City is 'Comb Playing Capital' of
state
By Alvin Benn
Montgomery Advertiser
Move over storytellers and butterflies
and make room for musical combs.
This little Black Belt town with
a rich and controversial history now can proclaim itself the "Comb Playing
Capital" of Alabama.
Gov. Bob Riley signed a proclamation
adding that title to a town that already has been proclaimed by other governors
as the
"Buttlerfly Capital" and "Storytelling
Capital" of Alabama. The most recent proclamation, signed this week, resulted
from three
years of comb playing gatherings
outside the Selma-Dallas County Public Library.
"This is a harmonious example of
what makes Alabama such a unique state," said Pepper Bryars, Riley's assistant
press secretary.
"We can't afford to lose a tradition
such as this one."
Alabama's most famous storyteller,
Kathryn Tucker Windham, came up with the idea as a way to have fun and
promote racial
harmony at the same time.
She and friends bought a big bag
of small plastic combs and invited everybody in town to show up outside
the library on a Sunday
afternoon three years ago.
Wax paper was distributed with the
combs so that the "players" could blow into them and make something approximating
a joyful
noise.
Mostly, it was noise, but nobody
seems to mind as participants provide their own versions of "Comin' Round
The Mountain,"
"Amazing Grace," and "When The
Saints Go Marching In."
This year's event will be held at
2 p.m. April 13 outside the library with Windham and Gordon Welch, minister
of music at the
downtown First Baptist Church,
welcoming people and explaining what is about to happen.
"It's just so simple," Windham said
Thursday. "Anybody can play a comb. It's also a great way to unite our
community. We all
come together for a good time."
Each comb has "Making Music Together
in Selma, Ala." on one side. They come in all colors of the rainbow.
Mayor James Perkins Jr. hasn't missed
any of the previous "Comb Chorus" events and pushed back an appointment
to pick up a
comb of his own.
Windham said more patriotic songs
will be played this year as a way to support the troops in the Persian
Gulf.
"We'd love to have Gov. Riley join
us," she said. "He and Mrs. Riley could come over after church."
Windham indicated that the Rileys
could stand "on the right side" of the library "because we don't have to
mix the right wingers
and left wingers if that's what
they want."
Comb players make music to style
your hair
by
News Columnist Gene Owens
When played properly, sound somewhere
between whine of
marauding mosquito and hum of
browsing bumble bee results
04/17/02
By GENE OWENS Register Columnist
SELMA -- If you think "Amazing
Grace" sounds good on a bagpipe, you should
hear it
played on a comb.
If you think "La Marseillaise,"
sounds blood-curdling in brass, you should
hear it rendered in
plastic and tissue paper.
If enough Frenchmen could have
heard
Kathryn Tucker Wind ham and
me
playing their national anthem
on combs
they probably would have started
a
revolution right there on the
lawn of the
Selma Public Library. But the
French on
hand were too few in number
and too
civil by nature to raise much
of a ruckus
when we summoned the "enfants
de la
patrie" to "le jour de gloire."
As the well-coiffed Cecile Fourel
of
Lyons, France, put it, "the
Gauls don't
use the comb for a musical instrument."
"You just comb your hair," she
said.
She was one of several French
citizens
visiting Selma as guests of
the local
Rotary. In their honor, the
75-or-so
comb players on hand, joined
for a
round of "Frere Jacques."
The virtuosos of the toothed
instrument
were gathered for the second
of what founder Kathryn Windham hopes will be
an annual
comb concert in Selma.
Kathryn chose the comb as her
instrument because it's inexpensive and
everybody can play
it. As far as she is concerned,
you can forget about your brass, your
reeds, your woodwinds,
your strings and your percussion.
She goes for the teeth: the teeth of a
plastic comb
covered with a piece of tissue
paper and pressed to the lips. You don't
have to tune it; you
don't have to fret it; and you
don't have to blow your lungs out to
produce a melody. You
just sort of hum the tune, and
it sets up a vibration between the paper
and the comb.
A properly played comb emits
a sound somewhere between the whine of a
marauding
mosquito and the hum of browsing
bumble bee. If you're playing it right,
you don't hear your
voice. You just hear the hum
of the vibrating paper. And you should feel
the vibrating paper
tickling your lips.
Kathryn learned to play the comb
when she was growing up in Thomasville,
Ala. I learned to
play it while growing up around
the mill villages of South Carolina.
During the early 40's, local
radio was beginning to twang
with the sound of homegrown hillbilly bands,
and several of
the boys around Pappy Rains'
house took up instruments. Pappy was my
grandfather, and I
spent a lot of time at his house.
James bought a fiddle, Bud bought
a guitar, and I reckon one of the other
boys had a
harmonica -- a mouth organ as
we called it. We smaller boys tried to
emulate the older boys.
We put together a band consisting
of a comb, a whisk broom and two sticks
of pine lighter.
The comb was our harmonica,
the broom was our guitar and the lighter
sticks served as a
fiddle.
Aside from a rough rendering
of "The Wreck of the Old 97" on a flattop
guitar, the comb
represents the pinnacle of my
musical achievement.
So I felt comfortable when Gordon
Welch, minister of music at Selma's
First Baptist Church,
handed me a comb and a piece
of tissue paper, although I don't remember
using tissue
paper in the old days, probably
because it was too fancy for us, and we
didn't keep any
around. I found that waxed paper
made the best sound, although it tickled
the lips more
than the others. When we didn't
have waxed paper, newsprint worked just
fine.
In Selma, it was a blue-sky day
on Broad Street, and Welch put the tooth
orchestra through
several familiar pieces: "America
the Beautiful," "You Are My Sunshine,"
"Swing Low Sweet
Chariot" and "God Bless America."
When he asked them to play "Frere
Jacques" in rounds,
it was hard to tell which group
was playing which passage. The hum of
combs seemed to
blend seamlessly.
Mayor James Perkins Jr. showed
up with his two sons, Justin and Jarius,
and soon they
joined in the buzz. Pauline
Wheatley, Kitti Windham (Kathryn's daughter),
Euelle Bell and
Emily Weissinger turned the
gazebo on the library lawn into a bandstand
and joined the
noise.
Soon Welch had couples dancing
arm-in-arm on the lawn.
"We want to make this the comb-playing
capital of Alabama," said Kathryn.
Just Alabama? I asked.
"O.K., the world," said Kathryn.
Why not, the camaraderie is great
and the music will part your hair.
(Readers may write Gene Owens
at the Mobile Register, P.O. Box 2488,
Mobile AL
36652-2488, call him at 434-8587
or e-mail him at
gowens@mobileregister.com)
ANTHONY McCARTNEY
Selma hums its way to harmony
'Comb Chorus' helps unify troubled
city with laughter
04/14/03
By ANTHONY McCARTNEY
The Huntsville Times
Times Montgomery Correspondent
anthonym@htimes.com
SELMA - They sound like a chorus
of
bees, humming the "Battle Hymn
of
the Republic."
Except there's no malice from
this
group. It's tough to look dangerous
with a comb and sheet of wax
paper
pressed to your lips. Nor does
a
comb, when played, sound the
least
bit threatening.
That's the point of the "Comb
Chorus," an event aimed at bringing
unity and laughter to a city
that cast
off segregation violently and
can't
quite shake the image.
The chorus's organizer is spry
storyteller Kathryn Tucker Windham,
whose tales and weekly segments
on
Alabama Public Radio have
captivated generations of listeners.
And yes, she can play a comb
like a
pro.
Then again, "Everyone's on the
same level musically when you play a comb," Windham said.
Sunday's chorus was the fourth
time locals joined on the front lawn of the Selma and Dallas
County Public Library to belt
out tunes on a pocket comb. Windham called it the "Spring
Concert."
It started, and ended, on a patriotic
note, with the assembled chorus of about 100 people
playing the "Star-spangled Banner,"
and "America the Beautiful."
Up front, Gordon Welch led the
music with all the hand-waving fervor of an orchestra
conductor.
The tunes are short, lasting
a minute or less.
They're unmistakable, but they
sound like a person's voice after a gulp of helium. So
naturally, it's impossible to
listen without smiling.
Welch, the minister of music
at Selma's First Baptist Church, sticks to familiar songs, including
childhood favorites such as
"Old MacDonald" and "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands."
Most of all, he makes the music
fun.
Which is what Windham said she
had in mind when she envisioned "Comb Chorus."
She wanted Selma residents to
come together. She wanted them to meet each other. To
laugh. To play happy music.
Together.
She said she didn't want anything
that was too organized. No studies. No committees.
Just wax paper and combs.
Wider recognition
People are noticing. On Sunday,
Selma Mayor James Perkins read proclamations from the
city, Gov. Bob Riley (who declared
Selma the comb-playing capital of Alabama), and from
the U.S. Congress.
The crowd included several people
from around the state, which pleased local residents.
Locals are "interested in promoting
Selma," Doris Holland said.
Most people equate Selma with
another Sunday 38 years ago. On March 7, 1965, state
troopers and local lawmen attacked
a crowd of 600 civil rights marchers on the Edmund
Pettus Bridge.
The images were so horrific,
the ensuing march so captivating that it provided a catalyst for
Congress, which passed the Voting
Rights Act of 1965.
"It is so different" since then,
Holland, a local jeweler, said. "There's no comparison."
Windham and Holland said Selma
residents want to be recognized for something other than
"Bloody Sunday."
"We don't get positive publicity,"
Windham said.
But maybe something as simple
as playing combs could help.
It's worked for her before.
"When we grew up, we didn't have
any entertainment," Windham said. "This is free, fun and
portable."
And easy to learn.
Chad and Holly Bagby are both
musicians, playing the trumpet and saxophone at Martin
Middle School in Selma.
Learning the trumpet took Chad,
14, about a year. His sister has spent the last eight months
learning the sax.
The comb was a simpler instrument,
taking "like five seconds" to learn, Holly, 13, said.
Both said they came to Sunday's
comb chorus to have fun.
Which is what Windham said she
wanted, loftier goals aside, in the first place. The whole
idea of playing a comb with
scores of other people was nothing more than a way, she said,
to bring some of the "laughter
we all need everywhere."
The other results - the camaraderie,
the strangers becoming friends over a rendition of "God
Bless America" - are also important
to Windham. That's the sort of ties she'd like to
encourage in Selma.
She conveys the message with
the combs she brought, each stamped with seven words; Six
across the middle, in white:
"Making music together in Selma, Alabama;" and in the left
corner, just one: "Unbreakable."
\
Thanks for visiting my
"A Sunday afternoon in Selma"
Web page
Ed Williams
Professor, Department of
Communication and Journalism
Auburn University
313 Tichenor Hall
Auburn University, Ala. 36849
