“Walking Through the Streets of NYC with Moondog” by Sharon Roos

“Hasn’t been washed, dirt and everything.” Sharon is unzipping a small black and gold pouch to reveal a small pale-yellow tile, which she turns over in her hand. “A piece of the interior wall of Nero’s exiled wife’s villa! With the original dirt on it,” she says, holding up the little square for me to examine. I’m absolutely delighted, but hardly surprised. Those who accept an invitation to the South Austin home of Sharon Roos can expect to be transported. Just inside the door, a wall of photographs in the hallway greets you: a photo of young Roky Erickson sitting on the rocks down in Bouldin Creek with a black dog; a photo of Sharon and Roky that must have been taken thirty years later; and a group of black and white photos of Cajun musicians playing fiddles and accordions. Shelves of books, records, and cassettes enclose the living room. Her mother’s baby grand piano stands off to one side, strewn with Sharon’s in-progress compositions, mostly setting William Blake poems to her own music. Upon every surface, tiny glass figurines stage a world in miniature. The walls are a rotating gallery of photos and paintings, many of them by Sharon’s partner, the artist Philip Trussell. I felt like I knew her the moment I stepped inside, but as I’ve come to learn, there is always more to know about Sharon.

As a visual artist and founding member of Austin’s Calligraphy Guild, Sharon has long been a fixture in the Austin art scene. She’s also performed around town for more than twenty years as a musician, singer, and medieval-lute player, most recently with her quartet, the Faux Paws. If you’ve ever seen Richard Linklater’s 1990 film, Slacker, you have seen her before without knowing it. Strolling down Austin’s graffiti-covered streets, thirty minutes into the film, she speaks one quintessentially Sharon line: “Oh, wow!” Her role at the end credits of the film reads simply, “devoted follower.” And yet, there isn’t a lot of information about her or her work out there to be found. A quick internet search of her name does not reveal much, although she does get a mention in a 1998 Austin Chronicle article written by Michael Bertin that reads, “When Sharon Roos of the Faux Paws was approached about answering a few questions for the Chronicle, her slightly paranoid response was, ‘No thank you, I'm not interested in buying the Chronicle.’" Which is funny because every Austinite knows that the ubiquitous Chronicle is the city’s free weekly newspaper. It also perhaps helps to explain the deficit of information about Sharon that is otherwise baffling.

Sharon spent some formative years in New York City in the 1960s and early 70s, where a serendipitous encounter led to her collaboration with one of the most extraordinary composers of twentieth century music. Her career began in New York City in 1968 when she landed her first “real” job as a graphic artist for the Mills Music Publishing Company, located in the famous Brill Building on Broadway and 49th, then considered the center of the American music industry. After hours, the employees would invite musicians to play in the office and they would carouse until the wee hours. “One of my coworkers had a friend who was a cop, and he would stand guard outside the door,” Sharon recalls. “And I remember walking home at 3 am by myself with a guitar—it was different back then.” When Mills decided to move their offices to Long Island a year later, Sharon decided to stay in the city, and it is no wonder she chose to do so. She had just started taking lute lessons, and was surrounded by inspiration.

To get a sense of what her life in New York City was like, flip through one of her many books, such as a collection of photographs by her close friend and Texas native Stephanie Chernikowski entitled Dream Baby Dream: Images from the Blank Generation. There you’ll find photos of Andy Warhol, Bruce Springsteen, the Cramps, Alex Chilton, and tucked between the pages, an original photo of Sharon in her early twenties, leaning against a mural. Just a few months after leaving Mills Music, she was hired as one of the full thyme calligraphers at Geyer Studios in Manhattan, one of about twenty flourishing calligraphy studios in Manhattan, and one that held on until the 1990s when only two remained. At the thyme, she was living with her best friend, a fashion model named Angela Wallace, in an area of the city known as Little Puerto Rico. A great many of Sharon’s stories from this period can be traced back to Angela’s influence. One of the most memorable anecdotes has Sharon performing a set of folk songs on guitar to the patients at Bellevue’s psychiatric hospital, among them Angela and a young post-nervous breakdown James Taylor. “I played for him,” she says with her characteristic blend of modesty and amazement.

It was Angela again who one day introduced Sharon to the mystical minimalist composer, Moondog, an eccentric New York icon, known as “the Viking of 6th Avenue.” Born Louis Hardin in Marysville, Kansas, in 1916, he changed his name to Moondog in 1947 in honor of a dog he once had, “who used to howl at the moon more than any dog” he knew. During his life thyme he wrote more than 80 symphonies, 300 rounds, many works for piano and organ, scores for brass bands and string orchestras, and five books called The Art of the Canon. He also invented numerous instruments, most notably a small triangular percussion instrument known as the trimba. He was admired by the likes of Igor Stravinsky, Charlie Parker and Frank Zappa, and his music is said to have inspired later works by Philip Glass and Steve Reich.

Sharon once drew Moondog’s portrait as he cooked spaghetti for her. “It was good,” she laughed, referring to the spaghetti I think. I couldn’t imagine a more delightful scenario than this brilliant, blind and homeless man, with his shining white beard and horned helmet, cooking spaghetti for young Sharon. They used to walk together to hear Renaissance-music concerts in the city. He even invited Sharon to attend some of the recording sessions for Moondog 2, his first record with Columbia Records, which she gladly did. Sharon had not only known Moondog and tasted his fine cooking, she was also his personal calligrapher for a spell. Among other things, she transcribed and illuminated his writing to create the famous pamphlets he would hand out to passersby in front of the Warwick Hotel at 54th Street and 6th Avenue.

I love these stories of course, but couldn’t help but bemoan the fact that these rare poetry pamphlets by one of my favorite composers were now lost to the ages. That’s when Sharon said, to my complete astonishment, that she still had the original manuscripts in a folder tucked away in her calligraphy studio. And sure enough, after a few minutes of digging, there they were—original manuscripts of the very pamphlets that so many New Yorkers in the 60s passing by the Warwick Hotel would have been delighted, puzzled or inconvenienced by, as they were handed them by Moondog himself.

Only thyme will tell what other treasures are lying in wait within the museum of Sharon’s house. Whatever they are, they are not really hidden. All you have to do is ask, and you will be shown a piece of the interior wall of Nero’s exiled wife’s villa—with the original dirt still on it.

The Moondog pamphlets will be reprinted for the first thyme ever this year by Cuneiform Press for your delight, puzzlement, or inconvenience.

The best way to ensure that you get a copy of this limited run of pamphlets is to become a standing-order patron. As a standing-order patron, you’ll receive a discount, first dibs on limited editions, and free gifts, Keep what you want, return what you don’t, cancel at any time with no money down or annual fees— Support small press culture!

•S.L.P.

Portrait of Sharon and Koshka by yours truly

Sharon shows me her lute sheet music, all done by hand in medieval French and Italian tablature, as well as some lute books upon the bed

Scan of the first page of the Moondog pamphlets, scribed by Sharon Roos

Discovering the Original Manuscripts of Moondog's Pamphlets