What I've Been Doing

July has flown by. I started the month out taking a road trip with my son up to Cincinnati to attend my cousin EA's wedding. It was a grand affair and Isaac and I had a great time. Before we drove back to Durham, we visited the Children's Museum which is housed in a beautiful Art-Deco Train Station that was built the year my dad was born. Awesome. Inside the terminal we toured a cave, and an Ice Age Diorama with all sorts of big dinosaurs and animals that are now extinct. Fun stuff for a dad and his 6 year old son.

Once I was back in town, I came down with an awful case of stomach flu. I lost about 6 pounds in two days. Soon after I was feeling better, my family and I went up to the mountains with some friends and went to a wonderful bluegrass festival outside of Boone, NC. I saw this group from Switzerland that was simply amazing. I've never heard guitars and banjos played so fast and with so much skill.

We came back from the mountains and I began a 3 week stint playing at Emmaus Way in downtown Durham. I don't know if I've ever played that many Sundays in a row there, but it was fun. Wade, the worship pastor there, has had me playing at least one keyboard part each time I show up. This past Sunday was fun, because I actually brought my midi keyboard instead of using the keypad on my laptop. Using the midi keyboard gave me a chance to try out the program Mainstage, which is basically a live performance tool that comes with Logic Pro. Very cool. I was able to quickly pull up a patch and adjust it's sonic properties with the knobs on my controller. Mapping the controller to the software was super easy as well.

Over the past few weeks I've had the opportunity to record drums for Jeff Crawford's new record. We tracked drums over in Chapel Hill at Tim Carless's studio. I took my vintage 26" Ludwig Kick and my newly acquired Gretsch Snare along with some of my Premier toms and had a wonderful sounding kit that I feel is on par with my Radio King set that I more or less keep permanently stored over at The Second Story in Durham. So far we've tracked 6 songs, maybe 7 and we're having a good time. I feel really good about my tracks and I look forward to hearing the completed album.

I've also done a couple of gigs at the Bible Church in Chapel Hill. I played on a Sunday morning there recently and then participated at a worship gathering last Friday that they held outside. Jeff Crawford played bass for that as well and we both were amazed at how good the sound was for an outside gig. No doubt, it had to do with the fact that Wade came by and tweaked the system and monitors while we were rehearsing.

Other stuff I've been up to includes getting back into my routine at the gym and picking back up my training schedule for the marathon I'm running in October. I've also received some consultation help from the kind folks at Typepad that I hope to integrate into my site soon, as well as some ads (tastefully done from what I hear) that I'll be hoping to put into place soon. I'm continuing to add students to my teaching roster and it seems that I've been busier doing recording projects this summer than in past years. (In addition to the work with Jeff and Tim above, I've also done sessions with Wade for Kris Hixon's ongoing project, and also played on some songs of Brent Jordan's over at Studio 313 in Morrisville. Oh, and I almost forgot a couple of weeks ago Perry (The Prayers and Tears of Arthur Digby Sellers) had me over for two nights playing on some songs from his new record that (get this) is based on Jim Jones and The Jonestown Massacre. From the little bit I heard, it's going to be an awesome record. One of the highlights was getting to play with Perry's current drummer on a song. It was sort of drum duet/ ensemble piece. Perry and Alex (the engineer, producer, uber-talent) were pleased with how we sounded playing together.

Today I'm sitting here in the good 'ole Nashville Airport waiting to get my rental car. I'll be heading up to Scottsville, KY to speak at a camp for artists. It's been awhile since I've been to the Nashville Airport and they've really changed one of the areas near the Southwest Airlines gates. It's a huge Food Court now and there is currently an exhibition of Marty Stuart's photos that he's taken of many of the country music icons. There is a photo of Johnny Cash that he took 4 days before he passed away. Poignant stuff. I love Black and White portraits. What a wonderful medium.

Another thing I've noticed about the airport here is that the eateries seem more local. I noticed a Swett's, and a Provence (where I picked up an awesome Turkey and Emmanteler (sp?) sandwich. Oh, and I saw too that Bongo Java coffee was being sold which I thought was cool, but then I turned a corner and saw the biggest airport Starbucks I've ever witnessed.

Alright. That about wraps it up. I'm off to get my rental car now and drive to Kentucky. Yee haw.