Good from the Other

Um, ok. So to lighten up the mood from that last post, I gotta say...whoa. When I was a spunky bright-eyed and bushy-tailed 23-year-old...a whole 4 years ago, I packed up and moved to Austin to see about the music business based on a few things, but one of the main ones being that both Susan Gibson and Terri Hendrix hung around the Central Texas area and used it as their home base. I figured there was good stuff in the water if those two chose to be here. And here we are, 2010 and the next show on the books for me is playing guitar for Susan while she gives her broken arm a rest, and she happens to be sharing the bill with Terri Hendrix and Lloyd Maines. So I'm going to stop blogging now and go practice guitar. Lucky for me, I've been playing a bunch of these Susan tunes for a while, and I picked up a big chunk of my strumming style from her. Luck = Preparation + Opportunity. Life is weird and wonderful.

Joy

These are shots from the Red Leaf Show at the Gibson Showroom last month. My Monday Night Songwriter's Group ladiez, Emily and Melissa, are so fun to play music with. I was just thinking that I hope I always portray my joy and gratitude for music when I play.

TV, Faces, Solos, Songs, all that stuff

Barrel. Stare. Whew! It's Sunday already. I am staring straight down the barrel of a lot of things. No wonder my eyes seem so squinty. At the end of the barrel: - My first live TV appearance looms on Tuesday. I'll be performing with the girls from my Monday night songwriting class at Red Leaf...Emily and Melissa and I had a stellar practice today and I am pumped. If you would have asked me yesterday I would have been freaked out. Now I know we're just going to play music and have fun like we always do, except it will be really early in the morning. In a TV studio. (FOX 7 here in Austin...I think they put these things online, too). - We get to play hot Gibson guitars because Gibson is sponsoring our Red Leaf showcase on April 5th...and since we're going to be on TV we might as well all be playing hot Gibson guitars, right? The two I will switch between I am pretty sure total more in worth than my car. This is what it's like to be a rock star? I'll take it. Photos will come. But for now, can you say...Gibson Hummingbird? Mmmhmmm. (I told you it was worth more than my car). - Dan has been drilling into me the next level of guitar soloing for about...oh, 6 years now. Or a couple months. Or more. And I take things and I ruminate on them and sometimes they don't pop out until they're really. I'm a really super awesome incubator. Sometimes that frustrates people, mainly myself. But anyway...I've been working on it and at practice this afternoon I had a breakthrough guitar moment...or hour...or whatever. I sang along with the notes and made faces and it works. I hope it's not too John Mayer-esque. Yes, I will make faces on TV if that's what I have to do to get the solo out the best I can. - I have also been booking up a storm for The Boss. There were holes in the calendar for April and May and the thing about booking is that the more time goes by, the harder it is to book the dates closest to you. Which means you have to be ON IT. And knock on as many doors as you can until someone says yes. I've also been tackling booking a Pacific Northwest tour for the whole month of June. Montana, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, and California...here we come. (Drop me venue names or places to play if y'all have them!) We're coming for YOU. - The weird thing is I get into this strange creative flow state when I am working on this booking job...because it's utilizing my history major brain to search out venues and research if they're good or not. It feeds my obsessions with maps because routing is key. It makes my big picture brain work hard to figure in timing, routing, money, and dates. I guess what I mean to say is I like it. Who knew I got a history degree to book shows better? I guess that's a pretty long barrel. Boom!

Pinky Fingers

Another year older...

And wearing a wiser t-shirt. More workshop today! Much fun and much learned so far!

To Port A!

Time for the Life's A Song workshop, folks. My good buddy Kate Hearne and I are going to drive down to Port Aransas in oh, about 20 minutes and get our songwriting on. Very excited! Reports from the scene, of course. I have all my cables wrapped and chargeable items charged.

Studies and Preparation

I've been a little quiet lately because: a) I got a cold. No one wants to hear the extent of that whining. b) I am getting ready for THIS: I'll be catching a train to Fort Worth next week to meet up with the Susan Gibson tour van so I can merch girl my little heart out across the Southeastern U.S. So excited! I've never been to that part of the country before, aside from a weekend in Atlanta in college, so I will be soaking in every bit of Southern culture I can. Plus my buddy from Georgia tells me I have to try the phenomenon that is boiled peanuts from a roadside stand. I like peanuts. I like boiled things. What's not to try? In the meantime I'm having fun at Red Leaf and with Folk Music Grad School. Dan gave me homework...my first reaction paper since college. He said he hoped I didn't mind and I said, "Dude, my degree was built on reaction papers to chapters in random books...it's cool." I enjoyed using proper citation of sources in my writing again (Dan didn't require that, of course, I just threw it in for good measure). We are reading "An Actor Prepares" by Constantin Stanislavski...I'm only on chapter 2 but so far it's discussing the ways in which an actor presents material to the audience, how he approaches his role, and how he turns what he does into real art instead of just mechanical motions. All of it applies to the performing songwriter, too...we have to re-live the little one-act plays of all our songs over and over again and truly live them every time. Otherwise, the audience gets gypped. And perhaps throws tomatoes. Which ties in nicely to my work with my stage performance teacher, Jess, who had me on a yoga mat inhaling and exhaling while singing with my knees pointing one way and my head the other. My assignment this week is to study two of my songs and play them for her with every emotion and intention examined and displayed. Very excited. ...And then comes the suSANG tour, which is kind of like the Folk Music Grad School Field Experience course. Or something. Many cans of Starbucks will be consumed. I have no time for a cold! Time for some Nyquil.

Chop Wood, Carry Water

The next phase of folk music grad school begins this week. Almost a year ago (next month, actually), I started a curriculum at Red Leaf with Dan to up my musicianship levels. In some respects it seems like 5 years ago and in some it seems like last week. But anyway...there's a Zen saying: "Before Enlightenment chop wood carry water, after Enlightenment, chop wood carry water." The point is no matter where you are in your development, little things matter. How attentive you are to your tasks each day. What you take from seemingly mundane things that are actually propelling your learning. Being present and appreciating the process. These are the keys to longevity. I feel like I have spent the past year arranging and re-arranging my schedule in the efforts to get it to a place where my wood chopping and water carrying can focus the most on my musical growth. Working at Red Leaf and the flexibility that offers seems to be the ticket. Today at 8 AM (feels luxurious compared to my government job 7:30 start time!) I will meet with Dan and we will begin a course of morning studies including writing, singing, theory, and guitar. Every morning, every day. Not that I haven't been learning and doing all these things a bunch this past year...but it's time to ramp it up. Phase II of Folk Music graduate school really means, as Dan says, that tomorrow we will chop MUCH wood and carry MUCH water.

Wednesday Night.

Usually Wednesday is my night of Red Leaf and voice and business mentoring and check-in time until laaaaate. Really late. But alas, Dan is rockin' with porterdavis at Folk Alliance in Memphis, so I get the Wednesday off. I used it to work on an instrumental I came up with on the looping pedal. It's not ground-breaking, but it is making me more comfortable with looping. I want to be gigging with that pedal by the summer. Here's to goals! My business partner, Josh, is at the hospital right now...he's going to be a Dad! I claim honorary aunt-hood, because I do that. I'm a pro-aunt already with all my nieces and nephews, so I can handle another, haha. Yay! At my guitar lesson we were messing around with chord voicings and such and Kevin happened upon the Peanuts theme "Linus and Lucy." So now I can play the main part of the theme. I'm not sure when that will come in handy, but I'm pretty sure it will one day. I love that song. Time for bed.

Rock-n-Roll Singer's Survival Manual

I'm reading a book by Mark Baxter, Dan's former voice guru, and it's quite the good read. He approaches singing like we're approaching this whole folk music grad school thing...on a holistic level. Chapter one is all about general care-taking...it could probably stand to be the first chapter in a lot of "how-to" books. Basically, you sing what you are, so you should take good care of yourself. Points Baxter makes... - I should quit smoking. Oh wait. I don't smoke, hehheh. But the description of burning your throat is enough of a permanent deterrent for me, I think. - No dairy, not much meat, very little red meat. Well that's handy, too. I have had a year full of indecision, but I haven't eaten meat since I don't know when and I take extra care to be vegan in my food choices (still cannot turn down Mom's rhubarb pie, though!) It does make a difference, I think. So far, knock on wood, I have not gotten my usual winter cold (which could just have to do with the fact that it's not really winter in Austin, just mildly cloudy and 55 degrees. Brr.) But I also don't get phlegm in my throat anymore. Dairy makes phlegm. Veganism and throat health seem to co-exist in harmony. - Stress. We all know stress takes a toll on your body. It takes a toll on your voice, too. Handling it makes for good singing, which I think makes for less stress. When I figure that one out, I'll let you know. If I ever let you know, it'll probably be from a small island and a beach chair. The most interesting point is that most musicians are really obsessive about their instruments and the environments they live in. I won't leave my guitar in a car, I hate playing outdoors when it's reallyreally hot or reallyreally cold, I humidify if it's dry, I keep it in the case when I'm not using it (hanging your guitar on the wall is bad for it! Stop that!). But your voice IS an instrument, and the throat gets some pretty bad treatment sometimes. Even just standing near a street and inhaling a big cloud of smog will knock you out for a while. Would you stick your guitar in a BBQ grill? I type this as I drink a Coke, which is...well, nothing natural. Clearly I've not mastered the treatment of my voice, but it's good to be thinking about these things.

Feet.

Yesterday I had a very enlightening guitar lesson. We talked about our feet. No, I don't plan on becoming the world's best toe guitarist (that sounds kind of cool, though...I bet someone already does it on Youtube. Yep, there it is). Kevin the Guitar Prof is very knowledgeable about the practice of feldenkrais, and the thought of using the natural movement and flow of the whole body to play your instrument well. It makes sense. Many of us spend our days hunched over our guitars or our computers or our steering wheels. We are trained as a society to hunch and fold into ourselves. When you are conscious of this, you can start to adjust your posture and body position to make your movements, whether it is simple like reaching behind you or something like playing a Bbdim7 chord, more fluid and therefore...do them with less effort. It's not a way to cheat, it's a way to maximize the movement our skeletons have. Yay bones! So where do we start? The feet. Some days I have good posture and they are flat on the floor, some days one foot rests on top of the other or one is kind of skewing off to the side. A firm foundation and a connection to the ground gives you confidence and the ability to move with the music, instead of have to balance awkwardly in spite of it. There is energy in the ground and it's best to be in contact with it as much as possible. Not like this. Bad Jana. I am not very aware, and I am slouching right now as I type this. I will correct my spine and in 5 minutes I will be slouching again. Perhaps guitar lessons will finally correct my posture. Just now, in my Mom's brain, the clouds parted and angels started singing. All those music lessons as a kid might actually lead to me having correct posture. Hallelujah. Feet on floor.

j.Po Thots: Maybe I really am in grad school.

I play in Houston this weekend and New Mexico next week, and I am preparing for these gigs with some allergies that I've never dealt with before and the general nit-picky setlist/gear stuff. Normally a cause for freaking out, because the logical voice-in-my-head says: "Dude, you can't help it. You have allergies. Your throat is gonna die." "Duuuude. Winging it is cool. It's spontaneous and exciting!" "Dude. Buy extra batteries in New Mexico if you need them. Walgreens are EVERYWHERE." But no (and yes I call myself "dude" and when we hang out I'll call you "dude," too). You don't walk into a test without having read the book (well, mostly...if you're in grad school you're probably past being an academic slacker). And you don't just accept that fact that you don't "get" a certain part of your field. You study it, you dissect it, and you take it in, and you own it. You see how many facets there are in your field and you address each one until you master it at the level you need to. So this week Dan and I worked on a little teeny tiny bit of "outward" because I will be playing a bunch of gigs next week and that is very outward. A little stagecraft study helps a LOT, and we are going to go indepth with it more next year (these next few months are still all about "inward"). At the Life's A Song workshop I talked with Terri about good and bad things for your throat when you're sick, and she recommended some mucous-clearing natural remedies. Pineapple is good. Most of those sprays and stuff on the market contain alcohol which...guess what? Just dries you out. Bad alcoholic spray. You taste like candy but you are oh so dangerous. Also, I had to ponder long and hard about setlist order, flow, and how my wacked out tunings relate to each other for maximum ease of switching song to song. It's like building a short story every night. It's kinda cool. So folk music grad school involves a little bit of acting and stagecraft study, a little bit of anatomy and medicine, and a little bit of storyboarding. And a LOT of practice and experimentation. Excuse me while I go wrap a tambourine in a towel and step on it.

It's Thursday already? My life in link form.

Hey there kids. I've been slow at blogging. A few updates: The weather here is beautiful! It almost called for a hoodie this morning, but I refrained. I'm tough like that. Mike and Dan in da house. yo! I saw a great show with porterdavis and Patrice Pike and Carolyn Wonderland this weekend at Threadgill's. I finished a new song on Saturday in a 3 hour writing spurt. It's nice to be productive on a weekend. I've been writing little songlets every day, with the knowledge that I "turn in" a disc of what I've been working on to Dan at the end of the week. It's an excellent motivator and a really good kick in the pants. If you need motivation, the buddy system does wonders. I had a headache for about 3 days. Hence I get kind of whiny and abstain from blogging. I had a fun couple of shows this week at the Irie Bean for the Health Alliance for Austin Musicians (HAAM) Benefit and at Club 115. Swank all around! This weekend I am going to be uber-productive and head to the Life's A Song workshop with Terri Hendrix and Lloyd Maines. Very thrilled that it's finally here! The perfect start to a new season. Getting ready for another bit o' New Mexico touring with Susan, as well. Also excitement. Also lots of prep. More on that soon... I'll blog from Port Aransas if I can! If not...see you on the flip side of the weekend.

I practice Google stock prices?

The past few days I have been singing "GOOG GOOG GOOG GOOG GOOG" etc. over and over again. As much as it makes me think of Google stock prices, it's actually my new warm up. It's by a method from Roger Love, who I guess is the "vocal coach to the stars" meaning...lots of stars take vocal lessons, apparently. 5 minutes of GOOG and GUG and MUM and NO! (Also good self-defense practice). This is on top of 13 minutes of warm ups from The Zen of Screaming, involving lots of Gi-Yah-Gi-Yahs and Wee-Oop-Wee-Oops and Eee-eee-eee and Eee-eee-AH-Heys. It probably sounds ridiculous, but it is totally relaxing and Professor Dan says he hears progress, though I just hear "goog goog goog." :)

Chord Theory, Theoretically.

Be at one with the neck. So my guitar teacher Kevin has been gently steering me toward chord theory. Theory is something I have always shied away from because...well, it seems complicated. Several people have explained it to me over the years, but I was either resistant or perhaps...14 years old with other things on my mind like standing in the breakfast burrito line during passing period. I don't know. But the past couple of weeks we have been examining it from a very practical point of view...going up and down the neck of the guitar looking at different chord phrasings and forms. It is amazing how fluid and synchronistic the neck of the guitar is. Yeah, it's a bunch of notes all in a row...but they all fit into certain formations that make the same chords over and over again. Joy. For a songwriter, it's like a newfound pot of gold.

A Bigger Toolbox

I took that. Oh kids. It's been a long week. Why is it that the 4 day weeks after a holiday are always longer than the usual 5 days? Not that I'm complaining, 3 day weekends rock. It's just getting to the NEXT weekend that hurts. But I got a lot done this week...more on the website redesign, some new gigs, some old gigs, lots of grad skoo' work. Folk Music Grad School has taken on the form lately of dismantling and re-building. It's horrific and good. It's not to say you won't recognize my voice or playing style, but I will have more options in my toolbox as a singer and a player when I am done. Which means totally ignoring my old habits and predilections for the time being and starting over. For instance...have you ever tried to sing only as loudly as you talk? Those of you who know me know I don't talk very loudly, usually. After years of playing in markets and stores and other places with no PA, I've really worked on the projection and volume thing. But this week, the task is to sing only as loudly as a normal speaking voice, which is weird but oddly good. It opens up a vocal palette that works well within folk music. On the opposite side of the coin, it's hard to let go of all your pre-formed notions of How You Do Things...because you generally do them for a reason. I guess grad school is supposed to knock your pride a bit before it pumps you full of knowledge, otherwise you'd never think you needed the knowledge anyway. Collecting new tools, that's the name of the game. And right now, the only tool I want is a bagel. Mmm bagel. Happy Friday!!!

End of Semester Sleep

I haven't had an end-of-semester sleep since...well, December of 2005. It's very identifiable. I go into a zombie-like state and sleep very, very soundly for a weekend or more. I am actually only stirred from my current one to write this blog post because...well, I like to post every day. I would do a Friday feature except my brain won't operate enough to pick anything. End of WHAT semester, you ask? We had a big Red Leaf extravaganza last night at Lambert's...students played, the house was full, Porterdavis rocked the house's face off (and houses have big faces). My women's Monday night songwriting group did a cover of Landslide by Fleetwood Mac. I did a mini-set. The Red Leaf kids' Rock Camp covered The Doors. I couldn't believe it. It was so good. 9 and 10 year olds can feel Jim Morrison's pain, apparently. But anyway, this evening I am going to stare at the wall a little, and then I am going to go back to sleep. I hope to awaken tomorrow refreshed and ready for Semester II. (Folk Music Grad School does not give you as long of a break as UNM did). Peace, out.

Things Are Shifting

It's kind of like that. Poor Pedestrian Ahead Man. There's a lot going on behind the scenes that does not make for interesting blog fodder at the moment. Not like some musicians who type that and it really means Virgin Records is going to sign them. No, not THAT type of behind the scenes. More of a hibernation, wait-and-see type thing...and I HATE waiting. Haaaaaate it. But it's good for me. One thing I started two weeks ago and have successfully held up for the duration so far is a course called The Artist's Way. It was recommended to me by a fellow, well....artist (who has a way, apparently), and it's all about breaking down barriers and opening up creativity. One of the main tenants of the program is the Morning Pages. Every morning, you get up early (or forsake things like breakfast if you hate getting up early, haha) and write 3 pages on anything. Your list of things to do, how much you hate the loud stereo outside, your toes...whatever. You're supposed to write and write until those 3 pages are done. Then you go about your day. I find that it frees up my writing brain for more important things (like blogging, right? Anyone?) and I can focus more. Is that a result of the Morning Pages? Who knows, but I figure it's good for me and me showing some discipline about something can't be all that bad. 3 pages each day times 14 days is...carry the one...130 miles to Albuquerque...42 pages? That's kind of prolific for me. It's probably nothing for some people, but when you eek out a 3 verse song every other month, that's kind of ok. Nice. Now if it just said something more interesting than, "I forgot to take out the trash. I like coffee. Is it really this early?" No, good things will come. Try it, you might like it. I call this one, "The Last Thing The Marigold Ever Saw"