FRESH WIND SESSION No. 22
Michael Virga
Recording Date: 10 December 2023
KNCE 93.5 FM Premiere: 14 December 2023
Substack Premiere: 20 June 2024
The first time I met Michael Virga was at a Bob Dylan tribute concert I organized last May in conjunction with the release of my EP of “One More Cup Of Coffee” covers. The artist scheduled to perform “Buckets of Rain” at the show had had a nervous breakdown the week before and split town. By chance, one of the other artists scheduled to perform called me on the morning of the show to ask if Michael could play - emphasizing that “Buckets of Rain” was a song that had been in his repertoire for years.
As it turned out, Michael’s performance of the song was one of the highlights of that evening, in a rendition that I found delicious and haunting. Virga had just returned from a number of weeks outside of cell service, camping with the children at the school where he taught at the time, and I caught a beatific glow in his eyes that evening that I’ve never quite forgotten.
Growing up in Maryland, just outside of the DC area, Virga’s first musical experience was singing in the choir at the church his family attended. In my opinion, there’s something of the exultant nature of choir music that remains central to the music he makes today. While the guitar accompaniment for the songs you’ll hear on this session call to mind the more progressive strains of the indie-folk era (Grizzly Bear’s Daniel Rossen especially comes to mind), the voice is the central instrument in these songs.
Michael originally moved to Taos in 2017, and shortly afterward started a band called The Second Wind Endeavor that by all accounts was one of the leading lights of the town’s pre-Covid music scene. That early work is captured quite well on their 2021 eponymous album. Unfortunately, two of the members of the group relocated during the lockdown era of the pandemic, and the group has not played a live show since early 2020. Though he speaks at length about the group’s possible return over the course of the interview of this Fresh Wind session recorded last December, I’m happy to share that this very evening the new lineup of The Second Wind Endeavor will be making their live debut in Taos at Omnihum Gallery.
I’m quite glad to report that this session includes a recording of Virga’s cover of “Buckets of Rain” alongside five of his originals: “Thimbles”, “Doubt”, “Speak An Open Door”, “Don’t Go Back To Sleep”, and “Carry No Fear”.
11: Fresh Wind Session No. 22: Michael Virga