(casual bass music) (band kicks in) - [Announcer] Coming up on "Ocean State Sessions", Rory MacLeod and Sandol Astrausky.

(playing vibrant folk music) And Gained In Translation.

(singing in foreign language) (band playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band continues playing "Knoxville Rag") (band finishes song) - Whoo, yeah!

(all clapping) (band playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band continues playing "The 28th of January") (band finishes song) (all clapping and cheering) - Hello.

- Hi, Mareva.

- Hey, Sandol.

Hey, Rory.

- Hello.

- How'd you guys feel about your set?

- Okay.

You know, it was fun actually.

- Do you wanna tell us about the folks you played with?

- Sure.

You were asking us to bring some of our community members in, and all three of them have been in the community class, some much longer.

David, the ukulele player, started in the community class somewhere around 2008, we think.

And he's been there and back.

Sometimes he's around.

But also, those other three are part of a band we have called I'll Pack a Lunch.

And I thought I'd bring them in, 'cause we play together quite a bit.

- And actually, Matt Pottle, who is the other fiddle player, was a student of mine many years ago, and he just took off with this music.

He loved it, and he progressed.

I sort of fired him from being my student, because I didn't know what else to do with him.

He was on his own.

And he took off with it.

And now we fiddle together.

It's great.

- He graduated?

- He graduated, yes.

- How did you come to lead the Old Time String Band class at Brown University?

- We took the class.

We went once in the spring of 2004 or 3, or something like that, and never missed a class from then on until our mentor, Jeff Titan, decided to retire.

And when he started retiring, he took a sabbatical, talked Brown into letting us do the sabbatical, and then we did that a couple times, and he retired, and they decided to keep it, which we appreciate.

You know, at first it was like, it's an easy class to do, but it's become quite a bit, very popular.

- What do you love about old time music?

- I think the attraction for me, and what keeps me at it, is I love physically playing the fiddle, the vibration that comes from the instrument back at me, and with old time music, you get to tempos and melody patterns that are just sweeping and fun to play, and I just find, number one, that that's exhilarating.

I also like to work on tunes.

I like to figure out from these old field recordings what fiddle players are actually doing.

It's a challenge, and it keeps my brain pretty occupied.

And just listening really hard to what these rhythms are, what these notes are, it's like a puzzle, I guess, if you like making puzzles, that's your thing.

But I suppose I make puzzles out of the notes and the tunes.

- What do you love about the old time community in Rhode Island?

- There's some times we'll get together with someone, and we'll just talk, and tell stupid stories for in between, for 15 minutes between tunes- - That's part of it.

- And end up doing five or six tunes in an evening.

But that's how it's part of being in part of a community.

It's really fun.

- Rory and Sandol, thanks so much for talking with me.

- Thanks for inviting us to do this.

- Thank you.

It was a pleasure.

- One, two, three, four!

(band playing "Bella Ciao") Here we go!

Yeah!

(singer singing in foreign language) ♪ Bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ (singer continues singing in foreign language) ♪ Oh bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ (singer continues singing in foreign language) ♪ The world is waking ♪ ♪ Outside my window ♪ ♪ Bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ ♪ Drives my senses ♪ ♪ Into the sunlight ♪ ♪ For there are things that I must do ♪ ♪ Wish me luck now ♪ ♪ I have to leave you ♪ ♪ Bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ ♪ With my friends now ♪ ♪ Up to the city ♪ ♪ We're gonna shake the gates of hell ♪ ♪ Yeah ♪ (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ Bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ Bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ And I will tell them ♪ ♪ We will tell them ♪ ♪ Bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ ♪ That our sunlight ♪ ♪ It's not for franchise ♪ ♪ I wish those fascists would drop down dead ♪ ♪ Next time you see me ♪ ♪ I may be smiling ♪ ♪ Bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ ♪ I'll be in prison ♪ ♪ Or on a TV ♪ ♪ I'll say the sunlight dragged me there ♪ (band continues playing "Bella Ciao") (band continues playing "Bella Ciao") (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ Bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ Bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao ♪ (band finishes song) (all clap and cheer) (band playing "Ukrainian Medley") (birds chirping) (band continues playing "Ukrainian Medley") (band continues playing "Ukrainian Medley") (band continues playing "Ukrainian Medley") (band continues playing "Ukrainian Medley") (singer singing in foreign language) (both continue singing in foreign language) (singer singing in foreign language) (both continue singing in foreign language) - Here we go!

♪ My Dekosak ♪ ♪ Tall and handsome ♪ ♪ Every garden has a girl ♪ ♪ I'm young, but not so foolish ♪ ♪ Take your ring right away ♪ ♪ Marisol, one, two ♪ ♪ Black eyed Mary, one, two ♪ ♪ Pickin' berry ♪ ♪ May I give a silver ring to you ♪ ♪ Marisol, one, two ♪ ♪ Black eyed Mary, one, two ♪ ♪ Pickin' berry ♪ ♪ Take your ring right away ♪ (singer singing in foreign language) (both continue singing in foreign language) (singer singing in foreign language) (both singing in foreign language) (singer continues singing in foreign language) ♪ Orchestra ♪ ♪ Honey take me boots ♪ ♪ They are made of hired weathermen ♪ ♪ The winter when it's cold outside ♪ (both singing in foreign language) ♪ Leather shoes, angry, angry ♪ ♪ Wife I can never lose ♪ (both sing in foreign language) ♪ These boots are woe ♪ ♪ Every time I wear them, my troubles grow ♪ ♪ I hung up my leather boots on a peg ♪ ♪ I went out to the fields ♪ ♪ And I broke my leg ♪ (both singing in foreign language) ♪ Leather shoes ♪ ♪ Angry, angry wife I can never lose ♪ (both sing in foreign language) ♪ But they brought me well ♪ ♪ Every time I wear them ♪ ♪ My troubles grow ♪ (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ Leather shoes ♪ (both sing in foreign language) (both continue singing in foreign language) (band continues playing "Ukrainian Medley") (band continues playing "Ukrainian Medley") (singer singing in foreign language) (singer continues singing in foreign language) (singer continues singing in foreign language) (singer continues singing in foreign language) (singer continues singing in foreign language) (singer continues singing in foreign language) (singer continues singing in foreign language) (band finishing song) (all clap and cheer) - Hi, thanks for taking the time to chat.

- Yes, our pleasure.

- That was fabulous.

Wonderful.

- It was fun.

- It was really fun.

We're so thrilled you're here today at Big Night Studios, and actually, this is Little Night Studios.

- Likewise.

- Yeah, thank you.

So the name of the band is Gained in Translation.

Tell me about that.

I wanna hear your origin story.

I wanna hear where that name came from, and kind of the history.

- The band is called Gained in Translation, and the story, it's a very simple story.

When we were starting the band, we knew it was gonna be about languages, and I thought that "lost in translation" is not fair, and so I reversed the "lost in translation" to "gained in translation".

- How many languages are you singing in?

- I've been always interested in languages, and went to school, had to know five languages to get my PhD, so altogether, about 11 to 12 languages I've studied, but the band actually has, I lost count, to tell you the truth.

I was counting the other day.

So I'd say around 13.

Around 13, and this was not the goal of this band, it just happened.

You know, organically, languages and songs came to us through different channels.

- I wanna ask what I think might be a really obvious question to most of us who maybe don't have your linguistic skills, is how do you do it?

How do you sing in so many different languages, and what are the challenges of that?

- I mean, it's challenging, and I use all the friends who speak languages to kind of shape up the pronunciation.

I need to understand the words, so there's work in it, but very pleasant work.

- If you want to talk about the third song you played today, which was "Ukrainian Medley".

- It was made of three separate songs.

It's a medley, and there are two Ukrainian folk songs.

Those are the first two sections of it.

And then for me, I've always felt that it'd be fun to, I don't know, extend the boundaries of the music a little bit.

So we have that droney introduction.

And that was kind of a big deal for us, 'cause we don't normally do things like that.

- You had the birdsong?

- The bird songs, right?

- That was beautiful.

- I thought so.

- Lovely.

- It was a little controversial at first, you know, like really?

And I'm like, yeah, really.

You know, why not, right?

- I didn't say no to the birds.

- You didn't say no to the birds.

- I said no to the drone.

- You didn't like EBow.

- I warmed up to it.

- You warmed up to it.

- Yeah.

- When you notice that bickering a little bit back and forth, you have had a long time, what you call a musical alliance.

You've been married for 30 years, so you might, Moe tells me that sometimes you bicker a little onstage.

- Sometimes.

(all chuckling) All the time.

- Tell me about your musical alliance, because it was just a small, private little ceremony, right?

Some 30 years ago?

- Not really, not really.

- Not really.

- So we got married in Woodstock 2 in 1994, onstage of MTV.

- The person who was my friend who I asked to be the best man is a producer for MTV, and he was producing MTV's broadcast from Woodstock 2.

And he said, "Oh, you know, Moe, I'm sorry, I'm not gonna be able to be at your wedding."

And then I guess you said it was your idea.

- Yes, I said, "All right, we'll just go there."

I mean, I'm an adventurous type, so I said, "We'll go there," and then I said, "Maybe they'll pay for the tickets."

But they didn't pay for the tickets.

- What, 250,000 people?

- 250,000.

- At your wedding?

- Were right there, yeah.

- It was a media event.

You know, you have to be careful in the age of media what you do, because it persists.

It lives beyond you.

So there was a big dramatic wedding kiss, and it was a pretty dramatic wedding.

- It was.

It was passionate.

- You saw that?

- I saw that.

- Yeah, you saw that?

- Yeah, you go.

- Well that became, a still from that became an Adobe stock photo.

Yeah, for a while.

And then they sold it to some other stock photo company.

- $35.

- Yeah.

We never saw a penny for it, but that's okay.

But it became this kind of media niche thing.

- Good for you two, yeah.

- And then it was for a year, they cut a little piece, and it was like in between different shows, yeah.

- MTV used that kiss as a bumper, like as an interstitial thing for a long time.

- Wow.

- Yeah, yeah.

- But we wrote the vows, and in the vows, we said, you said that, right?

That we're gonna make beautiful children and beautiful music together.

So, hold and below.

- And we did.

- We have.

- Two kids later, and a lot of music.

You know?

- You did a lot of years.

- Yeah.

And he also called me a total babe on camera.

- I did that, too.

Still true.

- Yeah.

(Moe chuckles) - Well thank you for joining us.

This has been such a joy and such a privilege.

- Likewise.

- And we'll come out and see you again sometime.

- Cool.

- Please.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

- I promise to live with you in peace and love, and never ending harmony and respect and faithfulness, and I promise to do my best to make beautiful music, as well as beautiful children with you, and to live our lives together as if they were just, it's a perfect melody, and in rhythm with the beat of the universe.

And I hope that we can find answers to universal questions together, and I'm just always gonna love you, and I'm completely madly in love with you, 'cause you're just a total babe, and nothing could ever possibly even slightly separate us.

- I promise you, Moe, to live in love and faithfulness with you, and also we come from different parts of the world.

Let us join our life together in the perfect continuation of the freedom that I discovered from under the shadow of planning.

Let us dance our mystical cango together, to the beat of whatever drummer we decide to pull out, and let us have the strength to tolerate each other's moods, and let us remember that whatever troubles can come our way, our love is strong enough to carry the day.

Moe, I love you, and I'll be always happy with you, and no one can even come close to separating us.

- In front of some 250,000 witnesses, I now pronounce you husband and wife.

May your kiss celebrate your love for each other.

(crowd cheering) (cheering fades) (casual bass music) - [Announcer] For more "Ocean State Sessions", visit RIPBS.org, or tune in to The Public's Radio at 89.3 FM.

(casual upbeat music) (casual upbeat music continues) ♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh ♪ ♪ What else can I do ♪ ♪ Hmm ♪ ♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh ♪ ♪ My mind is set on you ♪ ♪ Ooh ♪