Feb. 2016. Eddie Love talks about how he bought a harmonica 50 years ago and couldn’t figure out how to play it. He’s a big, balding truck driver with the remnants of a white ponytail. The audience starts fidgeting, but then Eddie pulls out his harmonica and croons out “Shenandoah” with such sweetness that all are in tears. Then he bemoans the lack of blues guitar players and bursts into playing and singing the “Walking Blues.” The audience is hanging on to each note. The next open mic participant is a fifteen-year-old. “I am a museum,” she starts, “and you are a hospital. I recognize sickness.” Her words shock, and she’s smiling until the end, when cracks of her pain leak out of the edges of her smooth face. The temperature is rising. It’s another night at the Expresso Yourself Coffeehouse.
The brainchild of Thea Iberall and Linda Finkle, Expresso got off the ground when First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church of Medfield offered the space. Finkle, a replant to Medfield from New Hampshire, has gone to storytelling venues in New England joining into open mics when she’s grabbed by the theme. Iberall came to the Metrowest area two years ago from California. With numerous volun-teers and Starbucks to provide refreshments, the Expresso Your-self Coffeehouse opened its doors a year ago.
March 2016. The theme is “Coming of Age.” Andy Costello, a music teacher from Medfield, leads her violin students in an Irish medley. Ranging from age 10 to 14 years old, the students tentatively play, their bows bounce unevenly atop their instruments. The youngest boy sways back and forth watching the audience watch him. Andy encourages them with her eyes and violin, willing them to remember all she taught them. With each measure, they become stronger. She kicks up a heel as they finish to the audience’s wild applause. They take a bow and scurry off the stage.
Once a month, the aging vestry of the 228-year old church building is transformed into a Parisian café. Purple and yellow tablecloths cover the small round tables. During intermissions, people chat, sipping Starbucks coffee and eating brownies and lemon tarts. When asked why this is happening at First Parish, Finkle says, “The church wanted to build community through sharing thoughts, feelings, and music. We want the essence of human experience.” As a progressive faith community, the UUs have a principle: the “free and responsible search for truth and meaning.”
May 2016. The theme is “Anything Can Happen.” Iberall opens with a poem by Jack McCarthy, the late Boston slam poet. “No one knows why whales sing so,” she intones, as the audience quiets down for tonight’s ride. Open mic readers share poems about ants, stories about tee-ball, and songs about dreams. Finkle tells a story about how meeting Joe Biden changed her life. The feature Rich Berg, with his bald head vibrating under the high-energy track lighting, oozes stories about freedom and his traumatic brain injury. “It’s a matter of time before a swift lashing rain seeps down on you hard with a grip and a chain.”
Expresso has had twelve featured performers, one a month. Iberall says, “We’ve had storytellers, slam poets, page poets, singer/songwriters, a band. Even a didgeridoo player.” The rules of the open mic are simple: five-minute limit, original or non-original material, sticking to the theme is encouraged, teenagers and adults welcome. People come from all over the Metrowest area, even Worcester, Boston, and Cambridge to perform or to just soak it all in. Features are selected from around New England, trying to get a balance across genres. Medfield TV has filmed all but two of them. “They couldn’t get anyone to work on Thanksgiving or New Year,” Iberall says.
July 2016. At six feet tall, Deb Griffin is imposing in any situation, especially an open mic. “Race is not real, but it causes real pain. I learned recently that I am white.” As she continues, her voice breaks, “I cannot go back to living in the bliss of not knowing about a society that supports me.” As she finishes, the audience spontaneously stands in support. The feature, singer/songwriter Jacob Haller adds his own song of social justice, about Anne Hutchinson standing up for women’s rights. All this on a night with the theme “Cats and Dogs.”
February 25 is Expresso’s one-year anniversary. Volunteers will spend the afternoon setting up the tables, lights, and sound system. When the evening is over, they will break it all down until there’s once again an empty room. “It’s a journey—each night, we all go on a journey,” Shirley Riga says. As one of the volunteers, Riga monitors the front room activity, making sure there’s a flow from the registration table to the seats. She sets up more chairs when the crowd begins overflowing.
January 2017. Reverend Cindy Maybeck, the storytelling minister, is the feature. She has chosen a theme of ‘Rainbow Grace,’ and even though she will speak after all the open mic performers are done, it’s like she’s channeling grace into the offerings. Or maybe, it’s that the participants have taken her challenge and each adds some aspect of grace: a family healing at a funeral, a story of ancient Sufi wisdom, an act of paying it forward, and an experience of releasing fear. The lessons are sublime, the audience breathes in the grace. Maybeck swirls stories about hospice singing, about stepping forward, and about walking through doubts. The standing ovation demands an encore, and even though it seemed impossible, she brings the energy up another notch.
At the end of the evening, Iberall has a big smile. “When people leave, they say it’s the best entertainment anywhere. I have to agree.”
