ramblin' jack elliott, "912 greens"
Tuesday, June 04, 2013
[I wrote this in 1998. I still think it’s one of the best things I’ve ever written.]
"'Round about 1953
I went down to New Orleans
Perhaps I should say, many years ago"
Ramblin' Jack Elliott had just turned 22 in the summer of 1953, when the events took place which he chronicles in "912 Greens" (assuming they did take place, which is somehow both irrelevant and crucial). To be honest, I'm not sure he was "Ramblin' Jack Elliott" yet, 'round about 1953. He first recorded the song for the album Young Brigham, which was released in 1968. Thirty years later, the song is as timeless as when it was recorded. The story Elliott relates always happened "many years ago."
In "912 Greens," Elliott tells the tale of his trip south with some buddies to look up Billy Faier, "a 5-string banjo picker" who lived at 912 Toulouse Street. The vocals are casual; Elliott doesn't sing until the very last stanza, instead he just talks over a lovely guitar accompaniment, and the lyrics feel made up on the spot. It is impossible to imagine Jack sitting down with a pencil to put the words on paper. At times he stumbles a bit, repeats himself, and chuckles under his breath as he remembers some moment from his adventures. Even as he spins his story, adding just the right detail to bring matters to light, he suggests that there are hundreds, thousands, millions of other stories he could tell if he only had the time. As he says about Billy Faier,
"And the way we found him,
well that was a whole 'nother song
Let's just say we found Billy Faier"
Elliott was born in Brooklyn in 1931. His name at the time was Elliott Adnopoz. Apparently he wanted something different than might be expected for a young Jewish boy from Brooklyn, and so (depending on which story you believe, and there are many) he ran off to join the rodeo when he was still a teen. Somewhere along the way he changed his name to Buck Elliott; later he became "Jack" and later still, "Ramblin' Jack Elliott" (by which time he had indeed rambled). Also along the way he switched from traveling with a rodeo to traveling with Woody Guthrie, who was nearing the end of the "healthy" years that preceded his succumbing to Huntington's Disease. Woody and Jack had adventures; Elliott later became known as the premier interpreter of Guthrie's work, and for much of his early career he was perhaps known as much for being the heir to Guthrie's folk tradition as he was for anything. Clearly, Elliott Adnopoz had reinvented himself.
You could only get to 912 Toulouse Street by climbing over a fence. Once you got over, you found a concrete patio, in the midst of which was a banana tree. "Although I never did see no bananas hanging on it, as they said, it was a banana tree." Elliott is reinventing himself; his friends are reinventing reality. And succeeding: "as they said, it was a banana tree" is good enough for Jack. The house itself featured a balcony "that connected all the various different musicians' different various pads." That balcony is where reinvention takes place.
The sense of community in "912 Greens" is overpowering. Ramblin' Jack Elliott ... it sounds like the moniker of the last of the independents, a man with no home except the horizon. But when Jack sets off to ramblin', it's with his friends Frank and Guy, and they meet up with Billy Faier, who lives in a house where all the people and all the pads are connected. What makes this adventure so enticing is the ease with which Jack and the rest become friends, comfortable with each other and their different various pads. After a "tropical rainstorm" (I could talk about the three-legged cat, but that's a whole 'nother essay) in which Jack and "this girl there that had once been an ex-ballet dancer" (a bottomless phrase, to have once been an ex-anything) dance naked around the banana tree, everybody commences to "drinkin' Billy Faier's wine and gettin' acquainted." As Elliott talks and picks his guitar, gradually we realize that "gettin' acquainted" is the most important thing in the world. The various different people have different various pads, but the best part comes when we move onto the balcony and see our connections.
The sun comes up, everyone goes home over the back fence. "Stayed around 3 weeks in New Orleans," Jack tells us, "Never did see the light of day." It was many years ago. It could have been last month. And then he rambles. "And I never have been back," he adds. But every time Ramblin' Jack Elliott sings "912 Greens," everytime he comes to new people, everytime he "gets acquainted," he is indeed back in New Orleans.
As are we, back in New Orleans, when we listen to the song. There is no more beautiful ode to getting acquainted.
When I lived in New Orleans, I went down to the Quarter and just stood in front of 912 Toulouse. No banana tree. No gray cat. No former ex ballerina. And then I went down and stood and watched the river going around the big levee on the West Bank. I haven't been back. Years earlier, when Jack was parking his bus at my friend's friend's place back behind the Topanga Ranch Market, I thanked him for giving us all this song, which will probably outlast both of us as long as people keep remembering it.
Posted by: another49r | Thursday, September 05, 2019 at 09:33 PM
That's a lovely memory. Thanks!
Posted by: Steven Rubio | Thursday, September 05, 2019 at 09:43 PM
I just watched a video of Jack singing this song a few years ago. He says the three-legged cat's name was "Shakey" ... "not Gray, as I had stated in an earlier recording". Also, in that version, the tree actually had bananas on it.
Recently, I typed "912 Toulouse Street" into Google Maps. I can see 910, but there's no number on the next building, so I can only guess it's 912.
Posted by: Steven Rubio | Sunday, October 06, 2019 at 08:47 PM
Hey cousin! Here I was, listening again to some of the last music broadcast on the Old North Beach show long long ago. Up came "912 Greens", and lo a Google search turned up this page. Perhaps an appreciation of this song is bound up in the genes, or just being gentlemen of a certain age in a certain place.
Posted by: Stan | Wednesday, October 07, 2020 at 03:29 PM
I love this small world stuff! When I first wrote this, heck, it's been more than 20 years now, I heard from someone who knew some of the principles involved in the story. Told me how to spell Faier, as I recall.
Hope you guys are doing as well as possible during the pandemic.
Posted by: Steven Rubio | Wednesday, October 07, 2020 at 04:12 PM
There's a gate (or alley) at 910 . It enters into a courtyard. 912 appears to be on the second story. There's a long balcony on the back. A few years ago maybe 10,my wife and I were visiting NOLA . Took a picture at 910. We walked around the corner,there's an iron fence ,looked into the courtyard and damned if somebody hasn't planted a banana tree.
Posted by: Sid Holt | Wednesday, May 26, 2021 at 08:17 PM
It's evidence of the power of the song that we are still talking about it all these years later. Thanks for the comment, Sid!
Posted by: Steven Rubio | Wednesday, May 26, 2021 at 08:30 PM
In the 70's i met a draft dodger that came to Montreal, he had this album of Jack Elliot he said I should listen to and that tune made a permanent scare in my soul and I came up with this interpretation : https://youtu.be/ehlMZUJmbM4
Sorry for my bad english
Posted by: Pierre Dion | Wednesday, December 15, 2021 at 08:22 AM
Nice!
Posted by: Steven Rubio | Wednesday, December 15, 2021 at 12:13 PM