VIRGIL CAIN IS THE NAME, AND I SERVED ON THE DANVILLE TRAIN…

It was with genuine sadness that I read today of the passing of Levon Helm at age 71.  Apparently he’d been fighting a continuing battle with cancer longer than most people realized.  For those of you who are not rock & roll or roots music fans, Helm was the drummer and  sometimes lead singer of The Band, who, in this aging ex-hippie’s opinion, was the greatest rock band to ever hail from these shores.  (Ironically, this band that exuded Americana had only one member from the States, and that was Helm.  The rest were Canadians.) 

The Band had a long and storied career, both as the backup band for Bob Dylan (hence the name – everyone just knew them as “the band”), and as a star act in its own right.  I consider theirs to be some of the most interesting, powerful, intense, and influential music to come out of the late sixties and early seventies.  If I were to be dropped on a deserted island tomorrow, and was allowed to take only ten albums, The Band’s first two – “Music from Big Pink” and “The Band” – would be among them.  And if there’s a better vocal performance in all of rock history than Helm’s version of the Robbie Robertson song, “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,” I haven’t heard it.  If you like rock documentaries, many, including myself, consider Martin Scorsese’s The Last Waltz to be the best ever filmed.  Through the eyes of one of our generation’s finest film makers, this movie memorializes The Band’s truly amazing final concert.  The show was epic - a virtual who’s who of musical luminaries joining the band on stage – Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Muddy Waters, Van Morrison – the list goes on and on.  But the film’s unmistakable highlight is Levon Helm singing “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.”  With the camera fixed on Helm’s face, you feel his pain, you feel every nuance of this wonderful song, to the point that you’d swear this was Virgil Cain himself, and he had to have been there in Dixie that dreadful night. 

[Here's a YouTube posting of that remarkable performance, excerpted from The Last Waltz:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQYj2ltJKe8&feature=share.]

It was several years back that I was first saddened to hear that Helm had contracted throat cancer, but then I was subsequently gladdened to learn that he’d apparently beaten it.  In fact, he returned to performing with renewed enthusiasm.  Levon Helm was back, and once again, a musical force to be reckoned with.  Over the past five or six years since then, he’s performed live, both in the barn at his home in Woodstock, and on the road.  During that time he also released three exceptional albums - “Dirt Farmer,” “Electric Dirt,” and “Ramble at the Ryman” - all of which won richly-deserved Grammy awards.  Helm’s voice was different, a price he’d paid to the throat cancer, but it still had the same amazing, world-weary quality.  And the music was different – less rock, more old-time country.  But the songs - the songs are amazing - pure Levon Helm, at his best. 

Although I did have the privilege of seeing him perform several times while with the Band (including at Woodstock), I didn’t see him live in recent years, performing his own music, with his own band.  I’d seen ads for him and his band playing at local venues, but for one reason or another, I failed to make time to go.  I will forever regret that.   

Rest in peace, Levon.  Thank you for all the amazing musical memories.  “It was a time I remember oh so well.”