Summer Sounds: Amazing Kids, More Shows, and a Novel

Composition Recital at St. John's

First thing's first, I guess: Wow! (Is that verbose enough to describe something that really amazed me?) I attended, and performed in, a composition recital that featured both kids and adults. The recital was held at St. John's Episcopal Church in Chico, which has a very well-maintained piano and pretty awesome acoustics. I knew I was going to enjoy these kinds of performances because I love discovering what kinds of techniques, styles and patterns other piano composers use when they write music. I had the privilege of hearing these students play their original work, which included compositions that featured multiple instruments. Writing for more than one instrument takes an enormous amount of know-how and creativity, and kids as young as twelve were able to pull this off.

Okay, so now that I'm inspired... moving on!

Composition Recital at St. John's Episcopal Church

Got a House?

The idea of doing house concerts originated way before the composition recital, so the performances by the budding composers didn't actually give rise to this idea. It did, however, motivate me to look into this more closely. No dates have been set yet, but I've spoken to one person who may be interested in hosting a house concert over the summer. House concerts are exactly that -- a solo concert (in this case, a piano concert) in someone's home. I'm shooting for June, but the time frame remains to be seen and I'm hoping to have a narrower time frame in the next week or so.

There are really nice things about house concerts, including the fact that it's a more intimate setting -- and the fact that it's easier to hurl tomatoes at me if I don't play well ;) Okay, so I'm kidding about that last part.


The Lost Enemy -- off the shelf and on my desk!

My novel The Lost Enemy has been an on-going project for so many years now that it's difficult to pinpoint exactly how long I've been refining it. It has gone through many revisions, and up until last month it sat on the shelf (so to speak) for quite some time. I decided to get back into it one last time and finalize the entire project. It's hard to say when it will be ready to publish, but I'm definitely hoping by August. I've already looked at companies that are able to bind and print the novel, what their rates are, and what they offer.

As far as the last revisions and the final edit, the events in the story haven't changed since the last major modification in which I added an entire chapter to the book. The format, however, has changed slightly. Originally, each chapter was represented by one of my songs, and instead of calling these "chapters" they are now headings in the text, and each chapter may contain two or three headings. This works out better organizationally (Is that a word? Sure it is!) and it just seems to make more sense with regard to how the events are divided up in the story.

Another idea I have is to eventually provide the CD's of the music in the back cover of the book itself. Either way, one thing is for certain: the revision process can be tedious. Somehow I still find it thrilling and I grow more and more anxious as it gets close to completion.

I have a feeling, for some reason, that this summer is going to be exceptionally productive. Time will definitely tell, as it always does.

Spring Success and a Summer Show

A successful (and busy!) spring concert

The solo piano concert I put on last month (March 9th) ended up being a great success, although it had about the same so-so turnout as the last time I performed at the Chico Women's Club (about 30 people). The fun part of this concert was that I got to sell my sheet music for the first time. This is definitely something I plan to do for my next concert, in addition to selling my CD's, because a few of the sheet music I brought actually sold.

The busy part of the day was not just preparing for the concert, but putting on a student recital the same day. My colleagues and friends didn't really describe this as "busy," because I think their word of choice was "insane".

Despite my insanity, which should be no surprise to anyone, the recital was enjoyable, inspiring, and as much of a success as the solo concert. Nineteen of my students performed, and 50 or so parents and family members showed up. I had already collaborated with other teachers in helping them with recitals over the years, and having my students perform in those recitals, but this was the first show I organized for the students myself.

A number of people usually ask me, after I do any of these concerts, "How do you feel now?" The best way I can answer that question is, always, "I want to do more." And this, of course, brings me to my next exciting excursion. A summer gig... er, gigs?

Time to pose! Our group shot with me and my students, after a successful recital at the Chico Women's Club (3/9/19)

Wine Time in the Mean Time

I have been trying to book a solo piano concert at MONCA, the Museum of Northern California Art. I may wait for a while before actually performing there because I just played a big solo concert last month, which means many of my "regulars" may not necessarily bother coming to see the same kind of show a month later. I was thinking about playing MONCA in June, but either way I was still able to book a live show at Wine Time Restaurant on June 29th. The great thing about playing at Wine Time is that it's perfect for practicing, and the acoustics (and the staff!) are both wonderful.


Recording Woes, and the Ultimate Cure

At my spring concert at the Chico Women's Club I brought two different CD's, my demo album Heart of Storms, and a CD that featured various recordings, including a cover of the theme from Princess Bride, and six songs from the future album called August In Bloom. This worked out well because many people urged me to bring a second CD (The Heart of Storms album is an old one and many fans already have it). The only downside was that there's a glitch on the newer CD, where there's about two to four minutes of silence after each song. It just means that people have to skip to the next track after listening to the first one. It should be an easy fix, but either way I am in the process of recording all of the August in Bloom songs, and I may use this album as a way to send the tracks to a company that packages the CD's for you professionally.

As many people know I own a Yamaha C3X, which is a 7-foot grand piano, and I plan to one day record off of this acoustically if I can. Part of this depends on whether I convert the room to a professional recording studio, or if I wait instead to buy my own home to do this. The fact that I'm renting and unsure of how long I'll continue living there (the housing situation in Chico and the difficulties resulting from last year's terrible wildfire are a part of this) makes the issue slightly more complicated. Either way, the C3X has a silent system, and I'll soon be testing the recording quality on it as well as the acoustic recordings from my hybrid piano. I have a microphone that I haven't yet used, and I may be able to use this along with a high-quality video camera that I bought shortly before I went on my trip to Iceland and Greenland last summer.


More videos are afoot...

Speaking of videos, I plan to make quite a few more of them. My approach to getting more people to subscribe to my music and come to my shows is going to involve a lot of effort on social media and online videos, because 1) that's where most people go initially to find out about artists, and 2) the potential in terms of how many people you can reach on the Internet is pretty enormous. I added a brand new video on YouTube (below) and plan to make a lot more of these. This means, of course, I'll be just as busy as I've been... but not busier, because I don't think that's possible :D

An Arctic Adventure, with Concerts to Follow

A land like no other

In July of last summer I took a trip to Iceland and Greenland, with my brother, and as I'm writing this it's surreal to realize that it was about six months ago when we embarked on that adventure. After I returned, I ended up with kidney stones (again) from eating too much lamb (yes, really), and then I had to return to my normal routine of working at the Sutter County Superintendent of Schools, teaching piano lessons, continuing my recording projects and preparing for several concerts. It was the classic "hit the ground running" scenario.

Kulusuk, Greenland

One of the exciting outcomes is that I composed a song called "The Ice Floes of Kulusuk," which was inspired by the majestic and stunning scenery I came across while visiting Greenland for three days. Kulusuk is the name of the village where we stayed, and I'm happy to announce that I'll be performing this piece in a solo concert coming up in March. I've been practicing it repeatedly, especially today, which is quite apparent as I'm feeling the inklings of pre-carpal tunnel symptoms even as I type. The great news is that I can talk about my experience in Greenland while interacting with the audience during the concert.


Musicians stepping up during times of crisis

Everyone now knows about the horrors and the terrifying stories shared by the Camp Fire victims, especially people like myself, who live just a half an hour away from Paradise (my town of Chico is just a hop-skip-and-jump from the burn area). Musicians all over Chico have been donating their instruments to fire victims who lost their instruments in the blaze, and it's been inspiring for everyone. Two of my students were affected by the fire, and I had several family members that lost their homes. In light of the tragedy and all the inspiring efforts by members in the community, I'll also be performing at the Paradise Performing Arts Center on February 8th, where the Baha'is of Chico and other community members will be having a memorial for the 86 people who lost their lives in the event.

Ariel view of the Camp Fire in Paradise, CA (November 2018)

I'm hoping to donate proceeds from my March concert as well, maybe to some of the Paradise reconstruction efforts. Either way I'm excited for the event, since there are several other musicians performing (and no, not just because I'll have fewer songs to practice :P ).


Why the majority of my colleagues think I'm insane

I performed at the Chico Women's Club for the second time, back in September. The concert seemed to go well, although there were only about 35 people or so, and I was somewhat sleep-deprived by the time I walked onto the stage because I had been going non-stop since 7:30 in the morning. There's a lot of prepping that goes into it, especially when you factor in food, sound checks, set-up time, ticket booths, etc. For my March concert, part of my plan is to have everything ready and set up about two days before the show.

Undoubtedly, this "have-everything-ready-ahead-of-time" approach is a wise way to go, but the "insane" part is that I scheduled a recital for my students on the same day. I mainly did this because it's more efficient economically -- both the recital and the solo concert will be at the Chico Women's Club, with just a few hours in between. I'm not too worried about feeling burned out when evening hits because I plan to actually sleep the night before (what a concept!) and the most strenuous activity required of me during the recital will be standing at a microphone and announcing the next performer.

Chico Women's Club (Chico, CA)

The exciting part of the solo concert is that I plan to feature a local harp player as well as one of my composition students, who each plan to play two pieces. The best part of this is that the performance is still eight weeks away, which still gives me lots of time to practice, and I've already decided on the playlist. Maybe this time I'll be able to walk onto the stage without feeling like I'm going to fall asleep ;)

Update on the Yamaha C3X

...and it has a Silent System!

When I bought the Yamaha AvantGrande N2 (which is a hybrid piano) a friend of mine joked with me and said that I had finally "tied the knot" with my True Love. But I have now purchased a five-foot-eight grand piano, which sits magnificently inside the recording studio in my house. I guess this means I'm now in some kind of a shady polyamorous relationship? (Or would it be an open marriage?)

My original plan was to buy it much later (maybe in a few years) but this particular piano, a Yamaha C3X with a Silent System, was one of the few left in California and was about to be shipped out. If I wanted that particular model, I had to act on it right away. As far as why I would want that particular model, all I would have to do is direct anyone to go play it and listen to the quality of the sound.

The Silent System, in case you're wondering, makes it so that I can push a switch that changes the piano to "digital", instead of letting the hammers actually touch the strings, so that I have the option of playing the piano with headphones. As with most things in my life, though, this is just the tip of the iceberg...

I'm going to need how many mics?

I was told that the number of mics I will need is 'four', but I need to dig further and make sure I'm getting reliable information, and preferably from experts who know what they're talking about. As for the reason I'm looking into buying microphones, the whole purpose of buying this piano is to set up an acoustic recording studio, so that I can record directly from that the instrument. So far, all I have been doing recording-wise is recording digitally. 

The piano (okay, I admit it, I named her - it's "Isabelle") has been adjusted/tuned two times now, since I bought it. A date is still being set up for a third (and I guess final) tuning and adjustment of the piano. After that, I will carry on my shoulders the monumental task of finding out how to convert that room to an acoustic recording studio, which kind of microphones to buy, how to connect them to the piano, and how to use them to record successfully. In the mean time, I am still trying to manage my time so that I can record the digital way and put together the tracks for August In Bloom.

The Art of Piano Haggling

I guess it would be superfluous to point out that buying a piano is not like buying a loaf of bread at the store. There are other costs that come with it -- tunings, delivery, maintenance, and let's not forget the much-needed humidifier, which also requires you to buy distilled water (what??).

Since I bought the instrument in cash I was able to get them to take the price down quite a bit. Apparently, most people choose to finance when making a purchase like this. (Translation: pianos are expensive). 

An added benefit to this whole deal is that the piano gallery's owner, Vince Chambers, sold it to me, and is also the primary person involved in doing the adjustments and tunings. Since he already knows me and has worked with me professionally for some time, he's that much more invested in making sure the piano is taken care of, and I guess it's a benefit for him in knowing that the piano is being put to good use.


The Yamaha AvantGrand N2 stays

I'm not selling "Zoey" by any means. She's the hybrid piano I used for the performance I did back in February at the Chico Women's Club. My long-term goal is really to perform, more than anything else, and Zoey is far more portable than the new grand piano. Isabelle will mainly be an instrument for recording. I'm still amazed at how close the manufacturers were able to get the sound of the N2 to match the sound of a real acoustic grand. The hybrid also allows me to record my own music into its internal memory, which is yet another reason to hang onto it. Yes, sometimes people need two instruments, especially if they're professionals.

I blame myself entirely for the bank-breaking expenses of these pursuits, since I had the option of choosing a much more portable (and cheaper) instrument. You know, like a harmonica. Needless to say, though, every time I roll my fingers on the keys of that C3X, I don't regret my decisions for even a moment. ;)

 

Gleanings from the February concert

An awesome turnout

I'm a worst-scenario kind of a guy. When I plan my budget, for example, I assume that the worst possible financial outcome will be the reality, and then I shave off a few hundred dollars off of that, just to be on the safe side. The result is that I am usually very pleased with the outcome, because I plan for the worst. A certain amount of pessimism can be healthy, and I proceeded with my plans for the February 10th concert with that same mentality. At least several people asked me how many people I was expecting to show at the concert, and the ball park figure I gave them was maybe 35 or so. It turned out to be about 64! Some people even showed up late and people had to scramble to find chairs. 

I could describe the event in many ways, but the best way would be to label it as a learning experience -- there were last-minute changes, hangups, mishaps, misunderstandings, etc., days before the performance, but the minute the performance started at 7:00pm, it was as if everything came together perfectly. I was nervous the first couple of songs, but I finally relaxed during the third song ("Snowfall on a Light Glissade"), maybe because so far nobody had booed or thrown tomatoes at me.

The Next Adventure: September 15th!

I have to say I was really fond of that venue. The Chico Women's Club is just small enough to fit 60 to 100 people or more, but not too large that it appears intimidating or makes the audience look too dispersed. So I booked another show at the same location, which will be September 15th. It's a ways away, but it's the earliest date I was able to book it. I'm in the process of deciding on the program, and at this point mainly debating whether I want to have 10-ish songs played all the way through to the end, or do 45 minutes followed by an intermission, followed by another 45 minutes.

I've posted a video below of "Snowfall on a Light Glissade". I had written an arrangement to the original piece and included a cello, and I was able to find a cellist in Chico who agreed to play. I had also planned to perform a piece with an opera singer (which Vince Chambers had agreed to help with) but we had to forego that particular song since he had a cold the entire time we needed to rehearse the piece. He was still able to host the event though, and I'm hoping he can do both next time.

There are too many other learning experiences to list in just a short blog post like this, but there's one that's worth mentioning, which is that I sold all nine CD's at the event, at $10.00 each. I had only brought the nine, so next time I'll be bringing more. Raising the ticket price slightly will also bring the profits into the "black" instead of the "red", although I was expecting to be a little in the red during my first major concert.

I have considered putting on more casual/informal shows somewhere between now and September, but this is hard only because I work so much (including my day job in Yuba City) and it's tricky to squeeze in the time to visit the venues and set it up. Either way, more updates will become available as the date gets closer.

Some of my trusty helpers/supporters! (Mandalyn, Dawn, Ashley and Mindy)

30 Days to Showtime!

I've secured a venue in Chico, at a place called Chico Women's Club, where I performed for the Baha'is several months ago. The decision to book this event was generally a result of me telling myself to stop making excuses for postponing it. I've been wanting to put on a concert like this for quite some time. More specifically, I chose this particular venue because the place is small enough for it not to be too intimidating, and the acoustics are fantastic.

A secret to success...

I carefully chose the article 'a' in the above heading, as opposed to 'the', because I don't intend to claim that I know "the secret" to being successful, as if there were only one. But I do know a method that can work wonders, and that's being able to network well with other people. If you're good at building professional relationships, acquiring colleagues, and just being a nice guy (or gal) your chances of success will be a lot higher -- guaranteed. .

The Chico Women's Club concert is only 30 days away and I've been delighted to see how many people stepped in to help. I have a sound guy, a tech guy, a host person ("MC"), a chair set-up person, two other musicians that will be performing at some point, a promo guy, a design guy, a ticket lady, a merchandise person and even a person who's going to sell food.  Some of these folks I'm paying, but even when you can't afford to pay people, building supportive networks goes a long way and it means that much more people will still step in to help you out when you happen to be strapped.


Everything I know I learned from George Winston (and others)

In one of my blog posts I talked about a time I went to see George Winston perform in Redding, California. Part of the reason I wanted to go (besides just that he's a great performer and a fantastic composer) is that I wanted to see how what a typical piano concert looked like. Questions kept coming up in my head, prior to watching him perform, like "Does the performer talk between songs?" "Does he introduce himself?" "Does he do anything else?"

George Winston played some of his most popular compositions on the piano, as expected, but during the show he also picked up his slack key guitar and played on that as well. He played the guitar for two of his pieces, and the rest were all on the piano. This was a nice change of pace and it added some variety, even though I loved everything he was doing on the piano.

Watching George put on a concert this way definitely helped inspire me to dig for ideas to add variety into my own piano concerts. As a result I've been able to find a professional cellist who will be playing "The Swan" by Camille Saint Saens, as well as a melodic version of "Snowfall on a Light Glissade". The person hosting the concert is also going to sing for one of the songs, and I'm extremely grateful that the host just happens to have an opera background. I've rehearsed twice with him and once with the cellist.

Yo-yo Ma performing Camille Saint-Saens' "The Swan"

Since it's my first self-organized concert, only time will tell how successful the attempt at variety will be. And at just a little over two weeks away I'll be squeezing in as much rehearsal time that I can.

Why being a music teacher in July is like being a talented circus clown

Wait, you mean being a piano teacher is "seasonal" work?

It's amazing to think that it's now been six years since I first started teaching piano lessons on a regular basis. The "lesson learned" part of this process (which I'll describe in more detail later) emerged towards the tail end of this six year period, mainly because it's during this tail end that my clientele flourished up to 20+ students. As most people would guess, the majority of my students are kids, which means my time slots would involve after-school hours, the 3-6pm range. Most of my mornings and early afternoons were free for me to do whatever, or, more accurately, to work at my other various jobs and multi-tasking duties that I've just realized has the potential to turn me into a complete basket case. 

Now, with regard to this concept of students somehow identifying themselves as "school children", I noticed an interesting pattern: they all seem to want "free time" over the summer. By the time June rolled around, I found myself having to juggle appointments around, re-schedule, cancel, re-cancel, re-appoint, post-pone, re-post-pone, and even pre-pone. I know "pre-pone" isn't a word, but I'm sure I did it at some point. What would a "pre-pone" be, anyway? Is it re-enacting an appointment from the past that didn't happen? 

I digress... so all through the summer I was juggling these students around, rescheduling appointments, etc. Apparently, the reasons for kids wanting to cancel or reschedule their lessons included the following:

1. They didn't want to go to the lesson.

2. But it's summer!

3. They were busy because they were going to be fishing crawdads out of the water with a paperclip. 

4. They were chasing lizards in the back yard. 

5. But why do I have to go to piano? It's summer!

6. They were camping.

7. They were "sick". 

8. They were sick and/or camping. 

9. They were sick from camping and couldn't come to piano lessons because they had stomach cramps from eating too many s'mores.

10. They were sick of piano lessons and just want to go camping. 

11. "I'm not going to school, why am I coming to piano lessons?"

12. It was too hot.

13. Yes, they know the music store had air conditioning, but they really just wanted to sleep in and not change out of their pajamas the rest of their day. 

14. All of the above. 

Unicycles and flying chainsaws don't intimidate me

At first I was pleased that I was able to handle everyone's request for time changes. This was before I realized that the juggling of these time slots was a full-time job in itself, which meant extra time, which also meant extra time I was not getting paid for. I then realized that this is why a lot of private music teachers just say "screw it" and take the entire month of July off, or even the entire summer off. That way they can tell the students to just return on a certain date in August. They're going to be camping in the dirt and chasing frogs, anyway--they're not thinking about the phrasing of notes and the chord progressions in Bach's two-part invention. 

First I thought, "Hey, it's still a little extra money, even though many students are out of town." Then I realized this was not just a "juggling act." It was a circus act that involved me on a 12-foot unicycle, on stilts, juggling a set of chainsaws while balancing a pole on my nose with flames on top of it -- and then having to jump through a flaming hula-hoop at the same time. If you like doing that sort of thing, and making a few bucks for those few students who are still sticking around during the summer, then that's great. I'm considering doing the whole take-off-July thing next year. That is what "lesson learned" means to me. 

How many W-2's does it take to make a guy realize he's a sucker?

I continued, of course, to work on my other projects and jobs throughout the summer, as expected. I've been helping Vince Chambers out at Apollo Piano a couple days a week, and was being paid with a 1099. Then the payroll system was given to an employment agency to handle, so I technically work for them now, and I'm on a W-4. But the new school that he bought, which is now called Apollo Academy of Music, is paying me via another 1099, and I've been teaching two new students there (who also contribute to my apparently-amazing juggling ability). On top of that, I somehow found the time to write articles for Klazema Communications, an online freelance writing company that hired me to write website content for their clients. Another 1099!

As far teaching ESL, I'll be going back to that next week and will be teaching at the Sutter County One-Stop program Mondays through Thursdays, until 11:30am. W-2! Not to mention that I'm on a W-2 for Chico Unified (substitute teaching) as well as, I think, the Tri-County Substitute Teacher Consortium. I actually forgot whether I'm still on a W-2 with that place or if that was in the past. 

Is this even legal? I heard that in Finland they give you a fine if they find out you're holding down more than one job. And I'm doing this while writing this blog (I'm actually at Apollo Piano right now) and still producing my CD, August in Bloom, which is only half-way done, and of course revising my novella, and rehearsing for a live performance at a wedding that is taking place next month. 

I'm not sure if I should be proud of the fact that, even last year when I filed my taxes, my CPA (who happens to do my taxes every year) actually got confused. And I mean genuinely confused, like he was actually furrowing his brow. And he's been a CPA for decades.

I'm going to use the remaining time in my shift here at the piano store to think about whether I should be proud of this, or if I've piled too much on my plate. After that, I'm going home and taking a nap.