Monday and a Half

Third week of school already! Wow. Also, have a good first day of school tomorrow, PHS kiddos! I am wonderfully NOT sick this week. Hurrah!

Another PHS play update: Yep, I went on Wednesday, talked with Mr. VL, and confirmed what I already knew: the only person who will make sure this program happens the way I want it to is me. I returned on Friday with new resolve: to talk with the new principal and make this happen myself. He wasn't there, but his secretary had me email him, to which I got a positive, "Yes, let's meet and talk more!" sort of response.

Band stuff is band-y. We did record, and my bandmates have been emailing with quite frequency with song ideas while I quietly don't respond much because I'm very focused on this play right now. I will have to pay attention to them again soon. Not that I don't want to, of course. But the play is quite the time-sensitive matter, whilst band things have not yet reached any sort of "OH MY GOD TICKING CLOCK" sort of phase.

I've been reading Hyperbole and a Half, so I feel like my writing for this post has taken on a very sarcastic and ridiculous tone in comparison. Is this good? Do we like the sarcasm and ridiculousness? I'm sure I'll be embarassed by my lack of maturity when I re-read this later.

Godspell was amazing, by the way. I think I shall post about it this week. Maybe. I'll be seeing my friend Daniel perform once again this Tuesday, so it's probable that I'll blog about him again. Then again, I may not have anything new to say. We'll see.

Have a very splendid Monday and a super splendid week!

P.S. If you haven't seen yet, I'm giving away stuff for free. Yes. Do it. Enter. There's going to be a wonderful surprise for everyone who enters. I'm quite sure you'll like it. :)

Word to the Setting Daniel

Last night was awesome. If you didn't know, kick me and let me know that I have to invite you next time. No, actually, what I was going to say (write?) was that if you didn't know, Daniel Zlotorowicz, one of my best friends for years now, had a show last night with Setting Sunrise and Word to the Wise. Oh, and New York Taxi too. Backstory complete.

I thought the show was supposed to start at 8PM, but it ended up being more like 8.30PM. Oh well. First up was New York Taxi, a duet made up of guitarist/vocalist Ryan and keyboardist/vocalist Shannon. (Sorry, didn't think to take pictures until after they were done!) Their vibe, both musically, and from talking with Ryan, is a very laid back, "real" sort of thing. All of their music is entirely free. As Ryan put it, if people want their music, then they should be free to have it and to listen to it. He said he prefers doing house shows with no admission costs, a whole bunch of people, and just a donation pool.

A novel idea. Not the makings of a millionaire, but a novel idea nonetheless. If more people took a similar attitude in what they do, a complete willingness to freely give to others, than we'd probably all get along much better. Not that I'm about to give everything I have away for free right now though. I like to be able to eat.

Next up was Word to the Wise, which is guitarist/vocalist Sarah Meeks-Clark and vocalist Ari Cruz. I vaguely remember the very first time I saw these two perform at The Wire in Upland. It was long, long ago (at least a year ago maybe?). Daniel had a show the same night as them, which is how I managed to see them for the first time. I've been a fan ever since.

Ari and Sarah, Word to the Wise

And then it was Daniel's turn to perform! I've been listening to Daniel Zlotorowicz's music for four years now, and he always just gets better and better. I've seen him grow as a musician and as a performer, which is truly incredible. Last night, he had no set list and not a whole lot of preparation, but proved he doesn't necessarily need it to put on a good show. (But preparation is a good thing; don't skip it all the time!) Daniel knows how to improvise on the spot, even when he forgets the lyrics to his own music, and that's something any artist should know how to do. He connects with and engages the audience, and that's what performing is all about. Recording is when you follow scripts and make everything perfect.

Daniel Zlotorowicz

Last but certainly not least was Setting Sunrise, also known as Joey Biagas. He plays guitar and sings, like the other acts last night, but throws in pre-recorded beats off an iPod for some of his songs too. Joey definitely knows how to get the audience involved, and does so at every one of his shows, to the point of getting hugged by the audience mid-song last night. Despite a fever, he ended the show on a high note for everyone with his high-energy performance.

Joey Biagas, Setting Sunrise

I first heard Setting Sunrise, like Word to the Wise at another one of Daniel's shows, and the three groups (Daniel, Word to the Wise, and Setting Sunrise) have started playing shows together recently. As a fan of any one of them, I think it's great to get to know the other bands from repeated exposure to them, and as a performer, I'm sure it's a lot more fun to perform with other friends. Overall, what it ends up creating is a sense of community among fans of any of the three, as they end up becoming fans of all three. Music brings people together, and that deserves my first ever emoticon in this blog. :)

Have a happy Wednesday. See you tomorrow!

Mondays Are Nice

Monday. The beginning of a new week. Clean slate. Fresh start. A time both to reflect and to look forward. Mondays are nice.

This week is my last week of summer. A week from today, I will be frantically trying to deal with classes, running around like a chicken with its head cut off. Drop this class, add that one. Park here, pay for that. Write this down, file that. Memorise this, that, and these. Et cetera, et cetera. So I plan to enjoy my last week of summer.

This week, however, shall be just as frantic, if not more so, than next week. There's so much to do before summer ends, and only one last week to do it!

First, I have a script to finish. Last summer, no one expected anything but what you'd usually expect from a seventeen=year-old high school student trying to write a play. This year, the expectations are so much higher though. Everyone knows I'm capable of writing something great, even me!, but the pressure is making me panic. I'm horribly behind, and I have to send the script to press in one week. Activate NaNoWriMo mindset!

I'm going to Universal Studios today with my brother and my best friend. This is the sort of regular summer day that I haven't had much of all summer. Wake up early, run off to somewhere with people you love, have a blast, come home exhausted, and do it all over again!

And then Daniel Zlotorowicz has a show this week. (If you're anywhere near Pasadena, you should come! Contact me for details: ethraen [at] gmail [dot] com) It's totally different now though, because I'm in the music business too now. Once, a loyal fan. Now, a fellow musician. It feels so very different.

But most exciting for this week is getting to perform myself! I have a flash mob event (but it's a secret, shh!) on Saturday and rehearsals this week, and then I have my now-usual gig as an occasional street performer. It's pretty cool to just perform on the streets for total strangers. Being backstage is fun, and I really do enjoy it, but being the performer has a certain charm nothing can ever compare to.

Yeah, it's going to be an awesome week. Mondays are so great.

Tingling Souls

I love music. I have loved music my entire life. I was singing and dancing and making instruments out of the world before I even left the womb. My childhood was spent discovering every sound I could possibly make. I joined choir when I was 5, and sang my way through years of musicals in elementary school. My dad and I tapped out beats together at the dinner table. I was staring about 500 different bands. And my eight grade choir was by far the coolest choir my classmates had ever seen.

And then high school happened. Maybe it was hormones. Maybe it was the divorce. Maybe it was public school. Maybe it was nothing at all even, but I stopped making noise. There was a period of my life in which I barely had any kind art, especially music, in my life, and it was the most unhappy period of my life.

One day, my friend Daniel Zlotorowicz (Yeah, that's a shameless plug to his music page.) handed me a CD and told me to listen to it. So I did, and it changed the course of my life forever. (cue dramatic music) The CD was One Cell in the Sea by A Fine Frenzy.

I loved it. We went to see A Fine Frenzy that April, and it was one of the best days of my life. I decided to teach myself piano, and, that summer, I sat down at the piano bench, set up whatever sheet music or piano tabs I could find, and slowly started translating all the scribbles and letters into music.

I love music. I finally joined my high school choir (for my final semester), and I've rediscovered how utterly relaxing it is to stand up on stage and just sing. I know not everyone feels the same, but it's what I spent my childhood doing; it's like going home.

I love music. You can pour your heart and soul into it; belt along with your favourite song, and it somehow takes a little of the weight off your shoulders. Playing music, writing music, is just as incredible; when you lose yourself in music, it opens up all the floodgates of emotion and lets everything free. Like when your leg falls asleep, and you suddenly use it again, and all the feeling comes rushing into your leg, tingling and pricking.

We let our souls fall asleep, and music wakes them up.