Thursday night Kevin and I debuted Redbird on Carolyn VandeWiele’s Womenspace show on WFHB. It was a fantastic experience.
Due to other commitments, I arrived after the show had begun, but in time to hear Curtis Cantwell Jackson backed by Janiece Jaffe and possibly Bobbie Lancaster. Curtis is tremendously talented and has a great voice.
Kevin arrived with his hollow-body electric guitar and we nipped into a back room to run the piece and get used to the different sound. We then went into the studio to set up while Arbutus Cunningham had everyone in stitches. Krista Detor was in before us, prepping to play, so she was the only one with headphones. We couldn’t hear Arbutus but heard everyone in the sound booth and Krista bursting out laughing.
Krista dedicated her delightful Teeter-Totter on a Star to Arbutus. I could only listen with half an ear because I was keeping my nerves under control and staying “in character” for Redbird. In the midst of my stage fright, I suddenly got clear. I looked around the room and realized this was part of my dream come true—to be in the midst of truly talented musicians, performing music I’ve written the way I want to sing it, rising up in the hopes I could be anywhere near as good as they were, and having the scary-yet-exhilarating thrill of singing live. This is what I want to be doing with my life. It was a wonderful realization.
We had no time to run the piece, so I could only hear the mix on the fly. And I couldn’t hear much at that! I pulled one headphone off an ear so I could hear myself and kept the other in place to get a sense of the mix. Kevin played beautifully and I—well, I tried my best! 🙂
Everyone was very gracious afterwards, complimenting the piece and our performance of it. It’s been terrific to get the feedback and support of the family and friends who listened to it. I loved having my friend Bry in the lobby—it was wonderful to know I had a groupie no matter what I did! 😉
Since I couldn’t hear very well, I don’t know how well the piece worked, but Kevin thought it was our best effort yet, which is pretty damn good. And lots of people seemed to like it. I am very satisfied at having more of my creative path affirmed! It was a great night.
Vow in the studio
January 22, 2011Went into the studio yesterday with Grandmaster Kevin (MacDowell) and recorded almost all of Vow. We just need to add the drum line and then edit the spoken word section to the sung part. I’m hoping Lara will drum. I would love her energy on this project.
It’s a demo recording, so it’s pretty rough. You can hear the pages of the sheet music turning, for instance. I’m not thrilled with my vocal performance but it’s not bad, considering we did almost every line in one take. The alto line sounds bad because it’s right at the bottom of my range and my sound production cuts out by half on an F so I just go with this really breathy sound—awful. Especially considering it’s supposed to be this powerhouse bass.
Kevin attempted to do everything through Garage Band but it kept freezing up. So he pulled out his venerable analog 4-track and recorded onto tape! Très retro. But he knows a way to get it transferred to digital without losing quality, so I say all the better for him. It was just ironic that the $400 equipment trumped the $4,000 set-up.
Mucho thanks to Kevin. More news as it’s fit to print!