill

Evelyn Kain

Here I tried to coordinate elements of the song to the piece. Speech balloons are embroidered with lines of text. Repeated lyrics share the same fabric pattern: “Because I’m happy!”, “Clap along”, “ if you feel”. The two lines that don’t repeat each have their own pattern:“Like a room without a roof” and “Like happiness is a truth.” Rows of “Happy” in red and yellow fabric paint on the potholder represent the backup track.

An uptempo neo-soul song first released in 2013, Happy was the favorite tune of John Lewis, caught dancing on YouTube in 2018.

Evelyn Kain - Daisy Bell, Henry Dacre, 1892

Daisy Bell, Henry Dacre, 1892

Gingham, felt, cotton fabrics, embroidery threads, zipper, fabric flowers

Evelyn Kain
My mother sang this to me!

Daisy, Daisy, Give me your answer, do,
I’m half crazy all for the love of you,
It won’t be a stylish marriage, I can’t afford a carriage,
But you’ll look sweet upon the seat of a bicycle built for two.

Evelyn Kain - Don’t Worry, Be Happy #2

Don’t Worry, Be Happy #2

Bobby McFerrin, 1988

Fabrics, embroidery thread, bias binding, rickrack, buttons

Evelyn Kain

In this version, it’s the primary colors that trigger happiness!

More good advice!

Cause when you worry your face will frown

And that will bring everybody down

Evelyn Kain - Don’t Worry, Be Happy #1

Don’t Worry, Be Happy #1

Bobby McFerrin, 1988

Fabrics and embroidery thread

Evelyn Kain

This song has good, everyday advice. Its music makes me so happy that I made two versions, this one a multitude of French knots.

In every life we have some trouble,
But when you worry, you make it double.

Evelyn Kain - Over the Rainbow

Over the Rainbow
A ballad composed by Harold Arlen with lyrics by Yip Harburg written for the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz and sung by Judy Garland.

Fabrics, machine and hand-embroidery, lace, yo-yo’s stuffed with polyester fill, metal star

Evelyn Kain

Some day I’ll wish upon a star
And wake up where the clouds are far behind me.

The words capture the longing for a peaceful world in troubled times.

Key elements: the wishing star, yo-yo clouds and a lace-edged pocket behind the embroidered “Somewhere” showing that the place “over the rainbow” can truly be found!

My favorite version, 1990, is by Israel Kamakawiwoʻole, aka IZ, a na- tive Hawaiian singer-lyricist and activist.

Nancy E. Schmitt - Fields of Gold

Fields of Gold

Machine pieced & quilted using hand dyed and batik cottons, satin and set into vintage linen. Bead embroidery with pearls, wood, glass and metallic beads using hand dyed, metallic and rayon threads as well as silk ribbon.

Nancy E. Schmitt

This version of the song, “Fields of Gold”, written by Sting and re- corded by Eva Cassidy reminds me of the fields I like to walk through surrounding my home in Wisconsin during harvest time in Autumn.

Jane Pearlmutter - Famous Blue Raincoat

Famous Blue Raincoat

This is a mini-quilt, 17”x21”.

The lyrics are done in freehand hand embroidery on cotton.

Jane Pearlmutter

“Famous blue raincoat” by Leonard Cohen. I love this song because it’s a letter that’s a song but practically a novel within these lines.

Don't look for this at Oakwood, Jane sent the images from Corvallis, Oregon.

Nancy E. Schmitt - Spring Rain

Spring Rain

Hand & machine pieced, machine quilted, hand & machine appliqued, beading, fabric folding and sashiko. In addition to batiks and cottons, I used sueded and patterned upholstery for the background of this piece and velvet upholstery for the branches and binding for added texture.

Nancy E. Schmitt

“Look of Life, the birds are out again I can feel a change upon the wind The color of the sky and
The sound of the rain

Coming down, down, down”
Excerpt from the song, “Spring Rain”, by Oscar Dunbar