Barry Oreck is grateful to be a part of the New York City folk community. The lower East side was once the center of the American folk movement and though Oreck spent most of his career as a dancer, he’s familiar with the tradition he’s carrying on.
“It’s just amazing to me, the breadth of it, the new music and old music,” said Oreck of the folk scene here. “Thankfully it has some young blood. There is a really building of a multigenerational community there, where I think for a while it was a bunch of us gray hairs talking about how great we did in the 60s.”
In many ways, We Were Wood feels like a work out of that time. For those who grew up on similar folk albums, the sounds and left-of-center themes will be comforting. The histories Oreck presents, whether it be the exploits of Robert Moses, the collateral damage of the Norris Dam, or tailors from Scotland, would’ve been fresher from a chronological standpoint in the 60s as well.
There’s a reason we learn about history, however. In “Build Me A City,” Oreck sings of Moses: “He never was elected/how was he selected/to say what would be destroyed and what would be protected?”
Sound familiar, anyone?
Robert Moses might have taken the expression “move fast and break things” more literally with his demolition of neighborhoods, but Elon Musk seems to be doing very much the same thing with government agencies.
“He definitely was a precursor of the Trump playbook and he did it excellently,” said Oreck. “He had the newspapers in his pocket, the bankers, they were all enjoying the largesse.”
Much of what Moses created is still being dealt with today. The glut of cars, underutilization of public transit, the paved over neighborhoods and farmland, and the very presence of Long Island’s endless suburbs.
Some of it inarguably contributed to New York City being the largest urban center in America today. Many of the buildings that were knocked down would not be considered up to our standard of living today. And yet, there was a darkness to Moses’ vision. He had a knack for destroying majority minority neighborhoods.
Long Island mansions were spared even if the highways had to take a sharp turn to cover land owned by small farmers. Even public utilities like Jones Beach had a way of being exclusionary.
“He designed the overpasses too low for city buses so you needed a private car,” said Oreck, noting the reasons behind that decision were well known even in Moses’ time.
The architects of the New Deal also draw Oreck’s ire for their creation of “The Norris Dam,” which was at the center of the Tennessee Valley Authority. Here too, Oreck talks about those left behind by progress and environmental destruction.
“Snake Bones” is one song that finds anxiety in modern issues. Climates both political and meteorological are mentioned for their worsening. In this world, it pays to adapt.
“Snakes are survivors,” said Oreck. “They find their way over and under and around. They have such meaning in terms of how to live on this planet. Finding solutions is a circuitous path; there’s no straight lines.”
Oreck’s insights into the politics of our time are a bit different than mine. While I’ve spent my adult life adjusted to the idea of polarization and bitterness, Oreck remembers a time when things were different.
“When the crisis comes we seem less likely to work together these days instead of go further into our tribes,” said Oreck. “In the 60’s I really believed that people could come together and solve it. Now the idea seems very distant to me.”
As always with these albums that address societal ills, a few songs that present a more positive vision go a long way. The title track describes natural decay in a way that reminds us of the value of change, recycling, and well balanced systems. “The Crabbit Wee Tailors of Forfar” focuses on the benefits of recycling and reuse and a culture that promotes those values. Oreck has a brother-in-law who comes from the Scottish region who often creates art from items like toilet paper rolls.
“He seemed like a perfect symbol of that,” said Oreck. “The Scots in general are known as frugal or thrifty or you could call it cheap. I felt like they were a perfect group to highlight what we need to do. We can’t keep throwing everything away. We need to reuse and repair.”
On an island largely designed by Robert Moses, it might be hard to imagine a more organic way of life. Yet it may ultimately prove more painful not to adapt.
Above is the full episode as aired on WUSB’s Country Pocket, including both my interview with Barry Oreck and the songs we discussed, starting with Build Me A City, which tells the story of Robert Moses, the controversial power broker of mid century New York. The interview begins with the second video in the playlist. You can hear the show live every Tuesday at 12pm on WUSB 90.1 FM or check the blog to watch it as a YouTube playlist. Visit http://www.WUSB.fm and https://barryoreckmusic.com for more.
Country Pocket 