June 21, 2008

Our performance at the 2008 Albuquerque Folk Festival was awesome – or so we were told! We were really clicking and having a great time on stage, and it must have spilled over onto our audience because they had a great time, too! They were tapping their feet, clapping their hands, and laughing right along with us -- at all the right times, too, which is sort of important if you think about it. Our new song selection was a big hit. The audience especially enjoyed No More Tortillas and our version of the Russian classic Katyusha. Ben Chavez did a great job singing Annabelle and Wagon Wheel and, of course, Diane Prior rocked on Little Sadie and Come into my Kitchen which was great, as usual. Here’s one of our secrets: we almost never practice this song anymore because it just never sounds as good as when we’re performing it!

Congratulations to 10-year old Gwen Prior for wining the fiddle contest (0-12 year old category). She performed Red-Haired Boy and Soldier’s Joy with her proud daddy Ben Prior accompanying her on ‘cello. Her prize was a ton of money (for her, that is) and the chance to perform one of the songs on the main stage. You rock, Gwen!

We are looking forward to the upcoming festivals including Wildlife West, the 34^th Santa Fe Bluegrass and Old Time Music Festival, and the Corrales Harvest Festival in August. See you there!

March 14, 2008

We played at The Explora Museum for Adult Night. We really enjoyed ourselves. We performed next to the fountain and we kept getting distracted by the water! We would like to thank Patricia Decker for booking us, and making us feel at home. The Explora staff were all very friendly. Also we would like to thank Michael and Judy Muldawer for coming out to see us!

February 16, 2008

We played at Solid Grounds Coffehouse on February 16. It was a great time and we enjoyed seeing many of our friends. We want to thank the Apple Mountain Dulcimer Club for ending their meeting early so they could all come to our concert. Thanks a lot folks! We also enjoyed seeing the Sjaardema family; they always make a special effort to see us. We took some pictures at the concert and posted them for you to see.

January 12, 2008

Our album, Cactus Jam, came about more as an unexpected opportunity than a planned event in our progression as a musical group. At the time we were not even thinking about recording an album, but it happened that a local recording studio was offering low, flat rates as a promotional effort, and we decided to just go for it, even though we may not really have been ready at the time!

We had two recording sessions over Mother’s Day weekend in May 2007, each lasting pretty much all day. The setup was such that we recorded each take with all instrumentation and vocals at the same time – basically, a “live” recording (sans applause) although we did do several takes on each song. We recorded eight songs the first day and six the next. It was great fun but also very tiring! In the end we had to dub a couple of solos. The mixing and final production took a lot longer than expected, but only because we wanted all of the songs to be the best they could possibly be.

We recorded two songs that were ultimately left off of the final album because we didn’t think that they lived up to our standards. One of these, Wayfaring Stranger, highlights the beautiful singing voice of Diane Prior and has a couple of nice, bluesy solos, but we felt that since the time that we made the recording our rendition of this song had improved so much that we really didn’t like the recorded version anymore! So, it had to go. Just one of the victims in our quest for musical perfection! The other song we left out was Vagabond Waltz, an Art Garcia original. We are hoping that these songs will be included on a future album.

At the time, Slowdown Brown (written by Charlene Hirsch but modified to the point that she could barely recognize it!) was a brand new song for us. We were introduced to the song on Tuesday, rehearsed the song on Friday, and recorded it on Saturday! It was so different from our usual repertoire that we just had to include it!

Ben and Diane Prior did the artwork and layout for the album and the packaging. We all think they did a great job! You need to look closely to notice, but the “Wanted” poster on the front of the album case contains a photo of the band taken at Heritage Farm, similar to the color photo on the inside of the package.

One thing we learned from this adventure: we’re going to limit ourselves to original songs and/or traditional music as much as possible. Getting licenses for copyrighted songs turned out to be a big hassle (not to mention the cost), and we’d just as soon avoid that again if we can!

We are very much looking forward to recording our next album, probably for release in 2010 if not sooner. We’re having way too much fun practicing and performing to think about recording any time soon. We’ll keep you updated if that changes, though. For now, enjoy Cactus Jam and we hope that you will come see us perform soon!

November 17, 2007

We had a fantastic time at the Smokehouse BBQ in Rio Rancho this weekend. The energy was high and the audience was wonderful. We would like to thank Janet Wilder and the whole gang at the Smokehouse for having us there. We hope every one enjoyed the show, we sure enjoyed our audience! Check out the view from the 'Cellist's Chair, maybe you can see yourself in one of the pictures I took.