Musings from the South Shore

The long process is nearly over

2011-12-06T13:01:00.003-04:00

It's taken several months but the long wait for the finished Wires Rosewood & Roots is almost over. The manufacturing is underway and they've promised me the finished goods should be ready to ship in about 10 days. They should arrive just in time for Christmas and there will be an official release early in 2012.

Thanks are due to several people during the production of Wires. Not least is the long-suffering. . .

Julia Williamson who had to listen to all the intermediate versions of the songs. Julia also had a lot of input into pretty well every aspect of the production including listening to the music and making suggestions for the artwork on the CD case. To give specific credit where it's due, it was Julia who made the suggestion that we should add some other instrumentation to the CD so that it is more than just 12 solo guitar pieces. Without that idea, I would never have browsed the Music Nova Scotia database and met. . .

David Findlay. David has been in music production for over 25 years and brought a wealth of experience and musical talent to the project. From playing several instruments, to mixing and mastering, to overall production, without David, Wires would not be the album that it is. In addition to David, two other musicians contributed their time and talent. . .

Kev Corbett, Nova Scotia's Musician of the Year for 2011 came into Lunenburg for an afternoon and laid down some fabulous backing tracks for Flea's Reel. I initially asked Kev to play percussion and we weren't thinking about bass for it but Kev put his upright bass in the car "just in case" and came up with a great addition to the song. Speaking of laying down the bottom end. . .

Alyssa Wright, my favourite cellobabe, put together a great cello track for Out of Work. I'm particularly grateful to Lyss for coming up with a great track with not very much input from your humble correspondent. It is also noteworthy that she could turn her talents to the job when most of her thoughts were consumed with the health and upcoming surgery of. . .

Don Bray, who engineered and recorded Lyss while waiting for surgery. I met up with Don and Alyssa while I was at the OCFF conference and had a chance to catch up. All of Don's friends are extremely pleased that the operation was a success and he is well on the road to recovery. Once the music was in the can, we then turned our attention to the CD package itself and while I was at the conference and I also met with. . .

Paul Mills, one of the best folk music producers in the country (if not beyond our borders as well), who is also a graphic designer. Paul was very patient with the artist who got fixated on one design for a while but eventually came to see things from a different view. With a good deal of input from Paul we came up with a great design which he then translated into the graphics files need to upload to the manufacturer. It's a simple four-page spread using photographs taken at a photoshoot with . . .

Christian Stalley, a music lover who takes great pictures. We shot about 130 pictures over a couple of hours and selected several of them to use both on the CD package and in some other promotional material.

One final word of thanks goes to Lloyd Williams, my friend and fellow musician in Lunenburg. Kev's bodhran needed a new head and we didn't have time to replace it so Lloyd very kindly lent us his to us for the session.

So now I'm waiting for the e-mail from the manufacturer to let me know the CDs have been shpped. Once it's out on the street, I'm going to be putting together some dates and bring it out to the world. Stay tuned for more details. . .

Wires, Rosewood & Roots

2011-10-11T10:58:00.002-03:00

Tomorrow, my friend Manitoba Hal and I jump in the van and head off to Niagara Falls for the Ontario Council of Folk Festivals conference. We'll be stopping in Ottawa on the way and will be there in time for the fun to start on Thursday.

One of the CDs we'll have in the van with us will be a rough burn of my new album entitled Wires Rosewood & Roots. WR&R is a suite of 12 instrumental pieces for acoustic guitar and will be officially released in the not-too-distant future. Some of the songs are guitar solos and some have other instrumentation as well. The guitar will always be the focus and the other instruments will provide a little rounding out and a full rich sound.

The recording has been underway over the summer and in September, I connected with a new Lunenburg resident, David Findlay, to produce the album. David is a great producer who has been in the music and recording industry for many years. He brings playing talent to the record as well as production and has made a number of suggestions on how to arrange the songs to bring out the best in them.

We still have to mix Flea's Reel with some bass and percussion tracks laid down just yesterday by my friend Kev Corbett. Kev is a multi-instrumentalist sideguy, songwriter and performer who is one of the nominees for Music Nova Scotia's Musician Of The Year. It's an honour to have him on the record. We're also waiting on a cello part for Out of Work from another good friend Alyssa Wright who is my go-to "cello babe" (her description). She played on Returning Home and Come From Away as well

Although the music isn't complete yet, you can hear some of the rough mixes (the ones we'll be listening to on the road trip) at a hidden page on my website. Please give it a listen and let me know what you think. For the record, I do know that Flea's Reel isn't a reel. Reels are in 4/4 time and Flea's is in 9/8. It's more of a slip jig or maybe a swing waltz.

And if you're in Niagara Falls at the OCFF conference, I'll be playing at a guerilla showcase on Saturday night. Songwriters Unite are hosting a series of songwriter circles during the conference and your humble correspondent will be in the 2am-3am time slot on Saturday night/Sunday morning. Come on up to room 305 in the Marriott Gateway on the Falls and catch some great singer/songwriters as they strut and fret their hour.

It's a busy time for the next few weeks so in an agony of haste, off I go to start packing for OCFF.

Cheers, Bob

2011-06-21T10:15:00.005-03:00

First a brief weather update - the rain has stopped and the sun's supposed to shine all week. And now for the news. . .

The big news we are very pleased to announce is that your humble correspondent will be playing some dates accompanying Bonnie Ste-Croix. Bonnie is a great singer/songwriter originally from Gaspé and now living in Halifax after many years in Vancouver. To give you the short version, we were both booked to play a Songwriters Circle at Lunenburg Sessions in May. I offered to back up Bonnie with some guitar playing and a bit of harmony at the circle. The performance was well received and we decided to try it again.

Our first major event was on June 9 and we had a wonderful time at Fables in Tatamagouche. Chuck and Hanna Hunziker are the owners of Fables and they present a range of performance arts events every week. If I didn't love living in Lunenburg so much, I think I'd move to Tatamagouche and become a member.

A great deal of music is happening in Lunenburg as well. Traci and Rob at Scuttlebutt are presenting live music Thursdays through Sundays. I'll be back for another night of fun there on July 23rd. Also back for the summer is Anna Ludlow's Kitchen Ceilidh at the Fish Factoryon Wednesdays. As always, Lunenburg Sessions is presenting music in the Academy on the first Tuesday of every month.

Hope to see you out at a music event soon.

Spring on the South Shore

2011-05-19T16:35:00.004-03:00

Oh my, what a rainy spring. The boatbuilders in town have turned their skills to making arks. I was by the Bluenose II restoration site a few days ago and saw an old guy with a beard who had a couple of saws and a chisel in his hand. He was muttering something about not enough animal accomodations. I couldn't quite make out the name embroidered on his overalls but it looked suspiciously like Noah.

Ah, but as I sit and muse this afternoon, the sun is shining, the leaves are starting to explode on the chestnut tree and it's looking beautiful in Lunenburg. The ice cream parlours are open again and people are walking about without jackets (and umbrellas).

I've just spent a couple of hours restructuring the website although you shouldn't notice any difference - it just makes maintaining the site a little easier. Thank goodness for my computer skills; I knew they'd come in handy someday. In truth, there are features of being a programmer that I miss even though I wouldn't want to go back to earning a living at it.

Along with the underlying structural changes the website has one new feature. Andy Flinn and Ariana Nasr from Wolfville, NS have been putting on both a concert series called Night Kitchen and an annual music festival called AMP Festival for several years. On Mother's Day, I was honoured to play (with Ariana) at the AMPFest Sunday Night Gala Performance. There's a video of our performance of Senses of You on Youtube and you can now link to the video from the Music/Lyrics menu on my website or by clicking here.

Coming up on June 11th, I have another return engagement at Scuttlebutt - a great little restaurant on Montague Street in Lunenburg. The owners, Rob and Traci, are lovely people who put on live music in the restaurant most weekend evenings and it's a pleasure to be playing there sorta regularly. Come on down and support live music while enjoying good food in a relaxed and casual atmosphere. More info on Scuttlebutt can be found on Facebook - click here for a link to the FB group.

The following weekend, June 18 sees me back at the Harbour Folk Kitchen Party at the Rose and Kettle Tea Room in Cole Harbour. For more information, click here to visit the Harbour Folk website.

And one last but very important thing - Get Well Soon thoughts to David Walsh who is in St Mikes's Hospital in Toronto recovering from injuries suffered in a motorcycle accident. We're cheering for ya big guy.

2011-03-07T12:11:00.003-04:00

My goodness, it's been a long time since I posted. Music took a back seat for several months while we worked on the house and it took some time to get motivated again. Inevitably, all writers hit writer's block and my name came up in the rotation because I wasn't playing and wasn't writing anything. The good news is that I'm back in the saddle (not literally, you understand - I'm not going to become a singing cowboy) and enjoying playing and composing again.

I have two finished guitar instrumentals and a third that is almost complete. I also have a work in progress on getting lucky (in several senses) on the internet. There may be a verse in it about what a huge time-suck Facebook is. I'm not addicted to the internet. Really, I'm not. I can stop any time I want.

Sometimes it's the little things that kickstart you. For several months now, I've been playing in a jam organized by my friend Laurie every couple of weeks. I have to learn a new language living in Nova Scotia. I used to call it a song circle but down here it's a jam. If you're walking down Lincoln Street in Lunenburg every other Friday afternoon, you might see several musicians sitting in one of the storefronts, and if you stick your head in the door, you'll hear some interesting sounds. It's an eclectic mix of styles and we do have people dropping in just to listen, so if you're in the neighbourhood...

Here's some news on upcoming performances. On April 1st, 6:00 to 9:00pm, I'll be playing for the dinner and after crowd at the Scuttlebutt Restaurant on Montague Street in Lunenburg. The owners, Traci and Rob, are great people and are encouraging local artists by putting on music events and I'm pleased to be part of it. The food is good and won't break the bank. They have a liquid license so you can have a tasty beverage while dining and while listening after. One of my personal favourites: they serve breakfast all day so you can get bacon, scrambled eggs, and home fries whenever. Yum. Oh yeah, no cover charge. How good can it get? Click here to link to Scuttlebutt's Facebook page.

I'll also be part of a Songwriters Circle at Lunenburg Sessions on Tuesday May 3 at 7:30pm in the 3rd Floor Theatre of the Lunenburg Academy. I love doing songwriter's circle generally and I'm looking forward to this one in particular. Joining me will be Catahoula Brown, who was featured not long ago on CBC's Atlantic Airwaves, and Bonnie Ste. Croix who is a great singer/songwriter living in Halifax. Bonnie is one of the finalists at Folk Fiesta for the last spot at the 2011 Folk Harbour Festival. Click here to link to Lunenburg Sessions Facebook page.

Shortly after the Songwriter's Circle, it's off to Wolfville for the 3rd Annual AMP Festival, presented by Andy Flynn and Ariana Nasr. I'm on the bill for Mother's Day Sunday Night, May 8th. The format is a rapid-fire event with quick changeovers between acts so we get to see a lot of performers in a short period of time. The other good news on this gig is that Ariana will be joining me to play violin with me. Click here to link to the AMP Festival website.

So that's it for the moment. I will try to be a more regular correspondent now that music moves me again.

Cheers, Bob

Life continues in Lunenburg

2010-07-23T11:17:00.003-03:00

Hi again. It's been a while. I've been MIA for the last couple of months and I'm finally resurfacing.

As soon as I arrived home safe and sound from the Ontario tour, we started doing some renovations around the house. Among other things, we pulled down a chimney that ran right up the middle of the house in order to make some badly needed room in a closet and the basement. Let me tell you how long fingernails last when you're chiselling bricks out and tossing them into the dumpster. Not long - think nanoseconds. The whole project lastedmany weeks and in that time, the guitars stayed mostly in their cases and I hadn't been playing much at all. At the end of a hard day, I had virtually no energy left to play.

The good news is that the reno is complete and the only outstanding task is painting. The previous owners painted every room white so we're adding colour to the place. My nails are almost back to their pre-reno length and playing is a pleasure.

For the last few weeks, I've been playing in a song circle at my friend Art's. It's a fun group - some guitars, some fiddles, some flute, some keyboards all making for an eclectic mix on a Wednesday evening.

Coming up in the near future, I have a fun evening ahead tonight. One of the local inns, The Rum Runner, has a kitchen party on Friday nights. It's run by one of Lunenburg's many amateur musicians (who is also a town councillor and a local business owner) and he invites three or four others to play with him in a workshop/song circle type of environment.

It's probably not held in the kitchen but I'm finding out that East Coast kitchen parties are a big thing. Parties start in the kitchen (probably cause that's where the fridge is) and music usually breaks out and a good time is had by all.

Another event coming up that should be fun is the Bridgewater Growing Green Festival on August 21st. There will be a farmer's market, music, local book readings, art displays, food & drink, kid & family activities, community group booths, skills demonstrations and workshops. I'm not sure of the schedule yet but I'll be busking for part of the time and playing a set on the farmer's market stage.

In between, I'll be joining my erstwhile partner in rhyme, Jives, to head back up to Northwestern Ontario for the 8th Annual Live From The Rock festival. If you're up in that part of the world August 6/7/8, don't miss it. Red Rock is a great little town and LFTR is one of my favourite festivals. I'll be part of the sound crew again this year, running the Fish and Game Stage, hosting the Open Mic, and hosting Thursday night's campfire.

And finally, news on what's been going on with the website. I discovered an error in the pull-down menus that omitted a link to the Live at The Rose and Kettle page. The menus have been fixed so you can now get to the page from the Music/Lyrics menu. Also, I've added a new video page. While I was in Ontario, I had the good fortune to be asked to record a segment for the Hamilton Community program Hamilton Life on Shaw Cable 14. They sent me a DVD of the segment and I've put it up on the website for those of outside of Shaw's Hamilton feed. It's under the Music/Lyrics menu on the website.

Cheers, Bob

On the road

2010-04-08T11:31:00.002-03:00

Hi from the road, everyone. I've been having fun catching up with old friends, playing for new ones, generally having fun while Julia is at home having work done around the house and rediscovering that the life of a travelling musician isn't all the glamour of the show itself.

I'm through the GTA portion of the tour, looking forward to the show on Saturday on the shores of beautiful Georgian Bay at the Zen Waffle Inn in Waubaushene. Then on Monday, I'm off to Northern Ontario. It will be an interesting change to get up there in April instead of August when the long-suffering Jives and I head off to Red Rock for the Live From The Rock Festival. The CBC weather report is calling for freezing rain and snow up there in the next couple of days so I'm hoping it's all blown itself away by the weekend so I don't get snowbound. Sure makes a change from last weekend when I was in Toronto and it was 25 degrees.

Unfortunately, we had a scheduling conflict and we've had to cancel the house concert in Marathon on April 17. We've moved the Wawa performance to the 17th and moved it to the Legion. There are compensations though. I've added a show in Sackville, NB on the 24th which should be fun. Some friends have played there and the two brothers who run the Hamilton Guitar Association are originally from there and they've told me all about Sackville so I'm looking forward to that one.

One of the unfortunate side effects of being on the road is that I've missed Lunenburg Sessions. Last Tuesday we had Dusty Keleher in and I was sorry to miss that one. If you haven't heard of him and you like traditional Irish music, you should check him out. He's on Facebook and Myspace and worth a look.

Coming up on May's Sessions, for which I will be home, we're having my friend (and recently-arrived CFA) Manitoba Hal Brolund who is now Nova Scotia Hal having moved to Shelburne, just along the South Shore from Lunenburg.

Today it's time to help my mother buy a new computer. Her old one is as slow as a snail and I'm going to look for something new and fast for her. The only concern I have is that she's used to Windows XP and we're most likely to end up with a system that has Windows 7. I'm not convinced I like it. I have it on my netbook (that came with me on the road) and it wouldn't have been my choice if I could have found one with XP. There's probably a song somewhere in my brain about Microsoft and it wouldn't be very complementary.

So that's it for now. Stay well and I hope to see you at a show sometime soon.

Cheers, Bob

Feeling ill in beautiful weather

2010-03-18T10:38:00.004-03:00

DRAT! This wasn't supposed to happen. I came back from vacation with a cold - I think I picked it up in Toronto either in the hotel or on the plane back to Halifax. Either way, it's taken hold and isn't letting go. I am feeling better than at the beginning of the week but it still means I had to postpone the CD Release concert and the House Concert at Frank's Place.

Thanks to everyone who sent me get well wishes. At least it's sunny and warm on the South Shore and the feeling of spring is in the air.

Big news - after years of resisting, I finally signed up to Facebook. It's insidious the amount of time you can spend (dare I say "waste"? he he he) watching what the rest of the world is doing. I sorta rationalize it at the moment cause I'm feeling unwell and don't have the energy to do much of anything other than sit at my computer but I will have to change my habits once I'm back to full strength. Can you get Facebook Addiction and is there a 12-step program for it?

That's all for now. Cheers, Bob

2010-03-10T10:02:00.002-04:00

Well, goodness me, where did the time go? It was late January when I was last in here with any news and now here it is March already.

Preparations are well under way for the CD release party. We've been having a ton of fun working out set lists, rehearsing, and generally getting ready for the big night. If you haven't been to the Lunenburg Academy theatre, you're in for a treat. The acoustics are great and the room is cosy and intimate so I'm really looking forward to a fantastic evening.

I've added a few new dates on the tour in Northwestern Ontario - a house concert in the Soo, a house concert in Wawa, and a cafe in Thunder Bay. Check the In Performance page on the website for more details.

That's it for the moment - thanks for stopping by.

Cheers, Bob

2010-01-28T15:53:00.000-04:00

Hi again, everyone.

First of all, thanks to everyone who's been in to look at the new website and thank you for all your positive comments about the new look and the new songs. I'm spiralling in on having it static for a while and I've made a few more changes.

The first big news is that I've set the date for the official launch of Come From Away. It will be held at the Lunenburg Academy on Friday March 19th. I'm looking forward to it and I've asked several local musicians to join me on stage, including Eilidh Campbell, Chip Veinotte, Brian Tanner, and Barb Morris. I'm still working on a couple of ideas and may have a few surprises. I'll keep you posted.

Second big news is that Come From Away is available on-line through CD Baby. There's a link on the Come From Away page or you can link from right here. Click here to pop open a link to the CD Baby page. You can buy a copy of the CD or download the whole CD or individual songs.

Finally, there are a few changes to the site that you might be interested in:

The main addition is that I've added a link to For The Sake Of The Song under the About Bob menu. My friend Sean McGaughey of Midland, Ontario is a singer/songwriter himself and an avid fan of the genre. He interviews songwriters about music and podcasts them from his website. He was kind enough to include me in his podcast some time ago and our conversation is now on-line here. There's also a link to Sean's site so you can listen to his other conversations.

I've also changed the Guestbook a bit. The original version had no spam trap in it and I was being deluged with junk entries. I eventually turned off the "Add a comment" feature inside the Guestbook but for the benefit of the spammers who went directly to the "Add" file, I put in a redirection to the YouTube video of the Monty Python "SPAM" sketch. It's one of my favourites and seemed appropriate. Now the Guestbook has a Captcha screen in it that asks you to enter a randomly generated string and click on an "I am Human" button before proceeding. I hope this works to keep the spam at bay.

Finally, the Press Kit menu has a link to my SonicBids EPK (which will probably interest you only if you're a booking agent).

Thanks for stopping by. Feel free to send me an e-mail, sign the guestbook, add a comment to the blogosphere here.

Cheers, Bob

2010-01-08T15:51:00.000-04:00

Hi again from Lunenburg. The storm blew itself out after a couple of days leaving us to clear the driveway and ponder how many people have heart attacks while shovelling snow.

The exciting news is that the new CDs (and download cards) have arrived from the manufacturer so we're now live with the newly designed website. If you're a return visitor to the site, the looks are different but much of the old content is still here along with some new features.

The big feature is the new CD, called Come From Away. which has its own page. There's a sound player that lets you listen to clips of song on the album and you can read the lyrics there as well.

The history of the new CD and its title is quite simple really. Nova Scotians divide the world into two parts: Nova Scotia and everywhere else, which they call "Away." The term "Come From Away" refers to someone who has moved here from somewhere else. I wrote quite a few of the songs on the CD while I was in the process of moving down east from Ontario. Once I was settled I started exploring some of the history of the place, which started the muses working as well. There are a couple of relationship songs, one of which is a co-write with my erstwhile partner in rhyme, Jennifer Ives. Of course, it wouldn't be a Bob CD without a guitar instrumental or two.

Much of the recording was done in Lunenburg in a week in July, 2009 then later in the summer we added some of the other musicians in various places in Ontario. I am honoured to have such fine players who contributed their time and inspirations to the music. In alphabetical order the other players were Don Bray, Eilidh Campbell, Wendell Ferguson, Jennifer Ives, Tom Leighton, Mark Mariash, Barb Morris, Chip Veinotte and Alyssa Wright.

Along with the new CD, I have a live recording that's available only on download card. Yep, Bob goes digital. (About time, come the murmurings from the audience. *grin*) The download cards will be available at live shows while supplies last. The performance was recorded at the Harbour Folk Kitchen Party on July 18, 2009 at the Rose and Kettle Tea Room in Cole Harbour, NS.

Don Bray gets a big mention for both recordings because he brought a shedload of gear to Lunenburg for the studio recording, then dragged it all down to Dartmouth and back, setting it up and tearing it down several times during the week before taking it back home. Not only that, he plays mandolin and slide Hawaiian King guitar and sings some backup vocals.

I had the greatest of intentions of having everything completed at one go, only to discover I hadn't checked the size of some PDF files I'd created. They were far too big to fit in the website space and would have taken far to long even for the most dedicated follower to download. So it's back to the drawing board to shrink the files to a manageable size.

I've added some gigs to the listing - coming up next on January 23rd is the Carleton's Sing For Your Supper Songwriters Circle hosted by Kev Corbett. Kev and I will be joined by a couple of other singer/songwriters in a workshop setting. Come on down and enjoy the music - and the food too. The Carleton's a good place to eat as well as to listen to good music. Check the In Performance page for details

So now I'm off to try and shrink some PDFs. Hope you like what you see and hear. If you do, please sign the Guestbook or drop me an e-mail.

Cheers, Bob

Hello from the South Shore

2010-01-01T15:22:00.000-04:00

Ah, it's a chilly snowy New Year's Day in Lunenburg. The snow is falling, the sky is grey and the foghorn is sounding its mournful cry across the front harbour.

Here we are into 2010 already. It didn't seem all that long ago that Don Bray was here and we were almost taking root in the attic/studio laying down the tracks for Come From Away. I'm told that the CDs will be in my hot little hands on Wednesday and the official release can begin. It's been a long fun trip getting this project complete and there's more to come.

There's a new design to the website coming along with the new CD. Much of the information is the same as in the old site and we've added some new links, changed things around to make it easy to navigate, eliminated the frame structure (which is a stylistic no-no any more). There are just a few more changes to make before the updating starts, next week sometime.

More to come in a little while. I've just set up the blog as part of the new website layout so watch this space.

Cheers, Bob