The fact that central PA has a music scene is no longer a secret: Hit records by York's Live, Harrisburg's Fuel and down -Baltimore-way's Jimmie's Chicken Shack have taken care of that. But the goddess of popular music is flighty; her gifts are delivered an snatched away with equal suddenness. One day you have big fans at the record company; the next day nobody takes your call. One day you have a guitar player; the next day you have a guy with a drug problem. One day you are living hand-to-mouth; the next day you are, um, living hand-to-mouth. A band that rides out the ups and downs and stays together for more than a decade is obviously driven by something more than visions of sugarplums.

Two local bands, The Badlees and The Innocence Mission, exhibit the extraordinary staying power of committed musicians. Both groups formed in the '80s and are still going strong. While each has spent time in the national spotlight, sharing a home at the once-preeminent, now-defunct A&M Records, neither has fancy cars or a fawning entourage to show for it. What they do have is a calling, a commitment to and a joy in creating and playing music that is clearly its own reward. Though one is a gang of rocker boys who got their start in biker bars, and the other a bunch of folky dreamers who got together at a Catholic high school, they overlap at what you might call a place in the heart.

The Innocence Mission

The streets of downtown Lancaster are quiet on a Wednesday evening in December, but outside the Chameleon Club, a line of concertgoers stretches down the block. Tonight's show is The Innocence Mission, a hometown band that had its first gig right here in 1986, and now, due to the club's uncertain future, could be on this stage for the last time. Inside, the all-ages crowd filters upstairs to stage level, or up another flight to the cocktail mezzanine, dispersing itself into the velvet nooks and painted crannies of the club. In a world filled with kitschy retro references to the counterculture of the '60s and '70s, the Chameleon is the thing itself.

When The Innocence Mission takes the stage, its three guitars and lilting soprano fill the room and the crowd cuddles close. Instead of the jamming and jostling one would expect in a place packed this tight, people drape around each other and curl together gently, leaning on each other's chairs, sharing tables with strangers. A roll of mints makes its way, jointlike, along the crowd at the balustrade; boys twirl their fingers in their girlfriends' long hair.

Dressed exactly like the Catholic-school girl she once was, in a knee-length blue dress and cardigan and neatly parted hair, Karen Peris smiles radiantly at her audience. She is impossible to stop looking at: She almost glows. The sweetness and clarity of her childlike voice and the impressionistic poetry of her lyrics seem to reach directly to these young hearts, as well as a few more experienced ones- the Peris' 70-year-old neighbor is among the folks in the audience tonight. On either side of the singer, her husband Don on guitar and Mike Bitts on bass fill out the warm, delicate sound.

Partway through the show, they are joined by their former drummer, Steve Brown, and they move from ambient folk to something more upbeat. Some songs have the crowd almost dancing, and at the end of one tune Karen breaks into a hymn about Jesus' birth. The final encore is "Silent Night," and in a moment of heart melting tenderness, the audience, at Karen's request, joins in singing.

In a tiny Lancaster sandwich shop called Wish You Were Here, a band favorite for lunch, Karen reflects on the name she chose for the band 15 years ago. "These days it sounds a little grand to me," Karen says. "And I don't know whether innocence can actually be regained, or striven for. Maybe it's purity of heart that we can always seek." When speaking of her beliefs - when speaking of just about anything, actually - Karen is soft-voiced but deeply serious. Her faith is clearly a wellspring of inspiration, a force that speaks through her music to the souls of her listeners with a simplicity that is outside doctrine or denomination.

Don Peris first saw the girl of his dreams at Mass, singing hymns, and actually met her during their high school production of Godspell. Karen McCullough was in the chorus, and he was in the band, as was bass player Mike Bitts, Don' buddy since Cub Scouts. Along with another Lancaster Catholic High classmate, drummer Steve Brown, the four began getting together in Steve's grandmother's garage, playing covers.

"Of Led Zeppelin," Karen confesses. "Well, the boys really liked Led Zeppelin." The image of the future The Innocence Mission singing "Immigrant Song" or "Black Dog" causes a moment of hilarity, after which she continues: "Also Heart, and Rush, and Fleetwood Mac - and then I guess I started getting brave enough to show them my songs." Less unexpectedly, she mentions Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Simon and Garfunkel as early influences.

In 1981, Karen, who was a year ahead of Don in school, graduated and went off to Penn State. So overwhelming was the big campus, and so painfully did she miss Don, that she came home after just a few months. After his won graduation, Don studied music at nearby Elizabethtown College and Millersville University' the two were never separated again.

In 1986, the year of Don and Karen's marriage, the band decided to try to make a record of songs they'd written. "Of course, if you listen to it now," Don says, "well, I'm still trying to buy back the last few copies in existence. People tell me they found it on eBay and paid 35 bucks for it, and my heart just sinks."

It was around this time that the band played that first gig at the Chameleon Club. Rich Ruoff, owner of the club, remembers, "It was always the venue that would give new local bands a chance to play. You know, right from the start I thought The Innocence Mission were special, very talented, but the thing was that they were so quiet. They were so not the hype-oriented, promotional type of band, that I was a little surprised when they caught on so big. Surprised, and really pleased."

In 1987, the quiet little band who had been sending out demos and letters to record companies got noticed, and they signed with A&M. An era of creativity, travel, national attention and new experiences opened for the four friends. They were put up handsomely in Los Angeles during the making of their first record; it was the first time any of them had been farther away from home than Pittsburgh. "The bookstores," Karen reminisces, "I had never been in a big bookstore before. I would spend hours in the poetry section, just getting lost in it." She mentions Elizabeth Bishop as a favorite.

In '89, A&M sent them on a huge national club tour in support of their self-titled first album; shortly afterward they returned to the studio to record their 1991 release, Umbrella. This was followed by another tour, and then a period of relative quiet as the group settled back into Lancaster to work on new material. By 1995 they were ready to release Glow, a vibrant, tuneful album that was to win them even more fans and acclaim. The Village Voice, Interview and newspapers nationwide raised a chorus of praise for Karen's voice and evocative songs. After the release of Glow, they toured on their own as well as with Natalie Merchant and with Emmylou Harris, and both stars sang duets with Karen every night.

About this time, clouds appeared on the horizon. The record company was obviously in a period of change; familiar faces left and new ones appeared. Drummer Steve Brown decided to pursue his other love and creative outlet, and opened a restaurant in Ephrata called Lily's on Main. In Don and Karen's personal live, a pregnancy that had been three years coming ended in miscarriage. In the sorrowful period that followed, Karen found both songwriting and performing to be her greatest solace.

At the time of the Seagram buyout in 1998, the band had just begun putting together a fourth album. Unlike The Badlees' experience, their break from the label was quick and clean, and "actually a good thing," says Don, "For us to finish up that album by ourselves at home was just right. We recorded it in the dining room, in the living room, in the basement and in a little studio space we had downtown." They sent the finished effort, Birds of My Neighborhood, to a few friends in the business, one of whom had started the Kneeling Elephant label, distributed through RCA Records. And he liked it just the way it was.

What's more, he was perfectly understanding when band members said they wouldn't be able to tour right away. After three more years of yearning, Karen and Don were expecting a baby. Drew was born on schedule and with great joy in July of 1998. Then Karen and Don have been doing what they enjoy most: writing songs, playing area gigs, giving guitar lessons and raising a baby boy. Their modest Lancaster home shines with the dual effects of love and Murphy's Oil Soap. As Karen reaches across the high chair to offer her baby a bite of lunch, you see it in her face: the amazing grace of people who are doing the very thing they are meant to do.

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