4/19/2013 – Tae Phoenix at Bemis Building Art Show

• Tae Phoenix – vocals
• Robert VonFeldt – piano, backing vocals
• Matt Wexler – bass
• Michael Ahren – drums

First gigs are always rough. Dropped notes, missed cues, tentative endings, and stumbling rubatos abound until the synaptic passages formed by live experiences are formed. As a performer, you hope for the best but expect the worst, and employ whatever mitigation strategies you can to prepare. Listen to recordings, study the charts, play through the tunes, mentally get your head in the game.… [more]

I decided recently to start keeping some notes about performances after they happen. Sort of a “self-review”, I’d like to put my reflections somewhere I can look back at them down-the-line, both as a learning document and simply as a record of some of the artists that I’m fortunate enough to join on stage. I’m not sure what form I ultimately want these to take, so for now I’m simply calling them “Recaps.” Here’s the first one.

04/19/2013 – Lindee Hoshikawa at Cypress Wine Bar

• Lindee Hoshikawa – vocals, guitar
• Shalane Miller and Tara Kearns – vocals, backing vocals
• Matt Wexler – bass
• Tacket Brown – drums

Friday night I played my first gig with Lindee Hoshikawa, a PacNW native who recently returned from a number of years living abroad in Tokyo.… [more]

At about 3:45pm on St. Paddy’s Day a few weeks ago, the fairly new keyboard player in one of my bands sent out an email to the lead singer and included me (and only me) on the CC line. The email was a bit disjointed, touching on his concerns about the band’s direction and how he thought it wasn’t a good fit for him, but the bottom line was that he was pulling out of that night’s gig, just over an hour before load-in.… [more]

Jazz chanteuse Nikki Dee regularly performs at the Sorrento Fireside Room, and last month she was joined by Berklee-trained pianist and accomplished-songwriter Zarni de Wet (with yours truly on bass and Tacket Brown on drums along for the ride).

At the beginning of the second set, Scarlet Parke stepped up to the mic to join Nikki in a rendition of Fever.

That blows my mind a little bit – Nikki Dee and Scarlet Parke singing Fever, backed up by Zarni de Wet piano.… [more]

Two weeks ago Gunstreet Glory lost our lead guitarist, Mike Hollenbeck, aka Mike White aka Leech McBuggnutts.

The full band hadn’t played together in awhile – when I left for New England to be with my family through my mom’s cancer, Gunstreet Glory went into hiatus except for one gig, where Steve Steele graciously filled in for me. So I hadn’t played with GSG since August, nearly half a year, and suddenly I get a phone call from Devin saying Mike had died.… [more]

2012 was another great year of performance opportunities for me, and I’m amazed at the roster of musicians that let me be a part of their projects. It’s a bit sobering to realize, however, that in context of what I hoped to accomplish, 2012 was a big failure. First a bit of history, then a bit of analysis, then some direction-setting for 2013.

The History:
Under the shadow of the Global Economic Downturn, 2008 and 2009 were a chaotic mix of day-job/career/personal setbacks for me, offset only by a few great performance the opportunities I was offered – mainly through 3 stellar trips with Two Loons for Tea.… [more]

This morning I updated my gig calendar for the first time in nearly two months. I felt a palpable sense of relief, a peace of mind knowing that I’ll be performing again soon. And most of all, I meta-felt some surprise at that sense of relief – I was caught off guard by how much weight future performances and upcoming gigs hold for me.

It shouldn’t be surprising – I’ve talked at length on my blog about meaning and art/performance, and how these experiences have significance.… [more]

Last June I wrote about Joe Albanese, a fellow Seattle upright bassist who was tragically gunned down in a local restaurant. While news articles at the time concentrated on his and fellow victim Drew Kerikades’ bands God’s Favorite Beefcake and Circus Contraption, Joe also contributed bass duties to local ensembles including Nu Klezmer Army and one of my favs, Bat Country.

Bat Country is currently in the midst of an Indiegogo campaign to complete their album. They have tracks for all their songs recorded from before Joe’s untimely and tragic murder; now they need to get ‘em polished and mastered, and then produce the physical album itself.… [more]

Last Friday I played my first gig with Zarni, a songwriter new(ish) to the Seattle scene by way of Berklee College of Music. She’s a terrific songwriter and musician who brought a ton of energy to the stage. Joined by my constant rhythm-section comrade, Reverand Professor Tacket Brown, our set went swimmingly, and I’m totally psyched for the chance to join Zarni on stage again soon.

I already knew going into the show that Zarni had the legitimate piano chops to impress the music major snobs (like me).… [more]

UPDATE – Looks like music is back at the Renaissance. I haven’t been back myself yet for a show, but hopefully the new fellow running the show has the same drive to showcase aspiring, ambitious artists that the previous booker had. Who knows – maybe my blog entry below had something to do with it.

ORIGINAL ENTRY – Spanning the width of First Hill is a small phalanx of artsy hotspots. The Renaissance Hotel was the Western Front, with a plucky series of local songwriters and artists appearing weekly in the hotel lounge.… [more]