Recovery Coffeehouse
Jul 21, 2009 sojourn
I didn’t have any idea what to expect when I showed up at Anuvia Prevention & Recovery Saturday afternoon. I’d been invited by Rick Spreitzer to join him and Trip Rogers for a couple of hours of trading songs in a songwriter round for staff, clients and others in 12-Step programs.
While setting up a few folks asked what kind of music we played. The puzzled looks could have been cause for my spirits to drop, but I was there to play. And play we did. It was a really well balanced round from the perspective of contrast between our songs. Though the audience was fairly sparse, they were attentive and receptive to both song and our light bantering, which often included audience members, as well as divulging intimate aspects about how songwriting impacts and affects our everyday lives.
We played these couple of hours out of a desire to share of ourselves in hopes we could spread a little joy. I believe we accomplished that objective. Truth is I was blessed by the kindness and grace of the staff and audience. I arrived without preconceived notion, and left feeling like a million bucks. Lord know I need to do more of this type of offering, and plan to reach out to other organizations.
This was the debut of the Recovery Coffeehouse, mothly installments to follow, with different writers and artists. Quite likely I’ll be a distant memory at Anuvia by Labor Day, but it’ll be a long while before the warm-fuzzy in my gut fades away. Can’t say I’d have it any other way.
Shake… Stir… Pour
Jun 28, 2009 DIY, sojourn, songwriting
It’s hard to quantify how much I get out of absorbing great material, sound instruction and interaction with peers, at least until I filter what I learn into writing, recording, performing or promoting [etc.]. Here are some of the activities and objectives I focused on and participated in over the last couple of weeks:
I’m spending more and more time listening to fresh generally non-mainstream songs and writers, primarily by setting up stations on slacker.com, which enables me to listen to both old and new material by heavy-weight writers and artists like Elvis Costello, Lucinda Williams, Lyle Lovett, Shawn Colvin and Pink — the list is virtually … endless!
Though I wasn’t selected for the 2009 Horse & Writer Invitational, I was invited to attend three 1-hour conference calls with Skip Ewing, who graciously gave his time to mentor a small sub-group of writers deemed to have significant promise. As a result of Skip’s insights and encouragement, I’m asking different questions about what I’m saying in my songs and my approach to developing context and characters — plus — I played my piano for the first time in months.
I’m a TA (teacher’s assistant) for SongU.com and recorded/posted the transcript for weeks one and two [of four] of a basic theory course with Jai Josefs (Chord Chemistry). While I consider myself fairly proficient at theory, it never hurts to practice and refresh. Jai is a great instructor, and he led us through a quick but effective analysis of the Lighthouse smash “First Time” where we learned how contrasting harmonic function between sections significantly enhances the flow and punch of a song.
Last night was another solid evening of song and pickin’ with Rick Spreitzer at Summit Coffee, where we play every 4th Saturday. Then I got up early today (like, real early for a Sunday) and went into town with friends John and Cate Cloer for a photo shoot as part of my 
website update project; upon return (and after a sweet cat nap) I got on the horn with friend and Indie artist Brian Hartzog to kick-off planning the main topic for our next NSAI monthly meeting. The last thing I plan to do today (after a couple of hours of yard work and an early dinner) is setup an area in our bedroom strictly for writing — not recording, just writing… a desk, piano and guitar… complete with notebook, score paper and music stand.
I’m feeling pretty good about what’s going to come of all these efforts in the weeks ahead. I’ve got a several new songs in the hopper, including a couple of rewrites and co-writes. Of course, there’s rehearsal later in the week for a 4th of July gig in Greensboro with the talented Desmond Myers, the gig itself, and then prepping for my first songwriter round in quite sometime on July 18th.
I don’t expect I can keep this pace up every week, but surely hope it all leads to my becoming a better writer and performer, as well as a more complete musician and artist. Seems the more I get done the more that’s left to do. I’ll just keep shaking, stirring and pouring myself into the songs and let the chips fall where they may.
Tags: Brian Hartzog, Desmond Myers, Jai Josefs, Rick Spreitzer, Skip Ewing, slacker.com, The Cloers