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JC: Rolf was introduced, in the late 1940s - by my mom, I think -
to 'folk music'. By the mid-fifties he was obsessed with it and also had taken on Flamenco guitar. So, by the late 50s he was a very accomplished guitarist and had already been teaching for quite awhile. He was rather innovative in his teaching methods, using the reel-to-reel tape machines available at the time. I have some of his lesson tapes dating back to the early 1960s that I have been able to gather via the Internet. His students have sent me wonderful letters along with the tapes commenting on how they treasure his instruction and how they have benefited for years afterwards from his tapes. (I use a similar system today). So what I am getting at here is that he had really established himself in the coffeehouse folk music scene by the time Bob Dylan was coming up in Minneapolis and so when Rolf passed through there on a road trip - playing his way across the country - it was somewhat of an event on the local scene and he naturally came in contact with Bob. He must have recognized the talent and drive that Bob had at the time - Dylan was only like around 18 or 19, I think, and Rolf was in his mid 30s. Bob attended a workshop that Rolf was doing and as he left he made it known that he saw wonderful potential in the young Bob Dylan. According to his biographer, this encounter was very inspirational and a great confidence boost to Dylan at a crucial time in his early development as an artist. He also had the opportunity to teach guitar to Joan Baez, Jim Kweskin and others during the late 50s and early 1960s when that whole generation was getting started. BM: Is your father's lack of recognition in music books due to
his lack of original recorded work? JC: I think so - and the reason for that lack of recordings was
that he more or less 'dropped out' in the mid 1960s and moved to New Mexico to raise his 2nd family. He did quite a bit of self-produced recording though, in the latter years of his life covering a wealth of original material. His self produced albums 'Special Love', 'Midnight Sun' and 'Fall Rain' along with a host of other more informal recordings are available at his website which is linked to mine. BM: He certainly comes over as
a man that truly lived, as he is
quoted as being a folk guru, martial arts & guitar teacher, author, social activist and one-time WW II Special Forces agent. JC: Here is a little anecdote
about his early life that explains
his lifelong relationship with the Blues and also the Martial Arts. My dad's first exposure to the Blues was through a black man that was working as a mechanic at my grandfather's gas station in Detroit. He was just a skinny little Jewish kid from Dusseldorf who didn't speak much English and was getting beat up everyday at school. So the man took pity on the boy and one day, took him over to the boxing gym where he worked out and showed him some moves. Rolf was awestruck by the whole ambience of the place - you can imagine - all these jabbing, sweating African-American men and solid, driving Blues on the radio in the background. Forever after - to him - The Blues was more than music - it was a calling - full of irony, redemption and survival. He went on to become a pro boxer and fought under the name 'Kid Cahn' out of Detroit for a couple of years before he was drafted. Later he dubbed an amazing collection of reel-to-reel tapes off friend's 33s and 78s covering every imaginable music form. When I was a little kid and he had gone on to explore the Gypsy Blues in Flamenco - he would still begin every Sunday morning with Sister Rosetta Tharpe and The Golden Gate Quartet blasting through whatever little pad in the black neighbourhood he always found to live in - he felt safer there. Yes, he lived life to the fullest right up to - and through - the end. His passing was one of the most profound things I have ever witnessed. He was teaching and performing up until a couple of weeks before he died. He is buried in a little graveyard in El Valle, New Mexico. BM: The talented ragtime finger-picker,
and painter Eric Von
Schmidt, crops up in your dad's life I believe. JC: They recorded an album together
in 1961 for Folkways Records
called 'Eric Von Schmidt and Rolf Cahn' and also Rolf is quoted and written about in Eric's book 'Baby Let Me Follow You Down' - a book about the Cambridge music scene. Pop also recorded an album called 'California Concert with Rolf Cahn' in 1959 for Folkways and both are available from the Smithsonian Institution Folkways series. BM: Having Odetta baby-sitting
your kid is a great way of giving
him a head start in the CV stakes. JC: I have fond memories of running
into Odetta in the Village in
the 60s and getting a big hug every time! She's great. Another early experience - and one probably best forgotten is when I had an accident at age two during a gathering of Folksingers at someone's house. Waking up from a nap - I mistook the hole of a fine Martin guitar for - well, you know - think sleepy two-year-old. I met the guitar's owner - legendary folk instrumentalist Billy Faier - some 30 years later and, needless to say, apologized profusely while the 'victim' good-naturedly did not laugh... BM: Another event that is really
folk/blues history is the
comment on your website of Jesse Fuller turning up at your house with a prototype of his one-man band footdella. JC: Yes. Thank you for that excellent
segue. We were so lucky to
know that man. He was really something. He was such a, sweet, creative human being. He was quite an inventor and tinkered all the time. When he had built the first footdella he just brought it by our house in Berkeley and set it up in the living room and played it for us. The original laid out flat like a small grand piano. It didn't fit well on stage and so he re-designed it into the stand-up bass contraption that you can see in pictures of him. He is still one of my favourite 'songsters' and I will always treasure the little bits of wisdom he imparted to me as I was growing up. BM: Was a career in music a forgone
conclusion?
JC: I think so. Everything I have
done to avoid it has been to no
avail. (Laughs) BM: What did your brothers Michael
& Andrew do career-wise?
JC: You're speaking of my brothers
Michael and Andrew, my dad's
"2nd family" sons. They both play a little guitar. Michael is a ski instructor and lives in a cosy little house he built himself in Taos, New Mexico. Andrew is a Chinese Medicine Doctor and is a partner in a homeopathic practice
in Ashville, North Carolina.
BM: You play other types of American
indigenous music, but what
was it that made you want to play the Blues? JC: Well... The Blues is kind
of a religion when you look at it a
certain way. It is a conversation with circumstance. A cathartic and healing force of nature. So it is like I except and enjoy other means of expression and I love doing all kinds of music - but when I go home, I go home to the Blues. It never fails. BM: To add to that, musically
what's Jesse Cahn drawing on?
JC: Right now I am listening to
Howlin' Wolf. This morning it was
Bob Dylan and Mozart. I think I will listen to a little Charlie Mingus later tonight or in the morning. I am just really auditory and eclectic as hell... I draw on everything around me the birds and the bees, the rhythm of life - everything. Mostly I listen to my heart and I remember that inside everyone there is a beating heart and a soul and I try to reach that level of communication every time I play and sing. Right now I am sort of a classical groupie. It's a good thing that Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven are not around anymore or I would be like a Deadhead following them around everywhere they played with like this really funky cello under my arm... BM: You are a multi-instrumentalist;
did you set out to become a
one-man band, to get a broader musical education, or simply to try something new? JC: I just wanna do it all! I
think I got that from my mother.
Right now my passion is the Ukulele. And yes - seriously - at a certain level every instrument is an education. It forces you to look at things from another perspective. Like inversions or transposing on steroids... I'm playing drums in one of my students' Blues bands right now amongst other adventures. I haven't done that since I played drums with the Chambers Brothers in the 1960s! I'm also directing the band - so it is a whole different perspective than my usual place at the 'front'. Just great! BM: You reside in Oklahoma, a
state I believe that has seen more
wind than change; but how does it fare as a Blues region? JC: Fairly rich actually. I am
getting ready right now (Middle
October, 2003) to go on a tour of the Mississippi Delta region - which is only 8 or 10 hours drive away - with 68 year old singer Miss Blues from OKC. She is a good friend and she and I have been doing an educational presentation of hers called 'Reminiscence of the Blues' in schools, museums and libraries around the region. I play examples of the different styles that she teaches about. South-western, South-eastern and Delta and she and I alternately sing. There is a fairly strong Blues Society here in OKC and another in Tulsa, also there is a thriving club scene and plenty of quality studios. Oklahoma is really an undiscovered mother load of talent in almost all genres. BM: If pressed to label yourself
in an attempt to reveal yourself
to our readers; in a sentence or two what would you say sums up Jesse Cahn, man and musician? JC: Wow! Hmmmm....A Man about
town.A Willing member of a
creative community - worldwide
and without borders. A good Friend,
I hope. Musically I aim for the
most honest expression in the moment.
I heard Pete Seeger the other
day on PBS quoting Yip Harburg.
Something like, "Words are a way of expressing a thought. Music is a way of feeling an emotion. Songs are a way of feeling a thought." I think he got it about right. Interview: Billy Hutchinson
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