Nearly every week (save for a few weeks in July and August), I take the bus and metro to a refugee center near Molenbeek to write songs from the written and spoken words of immigrants in search of a better life. Even though I volunteer, I think of this work as my once a weekday…
Category: storytelling
Will you join us?
Malcolm and I have spent a lot of time trying to clearly communicate what makes the Story-to-Song method different than other songwriting out there. Having been trained as scholars in the Prescott College Sustainability Education program, we have learned firsthand how important it is to be able to offer a clear and concise response to…
North of the border
It is the final day of April, and I am sitting in a third floor room typing away as the rain falls in a cold, wet blanket outside my window. These past two weeks, I have traveled under the auspice of Story-to-Song to two very different locations, cities, and climes in Canada. Last week, I…
What now?
The Sandbox may be over, but my work as a startup entrepreneur is just beginning. The past three months feel like a surreal, frenetic blur. They were very real and quite invaluable. I took an abstract idea and found a way to turn it into a viable business with tangible products. I even worked with…
Believe it or not
Last night, I performed at an exhibit opening at the Arts League of Lowell. I had submitted my first recorded album for an exhibit honoring the life of Kerouac called “Travels off the Beaten Track.” I knew that David Amram would be playing earlier in the gallery opening, but I got the go ahead to…
Fake it ’til you make it
I went to an extra Sandbox session this morning. I went into the session thinking that it was about fundraising, but the more appropriate title would be “Pitch Practice and Ego Destroyer.” I came home with a hopeless feeling in my heart, heaviness in my chest, and a lump in my throat. You will feel…
Talk to everyone because you just never know
There are many people who have walked in and out of my life and had a formative affect on the person I am today, how I engage with the world around me, and the values I try to embrace and infuse into the work I do, particularly with regard to sustainability and songwriting. I wonder…
Perfect Pitch
Last night was the much anticipated, anxiety inducing Mid-Pitch for the Merrimack Valley Sandbox Winter Accelerator Program. I spent the better part of the day and week before reflecting and revising my pitch outline. A challenge with selling songwriting products is finding ways to describe something that can be rather abstract and difficult to explain…
Singing the songs of the people.
I grew up in a small town in eastern Massachusetts on the south shore. Throughout my childhood and into college, music was my identity. I played and performed classical piano; I was first chair for the clarinet in the school band; I listened to any and all music I could find. I started plucking around…
Everyone has a story
Everyone has a story. Yes, that means you, too. This past Friday evening, I performed some original songs and led a songwriting demonstration in downtown Lowell at an artist maker’s space called Lowell Makes. It was part of a skill share through a local time bank called the Merrimack Valley Time Exchange (MVTE). One skill…
Guiding Song 