Those of you gazing and gawking this Saturday
at the downtown Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum
festivities will sooner or later need nourishment and
refurbishment, both mental and physical.
If sooner is better — say, 12:30-2 p.m.
— drop by the Trout Lily Café, just two blocks south
of the Lincoln Presidential Palace on Sixth Street. As you sample
the many fine culinary wonders and award-winning coffee, relax to
the old-timey music of Banjulele. Locals may recognize musicians
from the Allen Street String Band, a popular dance and folk group
that once played frequently in Mr. Lincoln’s hometown. You
will discover that the band is actually playing songs that were
popular during the Railsplitter’s day. The Threshers,
featuring some of the finest acoustic players in the central part
of the Land of Lincoln, start the TLC second show around 7 p.m.
Now ease yourself away from those comfortable
surroundings, cut through the alley north of the TLC, and head
east. You’ll soon see a tall building that looks as if it got
lost on a Sunday drive from Chicago to St. Louis and decided to
just stay put. Contained in this circular architectural behemoth,
the Hilton Springfield, is the Underground City Tavern. Within the
UCT this Saturday evening you’ll find an art display
featuring works of local artists. A Springfield songwriter
showcase, featuring John Brillhart, Ben Bedford, Josh Reilly, and
others, heads up a 7-9 p.m. early show dedicated to the spirit of the Great Emancipator (but
without covering any songs popular during his era).
Around 10 p.m., Last Train Home, an excellent
alt-country band originally from Washington, D.C. (voted the 2003
Artist of the Year by the Washington Area Music Association, and
now based in Nashville, Tenn., takes the stage. The group is in
town supporting a new CD, Bound Away, which happens to list a public-domain song called
“Rye Whiskey” that was around during days of Honest
Abe. (There’s always a connection, if you only look hard
enough.)
After you’re done with all that, at
2-something in the morning, I think you’d better go home and
go to bed. It takes a lot of strength to look for Lincoln in all
the wrong places.
This article appears in Apr 14-20, 2005.
