SARATOGA — He’s a little bit country-folk. He’s a little bit rock ‘n’ roll. He’s a little bit…Wayne’s World?

Michael Eck had just attended his third Richard Thompson show in three nights at Caffe Lena when he paused and shared some thoughts about his own career celebration set to stage at the historic Spa City venue. 

“To be on that stage? The same month as Richard Thompson? Oh. My. God. I’m not worthy, I’m not worthy,” he said with a chuckle, launching into a fairly decent reconstruction of the magical moment when Wayne and Garth met Alice Cooper. 

On Sunday Sept. 25, singer, songwriter, poet, writer and Capital Region legend Michael Eck will mark his 40th Anniversary in Live Music with an acoustic performance at Caffe Lena. And while he likely hates the tag as “legend,” worthy he certainly is. It is, to paraphrase the title of his new upcoming release - his turn to shine. 

On Friday, October 1, 1982, Eck made his live musical debut, playing electric guitar with a hardcore band during a Battle of the Bands at Bethlehem Central High School. On the planet, it was A Week. The musical “Cats” opened on Broadway kicking off a generation-long run. Marvin Gaye released what would be his last studio album (“when I get that feeling I want sexual healing” buried within its vinyl groove), and Sony launched the first consumer compact disc player. The sitcom Cheers premiered on broadcast TV. A Bomb attack in Teheran injured 700 people. Ronald Reagan was in The White House, Pope St. John Paul II was at The Vatican, a gallon of gas cost 91 cents, and Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” was but a mere few weeks away from being unleashing upon the world. 

A prolific longtime reviewer of music and theater, Eck has played the mandolin and the jug, the dobro, ukulele and jaw harp while performing with most every band you’ve ever heard of in the greater Capital Region over the past 40 years, and scores of others that you likely haven’t. Above all else, a six-string noisemaker has been his steady. 

“I always had a desire to be a guitar player. I wanted to be Bill Nelson, from Be-Bop Deluxe,” he says.  “But then punk rock came along and totally blew my mind: Oh, you can just do this teach-yourself-thing.” 

The musical passion-bug seeped into his psyche at a young age. 

“My oldest brother Billy, who recently passed, would play 45’s. We had a battery-operated turntable, and we’d buy plastic bags filled with jukebox 45’s from the old LJ Mullen Pharmacy,” Eck recalled.  “We’d listen to those in the back of the car while the country music that my parents were listening to would come in from the car speakers. Hearing all that music at the same time…it just made me into a music nut from a very young age.” 

The first album purchased with intent? “’Frampton,’ by Peter Frampton – it was the one just before ‘Frampton Comes Alive.’” 

His first attended concert featured Aerosmith at The Palace Theater. “March 3, 1978,” he recalls without a flinch. “Concrete seats in the back of the balcony. I was 13 years old and they were my favorite band.” 

“Aerosmith blasted the roof off the Palace Theater to a capacity crowd of lucky people,” wrote reviewer Al Baca in the Albany Student Press, in the days following the concert. “Unless one is a corpse in the advanced stages of rigor mortis, it is impossible to leave an Aerosmith concert without feeling emotionally drained.” 

“The Palace Theater as a young kid…seeing rock shows at the old dirty Palace before it got renovated, that was something really special to me. This is music, happening right in front of me, being played by people. I just couldn’t imagine anything better. I’m still a voracious live music attender,” Eck says. “Seeing Patti Smith for the first time changed my life. There was a freedom there that just spoke to me.” Decades later, in a church in Albany he and Patti would spend an afternoon together, rehearsing, laughing, and performing. Grooving across state lines, watching jazz saxophonist Hamiet Bluiett performing at Great Barrington’s Club Helsinki is one lasting “just amazing” night of music. 

But to think that Eck’s 40th anniversary in live music is strictly nostalgia is to be misguided. The celebration gig at Caffe Lena will mix old favorites and previously unheard new tunes, as well as serve as the release party for his new album, “Your Turn To Shine.” 

“The great thing about Caffe Lena is that as much as people think of it as a historic place, and it is – it’s always been about the future. What’s going to happen years in the future is happening at Caffe Lena now, and I think that’s terribly exciting,” Eck says.

“What people can expect at the Lena show will be all songs I wrote, all original material – about half the songs from my previous four albums, and half new songs.” 

Eck made his solo artist debut in 1995 with the release of his “Cowboy Black,” album, and followed with  “Resonator,” “ Small Town Blues,”  and “In My Shoes.” 

“Your Turn To Shine” features 12 new songs, - three of which were written a handful of years ago, he explains, and the other nine written in this new era: during a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic, and for Eck personally, following a stroke. 

“I had a stroke a year-and-a-half-ago. It was a completely life-changing experience, but, oh well - we take each day as it comes. Health-wise, I think I’m doing OK. I can walk and talk, and depending on the time of day, better than at other times of the day. I can take that as a bonus,” Eck says. “Every day is different, but playing music and writing songs are really good therapy for me.  It does a lot more for me spiritually even than it does physically. And my family has been incredibly supportive. I’m feeling pretty lucky.” 

His children Lakota Ruby-Eck – on guitar, and Lillierose Ruby-Eck – on violin, will be joining him for a few songs at Caffe Lena. 

That spirituality? 

“My spirituality comes from a belief in humanity. And a belief in the power of the arts,” Eck says. “I think we can find – to use that term ‘spirituality’ – in whatever we look to or choose to find that. And for me it’s in people, and the arts.” 

Michael Eck’s 40th Anniversary in Live Music will be presented at 7 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 25 at Caffe Lena, 47 Phila St., Saratoga Springs. Call 518-583-0022, or go to: www.caffelena.org. Physical copies of Eck’s fifth album, “Your Turn To Shine—New Songs, Live At WEXT,” will be available on disc at the event, with digital distribution to follow.

SARATOGA SPRINGS — Residents who had attended several City Council meetings to advocate for safer passageways for young students attending Caroline Street Elementary School were pleased to learn this week that the city announced it will be installing pedestrian sidewalks along a five-block stretch east of the school, where no sidewalks currently exist.     

“Nearly every time I drive on this stretch of Caroline Street, I have to drive into the opposite lane of travel to avoid pedestrians in the road,” said Olivia O’Malley, who was accompanied by her second-grade daughter, Carlin, at a gathering during the Sept. 1 announcement.  O’Malley said that once her daughter started attending kindergarten at the school, her perspective grew to a new realization for the “absolute necessity” for sidewalks. 

“Once you walk with your 5-year-old on this narrow, two-way road with no shoulders and parking allowed on both sides… there is no denying the need,” she said, adding that wintertime snow piles create an even more precariously narrow passageway for pedestrians.

The sidewalks will be installed along the north side of Caroline Street on a stretch of road that runs five blocks from Schuyler Drive to Foxhall Drive. 

Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner and Saratoga Springs Commissioner of Public Works Jason Golub made the joint announcement. Woerner secured $150,000 toward the project, with the city providing matching funds. 

“These are our tax dollars and it’s a pleasure to bring them back to the community to make such an important difference in the lives of our youngest members, and to help the keep the anxiety levels of our parents down considerably,” Woerner said. 

Golub thanked Woerner – “without her support this project wouldn’t have been possible” – as well as parents and residents who came to City Hall to bring the issue to the City Council. 

“This sidewalk project is something you fought for, both yourself and other families,” Golub said. “There is nothing more important than the safety of our children. When children and families are walking home from school in the street without the safety of sidewalks, we have not done our best.”   

The overall project will include the installation of new sidewalks, curbing, and storm water infrastructure to limit drainage issues along Caroline Street. City DPW will conduct the work which is anticipated to take place later in the school year.

SARATOGA SPRINGS — The Saratoga Springs City Council met for its regularly scheduled meeting at city Hall on Sept. 6. The following items were among those discussed: 

•The city’s annual 9/11 remembrance ceremony will take place 8:30 a.m. Sunday at High Rock. 

•A Public Workshop seeking creative solutions for parking issues in the vicinity of the Saratoga Springs Senior High School will be held at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 21 at City Hall, Public Safety Commissioner Jim Montagnino said. 

•The Saratoga County Board of Supervisors monthly meeting, typically held on the third Tuesday of the month, has been rescheduled to take place at 4 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 22, city Supervisor Tara Gaston said. 

•The City Council approved up to $10,000 in private attorney fees as well as expenses in initial amounts of $3,000 for legal advice and representation for former Mayor Meg Kelly and former Public Safety Commissioner Robin Dalton in responding to the subpoenas served upon them by the Attorney General’s Office. Additional requests for fees may be made; the Council shall review such requests and if found reasonable shall provide such additional fees and expenses by further resolution.

According to documents supplied by the city, Kelly is commanded to appear and attend before the Attorney General on Sept. 29; Dalton on Sept. 30. The documents point to each testifying in connection with an investigation and inquiry concerning allegations of misconduct against the Saratoga Springs Police Department.     

SARATOGA SPRINGS — Nearly 20 years to the date since last staging a show in Saratoga Springs, Kronos Quartet will be coming to town early in the new year to perform at 7 p.m. on Sunday, Jan. 29, 2023 in the Great Hall at Universal Preservation Hall. 

Their last Spa City appearance took place February 2003 at Filene Recital Hall at Skidmore College where Kronos’ international program ranged from the sweet, eyebrow-arching melodies of Portuguese guitarist Carlos Paredes to the eerie, heart-pounding tension of the Romanian-influenced “Doina.” They showcased a a sorrowful string adaptation of Tony MacMahon’s Celtic tune “The Fair-Haired Boy,” a cacophonous ode to Icelandic rock group Sigur Ros, and and the sensual Cubano-throbbing beat of “Tabu” to the salacious Esquivel tune “Miniskirt,” complete with humorous wolf whistles and cat calls.

Kronos has performed live with the likes of Paul McCartney, David Bowie, Patti Smith, Allen Ginsberg, and Tom Waits, appeared on recordings by Nine Inch Nails, and Dave Matthews Band, and in dance with famed choreographers Merce Cunningham, and Twyla Tharp.

Tickets are available through the Box Office at Proctors, in person or via phone at 518-346-6204 Monday-Friday 10 a.m. - 6 p.m. or online at UniversalPreservationHall.org starting Tuesday, Sept. 6.

SARATOGA SPRINGS — On November 15, 2021, President Joe Biden signed into law a bipartisan infrastructure law aimed at, among other things, rebuilding the country’s roads, bridges and rails, expanding access to clean drinking water, ensuring access to high-speed internet for all and tackling the climate crisis.

Eight weeks later, newly minted Saratoga Springs Mayor Ron Kim announced as one of his first actions in office the initiation of a city Infrastructure Committee. The group would be tasked with prioritizing a list of city projects with needs that could be addressed by those federal funding opportunities. Kim appointed former city Mayor Joanne Yepsen as chair of the city Infrastructure Committee and requested each council member propose appointments to staff the committee.

“It’s really a generational opportunity where monies from the federal government can address some substantial projects and infrastructure,” Kim told the City Council last week, during a presentation by Yepsen.   

“Our goal is to not miss opportunities, and to be shovel-ready for as many of these projects and funding applications as possible,” Yepsen explained. 

The Infrastructure Task Force held its inaugural meeting on March 2, identifying city priorities and grant-fundable projects. Subgroup categories were organized based on the way the funding is divided in the bill, Yepsen said. Those subcategories: Transportation, Water-Sewer, Climate, Energy and the Environment, and Health & Human Services. 

More than 70 potential projects were identified, and following an RFP process the city selected the Delta Development Group as its consultant to assist in securing potential funding. Founded in 1988 and headquartered in Pennsylvania, Delta specializes in community planning and funding strategies with a core focus on economic growth. 

The contract between Delta and the city in the amount of $25,000 began Aug. 1 and runs through the end of this calendar year. “They’re really grant writers and more importantly they’re right on top of how and when the funds will be released and going to flow for the areas through the legislative action,” Yepsen said. “We have a real opportunity to garner the significant amount of funds from the federal and state level. It’s a five-year program and we’re well into the first year.”

According to an Aug. 19 report by Reuters, the Biden administration has funded more than 5,000 projects to date and released around $113 billion. The administration will award billions of dollars in additional grants through the end of 2022.    

Regarding Saratoga Springs, five grant applications have been submitted and one awarded; Rise Housing and Support Services received more than $2 million from the U.S. House’s Transportation HUD Appropriations Bill, through Congressman Paul Tonko’s office.

RISE Housing and Support Services is a human service agency that has been serving people in Saratoga and the surrounding counties since 1978. The funds will be used to construct a homebase day center.   

“To put a little more detail on what was funded already - many of you have contacted our office because of the homeless situation in our downtown area,” Mayor Kim said. “One of the needs that we have not had an answer to for several years is a Day Facility for homelessness, for people who don’t have an alternative place to go. The funding Congressman Tonko has secured through the federal government is going to create a Day Program Facility at the RISE off of South Broadway,” the mayor said. “So, this is one of the very concrete uses of the funds that the federal government has offered, and it’s just the first of what we think are going to be many needs that we’ll be able to address through the various programs being offered.” 

Consultants from the Delta Development Group will visit Saratoga Springs next month to tour the city and visit various need projects identified by the task force, Yepsen said.   

An open-to-the-public meeting with the Task Force will take place at 4 p.m. on Sept. 21 at City Hall. 

SARATOGA COUNTY — Incumbent Democrat Congressman Paul Tonko, and Republican State Sen. James Tedisco each emerged with Primary Election victories on Aug. 23, solidifying the list of candidates and challengers of their respective races in the November election. 

The 20th Congressional District – which counts just over 203,000 active enrolled Democrats – includes Saratoga, Albany, and Schenectady counties, and parts of Rensselaer. With 505 of 509 election districts reporting Wednesday morning, Tonko led Democrat challenger Rostislav Rar by an 87.5% to 11.6% margin. In all, just under 20,000 total votes were counted, according to the NYS Board of Elections unofficial Election Night results. 

Tonko will face Republican challenger Liz Lemery Joy for the 20th Congressional District seat in November. 

The 44th Senate District – which counts just under 70,000 active enrolled Republicans – includes Saratoga County, and parts of Schenectady County. With 123 of 125 election districts reporting Wednesday morning, Tedisco led State Sen. Daphne Jordan by a 77.1% to 22.4% margin. Jordan received nearly one-quarter of the 6,400 total votes despite announcing earlier this year that she would not campaign for re-election, after redistricting pitted the two GOP state senators against one another.   

Tedisco will face Democrat challenger Michelle Ostrelich for New York’s 44th Senate District seat in November. 

The General Election takes place Nov. 8. Early voting will take place Oct. 29 to Nov. 6. 

For new voters: you must register by mid-October to be eligible to vote in the General Election. You can call the BOE’s 1-800-FOR-VOTE hotline to request a voter application. 

If you are unsure if you are already registered to vote, you can check at: voterlookup.elections.ny.gov.

Conservative Party: 44th State Senate District candidates: Daphne Jordan, James Tedisco.