We made an appointment to meet at a coffee bar on Wall Street in Kingston, not exactly in between the Connecticut recording studio where he’s currently working and his home in Greene County, but close enough. When he slid into an empty parking space right out front of Hudson Coffee Traders on a street that never offers a break and doffed a Panama hat, fairly bouncing out of the cold and into the building, I guessed that this Louisiana native might carry his own sunny disposition with him. Anyone who wears straw in the frigid gloom of an upstate December must be able to create his own heat and light. Indeed, Carver Blanchard appears to run on stored positive energy. Could it be a life of plucking a lute—an almost ancient instrument associated with simpler times—that causes this inner reserve of warmth?

It’s not a simple instrument to manage, ubiquitous as it was in the 17th century. With eighteen courses it has a huge range, but all those strings can be temperamental. Blanchard explains that a lutenist would have originally been employed as a studio musician might be today, to provide functional background accompaniment for events at court, for example. Players would be expected to maintain a large repertoire and be able to improvise on demand. He imagines an entire industry built around the production of lute bodies and parts, and emphasizes the expertise required of even the string makers of that era. When the harpsichord was invented, it and the Baroque violin became the dominant sounds, and the lute literally dropped out of hearing for a few hundred years.

Its revival has come about almost incidentally. Blanchard, like most modern lutenists, did not pick up the instrument as a first choice. The lute is not taught in elementary schools, nor is it yet commonly heard on the radio. Furthermore, lutes are not widely made and distributed. Blanchard’s instruments come from an artisan in Savannah, GA. Although there exists a handful of lute makers in the United States, as well as numerous lute societies, the market is not what it was in Renaissance Europe, if such a comparison can be made. Each instrument has to be hand-built, and modern lute makers are unable to charge what their labor is actually worth in terms of time and skill.

Still, Blanchard envisions a growing interest in the lute’s possibilities, attracting the creative talent that could bring it back as a standard instrument within the modern entertainment industry. To that end his CD, Lute Unleashed, released in 1993 by Albany Records, introduces the lute as part of a more contemporary quartet featuring Neil Moore on harmonica, Glen Sounders on double bass and Jim Cowdery on recorder. With selections by the likes of Stephen Foster and Cole Porter (and including a couple composed by Blanchard himself), Lute Unleashed offers the listener an alternative genre for the instrument’s unique qualities. He maintains, “The instrument is good for a variety of musical styles, even more contemporary ‘prop’ music. There are things it will do that a guitar can’t … and it sounds like a classy banjo when you do [traditional] American music.”

Blanchard came to the lute almost accidentally. As a guitarist and a tenor in the Air Force’s performance group “The Singing Sergeants,” his musical interests leaned towards the arrangement and composition end of the field. He joined the Smithsonian Institute’s music department as a singer; and when the lutenist left, there was a space to be filled. He became a lute demonstrator for the Smithsonian—and his relationship with the instrument took off. In addition to composing, arranging and performing, he is the director of the Fernwood Center for the Performing Arts in Elka Park, NY, and he teaches at Wesleyan University. His students there almost all start with the guitar and migrate to the lute. He says the kids can bring anything to him—like ‘60s era music from that fantastic explosion of talent—and he’ll figure it out for them.

He yearns for a critical mass of players and listeners who will revive the public’s appreciation of the lute and create new music. In fact, Blanchard dreams of developing his property in Elka Park—once the Poggenburg estate near Tannersville—to house an arts academy, a place for musicians and writers to hone their talents while taking advantage of the peace and beauty of the Catskills. He points out that Tanglewood in the nearby Berkshires was an outgrowth of just such an academy, and that all it takes to accomplish is the support of the surrounding communities—support like “Mrs. Vanderbilt getting all her dinner guests to pull out their checkbooks to make things happen,” he adds, his eyes twinkling. Anything could happen. I’m ready to sign on.

Blanchard’s current recording efforts entail three microphones bleeding sound into each other as he plays and sings solo—quite different than laying down separate tracks with three other musicians, with a sound engineer manically listening to every incremental vacillation in tone. He’s recording in a vast multi-purpose room at Wesleyan that looks like a mock-up of a classic ‘50s studio, and his choice of music centers on turn-of-the-last-century stuff his grandmother had in her library. One of the challenges is to avoid sentimental, antiquated renditions of these old tunes. “…like ‘Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes’ not sung as a period piece, rather as serious lyrics … you want to mean it but not over-sing it. What you want [to achieve] is transcendence. Not to be noticed for your technique, but for the music itself.” Hailing from Baton Rouge and New Orleans, he says this kind of music has stayed with him, but then jokes, “I’m looking forward to finishing up with this effete stuff and getting back to some rock and roll!”

With background strains of Foster’s “Hard Times Come Again No More” from Lute Unleashed competing against customers’ chatter, a noisy coffee grinder, and the clink of cups, Blanchard points up at a speaker and interjects “The ear accepts a variety of phonic balances—and that’s the way people listen! Or like the secretaries listening [to music] very low and around the corner.” He says if it isn’t interesting to hear in different settings, it won’t grab your attention anyway. He maintains that for any creative artist, there is a certain level of dedication which, once achieved, the world comes to your assistance. When your commitment to the art itself—be it playing the lute or writing a play or whatever—is strong enough to “throw away the safety net,” the muses will know it. Blanchard admits his modest success allows him to experiment, but he can’t get away with just anything. “At least people know I’m serious … If you’re good enough for long enough, the world will notice. But, do not underestimate how good for how long you have to be.”

He’s been good for a long time. Look for Carver Blanchard’s new Albany Records CD, titled Heartsongs and Audubon, to be released this spring. For more information see www.carversbarn.org.