A Star of the Pedestrian Precinct

Blues for Food: The Street-Musician and Song-Writer Richard Smerin Got Stuck in Fürth

Birmingham, Mosley 1982. A bare, gigantic room backstage. The Folksinger Richard Smerin sitting on a stool enjoying the silence after his performance. From outside from the stage drift (or blow) a few shreds (or wisps) of music to the inside. Suddenly there are voices and row. A group of important people comes into the dressing-room. Stage staff drags sofas, mirrors, food and drinks in. Utensils for B.B. King. After everything is arranged the master of Blues appears. He did not deign to look at Smerin. Time-laps (?). Scene change. Richard Smerin standing in the pedestrian-area of Fürth singing until he's blue in his face like he did for 25 years. "I don't care, whether I'm playing to 50 or 500 people", 39 year old says. It is not so important, whether they throw 50 Pfennig in his guitar-case or pay 15 Marks at the ticket desk. What counts is the Blues. The Blues brought him on stage, he was 14 at that time. When he was 19, he went to Copenhagen, where many American Jazz- and Blues-musicians used to live in the 80ies. He played openings for Alexis Korner, Bert Jansch and Joan Armatrading and accompanied the Blues-Legends Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee during their last Europe-Tour, which led him into the biggest concert halls. "Together with Terry and McGhee I had the nicest experiences. It simply was great, just to hear Sonny playing warming up in the dressing-room." Together with the Dane Kim Gutmann and with Jorgen Lang he made an album containing Blues-classics.

Later he played together with Steve Baker and Abi Wallenstein. Then came the lull, the return to England and another move. Something brought him to Fürth. "It just turned out that way. It is hard to live by music in England nowadays. You get 50 Marks playing in a pub." From Fürth he organizes his all over Germany gigs. "That's a lot of work, but I like talking to people. I'm not shy, I'm not proud. That makes it easy for me." Therefor you can find him in the pedestrian precinct. The street-musician returns to his roots. His little three-roomed flat in the old part of Fürth is simple furnished. A musician's life is a spontaneous one, you don't need hoarded stuff. Smerin serves English tea. He speaks only English, like Kevin Coyne, who lives in Nürnberg. "I play the guitar my whole life. Enjoying myself when I'm playing, abusing myself." Abusing himself. Smerin's teeth are in a bad condition. Even in winter he wears only a leather jacket over his jumper. You can feel it: a musician's life is not easy to bear. You need a strong personality to prevent yourself from going downhill. And personality rubs people up the wrong way. In Nürnberg's scene Smerin is notorious to be arrogant. "Most people telling stories about me never seen me at all, that's the thing about it. But that seems to be usual about here. They don't say to you straight-face, what they don't like about you. They tell it to others." Smerin makes a pause. "I don't feel very happy around here any more." There is always trouble with his concession making music in the streets. Maybe, like Smerin says, he will go back to England. But first he had a new CD come out. It is called "Personal". The cover is decorated by a wardrobe full of skeletons. "That's the English equivalent to the German: Leichen im Keller." Smerin assembled on it bitter-tender ultimatums. He passes in review former loves, reckons up in "Cambridge Blues" in a humorous way with the middle-class America and rejects all Irish Pubs in the world once and for all, because the people there demand from you nothing but "Whiskey in the Jar" all the time. Again you can hear on "Personal" this cracked, nasal and mumbling voice, telling about life to be a permanent collecting of wounds. And again there is this nimble, fine fingerpicking and the vehement foot-stamping. "This Body's Got to Go" was named a former CD from Richard Smerin. And that's how it is supposed to be. Here or in England. Eberhard Gronau