Another New Year

"Where do we go now?" - Guns 'N' Roses

2011 was the biggest year that I've ever had and that's largely due to the many of you who read this blog, buy my merchandise, come out to concerts and take lessons/workshops with me. Thank you. It's an honor, a privilege and a real joy. Happy New Year!

So, now what?

As you might've noticed, there was no huge rolling out of intent OR content on January 1st, 2012 from this camp and I'm just now getting around to posting the first blog of the new year. Going back in time to read past posts from the flipping of the calendar pages revealed the typical plans going forward, like here, here and here.

This time around, during the first week of the year, it's all about a little less talk and a lot more action: namely, those projects that have been brewing for awhile and some new ones that suddenly got ushered to the front of the velvet rope line. More than anything, this low-key approach to the beginning of 2012 is all about scoring precious time simply sitting with my instruments and working on the basics. If there's one thing I learned while on The RV Project Tour (besides how much people hate driving behind Winnebagos) it's that, despite all best intentions, not a whole lot gets done on the road. Practicing, writing, creating - it's all there in fits and spurts, enough to keep the plane leveled out and soaring, but most of my downtime in the spring, summer and fall last year was spent doing a whole lot of nothing. No thing.

That's not exactly true. There was visiting with folks in RV parks, campgrounds and festival parking lots. Many hours spent relaxing under the green canopy and red/orange sandstone and granite cliffs of our nation's state sanctuaries. Quite a lot of time madly pedaling my mountain bike on actual mountains. Soaking in the beauty of the United States of America and resting up before the next event. And sure - some recordings were made and some light administrative business was conducted but, for the most part, I came home in November to not only a huge glut of unfinished business but also to some tough choices that I had to make regarding activities in other areas of my career. Something like a total of two hours of video was shot on tour and that was by design. I wanted to live life as it happened. Not later while editing together Dulcimerica episodes. I had to pick and choose my battles last year in order to get through without imploding.

As the economy continues to take its nose dive, there has been a lot of evaluating going on here - looking at ways to work smarter and faster. Knowing when to step in and when to step out - sort of like a cosmic Hokey-Pokey because, you know, that is what it's really all about.

That's why no books were published and only a handful of videos were produced in 2011. I had to make some choices in order to move forward. Upon returning home from tour to find a deficit of registrations for the Key West Dulcimer Fest, there was a decision to make there too; not a popular decision in the least.

And after enjoying the holidays with Mrs. Futch, puttering around the house, getting caught up, re-oriented and blowing out my vice-ridden ya-ya's, I'm emerging, blinking, into the sunlight of a new year with some better plans. I'll let you in on a few of them before I get back to it.

Music

I've been producing "Dive!" now for almost four years and it's going to drop this year; period. If the Mayans are correct, then I've got 12 months before we're all turned to sheet rock or something. I will be a happier piece of sheet rock having birthed this bad boy, so it's priority number one.

Though "Storm's Sigh" and "Live At Old Songs!" have been available since the end of last year, the official release dates of both projects will be accomplished this month. (Mainly for digital distribution to pipelines such as iTunes, Spotify, Napster and more.)

As for Mohave, the trio (along with Roger Zimish and Tom Sharp) has been dead in the water since drummer Gil Oliver left town for the northeast. I've been busy on the road and with solo performances even as the guys have wondered aloud when we would get together next. Really, the next time needs to be magic in order for us all to pour the time and energy into it. It would take the right drummer and the right environment to make it work. That time may come this year and it mayn't. I know better than to make promises where there's more personality than just me involved, so stay tuned on that one.

I don't have as many festivals booked this year, but am still going to quite a few places for the first time including the Colorado Dulcimer Festival next month, Palestine Old Time Music and Dulcimer Festival in March, Augusta Spring Music Week in April and in May, the NGFDA Spring Thing and the Lone Star State Dulcimer Festival. Of course, I'll be back at Folkcraft headquarters for the Indiana Dulcimer Festival in July (with a return trip to teach ukulele in August at a brand new fest - stay tuned for details.) I haven't even begun to plan the in-between concerts and workshops but the idea is already to travel less across the country and more right here in my (now) home state of Florida.

Books

From no books in 2011 to at least three to be published this year, I'm right now working on some method books. Two of them concerning diatonic mountain dulcimer and one in support of the chromatic dulcimer. Before I get a load of ball-busting e-mails, yes - the oft-mentioned diatonic blues book will finally land. There may be more, but I kind of doubt it. I haven't knocked out more than four books in a year since 2010, I think, and I had a lot more time on my hands then.

Video

I officially got out of the video production biz (for hire) some time ago and realized last year that the state of the art was beginning to change without me. You know how it is with technology, right? First you need to upgrade the software. Then you've got to upgrade the hardware. Then you have to search for patches for the software because someone went "oops" at the hardware design phase. When it comes to media tech, especially video, which accounts for so much of our entertainment medium these days, it can be a full-time job just keeping the equipment happy and in working order so you can do what you do. The shift has slowly been tilting towards getting rid of tape altogether in favor of a fully digital format and I am very excited to embrace that. Once you shoot - you just move it onto the hard drive and you're in like Kevin Flynn. No more real time encoding and logging. It was largely the sheer amount of time that it took to produce individual episodes of Dulcimerica that kept me from doing more last year; just prohibitive in terms of actual hours in pre and post-production, especially during 19,000 miles on the road with only occasional whiffs of wi-fi. With a staff, I could make that work no problem. As the only elf in the shop, well - there I am picking and choosing battles again.

Sometime this month, I'll be taking delivery on a fully digital means of recording HD video. It's an experiment and I hope it works, greatly reducing the amount of production time so that I can shoot, cut and post as quickly as possible. In the immortal words of Dr. Walter Gibbs (Barnard Hughes) from "Tron", "Won't that be grand?" He said something else, eerily predicting the future, right after that but I'll leave it to you to find that chestnut.

So, new Dulcimerica. Soon.

Back To It

Many of you came up to me last year while on the road, or e-mailed, saying that I sounded a little off my game in this post from April of 2011 and you couldn't have been kinder or more on the money. Everyone has their breaking point and something, many things, had brought me to the brink of it back then. Thankfully, the cri de coeur was a brief one, partially soothed by the outpouring of love that was The RV Project. Then, as now, I plan to be less visible (as opposed to Les Visible, for there can be only one) so I can get to work on all of this cool stuff that's brewing. My headspace is 180° from almost a year ago. If indeed this is the last year of civilization, then I'm going to continue living the dream, making the music and loving the life. Honestly, I think we're about to enter another age of enlightenment and this is no time to be cowering under hollowed-out spaces for fear of what "might get us." If there ever was a time to be alive, alert, awake and thrilled for each second we are blessed to live - this is it.

It.

And on that note. Thanks for reading. I appreciate you and hope that you are receiving something of value from me. If not: be kind enough to tell me so and I'll do my best to deliver.

Wishing you peace, joy and, most of all, love, in this new year. Let's all win together!

Sho na bish,

Bing

Tour Update!

I'd like to call it a whirlwind tour, but three weeks does not a whirlwind make! It was more of a steady breeze that carried me through six state stopovers, two major festivals, a trade show, three house concert/workshops and more Mexican food than I've had in a number of months. As I've discovered, it's easier to update via the iPhone than attempt to find wi-fi and use my laptop, which is why I mainly shot tons of pictures and then posted them on Facebook. There are over 400 photos from Nashville, Tennessee (NAMM Show), Townsend, Tennessee (The Pickin' Porch and the Great Smoky Mountains), Bardstown, Kentucky (Kentucky Music Week), Cincinnati and Columbus, Ohio (Doug and Deena Snapp's), Portage, Pennsylvania (JT and Missy Taylor's) and Westminister, Maryland (Common Ground On The Hill.) You can find those pictures in three albums on Facebook entitled "Summer Tour 2010" parts 1, 2 and 3. The photos and captions tell the story:


Summer Tour 2010

Summer Tour 2010 Pt. 2


Summer Tour 2010 Pt. 3

Tomorrow, I fly out to Woodburn, Indiana for the 1st Annual Indiana Dulcimer Festival, teaching and performing along with Stephen Seifert and Lois Hornbostel, both of whom I've rubbed elbows with earlier on tour. Looking forward to a great weekend at Folkcraft Instruments headquarters. Returning on Monday, I'll have a quick shot at Epcot to see U2 tribute band 2U before climbing back into Buster and heading westwards to Houston, Texas for the Bayou City Music Festival, thereby kicking off the second leg of this crazy summer tour.

I'll try to be better about at least posting updates here on the blog - but if you follow me on Facebook and/or Twitter, you'll probably get more info until I'm back home with reliable wifi.

Many thanks to those of you who have signed up for the mailing list and regularly drop a line to say "hey". I do my best to answer each e-mail in timely fashion and sometimes the spam filter arbitrarily grabs a message. If you don't hear back from me, try again. We'll see you on the road.

There are Hotwire coupons you can use to get here.

Sorry, little guy

Cold killed my catfish.

A plecostomus, to be exact; an algae-sucker meant for aquariums and ponds. A bottom-dweller. I dug us a pond last year and stocked it with about two dozen tiny goldfish and one large-ish pleco. The golds were about twelve cents apiece and were an experiment to test my ability to maintain a living aqua-system in our backyard. Life isn't cheap, whether you're a fish or a fowl, but placing expensive koi and carp into an untested hole in the ground wasn't first on my list of financial priorities.

The pleco was $11, but would serve a distinct purpose: to munch on the algae that was most assuredly going to bloom in the hot Florida sun. About 6" long and a giant among the other fish, he exhibited a ferocity indigenous to catfish in general and took a swipe at the nice lady who suggested him for my new pond. "He's a fighter," she said, slipping him into a bag with some water. Words that echoed in my brain every time I had to wade knee deep into the 900 gallon installation to fish out pump and fountain elements that had become happily disengaged from their connectors.

Actually, since day one, I never saw him again until this fateful night. I sent the goldfish in first, sort of like floating canaries in liquid coal mines and when none of them rose, gasping, to the surface of the pond, I then released Sir Pleco into the depths, where he promptly slipped to the bottom and remained there. The still-clear water afforded a good look at his fearsome visage, blending almost perfectly with the rubber pond liner. As algae and other organic elements (most notably fish poop and uneaten food) began to make the area look more lived-in, I imagined that he must be quite happy, eating his fill and holding court somewhere in the three-foot depths of our mini-lake. In fact, I always imagined him growing to shark-size down there, popping up in my face whilst I changed the pump filter, prompting me to shriek and fall back exclaiming, "we're gonna need a bigger pond."

As time went on, however, I began to wonder if he had actually croaked down there, stuck in one of the unplanned crevices in the liner that had resulted from my poor excavation (it's still a nice pond, but there are things that would be done differently next time.) Or perhaps he was taken by one of the egrets that sometime go stepping across our lawn. That theory didn't hold water, pun intended, because the two dozen goldfish were imminently more interested in swimming near the surface where they could easily be eaten by egrets, cats or anything else that hung about, yet they not only thrived, but indeed multiplied in time, growing as large as I imagined the pleco must be.

But alas, tonight, after two nights of hard freezes, I went out to feed our little finned family and saw something lying on the bottom of the pond in the shallow end underneath the yellow glare of landscaping lamps. A white shiny belly was reflecting the illumination ever so much and I immediately thought "oh no." Grabbing the net, I shooed the monster goldfish away and came up with my dear pleco; freshly dead. There was no sign of life and he had not yet begun to bloat (or float, for that matter). His head was covered in a bit of algae, at least proof positive that he had plenty of the stuff to eat while down there. Living in Florida, I sincerely didn't believe that our pond would get too cold for him. In fact, the lady at PetSmart said that he was an incredibly hardy fish. A little more research revealed that plecos prefer water temperatures between 82°F and 74°F - neither of which have been the constant in our pond for the last couple of weeks.

"Oh well, little guy," I said. "I hardly knew ye."

He's been buried in the backyard, hopefully not to end up as fodder for our resident mole or possum (or as a stinky plaything for our dog, Bella.) As a living creature, I respected his life, his existence and wish him safe journey to where ever he may be traveling next. For the short time that he lived in our eco-system, I hope he had a happy life, happier than living in a tank in a big box retail store. And upon reflection, I suppose the wonder will always be there: did the other fish know him? See him? Enjoy his company? And better still, will they miss him?

On Phoenix, Tron and Re-Birth

The sound of nothing is louder than the vast din that surrounds us. Even in the midst of swirling sound, we can reach up and flip the switch inside of our heads and hearts that activates the Great Reduction In The Sound, a.k.a. G.R.I.T.S. (Well, of course it's got to have a catchy acronym. How better to remember that it's there?)

It was with great relish, corn relish, come to think of it, that this switch got activated on many occasions over the holiday weekend. Floating in the pool, bobbing about with face up-turned to sky and administering the clickety-click of that switch. Click, interstate noise be gone, please. Click, Tom Petty song be gone, please. Click, worthless and stress-inducing mind-chatter, exit stage that-away. In its place, a welcome flood of stillness swept into the empty halls and streets of my being, washing away the distractions and leaving cool pools of liquid God twinkling around my brain and heart.

It's here in the silence of these flooded spaces that inspiration rises up out of the ashes of intent. It was a wonderful weekend of chilling with Jae, later on with friends, and then once again with Jae as we tick-tocked towards the inevitable week where duties pushed and jostled for attention on the front lines of Monday morning. Back to work. Tour's over. Gardening is mostly done. The stack of to-do items towers like a triple Dagwood sammich and me, on a diet.

Production Deadlines or How I Learned To Be Responsible Again

It's easy to screw off when no-one's looking. Much harder to do that when people are paying attention, so I've been producing weekly podcasts for almost four years now, starting in 2005 with AFI Radio, which I ceased producing in the fall of 2007 (the archives remain active) while concurrently creating The Dulcimerica Video Podcast which debuted in January of 2007 and ultimately led to my first (gasp!) paying podcast gig, the DPNews Online audio and video podcasts, begun in April of this year. Working for Dulcimer Players News has brought certain things into perspective, like deadlines, for example. Mine are all self-imposed. Editor Dan Landrum said, "you know, it's a weekly podcast, you don't have to have them there on Monday." But I've chosen to get each one of the audio and video productions out by the first business day of the week. Why? To establish precedent and provide a measuring point for expectations.

How many podcasts have you seen debut, then new episodes pop up with a fury, and finally - they wink out like a long-dead dwarf star, leaving you sort of deflated, especially if you really liked them? I think it happens more often than it actually should, which is why that won't be happening with either Dulcimerica or DPNews Online. No, if they wink out, it'll be for good reason, much like with AFI Radio; reason being - I was sick of begging artists for material and figured on spending that time each week doing something that would be received perhaps a little better.

Dulcimerica has exceeded all expectations and continues to be a surprise in that people really enjoy it. The music, the tips and techniques, the travelogues and interviews. It's actually a lot bigger in concept than when I first started and the struggle has been to keep it from becoming too "Big Idea-y." There's a lot of flash and trash on television and radio already.

But DPNews Online isn't my personal platform for making a musical statement; it's part and parcel of a much larger entity that's been around longer than I've even known the mountain dulcimer, so I step with care and am careful to present the stories and music from a place just off-stage. So far, so good.

The summer issue of Dulcimer Players News has just begun landing in mailboxes around the world and I'm quite honored to be sharing the cover with hammered dulcimer player Bill Robinson. I met Bill in Morris, Illinois this past June at the Gephard Woods Dulcimer Festival and he is a fantastic player and great spirit. Our presence on the cover is in support of the idea that traditions are things that you make your own. There are ongoing conversations in the dulcimer world, for both hammered and mountain dulcimer, that have to do with maintaining traditions while moving forward in progressive fashion. Some people resist the moving forward bit. Some shy away from the roots of traditional music. Like anything in life, moderation and balance is the key to true understanding and appreciation. I've been incredibly blessed to have found the worldwide dulcimer community; it feels a little like re-birth, for without this direction in my life, and I always tell folks this when I meet them at festivals and shows, I'd probably be dead right now. Though I play other instruments and venues outside of the dulcimer festival circuit, it's the connection with the dulcimer, preservation of its history and the promotion of its future, that keeps me firmly rooted in the present. That's pretty darn cool.

Phoenix Joins Kokopelli

Part of back-to-work week is continuing recording on "Kokopelli Rising", which will be a largely tribal album of percussion, mountain dulcimer, Native American Flute and whatever else slips into the mix. A rough mix of one track, "Phoenix", is now on this page for your perusal (I've already gotten some very nice comments on the tune - thanks, all!)

End Of Line

July 9th, 1982 - I stood in line for many hours to catch the debut of Walt Disney's "Tron." I was a geek. I have the 20th anniversary DVD and am going to watch it tonight. I'm still a geek. Like the man says, there are no problems, only solutions. God bless Kevin Flynn. And now, a handful of great "Tron" quotes:

Kevin Flynn: On the other side of the screen, it all looks so easy.

=====

Sark: [paces back and forth on the deck of his carrier as he addresses his new recruits] Greetings. The Master Control Program has chosen you to serve your system on the Game Grid. Those of you who continue to profess a belief in the Users will receive the standard substandard training that will result in your eventual elmination. Those of you who renounce this superstitious and hysterical belief will be eligible to join the Warrior Elite of the MCP. Each of you will be given an identity disc.
[Displays his own disc to the crowd]
Sark: Whatever you do or whatever you learn will be imprinted on this disc. If you lose your disc or fail to follow commands, you will be subject to immediate de-resolution. That will be all.

====

Kevin Flynn: Look, just so I can tell my friends, what this dream is about, okay? Where am I?

====

Master Control Program: You're getting brutal, Sark. Brutal and needlessly sadistic.
Sark: Thank you, Master Control.

====

Dr. Walter Gibbs: Ha, ha. You've got to expect some static. After all, computers are just machines; they can't think.
Alan Bradley: Some programs will be thinking soon.
Dr. Walter Gibbs: Won't that be grand? Computers and the programs will start thinking and the people will stop.

=====

Ram: I'd say "Welcome Friend". But not here. Not like this.
Crom: I don't even know what I'm doing here.
Ram: Do you believe in the Users?
Crom: Sure I do! If I didn't have a User, than who wrote me?
Ram: That's what you're doing down here.

=====

Master Control Program: Mr. Dillinger, I am so disappointed in you.
Ed Dillinger: I'm sorry.
Master Control Program: I can't afford to have an independent program monitoring me. Do you have any idea how many outside systems I've gone into? How many programs I've appropriated?
Ed Dillinger: It's my fault. I programmed you to want too much.
Master Control Program: I was planning to hit the Pentagon next week.
Ed Dillinger: [Alarmed] The Pentagon?
Master Control Program: It shouldn't be any harder than any other company. But now... this is what I get for using humans.
Ed Dillinger: Now, wait a minute, I wrote you.
Master Control Program: I've gotten 2,415 times smarter since then.
Ed Dillinger: What do you want with the Pentagon?
Master Control Program: The same thing I want with the Kremlin. I'm bored with corporations. With the information I can access, I can run things 900 to 1200 times better than any human.
Ed Dillinger: f you think you're superior to us...
Master Control Program: You wouldn't want me to dig up Flynn's file and read it up on a VDT at the New York Times, would you?
[an image washes over the screen in Dillinger's desk. It is a newspaper with a photo of Dillinger plastered all over the front page. The headline above reads: Encom C.E.O. Indicted]
Ed Dillinger: You wouldn't dare!

====

Ed Dillinger: ENCOM isn't the business you started in your garage anymore. We're building accounts in thirty different countries. New defense systems. We have one of the most sophisticated pieces of equipment in existence.
Dr. Walter Gibbs: Oh, I know all that. Sometimes I wish I were back in that garage.
Ed Dillinger: That can be arranged, Walter.
Dr. Walter Gibbs: That was uncalled for! You know, you can remove men like Alan and me from the system, but we helped create it. And our spirit remains in every program we design for this computer.
Ed Dillinger: Walter, it's getting late, I've got better things to do than to have religious discussions with you. Don't worry about ENCOM anymore; it's out of your hands now.

=====

Master Control Program: I've got a little challenge for you, Sark - a new recruit. He's a tough case, but I want him treated in the usual manner. Train him for the games... let him hope for a while... and blow him away.
Sark: You've got it. I've been hopin' you'd send me somebody with a little more guts... what kind of program is he?
Master Control Program: He's not any kind of program, Sark. He's a User.
Sark: A user?
Master Control Program: That's right. He pushed me... in the other world. Somebody pushes me, I push back. So I brought him down here... What's the matter, Sark? You look nervous.
Sark: Well, I - it's just - I don't know, a User, I mean... Users wrote us. A User even wrote you...
Master Control Program: No one User wrote me. I'm worth a couple million of their man-years!
Sark: But-what if I can't...?
Master Control Program: You rather take your chances with me? Want me to slow down your power cycles for you?
Sark: Wait... I need that...
Master Control Program: Then pull yourself together. Get this clown trained. I want him in the Games until he dies playing. Acknowledge.
Sark: Acknowledged, Master Control...
Master Control Program: End of line.