Journal

And so, ready or not, here it comes. Resilience has been printed. It's in my hot little hand. Now I just have to deliver it to you. AAAAH the joys of independence. I've sent copies off to CDbaby, my favorite online music distributor, they'll be there any minute.
The New CD

Doing the best I can anyway. CD almost ready, I'm almost ready, I just need a little touching up and then we roll!
photo: Susan Moss

Slowly but surely, this record in the making is unfolding. We are close. Roma, Viv and I are giving loving attention to every note played. Saturday night we laid out the developing mixes, burned 'em to disc at three A.M. and drove through the wide empty swaths of streets -- Manhattan and Brooklyn -- listening through the whole bunch of tunes at once for the first time. It was a strange experience my friends. Sunday we switched the order, added an afterthought track, and listened again, then we took our notes mixed and mixed and mixed the night through until well into daylight. I was burnt toast by 5:30 am, my head resonating like a bass woofer. But Roma and Viv just kept going.

Then last night Viv and I constructed a swooshing sound with meticulous attention ... a pulsation really, made from breath and symbols, backwards, forwards, pitched down. Likely it'll be barely audible, but somehow it has a vitality. Like maybe it's the sound of blood rushing through the heart, being delivered outwards to every point in the body. River of Lava, head to feet. It'll support the dance going on in the mandolin strings

In the meantime, alchemists work their magic on the imagery to be delivered with the sounds. There are still wild cards and puzzle pieces unplaced... but this feels like a very special time. The moments before full light of day. The stirring inside the chrysalis. May the delivery run smooth and joyous.

Norval Morrisseau, Observations of the Astral World, c. 1994

I just heard the announcement on the radio that Norval Morriseau, the medicine painter, is dead today. Flying in blissful light I hope. It's rare for me to hear news like that and get shivers all over and burst into sobbing. In fact, it's never happened to me. Copper Thunderbirds work connects me to something I need to be connected to. There are images he has offered that I hold so close, that have carried me on this spirit path, that have helped me find my prayers and deliver them.

Copper Thunderbird, thank you for all that. I hope you are traveling now in a place as beautiful as your paintings.

2 nights in a row at La Sala Rossa. I love home.

Last night I sat in with Penny Lang and Ken Whitely, did a little mini set in between these two icons of Canadian folk, got to do some very fun harmonizing and fiddling with Ken, then rolled with the moments through Pennys set with George Koller on bass and Ken on mando and guitar... I played fiddle, mando, sang. We didn't rehearse. It was just listening and responding. Like Jazz said Penny, come on when you feel it. Like a workshop stage at a folk festival she said, just listen and join in when you've got something to do, and if you don't feel it, don't do anything. Felt really amazing. Penny was at the end of a long tour. She's magic even when she's beat.

And now I just got back from seeing Lhasa De Sela backed by a great bunch of musicians who float around the scene here. They had certainly rehearsed. I've seen a couple of them in other contexts, Sarah Pagé on harp and Joe Grass on slidey country things, but it's amazing what a being like Lhasa can do to bring out the magic of music in people. Gosh she's powerful. Creates huge swaths of warm liquid space to dwell in, to contemplate. Grounding. Just what I needed. She was trying out a bunch of new tunes, so it was a very special show.

It's funny, I was talking to George last night about the strangeness of the music business. You know, we live on energy, we channel something good. And then there is struggle to survive, there are egos, and there are formulas that encapsulate something special but within that things are lost. They function, but they stagnate. And there is business to support the demand for the formula. I've learned some things about business in the last several years, coming from this place of naive, but useful I guess, dedication to my practice and my ideals... I've learned how I don't want to run my business, and now I take my hammer and nails and go at building something that works for me within this commitment to the practice of music. But, so George says it's like everybody is a molecule trying to attach itself to more powerful molecules. And yeah. That's how it is. But then I go see Lhasa. And instead of that being a sinister thing based on ego, the idea transforms itself into something beautiful. Lhasa has a purity and a dedication and an uncompromising truth that she so kindly and sweetly shares with us. And holy cow, is that ever powerful in the best possible way. And she gives all these people around her a huge opportunity to create a transformative space together, and they all shine as individuals as they do it.

Wolfville was fantastic. Magic magic magic moments at the Deep Roots Festival. Mary Gauthier. Yeah.

Back to intensives in the studio. It's coming along.

Roma and Viv are fiddlin' with their brand new telefunken microphone, we tried out a whole bunch and this is the baby for the job. I'm feeling this lovely sense of well-being lately, life is really most excellent. Got two projects on the go now, my next album which is like this gorgeous big broccoli growing in the ground, and also I'm producing music for a dance by Aviva Geismar/Drastic Action, which is intense and fascinating, getting into the grooves and strange noises and soaring moods...It's a mammoth one this time, 50 minutes, which is the longest score I've ever produced. I'll be working it through the winter, I think the premiere is in March.

But this record unfolding is exciting. The collaborations are evolving, the musicians are emerging, I'm laying down the mood first, vocals and guitars and mandos and stuff. Things happen like, I wanna rock, like a shy kid I think about electric guitars and how i'd like to try them some time, and Roma throws one into my hands and says 'why practice when you can go straight to track?' and there we are, tracking electric guitar. Fu-u-un.

Waiting In Vancouver: Thankfully I got to meet Pony Boy.

Mission Folk Fest was delightful. Highlights for me were the workshop stage shared with other former Jenny, Cara Luft, as well as magnificent Penny Lang and the rowdy crew of Outlaw Social. It was hilariously named "Bailin' Jennys, Outlaws and Fierce Independents," and we rocked it. It was also great to hang with the McDades, The Bills, and lovely David Francey, and to hear and see gorgeous Buffy St. Marie do her thang.

Storyhill festival site

Well, they seem to have a backlog of Canadians applying for work Visa's to go play shows in the states. I had a harrowing experience trying to get the paperwork pushed through, and had to keep changing my flight to later and later, all the while knowing that I might not make it. Renee Gebhardt from Mountain Time Booking and Eric Fawcett from Storyhill Fest were forced to jump through many hoops to get me down here. Somehow it made me think of this burlesque dancer I once saw in New York City, Miss Saturn, who manages to catch flying hoola hoops and keep them all moving in intricate designs while artfully removing garments... I dunno, that's what popped into my head yesterday as I sunk into my plane ride after so much beurocratic uncertainty, having just triumphantly walked through customs with the proper paper in hand, faxed to Vancouver that morning. Kim Krueger from Senator Baucus' office finally made it all happen, pushing through my papers 'cause she knows and loves music, I got to the festival 3 hours after I was supposed to play, Eric scooted me onto the stage, and I sang in a circle of huge trees to the warmest bunch of people around with this view behind me as night began to fall. Then Storyhill got up there for a beautiful closing set, and the campfire circle continued late into the night with a fantastic round robin of vital and uplifting songs. Love and gratitude.