- [Voiceover] The following program is a production of Pioneer Public Television.

This program on Pioneer Public Television is funded by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage fund, with money from the vote of the people of Minnesota on November 4th, 2008.

Additional support provided by Mark and Margaret Yackel-Juleen, in honor of Shalom Hill farm, a non-profit, rural education retreat center and a beautiful prairie setting near Windom and Southwestern Minnesota.

shalomhillfarm.org.

The Arrowwood Resort & Conference Center, your ideal choice for Minnesota resorts offering luxury townhomes, 18 holes of golf, Darling Reflections Spa, Big Splash Waterpark, and much more.

Alexandria, Minnesota, a relaxing vacation or great location for an event.

ExploreAlex.com.

Easy to get to, hard to leave.

(gentle orchestral music) - Welcome to Postcards, I'm Dana Johnson.

Today we traveled north to take a peek inside the Evansville-located studio of wildlife artist John House.

To this date, John is the only artist to win all five Minnesota DNR Wildlife stamps.

Also, we take a seat with the band Hardwood Groove at the Historic Holmes Theater in Detroit Lakes.

But first let's catch up with the Detroit Lakes artist Caroline Smith, a rising musical talent who tells us about growing up as a musician in a small town.

- [Voiceover] I was talking to my buddy, Jake Hanson, who's playing with us tonight.

He's also Mason Jenning's guitar player.

He's doing double duty tonight.

But I was making jokes, I was like, "If we play really well tonight, you guys, "I don't have to go to my 10 year reunion."

Like, this is it.

Like, you know?

Everything I would brag about my 10 year reunion, they're all just gonna be here and I'm opening for Mason Jennings.

We are in Detroit Lakes, Minnesota at the Historic Holmes Theatre attached to the community center, and tonight Hardwood Groove is playing, a local Detroit Lakes band.

My band, Caroline Smith & The Goodnight Sleeps are playing, and the one and only Mason Jennings.

(rock music) I played with B.B.

King when I was... 17?

I started playing live shows when I was, like, 15.

My mom heard me playing in my room and, oh my god, freaked out.

She was like, "You're gonna be rich and famous "and I'm gonna take you there!"

(laughing) It's like... Oh my god, it was so annoying.

It was one of those, like, "Mom, stop!"

moments, but she started making me play around a lot and I had to do terrible things like play hair fashion shows and do all that stuff and Fargo and stuff like that, but, God bless her soul, she always knows what's right.

There was a promoter that happened to be at one of these shows and took an interest in my career.

My, you know, 16-year-old career at that point, and started putting me on these amazing shows.

♪ You say that I'd never ♪ ♪ Leave this place ♪ ♪ You say that you never wanted to ♪ ♪ Hit me in the face ♪ I got to play with Mason Jennings and Fargo and then, through that, he was like, "Oh, you know, I'm promoting these B.B.

King shows.

"Do you wanna play with B.B.

King?"

and I was like, yeah.

That would be awesome.

So I got to play a show with B.B.

King on his 80th birthday, along with a few others.

(slow classic rock music) I kind of just started writing music 'cause it felt natural.

And that's always, like, the best answer I can give for it.

It just happened, it wasn't like a "I'm gonna write songs!

", it was just... Just came out.

Chords made me think of songs that I could potentially sing that didn't exist yet and I just started writing them.

Growing up in Detroit Lakes was interesting.

What was nice about Detroit Lakes was the size and... To be an individual here sometimes is hard, but it's kind of like the "big fish, little pond" scenario.

You can really connect with a lot of people intimately, because it's so small, and there are a lot of great mentors and teachers that I got to connect with.

And I wonder if that would've happened if I had grown up in Minneapolis or... You know, so it was...

The encouragement that came from being in a small town was something that I feel fortunate about.

So it's so nervewracking to play in front of my hometown.

(crowd cheers) (microphone echo drowns out words) Oh, that's my babysitter!

(crowd laughs) I have no idea how I've never lost my voice.

We'll go on, like, huge tours where every night you know, I'm singing and I'm belting it out.

I always feel like you only get one first impression, and we always play a new place every night, so I'm always just, like...

Whether we're in some dinky art space or something I'm always just yelling and rip-roaring.

(loud singing) I took vocal lessons when I was a kid because I loved all the musicals and all that stuff.

And in Detroit Lakes I took voice lessons from a woman by the name of Cathy Larson.

And I think she just instilled in me how to appropriately use your voice, whether you were singing loud or soft.

(rock music) The new album is...

It's very different for me.

And it's...

I've been going through a lot of, like, life changes right now that have all kind of come about organically, and this record is one of them.

And my band and I went through a little stint where we were not happy with the songs we were playing.

It was very evident.

We were fighting a lot.

Somebody wanted to sound this way, I wanted to sound this way, and it just wasn't working.

And we were like... We had, like, almost a full record of songs.

We had, like, seven songs.

And I just looked at them, I was like, "You know what it is?

"I just wouldn't ever listen to this.

"I wouldn't even listen to these songs.

"I don't think we should use any of these."

And they were like, "We just worked all year on these."

I'm like, "I know, but I don't think this is me."

♪ I woke up one night ♪ ♪ As he slept next to me ♪ ♪ I wondered what woke me up ♪ ♪ Maybe the sound of my crying ♪ ♪ I walked into the kitchen ♪ ♪ To get myself a drink ♪ ♪ While you were standing at my door ♪ ♪ Trying to gave yourself to mind ♪ ♪ You're gonna make me move ♪ And so I just started, like, as an experiment, I just wrote a soul song.

And it just came out of me so fast, and it was just exactly how I wanted to sing it, how I wanted to say it, and the band was like, "Whoa, where did that come from?"

I'm like, "I don't know."

They're like, "Write another one."

So I came back the next day and I wrote another one and it was so easy.

I just sat down on the piano, which, I don't play the piano, and it just came out of me.

And they're like, "Write ten more."

and I did.

♪ Make my heart dry ♪ ♪ I rested my arm on the doorframe ♪ ♪ Unhinged before ♪ ♪ And we started laughing ♪ ♪ Cause we couldn't-- ♪ Right now it feels just so good to finally do something... Or, like, really do something that I feel 100% honest about, especially because it was doing these old songs.

I kept writing these old songs because that's what people wanted to hear, and now writing songs that I would want to hear for myself is amazing.

It's the best feeling in the world.

And I think, for now, I would just not like to not lose sight of that because it gets, as a woman, as an artist, as a public figure, it's really hard to maintain sight of something, maintain sight of yourself and what makes you feel honest and proud.

And right now I just want to hold onto that and try to keep that in my peripheral.

(cheers and applause) - Now John House tells us about his long journey to winning all five Minnesota DNR stamps, and how spending time outdoors has had a great influence on his art.

(acoustic guitar music) - [Voiceover] When I was very young I just had an artistic flair.

And I was always doodling.

I would doodle on the supper table, without a pen or a pencil.

I would just doodle.

There was an artist inside me at a very young age and my parents recognized that, and God bless them, they really invested into me.

They got me private art lessons, they bought me materials, sketch pads, charcoal, paint, oil paint.

They did their...

They did their best.

I really did not pursue art in high school or really in college.

But, through a long series of events, I just wasn't happy in college, and so I left college to become a Canadian fishing guide for a summer.

Well, I had to make a living and I had seen an article about a Minnesota decoy carver who was doing some beautiful carvings and fetching really good prices.

And so I thought, "This is how I'm gonna do it.

"This is what I'm gonna do."

I kept at it and got pretty okay at carving.

Ended up entering four international contests, won them all.

But what happened was the artist in me wasn't satisfied with carving.

Being the irresponsible artist that I was, I jumped ship, left carving pretty much cold turkey, jumped into painting.

(imitates splashing) Wasn't very good.

Not a good start.

And for years I would enter the Minnesota DNR stamp contest.

The DNR based out of Saint Paul has a contest every year for the honor of the artwork being select...

Your artwork being selected to go on the stamps that hunters and fishermen have to buy.

It was very competitive, but I wanted in, I wanted to take a crack at it, and so I did.

Intentionally enough, my first entry got third.

For years thereafter, I never got close to third, and that hurt.

And I finally won in...

I won the '98...

The contest in 1998 for the 1999 stamp.

I think there was a single factor in the painting that I finally won with that did it, and that was storytelling.

That particular piece was...

It's this green-winged teal over here.

And I have the male in a very animated pose.

He's preening, his wing is back, his body is twisted, his head is back here to preen.

Very animated.

And his bride, his hen, is also very animated, except she's the...

He's up and preening and, you know, and she's down, very docile, and looking to grab something to eat or peck away at or...

So he's up and proud and she's just down being tender.

And it's kind of a circle.

In design terms, it's a...

In abstract terms, it's a circle.

And so I kept trying with the pheasant.

Try and lose, try and lose, and finally I got a very nice phone call that I won the pheasant.

And at that point I said to myself, "You know, they have four."

They had four then.

Duck, pheasant, trout, and turkey.

And I said, "I have two."

And this was really wonderful because this was the fifth.

And at least two artists now have gotten the four that I happened to be fortunate enough to be the first one to get, but nobody's got five yet.

So that's still a little special to me.

I paint in oils.

Most stamp artists paint in acrylics.

I prefer oil paint.

Acrylics dry very fast, and there are people with personalities that that works with.

That just works for them.

That does not work for me.

Inspiration can come from many sources.

I will see a sunset, a particular sunset, out of a hundred sunsets, this particular one has such colors.

And they might not be bright colors, it may be very subtle.

And that's one of the reasons I try and carry my camera everywhere I go.

Because you don't know when it's gonna knock on your door.

But just a sunset or a sunrise or a color in a flower.

Really, almost anything would qualify, and you feel your heart move.

That's the measurement for me.

"Oh, that's pretty.

"Oh, I just love that."

I require my meter to be moved, and you know what I mean when I say that.

I have to feel something.

- Now we go back to the Holmes Theatre, where local band Hardwood Groove tells us about their original songs inspired by growing up surrounded by the beautiful nature of Becker county.

- And so I'd like to introduce Hardwood Groove.

Thanks again for coming.

(crowd cheers) (bluegrass music) - [Voiceover] It's a funny story, I was actually...

I think we were texting each other trying to come up with a name.

Thornby and Friends, I was throwing out Jazz Grass.

And I think Dan came with, like, Hardwood Grove or maybe it was Oak Grove and that became Hardwood Grove and then somebody threw Groove on the end of it and I think we were all just, you know, texting each other and that was the one so we stuck with that.

(bluegrass music) If there's anything that differentiates our music from other people's music, I think that it would just be... You know, I've grown up with a lot of my band mates since we were very young, and we've all come from the same walk of life and maybe that's something unique to a lot of other bands out there where they may be a little more thrown together as just good musicians that are trying to get somewhere.

We're all really good friends and I think that comes out while we're performing.

(bluegrass music) ♪ You took our dreams in a bag ♪ ♪ Walked out that door ♪ ♪ I don't need 'em back, I'm sure ♪ - [Voiceover] We have a close group of friends that we all get together and we used to all just hang out next to a campfire and sing and play and be merry, you know?

Enjoy life and just play some good tunes that we like to listen to and then, you know, we started writing songs.

- [Voiceover] You know, I kind of...

When I started with Dan and Jake and I, who you saw just playing the acoustics, it was kind of like a jazzy grass, hence Jazz Grass.

But now it's a little bit... You know, it's folk and jam band and bluegrass mixed together with maybe some, you know, classic rock in there.

- [Voiceover] You know it's bluegrass and folk, kind of, based.

That's one style, then also I'm really into, like, jam band type stuff and rock and roll, funk, and all sorts of things that kind of come into play.

- What I really picture us as is an electrified folk grass band.

We all have huge influence in bluegrass and in folk.

But I still love the intensity of an electrified band.

(upbeat bluegrass music) - [Voiceover] What's our music about?

Dan has a song that is about love and loss.

You know, he lost a father a couple years ago and he sings about it, and that was... And that's a very touching song.

So it can go from anything from staying out late drinking and having to go to work in the morning or missing loved ones, or even funny stories.

We have a song that is all about, literally, almost word for word, what a character, one of Dan's neighbors, told him about his neighbor.

So there was this neighbor feud that we wrote a song about.

So it can go anywhere that we let it.

(fast-paced mandolin solo) - [Voiceover] Nature is an inspiring factor.

There's quite a few references, I would say.

I think the first line of my first song is, "I was looking at the trees as they grow their leaves "in the green, green fields of Becker county".

So that was my first attempt at writing a song.

So yeah, that's a big factor.

♪ I was looking at the trees as they grow their leaves ♪ ♪ In the green, green fields of Becker county ♪ - I think that, you know, a lot of times when you're writing music you're...

It's gonna tie into something that's happened to you as a person, or it's probably a little window into, you know, where you've been in life or how you see things.

And so I think that, when you're listening to some of their tunes that that's probably where it's coming from.

- [Voiceover] This music is...

It's accessible to a lot of variety of people.

I have, you know, as far as demographics.

Everyone from the little kids that show up at our earlier shows are dancing around and having a good time, and it's, you know, adults that I've known most of my life, old teachers and things like that, they always have good things to say, too.

So I think that's a cool thing about the type of music that we play is that just a lot of people can get into it.

- Please help me give a warm welcome to Joel Riley with 89.3, she will kick off this great concert tonight with Hardwood Groove.

- [Voiceover] Amy Sterns here...

The director here at the theater, she contacted us.

She told us about this opportunity that this caravan du nord was gonna be coming to town.

So we were happy, you know?

Very happy to come and play on our stage here because it's such a great theater.

Beautiful theater.

♪ My neighbor Lizzy set her barn to fire ♪ ♪ Called the law and blamed it on me ♪ ♪ Sheriff, sheriff it was not me ♪ ♪ I was oversleeping beneath the willow tree ♪ The show was...

Exciting because it was sold out quite a while in advance, I believe.

(bluegrass music) ♪ I think you'd better lock him up and throw away the key ♪ ♪ Sheriff can't you see ♪ ♪ It was not me, it was not me ♪ - It was a lot of fun.

Playing in a theater is fun because people are sitting down, they're in comfortable seats, and it's more like you're putting on a performance or a show.

- [Voiceover] So the theater show is definitely different than, let's say, us playing down at Zorba's where it's all the locals just hanging out.

So yeah, little nervewracking, but still, like I said, that's what makes it fun.

♪ The other day I heard them crying across the pasture ♪ ♪ It's when I called the law man and see what he'd say ♪ - [Voiceover] I keep playing because I have a really good time while I'm playing the music.

It looks like I'm making people happy.

I like to think that I am.

That's my favorite thing about being in the band and playing the music.

And the relationships with the other band members, you know, we're all good friends, and that's fun, too.

♪ Sheriff can't you see ♪ ♪ Was not me, it was not me ♪ - [Voiceover] As of now we haven't recorded any type of album.

That would definitely be probably one of the goals, immediate goals, anyway.

Getting that out.

- [Voiceover] Our goal for the future in the band is different if you ask different people in the band.

My goal is usually, if we're playing at night, make sure that we're gonna be done by 1:00.

You know?

But their goal could be very different from that.

I think, in a long-term, non-joking, where are we going, I'd like to continue to see us, you know, perform for as many people as possible.

I really enjoy performing for municipalities and I think we'll stay around here.

♪ Sheriff can't you see ♪ ♪ It was not me, it was not me ♪ - That's all for this week.

For more information, go to our website.

See you again next time on Postcards.

- [Voiceover] This program on Pioneer Public Television is funded by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, with money from the vote of the people of Minnesota on November 4th, 2008.

Additional support provided by Mark and Margaret Yackel-Juleen, in honor of Shalom Hill Farm, a non-profit rural education retreat center and a beautiful prairie setting near Windom and Southwestern Minnesota.

shalomhillfarm.org.

The Arrowwood Resort and Conference Center, your ideal choice for Minnesota resorts offering luxury townhomes, 18 holes of golf, Darling Reflections Spa, Big Splash Waterpark, and much more.

Alexandria Minnesota, a relaxing vacation or great location for an event.

ExploreAlex.com, easy to get to, hard to leave.

(gentle orchestral music)