A Jazzy Little Christmas
Sadly couldn’t make it home for Thanksgiving, one of the disadvantages of living far away. I could, however, go spend the holiday with my childhood best friend!
One of the things I love about my friends back home is the connection we have through music – that’s how alot of us let…so when we get together, it usually ends up in some sort of music jam sesh. w00t!
So, as it was Thanksgiving, meaning time to prepare for Christmas, we pulled out a few violin/piano music books and sight read through a few songs.
Books, Balloons & Cougars
This past weekend was busy…explored alot of places, saw alot of things. I’ll let the images do most of the talking, but let’s just say I spent as much time outside as possible – beautiful blue skies, upper 70s, no humidity. Amazing.
Check out the art on this food trailer:
Texas Book Festival, held on the Capitol grounds:
Of course there can’t be a festival in Austin without live music. There’s something really special about Austin…I can’t put my finger quite on it, but I would be willing to bet that the amount of live music and the beautiful weather has something to do with the underlying liveliness and energy that seems to permeate throughout the city.
Nothing like a good old-fashioned jam sesh. Love seeing stuff like this – musicians who just genuinely love to jam & people of all ages who enjoy taking it all in:
Exploring Hyde Park:
Thriller dance class – prepping for Thrillerfest, coming up soon! My favorite part about it – and about many events in Austin – there are people there of all ages…middle school to middle-aged. Kids, parents, friends, single people, couples. Everyone just kinda co-exists and does things together. I like it.
Halloween fest. up in Lakeway. Check out these beautiful hot air balloons!
While wandering around checking out the balloons, I heard a band playing on the other side of the park- went to check it out of course. Couldn’t believe the band is made up up middle + high school aged kids – between 7th & 10th grade. These kids were so talented.
It’s one thing to be able to play a few chords on the guitar, but it’s another to be a real musician and these guys are def. on their way – super talented, good intonation, excellent improv. skills and pretty darn good stage presence, which is huge as a peformer!
Two things about the following video.
#1 – check out the piano solo at around :35. Stellar improv, especially for a 15 yr old!!!
#2 – go to 1:59 and listen to the convo in the background. a middle aged man came up to me and asked if one of the band members was my boyfriend. (???). The band members are between 7th & 10th grade.
I was completely taken aback by the question, so all I could spit out was: “I’m 23…that’d be illegal.” The guy was clearly embarrassed and appeared genuinely shocked that I was 23. He managed to get out something like, “Oh! …you just…look so small…uhhh… takeitasacompliment…!!!” …and then he made like a banana and split.
I’m still debating whether he thought I looked young, or thought I was a cougar. I’m going to go with the “looking young” option. SIGH.
Took care of alot of work Sunday am, went to the Texas bookfest in the afternoon – heard Ben Yogoda + Roy Peter Clark’s panel on “The English Language: Under the Hood
.” Takeaways:
So interesting! Love stuff like this.
Afterward, I went over to an Oregonian friend’s house for a house-warming / fall get-together. I made pumpkin spice cupcakes (Yes, the purple glittery stuff IS edible!)
And spent about 3 hours carving a pretty bomb.com pumpkin:
Hot Bodies In Motion
I have a good friend named Ben…he is honestly probably one of the greatest people I have ever met. I’m not sure I have enough good things to say about him.
Anyway, he is a friend from home and up in Seattle right now, probably changing the world. Oh yes, and he’s is this band that I am digging, Hot Bodies In Motion.
I hope to someday see them perform live; however for now, I’ll settle for this video. Here’s Hot Bodies In Motion performing ‘Pleasure Buffet’.
We Jammed
Awhile back I mentioned enjoying the Austic music scene as I’ve had the opportunity to learn / make music in a whole different way than how I was trained.
Rather than learning by reading music that someone has already composed (i.e. what you see in the previous post!), here in Austin, I’ve put the sheet music aside and am working on playing by ear as well as collaborating with fellow musicians to create our own musical ventures. (;
Neither method is better nor worse, but I know that I have been growing tremendously as a musician down here, which is lovely.
So last night Eddie came over for a last time, as he is about to leave for grad. school. (of course, this is the year of goodbyes afterall! ]: ) ANYWAY, we wanted to get in one last jam and record a few tracks. Hence the rando. cords and mics all over my apt. in this video.
Enjoy: