It’s about starting over . com

Due to popular demand, I’m adding a new category–Performances. This will give people the opportunity to keep up with my (hopefully increasing) performance schedule even if they’re far away and can’t attend.

Why is this important for my starting-over community? Performing is a huge step for me. It requires a huge leap of faith, and it also forces me to deal with a lot of issues, some physical and many emotional. I remember the first time I performed, that is, this time around. It was at the Tzora Folk Club, and my hands were shaking so frantically that I didn’t even need to strum my guitar–I just placed my fingers over the strings and the frantic shaking took care of the rest. Percussion was provided by my knees.

I performed a song titled, A New Life, and I literally felt I was performing naked in front of about 100 strangers. I don’t know if it would have been easier to perform a song I didn’t write, but I had been asked to perform this one and, truly, I wanted to.

Yes, I do want to perform, almost more than anything. And I’m determined to overcome any anxiety I might have about it. I’ll post here about my performances because I want my readers to understand that doing almost anything new is frightening, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it. If it’s something you want, something that will bring you happiness and fulfillment, you should go for it. The anxiety will fade with experience, and the people who love you will support you in every way because they want you to be happy and healthy. After all, what is life about anyway?

 So please stay tuned, and check out my performance category from time to time. I’ll give you stage-fright updates too–the most recent is that I’m really starting to enjoy it a LOT more, my hands are shaking a LOT less, and it really is one of the big loves of my life.

Yes, another year has flown by. I have one more final to go, and I’ll have finished the school year with (hopefully) flying colors. So far, I have one “B” and all the rest “A’s.” I’m really hoping for another “A,” but it’s the vocal performance final and, so far, that “A” has eluded me. It’s been “B’s” all the way on that one, but who knows, maybe this year????

It’s been a landmark year for me in many ways, and I hope to blog about it during the summer. For now though, wish me luck!

Just a quick post to say that if there’s one thing I love more than doing music, it’s doing music at a place like the Jacob’s Ladder Folk Festival. This year, I performed with my new group, Et al. and I also presented a guitar workshop for beginners. I’ll do my best to post a full report of how everything went over the weekend, but I wanted to get a few words out there to say that it’s just amazing.

 For sure, Murphey was with us every step of the way, but maybe that was the best part of the whole experience–so many things went wrong or not according to plan, yet like a cat landing on its feet, the performance seemed charmed from the get-go. The place was packed, no one left during the performance, and the audience took part in every song whether it was by singing along, crying, clapping, dancing or just plain being enthusiastic. I felt like giving them a huge, collective hug :-)!

I also want to post a public thanks here to a few people, and then I have to run off to a lesson. Huge thanks to:

Lynn Lewis for adding his amazing guitar skills on one song, and for stepping in the night before.

Steve Silberman for doing the video thing.

Judi and Lynn Lewis for being wonderful stage managers.

Dvir and Michal Cafri, Rahel Jaskow, John and Tammy Worley for being amazing members of Et al.

The entire audience for their wonderful pressence and feedback.

The sound guys for their efforts, but not for the feedback.

Last but not least, Menachem and Yehudit Vinegrad for doing the whole JL thing year after year.

More on this later!