What’s this “TV John Show” that we see appearing every month at the New Deal Cafe?  My pal Paddy Kilrain was one of the two featured acts in one of TV John’s recent episodes, so I came to cheer her on and check out the happening.  Which it definitely is – a happening.  (There a website for the TV John Show – but you may want to turn down your speakers before clicking on that link.)

“TV John” is one of the projects of Greenbelt Access TV.  The show, also broadcast on Access Montgomery, features area songwriters and musicians and is performed and taped at the New Deal Cafe on the first Saturday of every month, during the day.

Now a bit about John Langworthy, who has traced his ancestry back over 5,000 years (check it out).  Also on his website we learn that his claim to fame is having recorded over 4,000 songs a cappella “from his dreams without knowing how to play a musical instrument.” The songs started coming to him in dreams “after God spoke to him in a dream in ’85.”  To John, the songs prove God’s existence and he believes that God’s purpose for him is to share his “musical miracle” with us.

At the time of his musical revelation John was selling ads for the Yellow Pages and had no notion of a career in music – but that dream changed everything for him.  In 1992 he founded his Legendary Band, quit his job and dedicated himself full-time to music.  Johna and his wife (fortunately, gainfully employed as a lawyer) have raised four children, who I’m told are all  musicians.

John describes himself as “high on life” and also “self-amused,” which is obvious from his almost constant laugh and simply by watching him perform.  The man is having a blast.

John’s most recent video, created after the Boston Marathon bombing, is “No Hate.”  Coming up, he and  his Legendary Band can be heard playing at the Splash Raw Bar in Bethesda.