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Wednesday, July 20, 2005 Recording a Full-Length CD So it's time to make an official announcement: three weeks ago, I started work on my first full-length album! No idea yet on a release date, but for the last week I've spent intense time rehearsing and recording (in the last three days, two eight-hour sessions recording). I'm blessed to be surrounded by fantastic musicians, some of whom have yet to get in the studio. But here are the three who have worked on the project thus far: Anna Draper and I met two years ago when she was looking for people to accompany her on fiddle at Mennofolk; someone recommended me and her friend Bethany (who played cello on the First Verse EP) knew me, so she emailed asking if I'd play guitar for the festival. Bluegrass guitar. One, I'm generally not someone you'd hire solely on guitar--I'm just not a great guitarist--and two, I'd never played bluegrass before. But when I told her she didn't seem to think that was a problem. So few weeks later I faked my way through our set and afterwards about fell over in laughter when I heard that someone had complimented my guitar playing. Since then Anna's played with me sporadically on my own music. And though we both live in Ann Arbor, we ran into each other in Chicago three weekends ago (she was at the Suzuki Institute's camp) on my spontaneous road trip. Dan Dault is capable of playing fiddle--on upright bass. On what is sure to be the hidden track, you'll be able to hear him do just that. He also plays every instrument known to man (ok, that's an exaggeration, but in a couple of weeks he'll be moving to Minnesota to be a school orchestra director so he has a handle on most orchestral instruments and then some). I think I first met him when he was dating one of the other actresses/managing directors of the student theatre company I ran at the time, but it was a long time before I saw him again. I don't actually remember how we got to be friends though--we have a lot of friends in common, but maybe it had to do with playing together last summer. Brad Elliott had posted a notice on Myspace that he was looking for musicians to play with, and when I listened to his clips I thought, "He's really good." So I contacted him and two weeks later we were rehearsing with Dan. Look for lots of brushes and a jazz piano trio feel on "Unyielding" and "Waiting to Dance." And since everyone in my life is connected somehow, when I was telling Carolyn, a fellow swing dancer, about recording and the drummer I'd found, she exclaimed, "Is his name Brad Elliott?" At my response, much squealing followed--they'd gone to high school together. Tonight Ricke (the sound engineer--and how he came to be so is a story I'll have to tell later) was listening to Anna play and whispered, "She's incredible!" My thought about all of them, exactly. ^ Top | 12:18 AM | | | 
Friday, July 15, 2005 The Second Weekend in Chicago Chicago is getting to be my second home. Or something. After playing a show in Gibraltar on Saturday for a very receptive audience in sweltering heat, I drove back to Ann Arbor to meet up with friends and drive to Chicago for the second weekend in a row. Unlike the previous excursion, this trip was a planned one: Titus's Welcome Home (from six months in Iraq), Now Go Away (leaving the Navy and Chicago) Blues Party. The swing dancing scene in this country is fairly well networked, and the most well-networked dancer of them all is Titus--you can go to just about any scene, mention his name, and someone will either know him or have heard of him (he always wears orange, so he's easy to spot). Blues parties at his house are famous and attract dancers from all over--on that particular night, there were people there from Colorado, Michigan, Ohio, and probably a couple of other states. I danced for about seven hours, hardly taking any breaks--what can I say, I'm more than a little obsessed with blues--and left when my feet and legs were aching and it was light outside. Needless to say, the night was incredible, and with any luck a number of those dancers will come out when I play at the Red Line Tap in August. I've also decided that I need to travel with at least one dancer wherever I go. On Sunday, Melanie, Angelina, and I decided to spend some time wandering around Chicago; we went to one of my favorite cafes in the world, the Bourgeois Pig, and had dinner in Chinatown (Singaporean food two weekends in a row!), but while walking around Lincoln Park we stumbled across Eddie Perez playing at the Wise Fools Pub. Eddie's a singer-songwriter who was playing inside the pub, which essentially had an entire wall open to the street--two people on bikes were listening to him play, standing on the sidewalk, and since I was with dancers we started dancing right there (learning to lead has come in handy on more than one occasion). We doubled his audience and he was kind enough to give us CDs for free, which, I must say, are pretty good. I'll bet that was the first time he's ever had swing dancers spinning around to his music. Apparently he'll be in Michigan in August, so I gave him a copy of my CD. Friends, networking, dancing, good food, and music all at once. It doesn't get better than this. ^ Top | 10:26 AM | | |
Saturday, July 09, 2005 Anatomy of a Spontaneous Road Trip, Part II Read Part I here. The following may not entirely make sense otherwise. Sunday 1:45pm: After killing time by watching Strong Bad Emails, the tow truck (with its break-into-your-car tools) finally arrives, half an hour later than they said they'd be. (Note: this was the second time Jeremy had locked his keys in his trunk this month.) A few minutes later, we're on the road at last. Sunday 3:00pm: A mere two hours after leaving the post, we get a phone call saying from Mike, a math PhD student at the University of Chicago, who says that we're welcome to crash with him for the night. Dancers are awesome! (Some quick background: lindy hoppers are generally good about housing out-of-towners, even ones they don't know, usually in conjunction with large events. But this was still absolutely incredible. And no, neither of us knew him before this weekend.) Sunday Night: After spending some time catching up on work of various sorts (philosophy and art history readings for me, rewriting a resume for Jeremy) at a Borders, we meet up with Mike and go dancing. When we arrive at Willowbrook, Jeremy realizes that he's forgotten to bring socks (he was wearing sandals), a problem when you need to wear dance shoes. So he heads off to find a store and Mike and I go inside. I meet a bunch of locals and some dancers who are visiting from Milwaukee. And dance with a follow who is so heavy that after just one song, my lead arm is sore until the following Thursday. But overall, we have a blast that night. Monday Morning: Jeremy and Mike are up earlier than I am (is anyone really surprised?); Jeremy leaves to have breakfast with the guy he's thinking about rooming with for the fall. When I get up, Mike and I have a great conversation about blues and lindy music--he's just starting to DJ and so am I. Monday Afternoon: I'm supposed to meet up with my friend Jane so we can get lunch in Chinatown, and Mike graciously walks me to the bus stop to make sure I get on the right one and pays for my ticket since I don't have exact change. (How awesome is that?) Jane and I meet downtown and take the subway to the Penang restaurant, where I'm ecstatic about getting to eat Singaporean food. (One of the distinguishing characteristics about anyone from Singapore: we love our food. And will travel for miles to get it. It's an obsession to the point of my relatives--on both sides--together planning out half of my meals in advance when I tell them I'm visiting so they can make sure I'm not going to miss eating anything.) Monday Evening: Jeremy meets up with me in Chinatown and we head north to find a BBQ that's being hosted by the church he wants to attend come fall. I decide that wandering around town myself would be more interesting than the BBQ, so we split up again. I stumble upon an Algerian creperie, and since crepes remind me of Paris I end up ordering a dark chocolate crepe and reading Plato. Bryan calls and tells me that he's bought food if we want to BBQ, and since I figure Jeremy's going to be at his for least another hour and a half, Bryan and his friend Jonah pick me up from the café. Ten minutes later, Jeremy calls to say that he was never able to find the church group and what was I up to? So we turn back around to find him so he can follow us to Bryan's house in Evanston. Monday Night: Michiganders invade Chicago. Bryan did his PhD at U-M, so knows a lot of Michigan people--apparently when I'd called on Saturday, I called right after two other friends who still live in Ann Arbor just said they'd also be in town on Monday. As people start to arrive, I meet Gabe, who used to give violin lessons to Anna Draper, who sometimes plays with me. I haven't seen her in a while, and he tells me that he'd invited her to come to Bryan's but she'd decided not to go because she wouldn't know anyone. So I call her and convince her to find a ride out. Another random coincidence: the string players are all in town for a Suzuki camp, and one of the others who comes is Andrea (PhD #3 for the weekend), who knows me from swing dancing. We'd talked via the Detroit message boards, and now I have a face for the name. In total, there are nine of us that night, all from Michigan--and six are just visiting. Spontaneous lindy hop breaks out at one point (there are four dancers in the room). After everyone leaves, the three of us talk late into the night--at some point Jeremy goes to bed but Bryan and I can't stop until the sun starts to rise (which explains why I sleep most of the drive home). Tuesday Morning: Bryan makes us breakfast (awww) and leads us to the freeway--Jeremy and I head home, stopping at Starbucks to inject some caffeine into his veins. Tuesday Afternoon: I sleep for half the drive--he's interviewing and talking to people on the phone anyway--and when I wake up we make plans with the rest of the contingent that's coming for a dance event in Chicago next Saturday (yup, that's two weekends in a row). I get home just in time to teach a lesson and go dancing that evening. Quotable Quotes:"I put on this facade of being irresponsible" (Jeremy). "The one thing that's true about all human beings is that in serious relationships, we're all just a little insane" (Bryan). ^ Top | 1:21 AM | | |
Thursday, July 07, 2005 Anatomy of a Spontaneous Road Trip, Part I Wednesday Night: My friend Jeremy and I haven't seen each other much over the last few months, so when he comes swing dancing in Ann Arbor (he's from Lansing) we plan to do something on the Fourth of July. Friday Night: While making plans that night, he mentions that he wants to go to Chicago over the weekend to take a look at an apartment that he's considering living in when he moves in August. My Friday and Saturday are totally packed, but I tell him that I'm free on Sunday and Monday--so we decide to take a road trip. Since we know lots of people in the Windy City, we decide to find someone we can stay with on those two nights. Saturday Night: Most of our friends are out of town or their houses are being renovated (i.e. its residents aren't even sleeping in their own rooms) and Jeremy's friend who was able to house us decides to take a spontaneous road trip of her own; we can stay with her on Monday (my friend Bryan offers his place as well), but that still leaves Sunday. I talk to Jan, a dancer who stayed at my house last year during the Ann Arbor Lindy Exchange, and he says he can host us as a last resort but he's studying all weekend. Sunday 1:00pm: Every dance scene has a message board online, and since we've already posted that we're going to be visiting and will be dancing on Sunday night, Jeremy decides it can't hurt to leave another message: oops... so the place we were going to stay fell through... Jan offered us his place but he's studying for the GRE this weekend so we'd rather not bug him. So yeah, I doubt anyone will actually read this in time... :) But if anyone out there reads this today and can give us a little floorspace tonight to unroll two sleeping bags that would be AWESOME -- give me a call on my cell (we're on our way to Chicago right now) xxx-xxx-xxxxA few minutes later, Jeremy's putting some of my stuff in the trunk of his car when he slams it shut... and realizes that he's just locked his keys into the trunk. ^ Top | 11:13 PM | | |
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