and here are Mel Lyman’s cover notes to the Jug band Music album:
“Now the authorities have requested that I write something informative back here concerning the members of the Jug Band and their particular sources and modes of expression so let me say that we are a family consisting of Jim Kweskin, Marilyn Kweskin, Agatha Kweskin, Geoffrey Muldaur, Joe Flanken, Rex Rakish, Sebastian Dangerfield, Swami O’Rooney, Bruno Wolfe, Hugh Bialy, Maria D’Amato, Fritz Richmond, Bill Keith, Melvin Lyman, Theodore, and a grand display of instruments and toys and gadgets. Jim is our leader and he does all the work. Marilyn does the cooking. We love Jim and Marilyn because they take care of us. Aggie is our mascot. Fritz is our family inventor and he makes new things to play with. Maria is very nice to look at and Geoffrey is nice to look at too. Bill is very serious and before he joined the band we were pretty unruly. Rex Rakish is a pisces and very far out and Theodore is my cat. Mel Lyman is writing this and that’s who he is.
Jim plays the guitar and sings and plays the comb now and then and sometimes he even plays the banjo. Geoffrey has a beautiful voice and plays the guitar and makes faces and hums into kazoos and every now and then we make him play the washboard but he doesn’t really like to. Maria is our star female vocalist and she too plays the guitar and the kazoo and she also plays the fiddle and keeps rhythm on sandpaper blocks. Fritz is the only member of the band who can really blow a jug even though we’re called a jug band and I mean he can really blow a jug. Fritz also flumps his washtub bass and it looks pretty unbelievable. Bill Keith plays the banjo and that cat can actually play two songs at the same time if he wants to though he doesn’t do it on this record. I used to play rhythm banjo in the band but I was so bad at it that we couldn’t keep a beat and now all they let me play is the harmonica. I play the banjo on a couple of pieces in this album and Jim asked me to mention it so that people wouldn’t think it was Bill but I don’t think it was all that bad and anyhow the engineers have squelshed it to the point of being almost inaudible. Rex Rakish plays everything in the band and even things that aren’t in the band. He sings too. We all do a lot of different things but I think that pretty much covers what we do on this record.”
sblake,
I love the descriptions of the members from Jim to his cat. I assume she’s the Maria who became Mrs. Muldaur, one of my favorites. Love the description of the musical abilities.
If you ever stumble across a copy of Mel’s book “Mirror at the End of the Road”, it’s worth witnessing… but prepare to be unsettled.
Mel had a role well beyond the harmonica …
keepthecoffeecoming.blog 
May 25, 2010 at 11:10 am
yousendit link:
https://download.yousendit.com/OHo2L0dGT01sUjljR0E9PQ
May 25, 2010 at 6:11 pm
and here are Mel Lyman’s cover notes to the Jug band Music album:
“Now the authorities have requested that I write something informative back here concerning the members of the Jug Band and their particular sources and modes of expression so let me say that we are a family consisting of Jim Kweskin, Marilyn Kweskin, Agatha Kweskin, Geoffrey Muldaur, Joe Flanken, Rex Rakish, Sebastian Dangerfield, Swami O’Rooney, Bruno Wolfe, Hugh Bialy, Maria D’Amato, Fritz Richmond, Bill Keith, Melvin Lyman, Theodore, and a grand display of instruments and toys and gadgets. Jim is our leader and he does all the work. Marilyn does the cooking. We love Jim and Marilyn because they take care of us. Aggie is our mascot. Fritz is our family inventor and he makes new things to play with. Maria is very nice to look at and Geoffrey is nice to look at too. Bill is very serious and before he joined the band we were pretty unruly. Rex Rakish is a pisces and very far out and Theodore is my cat. Mel Lyman is writing this and that’s who he is.
Jim plays the guitar and sings and plays the comb now and then and sometimes he even plays the banjo. Geoffrey has a beautiful voice and plays the guitar and makes faces and hums into kazoos and every now and then we make him play the washboard but he doesn’t really like to. Maria is our star female vocalist and she too plays the guitar and the kazoo and she also plays the fiddle and keeps rhythm on sandpaper blocks. Fritz is the only member of the band who can really blow a jug even though we’re called a jug band and I mean he can really blow a jug. Fritz also flumps his washtub bass and it looks pretty unbelievable. Bill Keith plays the banjo and that cat can actually play two songs at the same time if he wants to though he doesn’t do it on this record. I used to play rhythm banjo in the band but I was so bad at it that we couldn’t keep a beat and now all they let me play is the harmonica. I play the banjo on a couple of pieces in this album and Jim asked me to mention it so that people wouldn’t think it was Bill but I don’t think it was all that bad and anyhow the engineers have squelshed it to the point of being almost inaudible. Rex Rakish plays everything in the band and even things that aren’t in the band. He sings too. We all do a lot of different things but I think that pretty much covers what we do on this record.”
May 25, 2010 at 9:46 pm
sblake,
I love the descriptions of the members from Jim to his cat. I assume she’s the Maria who became Mrs. Muldaur, one of my favorites. Love the description of the musical abilities.
Thanks, as always!!
May 26, 2010 at 12:30 am
If you ever stumble across a copy of Mel’s book “Mirror at the End of the Road”, it’s worth witnessing… but prepare to be unsettled.
Mel had a role well beyond the harmonica …
May 28, 2010 at 8:14 am
Thanks, J
“Unsettled” has me curious.