Changing of Seasons
Marcola, Oregon
August 7, 2006
Dan the Tan Van Mileage: 267, 146
Changing of Seasons
I’ve never had a handle on when the seasons technically change. It just
never felt quite right to me. As a child it always seemed that Christmas was
roughly in the middle of winter, and somehow it still surprises me when I hear
on the radio in December that winter has officially begun - “Wait! It’s
already been cold for weeks!” It’s the same with summer. I’m
well into the summer groove before the official season begins. In our county
in North Carolina school starts next week, and after a couple of years as an
administrator, Deanna is going back into the classroom to teach elementary ESL.
Does that mean it’s fall now?
The season officially changed for me this weekend, though - from home season
to road season. I’m writing from a friend’s beautiful little cabin
outside of Eugene, Oregon, where I’m spending a day catching my breath
between shows. It’s been a lovely weekend here, playing a small outdoor
concert by a rolling river and teaching a couple of creative writing workshops
in Duvall, Washington, then playing in Vancouver, WA last night at a homeless
outreach project there. The folks who hosted the concert took a huge woodworking
warehouse where they do job training and meaningful work and converted it for
the night into a concert hall - white Christmas lights hanging from the ceiling,
great sound system and lighting, and the smell of cut wood in the air. It was
an unlikely setting, but a magical one.
Tomorrow I’ll drive the rental car back up to Seattle, play at a house
concert there, then fly home on Wednesday, spend Thursday at home and leave
again Friday, this time for my twenty-year high school reunion. June and July
were spent mostly at home, which was the longest stretch of sleeping most nights
in my own bed that I’ve seen in years. With this northwest run, though,
I’m officially back on the road ...or the plane, as it were. And thus
the season changes for me.
The new record, Change, isn’t officially out until September 12, but I’ve got it in hand (and if you care to order it, MJ will go ahead and send it now), and it feels so good to be getting ready to put it out in the world. I worked on this record for a full year, from the time I recorded the first demos to receiving all of the boxes in the driveway a couple of weeks ago, and I feel like it was a year well spent.
Someone asked me recently about performing on a Sunday in Black Mountain sometime
this year and I checked my calendar to look for a free Sunday and found that
there isn’t one free. It’s going to be a very dense time for the
next few months, including shows all over the US and Germany, and a trip to
Guatemala next month to do some PEG
work down there. The most fun part of that trip, I’m guessing, will be
visiting the preschool in Tzanchaj that was built with your donations and opened
with sixty kids in January. I just got this picture of one of the smaller classes.
Cool, huh?
It’s always fun to get back to places that I get to infrequently, like
the Northwest. I see people I haven’t spent time with in years, and I’m
always amazed at the circuitous connections. A woman from Black Mountain, was
out in the small town of Duvall to visit a brand new granddaughter and came
with her family to the show. A friend of a friend of mine in Virginia got a
note saying I’d be here and came along. Another woman had seen me in Southern
California years ago and saw the dates on the web site. As an independent musician,
without the million dollar ad budgets of pop stars, I’m so grateful for
that grassroots support that keeps me going.
In July Deanna and I had a visit from our good friends from Germany, Sonja and
Chris, and their 18-month-old boy Jonathan, who is my Godson. They were with
us for four weeks, which for many friends might be a bit long, but for us was
just right, or maybe not quite long enough. The parting was eased by knowing
that Deanna and I will get to visit them in November. One sure does get accustomed
to waking up to the sound of that giggle, though.
I did do some regional shows this summer. The Bele Chere festival and a couple
of shows in Montreat were particularly fun, since I was performing with a trio
configuration and with hip-hop dancers 3 Def. No kidding. There's more of that
to come this fall, so keep your eye out.
As sweet as that home time was, though, I've got to admit I’m excited about being back on the road. Even after fifteen years of doing it, I really love playing music for people. Of course, part of the excitement is also about introducing people to the new record. I spoke yesterday with Evan Brubaker, who produced Corners and co-produced Spin, and he said he thinks it’s far and away the best work I’ve done. Coming from him, that means a great deal to me. We’ll be sending it out to radio stations and magazines in the next couple of weeks.
By the way, we also just got in some new t-shirts. They just say “Change”
on the front in big letters. That’s kind of fun because it can be read
in so many ways. I like the imperative version, as though it were a command
- “Change!” The fun part of that, of course, is that you can’t
disobey. If you want to check out the T’s, give MJ a call during office
hours at 800-995-6825 (there are so many options of color and size that it’s
impractical to put them on the web order page). By the way, these are locally
made 100% organic sweatshop-free cotton t-shirts. Change, as they say, begins
at home.
And speaking of new stuff - check out the new overhaul of www.davidlamottefan.com. This is a website run by Barb Ruehl, who lives in Chicago. She’s done such an excellent job with the whole thing that I think my web site’s going to get jealous! There are all kinds of cool things on there, including streaming tracks from Change, if you want to give it a test drive.
I’ll look forward to seeing you somewhere out there on the road. Fall
is pretty solid and Spring is actually booking up pretty fast, so I’m
bound to get where you are eventually. And if not, you can send along your friends
when I’m in their neighborhoods - there’s a good new sampler video
people can check out to give them a feel for what a concert might be like at
http://www.myspace.com/davidlamotte
if you want to send that info along. New England and California are about the
only big chunks of the mainland where I won’t tour before the end of the
year, and it looks likely that I’ll do both of those in the spring (y’know,
spring - that’s just after Christmas, right?).
Thanks for everything. I’ll see you out there.
David
