blog
Mar 21.2008
What a great trip I just had to the Martha’s Vineyard Independent Festival. I’m so appreciative to Jeremy Mayhew for selecting my two videos and arranging for me to perform. Also I’m grateful to founder Thomas Pena and to Brad Wescott, who I had the pleasure of meeting for the first time.
Martha’s Vineyard is a place that takes me back to some part of my childhood I guess. The first time I set foot on the island I felt like I’d been there many times before. Anyway, I was a bit worried that the magical effect this island and it’s great community had on me might during my first trip the festival two years ago may have been due to the fact that Sad Song was shown three times and I had received such an outpouring of love from the folks there. But I’m happy to say it wasn’t any of these things. It’s just a great place. I consider it to be one of my favorite places on the planet.
Here’s a few images from some footage I took walking with Jeremy and his friend photographer friend Josh Marowitz:
Look at how rich in color the cliffs are.
This is my good friend Jeremy Mayhew.
We showed Puss and The Turn at the festival. I think Puss went over better than the Turn, but I was really nervous during the Turn because an hour later I was set to give a performance. Still, folks were laughing a lot during Puss and many people came and told me they really enjoyed it. Never under-estimate the power of laughter!
The performance went well too, although I have to admit, it was a little odd… I was singing in front of a food line! haha. I guess any experience is a good experience, and really I was just grateful to have the opportunity to give my heart to these good folks. Here’s an image:
I left the island with plans to make a video with Jeremy within the next two months. I’ve got all kinds of ideas. As was the case last time I left Martha’s Vineyard, the place has set my imagination on fire.
Mar 17.2008
I’m going to keep this short because I’m still in Martha’s Vineyard and am trying to spend as little time on the computer as possible.
I’m proud to announce the release of March’s cluster performance, Moon After Berceuse - duet with Ike Sturm. Hope you enjoy it! It was very very fun to shoot and perform.
I’ll be back at you soon with images and thoughts from the Martha’s Vineyard festival, which was even more lovely than I thought it would be!
Moon Duet, featuring Ike Sturm
dreams of Martha’s VineyardMar 12.2008
I had rather strange sleep last night. I’d say it was kind of fluorescent, electric sleep… constant but buzzing. Obsessive thoughts about the Martha’s Vineyard Independent Festival and all my lovely friends there.
At some point I was at a video store with a couple friends and I saw a poster for Fellini’s Clowns (one of my favorite films) and asked my pals a question: does this mean it’s available on dvd...? The dream response was a widescreen dvd cover in messy black and white video, but… endlessly, horizontally wide, and it spread out before my eyes, honest, slightly sad and beautiful… and it was of the Sea at Martha’s Vineyard. Somehow I imagine seeing my friend Jeremy’s face kind of translucent smiling over this vista with his friends. I was lost in a trance. Then snapping back to the video store I said, Oh yes I’m definitely going to buy The Clowns.
What is the meaning of this? I suppose it’s obnoxious to over-analyze dreams. Especially in public! So let’s just chalk it up to me being very excited. I’m going to bring my whole video and audio rig, so there should be plenty of material to work with when I return.
On a side note… The Moon Duet cluster video has been finished for five days now, but we’re having some technical difficulties with the site. But if we can’t get them figured out before I leave they will be up by the time I get back. Thanks for your patience.
Puerto Rico / shooting with Ike / strange powersMar 06.2008
Howdy folks,
So just got back from a nice week off in Puerto Rico. Such a beautiful island. I brought my camera and made a lot of little movies, hopefully some of which will make it into some future work. Here’s an image from Old San Juan:
I got back just in time to shoot my next cluster video with my friend, the great upright bassist, Ike Sturm. We captured ten voices in five passes live to my p2 card for you. It’s a performance of my song Moon After Berceuse sung at St. Peter’s church. That’s a church famously known as “the jazz church” and Ike is the musical director there. Anyway, aroudn the middle of March I’ll be going live with it, so check back.
While I was away in Puerto Rico “The Sad Song” got featured on youtube, and in one day the stats went from 1,110 views to 175,000 views, and continued to climb until the video left the front page. It was very exciting, but most beautiful about it was hearing from folks who’d seen it.
Actually, I heard from an old friend with whom I went to elementary school. His name is Theo Burkhardt, and he has a great video which I totally love, so I wanted to post a link to it. Go watch it! The song is “Strange Powers” by the Magnetic Fields. Great song. Great video.
