The Voice

Volume 62 Issue 2 Winter/Spring 2017 Article 15

The Ruralists

Aleisa Dornbierer-Schat Dordt College, [email protected]

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Recommended Citation Dornbierer-Schat, Aleisa (2017) "The Ruralists," The Voice: Vol. 62 : Iss. 2 , Article 15. Available at: https://digitalcollections.dordt.edu/voice/vol62/iss2/15

This Features is brought to you for free and open access by the University Publications at Digital Collections @ Dordt. It has been accepted for inclusion in The Voice by an authorized editor of Digital Collections @ Dordt. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Dornbierer-Schat: The Ruralists

he Ruralists meet for practices in the “Back Back”—the deepest FEATURES Troom of Sioux Center’s main-street café, the Fruited Plain. It’s the dark, dusty home to odds and work,” says Laremy De Vries (’02), who “ruralism” represents a kind of ethic—a ends: a green vintage chair, a few plays electric guitar in the band and deeply principled approach to living and tables, a large lettered sign. There’s an owns the Fruited Plain. “It’s a kind of producing creative work in a place that old upright in the corner, a network of D.I.Y. approach to making music.” isn't often associated with art or high exposed pipes, and a makeshift stage. On culture. this quiet Tuesday, the only suggestion “That’s at the heart of ruralism,” says lead of sound is a dim collection of amps and singer-songwriter Luke Hawley, Dordt So far, the constraints of small-town cords, several guitar stands, a stray set College English professor by day and life haven’t limited the band’s early list. Ruralist front man by night. “The idea is rise to success. The Ruralists have only that you make do with what you have. existed for around six months, but It’s fi tting space for a band that prides You embrace the community you’re a part they’ve already performed to enthusiastic itself on the philosophy of “making do.” of, and you see what good can come from crowds at a variety of regional venues. In that.” October, the band was featured on NPR’s “Here we are, in this ugly back room, Sioux City affi liate, recording an hour- taping things together, just making it More than just a clever moniker, long segment that included live music. THE RURALISTS ) 11 ʼ ( SCOTT VANDE KRAATS

Published by Digital Collections @ Dordt, 2017 1 23 The Voice, Vol. 62, Iss. 2 [2017], Art. 15 JAMIN VER VELDE VELDE VER JAMIN Since then, they’ve won and advanced in a regional Battle of the Bands competition, they’re at work recording an ( ʼ 99

EP, and they continue to perform live for ) large crowds in tight spaces. At the center of all this—the swelling noise, the sweaty crowd—is the band’s anchor and heart: Luke Hawley, holding

FEATURES his guitar, singing a song. “Luke’s songs have a simplicity and an immediacy that is very rare. And very hard to do,” says Dr. Benjamin Lappenga, Ruralist electric guitarist and a theology professor at Dordt. “The craft of songwriting matters a lot to him, and as a fi ction writer, he also knows what it is to tell good stories.” The Ruralists opened for Caleb Hawley, Luke's younger brother, at Dordt last September. Caleb, a Lappenga spent much of his twenties New York City-based musician, now tours the country giving high-energy shows in a style critics have fronting a successful rock band in Seattle likened to Prince. called Driving the Eights; now he studies biblical texts in their original languages THE MAKING OF A a song,” he says. He pauses, then laughs. and teaches Dordt students to do the STORYTELLER-SONGWRITER same. As a songwriter himself, Lappenga “Honestly, I’m sort of a one-trick pony admires “the ease with which Luke’s Luke Hawley was fourteen when he fi rst about all of this. I write songs. I play songs come off the page.” picked up a guitar. After years plunking them on an acoustic guitar, and I don’t out half-hearted songs on the piano, he’d know how to do anything else. So, I do Some are haunting. Some are about love fi nally convinced his parents to let him that as well as I possibly can. And for me, (but not the simple, I-wanna-hold-your- move on to a new instrument. that means serving the song fi rst.” hand kind). The lyrics are spare, but they usually tell a story. None of them are His younger brother, Caleb, followed suit. Hawley’s emphasis on the song itself has especially cheerful. Hawley says, laughing, “I knew he’d be something to do with his early musical better at it than me.” education in the church. He grew up “I try to make jokes between songs,” the child of musicians, in a home rich in Hawley says, “Just to lighten the mood “My brother is a top-notch performer; instrumental music, yet some of Hawley’s a little.” Not that the shows are gloomy. he sells the whole show. And I don’t most formative musical experiences There’s no arguing with the energetic really have that,” he says. For the elder didn’t involve instruments at all. Hawley guitar riffs or drumline. Most in the Hawley, it’s always been about the songs was raised in the acapella Church of crowd bop up and down with the beat or themselves. Christ, where instruments are never used break into dancing. in worship. In place of an organ or praise “What I’m giving people, as a musician, is band, the sanctuary swells only with voices, blending in four-part harmony. ON LULLABIES AND TRUTH-TELLING “From the minute I could read the text, I also learned to read the notes,” Hawley “I’ve written lullabies for my kids, and I sing to says. His church experience even got them at night. My daughter, Eden, who’s seven him into a high school choir without an and now paying attention to lyrics, is suddenly audition. “Once the choir teacher knew I ) 11 ʼ ( asking about hers. Her song begins with the lines: grew up in the Church of Christ, she was ‘This world will break your heart, my dear / But like, ‘Okay—you’re in.’” don’t you let it get you down / When the night seems dark and drear / The sun is coming back He credits the tradition with instilling around.’ So, she wanted to know all about that in him a deep commitment to the SCOTT VANDE KRAATS the other night. And, yeah, I could pretty easily importance of melody. “Somebody along write about only the good parts of life. But the way told me if you can’t sing your there would also be a lot of lying in that, right? song without instruments around it, then So, maybe it’s not a good idea to write lullabies for your children about how hard life can be. But you don’t really have a song,” he says. maybe it’s not such a bad thing, either.” Hawley’s melodies are memorable, but as a fi ction writer, his songs are deeply

https://digitalcollections.dordt.edu/voice/vol62/iss2/15 2 24 Dornbierer-Schat: The Ruralists SCOTT VANDE KRAATS KRAATS VANDE SCOTT shaped by a storyteller’s sensibility. He the catalyst for a new short story. More first learned to appreciate the wedding of often, he’ll get stuck on a story and use song and story traveling to summer folk a song to “get out of the woods.” One of festivals with his family. his favorite stories in Northwoods Hymnal ( FEATURES ʼ 11

was reborn this way. By compressing a )) “The folk genre is very narrative, 2,500-word story into a 200-word song, centered on words and stories. And that’s he was able to better distill its shape. what I was interested in—finding ways to tell stories. Well,” he says, pausing again “The most important things rose to the to laugh, “that, and trying to get girls.” surface. So, when I went back to the story, I had a better idea of where I was Hawley began exploring the relationship going,” he says. between song and story in earnest in grad school. He’d been working on a “The craft of songwriting matters novel, then set that aside to a lot to him, and as a fiction writer, work on the he also knows what it is to tell good collection of short stories stories. That’s clear in his songs.” that would — Dr. Benjamin Lappenga on Luke Hawley's songs eventually be published as The Northwoods Hymnal, winner of a 2014 Hawley brings this genre-hopping Dr. Benjamin Lappenga, Ruralists electric guitarist, teaches biblical studies courses Nebraska Book Award. approach into his writing classes at at Dordt. He spent his twenties fronting a Dordt. “One exercise I have my students “At one point, I ran out of the stories I successful Seattle rock band called Driving the do is take a nursery rhyme—like ‘Mary Eights. had to tell,” he says. He decided to try an Had a Little Lamb’ or ‘Twinkle, Twinkle experiment: he sat down with one of his Little Star’—and put their narrative ART OUT OF CORNFIELDS favorite short stories, Raymond Carver’s into that,” he says. Hawley encourages “Cathedral,” and wrote a song from the students to explore the variety of ways The Ruralists often open their show perspective of one of its peripheral different genres can collide, or refract with “Ghost.” Hawley sits at the piano characters, a blind man. one another, and that way bring clarity— and strikes a single, haunting note, then or suggest a new direction. begins to sing. Slowly, the band builds “It gave me a new way into the story—a the sound behind the solo. As the volume different interpretive angle—to help me “When I get stuck, I find it helpful to rises, Hawley strikes the piano with more see what else might be there, just below jump back and say, ‘What would that force, introducing new, more dissonant the surface,” he says. Now, Hawley rarely narrative look like as a painting, or a chords. At the height of the song, he writes a song “without some piece of song? A screenplay? How would that be nearly pounds the keys with his fists. fiction attached to it.” different than a short story,” Hawley says. “I think of ‘Ghost’ as this haiku-ish Sometimes, an existing song will be Exploring the relationships between little love poem,” says De Vries, who different genres has made Hawley remembers considering the relationship a better writer, but it’s also been “a between poetry, music, and truth in his helpful gimmick for getting people to philosophy classes at Dordt. One of his read short stories,” a genre nearly as professors was the first to introduce him underappreciated as poetry. His short- to songwriting legend Leonard Cohen. story collection includes a digital code inside its back cover, which readers De Vries likens Hawley to the poet can use to access recordings of the William Carlos Williams, known for collection’s ten acoustic songs. his spare lines and precise imagery. That likeness is especially evident in “When I used to perform solo shows in “Ghost.” Near the end of the song, the the Twin Cities, other artists would set up band falls away entirely; the audience tables and sell CDs. I would sell books,” grows suddenly aware again of its own Hawley says. That the two genres are breathing. Hawley closes with that one, deeply knit together in Hawley’s work is plaintive piano note and the arresting Recently, part of a key was knocked loose under the just as evident now, when the Ruralists image of two people, standing outside force of Hawley’s playing. The band posted a photo take the stage and perform Hawley’s in the cold, their breath against the of the splintered key on its Facebook page. songs for a crowd. moonlight.

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https://digitalcollections.dordt.edu/voice/vol62/iss2/15 FEATURES says. “But I’m really interested in what kind beautiful things can also be made here.” made be also can things beautiful kind what in interested really I’m “But says. Hawley things,” bad are those of none And manufactured. get parts slaughtered, get hogs grown, gets made—corn gets stuff or poverty, terrible there’s either where places as tagged get often areas “Rural mind. to comes that thing first the isn’t art America, rural of images conjure people most When worship.” to how Iknow is how That make. can I that art precise and beautiful most truest, best, the in making interested am I “Ultimately, says. he work,” creative my about Christian overtly that’s little very is There things. good all of Creator the songs—and good stories—as coming from good Isee Ireject. adualism “That’s explicitly Christian or themes not. up takes it whether says, Hawley that, do should art All questions. unresolved life’s and ambiguity for room leaving yet structure, and form them giving them, engages It life. of parts difficult the from away shy doesn’t art Honest says. Hawley dangerous,” be can that ignorance—and willful of akind to down comes It isn’t. it that in away world the see to wanting with do to has art Christian some of badness the Ithink honest. be to has It truth. the tell should “Art life. of ugly parts even perplexing, hard, the for room has “beautiful” Hawley, For museums.” fancy of out come they as much as cornfields of out come things beautiful “That Hawley. says well,” as country the to belongs it but city, the to only belong not does art that says “Ruralism — Luke Hawley — Luke That’s my offering to God—doing that small as thing wellcan.”as I “I’m interested writing in about how people cope, and how people hope. around in my head, and I try to write my my write to Itry and in head, my around orquestions, I sit sentences with banging with Isit things. through Iwork is how this them, tell “I questions. through work to to use stories students He encourages tell—and we says. live,”stories Hawley the of up we’re made that recognize I storyteller, and “As asongwriter place. first in the stories tell to consider we why students encourages he drafts, own their workshop they as them with atable at sitting or literature, of awork through students guiding he’s Whether too. his classroom, into Hawley brings understanding that The Voice,Vol.62,Iss.2[2017],Art.15

Stories” and “The Meaning of Names” Names” of Meaning “The and Stories” Other and Sounds “Night of author Shoemaker, Gettert — Karen balladeer.” the of voice is atrue His notes. right the all hits Hawley Luke stories, and songs both of collection this In song. a good implies story love agood and story, agood tells song “A love good Forth” So 57, Route 7-Eleven, A&W, and “Stardust, of author Lear, — Patricia humanity.” their in holy but all are that stories of collection a written has who firmament literary the on voice American new is abrand Hawley “Luke FOR BOOK HIS PRAISE

SCHAT DORNBIERER ALEISA - small thing as well as I can.” Ican.” as well as thing small God—doing to that offering my That’s hope. people how and cope, people how about in writing interested “I’m says. Hawley truth,” in the hope of alot there’s remember: and myself check to I have sometimes And right? truth, the tells “Art hope. toward point his songs Still, messages. neat as packaged aren’t themes spiritual one, like this In songs snow.” “Minnesota in the it burying and lines, state four across it with traveling in Michigan, grave his up father’s digging acharacter about asong into it puts and hymn well-loved old, an soul"my from with is well "It refrain the takes Hawley, song, In that Hymnal. Northwoods in collected songs the of one Hymn,” Father’s Favorite “My perform often The Ruralists way in. their find invariably “Christian” questions about God art, aim make to doesn’t Hawley While life. family of happiness ordinary the or community, of value the up like themes loneliness and isolation, take Some identity. and place between stories explore deep the connections and songs Hawley’s of Many are. we who understand us help can they students, his teaches he as but conclusions, simple stories don’tGood offer makesthat sense.” some in away questions those through way ALEISA DORNBIERER ALEISA - SCHAT 4