Friday, July 24, 2009

Playing at a charity fundraiser plus a gig in Safety Harbor

One of my wife's friends asked me if I could come up with any acoustic music to entertain the guests at a charity fundraiser. The event is organized by a womens' group that helps a different charity each month. This month it is the Childrens' Dream Fund.

I asked Bruce if he would join me for a Blue Island Beer Club performance and also asked two friends who are female singer/songwriters to join us. Everyone was enthused and accepted almost immediately. So Kate Amirault and Jayne Kelli will be joining us on Thursday. We are all excited.

And then on Friday, the Blue Island Beer club plays at Taste in Safety Harbor. A fun small restaurant with good food. Perhaps you can join us?

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Lyricists

There was a long discussion on a songwriting site recently about people who consider themselves songwriters but only write lyrics. These folks are not musicians for various reasons, but still are moved by music and contribute song lyrics in the hope that someone else will collaborate with them and add the music.

Before I began participating in songwriting forums, I was not really aware that lyricists were common. I knew about songwriting teams like Elton John and Bernie Taupin and Rodgers and Hammerstein, but I thought they were rare and in many cases, were playwrights who needed a spot of music for a Broadway type musical.

It turns out that lyricists outnumber musicians by leaps and bounds in the forum I refer to. The musicians encourage the lyricists to learn the musical side but in many cases they cannot.

I do not have a problem with someone being a lyricist as long as they have a sense of rhythm. A tin ear doesn't really stand in the way of writing lyrics, but a lack of rhythm does. Lyrics must have meter, prosody and rhythm! Some would-be lyricists obviously were not born with rhythm and probably are terrible dancers.

I am working with a couple of lyricists and putting music to their words. It is fun to collaborate because you can bounce ideas off each other.

So if you are "just" a lyricist, I say have fun at what you are doing. But if you can't dance, your words are probably not going to make a good song!

Saturday, July 4, 2009

Sailing Adventures?

The title here includes Sailing Adventures but I haven't posted much about sailing lately, so here goes.

Last year, we cruised on our Catalina 42 sloop back to the Bahamas for the 8th time (I think), and spent much of the winter in George Town, Exuma. George Town is a great place to hang out on land or on the water so there are lots of visitors there. One of the events that occurs annually is the Bahamian Music and Heritage Festival. It is a three day celebration of things Bahamian and includes live music on an outdoor stage every evening. Numerous Bahamian recording artists fly in from other islands to perform. Bahamian music sounds very Caribbean but is different from Reggae or Calypso or other well known island music. It features a strong rhythmic bass line, lots of percussion, and usually a personable frontman singing risque lyrics......a formula for fun and dancing.

The visiting boat people usually have a number of musicians in their midst and for the last three or four years have quickly put a band together to join in and show support for the event. In 2008, I was a member of the band which we called Folks on Boats. Our performance was well received. So here is a YouTube clip of our dress rehearsal - a song I wrote for the occasion called Eddie's Edgewater - a local watering hole that features Rake'n Scrape music. We rehearsed on board a catamaran called Freebird and the dress rehearsal took place anchored in the harbor with about 100 dinghies gathered around to hear us.....very cool.