We’ve finished our tour of nine libraries in Cuyahoga County with audiences who brought out the very best in our interpretations of Dylan songs. There’s nothing like live music! 

When I’m getting ready for a big show like yesterday’s, I wonder what an introvert like me is doing in a place like live music. But I soldier onward - change strings, replace batteries, load gear and head out for sound check - because there’s nothing more worth doing than a good live show.

People like to ask, with a grin to their lips, ‘which one of you is Muscle and which one’s Bone?’ We tell them, ‘Muscle and Bone describes the music we play, pure Dylan, stripped to its essence.’ 

Is it my imagination, or does that last sentence fall on deaf ears? 

‘You’ve internalized, Bob Dylan - his spirit comes right through and we all feel it,’ says a Dylan fan gesturing toward rows of chairs recently filled with hushed listeners AKA noisy clappers in Fairview Park’s Meeting Room A.

Libraries, we are told, are no longer meant to be quiet zones.

Muscle and Bone joins local musicians performing songs of Bob Dylan to celebrate Peggy Spaeth's leadership and service as executive director of Heights Arts for the past 13 years.

You could say there were four musicians, one radio host and five swimmers in our Deweys audience. You could also say there was a math professor who knows Greek, a house builder who knows law, a yoga instructor who knows finance, an office manager who knows fiction and a dancer who knows food.

It turns out only a table or two of patrons at the crowded tavern had heard us before. The remainder came for the live music the place is known for. Our audience, split between Dylan lovers and fans of ‘that acoustic-electric thing’ we do lived up to the Spider’s reputation for expert listeners.

Mutual admiration did not take long. The fire place crackled, the wood beams shook - enchanted gusty Cleveland, wrapped in timeless song.

Muscle and Bone ventured out on slick and splattery I-480 last night with a car full of gear, heads full of lyrics and shoulders taut with wonder. As in, ‘wonder if anybody’ll show up?’

In all the excitement of developing a Bob Dylan show - song choice, arrangements, set lists - and lining up a web presence - facebook, twitter, youtube and our ever popular e-letter - meanwhile laying down tracks in the studio, I'd

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, two creatures of muscle and bone pondered their duty to honor the beauty of sound. Music was their sacred trust, but tools of augmentation turned their music into dust...