Cross-post from MySpace
Oh friends. My life has been changed forever methinks. I've just finished an amazing week at the Planet Bluegrass ranch up in Lyons Colorado. It is a magical place with a big grassy field, two beautiful stages, a huge cliff face of red stone and a small but rushing river. And for the past 15 years they've been hosting a Song School where amazing masters in every aspect of songwriting and performance come to share their knowledge and experience of the craft, and everyone who is brave enough to jump up and take a turn is supported, applauded and pushed to a new level of greatness.
There was SO MUCH input, I'm not really sure where to start, or how long it would take to go through it all, or even if I'll get to all of it, but I met A LOT of amazing new people who I hope to introduce you to over the next weeks and months, so keep an eye on lyricalvenus.com for the ladies, and probably here for the guys, (though I'm really tempted to start a new blog and/or radio show to include them, but maybe a guest spot on someone else's show would work... just thinkin off the top of my head here). There were so many awesome people to take classes from, and I think I got a good sprinkling of nearly everyone either through a class or by watching them perform, which will help me choose next year what to do because I definitely have to go back!
A couple really big things I learned that I want to put down here before I forget:
1) I kept getting from a bunch of different teachers the concept that it's more important to make sure the meaning of your song comes across clearly than to "feel" your song while you perform. So conversational tone and delivery are going to help with that. Ron Browning put it something like - "Don't chew my steak for me - just give me the plate with it arranged all pretty. I can cut and chew it myself." As emotional, feeling centered people it's easy for songwriters to want to get the audience to "feel how I felt in that moment" so it's a little counter-intuitive sometimes to pull back from the emotion. But really, writing a song and performing a song are two different skills. Not to mention running the business of being a musician - being an independent singer-songwriter means wearing a lot of different hats. This week made that more and more clear to me that keeping the hats separate, (or even getting someone else to wear some of them for you) means that each area is going to get the best attention it needs, when it needs it.
2) There really is a craft to songwriting - there are certain things that the hit songwriters do that are repeatable that make for good songs, there are tricks you can apply to songs already written to take them to another level. While that might seem to take some of the magic out of it, it's encouraging to me because it means it's a skill I can learn if I apply myself to it, and I don't have fumble around in the dark and hope things work. If I feel like one of my songs could be better, now I know a bunch of things I could look at to improve it, or I know where to go look that stuff up. I don't know why it didn't occur to me before - I know there are certain guidelines for writing essays and newspaper articles and novels and such, so why not songs? And it's not to say you can't break all the rules in any of these things, but knowing what the general rules are makes a break from them something conscious and purposeful and interesting.
And if the Song School wasn't enough, right after it was the Folks Festival. The first two days of which, I have to admit, were a little miserable due to steady rain. Or maybe I should say steady wetness, everything from misty sprinkling to windblown, pounding downpour. Unusual for Colorado, and she needed it, but it's a bummer it had to happen all over those two days. I got to see a lot of cool acts though, and probably missed a few when I just couldn't take it anymore and had to go curl up in my tent. (Which was behind the stage area, so I got to still hear them, just not as clearly.)
My original plan was to drive out to Song School with Sharon Bousquet (which I did), and then come home after Folks Fest (Sharon couldn't stay for it) with my husband who was going to be in Boulder but then he didn't end up going. I thought that with 10 other Fairfield people going I'd have a pretty good chance of finding a ride home, but I neglected to factor in that all those people would be full up with instruments and camping gear, and so adding another person and gear and instruments was just not gonna happen. So my next choice was the train, which I've done before, but it was sold out till Wednesday, which means I won't be home till Thursday, and which also means I get to hang out in Boulder for a couple of days and visit with old friends. Kind of a nice gentle glide back into the real world I think.
But I gotta do some laundry and think about shipping some clothes back home so I don't have to lug it all on the train. Because while I knew going home on the train was a possibility, there was stuff I had to bring for camping, and then I went and bought a few things - CD's, a sweatshirt, hats (those came with the camp and volunteering) and, drumroll please - A PINK UKULELE! Now I have to learn how to play it. I bought the chord book too. I'd just seen Priscilla Ahn close her set with a ukulele song, and when I went into the little merch shop and saw all the ukuleles it was calling me with its cute pinkness. I strapped it onto my travel guitar case with the blue rope that held up the tarp over my tent, but I still have at least one bag too many to take on the train, so mailing some clothes back is gonna be the way to go methinks. They'll be the lightest.
And then I want to go on a bike ride! I always say one of the things I miss most about Boulder is the bike trails, so I shouldn't miss out on that chance while I have it.
More pictures and stories and such to come, just wanted to say hi and I'm back online. :) (though I'm also thinking I should probably spend a little more time offline in the future. We'll see what happens.)
1 comment:
Oh wow! That's so awesome that you got to do that Heather! I have to see some pictures of that uke. you bought. I'm still trying to find a way to learn the banjo.
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