Bay Station Love the Bay 2019: Episode Two featuring Yours Truly, Michele

Bay Station welcomes chanteuse and drummer Yours Truly, Michele aka Michele Kappel to the sailboat Espresso, for an afternoon conversation and concert on the Oakland Estuary of San Francisco Bay.

Postcard: Bay Station's Love the Bay Day 1

Bay Station spent a long Memorial Day weekend, sailing around the San Francisco Bay, playing music with a bunch of area songwriters. Check out highlights from Day 1 when they say from Alameda to San Francisco and meet up with SF songwriters Nina Jo Smith and Peter Whitehead.

Songwriter Linda McRae Smooths Life's Roughest Edges with Song

Less than a verse into the first song Canadian-born, Nashville-based Linda McRae played at her 2014 FAR-West Showcase performance, my husband and I turned to each other and said 'oh yeah.' Playing a banjo and singing in a strong alto, McRae went on to offer a masterful and stirring set of songs. Songs with a capital S that took one on a sonic journey while steadily cracking open your heart. One, "Rough Edges & Ragged Hearts," the title track to her 2012 Cd, contained one of the best lines I've heard: "living is a dying art." Another song was based on the words of a Folsom Prison inmate she'd met through her involvement in the Arts and Corrections Program at California’s New Folsom Prison. By the end of her set, tears were streaming from our eyes.

As became evident upon further inquiry, McRae wasn't just a stellar artist, she was also a stellar person, both continually creating and giving back. McRae went solo in 1996, after a decade spent with the popular Canadian folk band, Spirit of the West, and has since released five CDs of her own work. Routinely charting in the top-10, performing in festivals throughout North America, she's collaborated, recorded and performed alongside a whose who of roots-based artists including Gurf Morlix, Neko Case and Bruce Cockburn. And the alliance with New Folsom led she and her husband, James Whitmire to start Express Yourself Writing Workshops for other disenfranchised communities in 2011, adding to an already full touring and recording schedule while further fueling her creativity.

Amid a month-long Escape to Create! residency in Florida that she was deservedly rewarded, McRae answered my questions about her work as an artist and teacher and all she'll be up to in 2015.

Q: Tell us about your upcoming year: Are you playing anywhere new? Any key dates or projects you're especially excited about

LM: 2015 is shaping up to be an incredibly exciting year. I’ll be touring all over North America in support of my new recording being released September 15th on my new label Borealis Records. I’m really excited to be working with Borealis. They have been incredibly supportive, and their promotional team was instrumental in my career retrospective, Fifty Shades of Red, hitting some “best of” lists for 2014. It was also # 5 Top Canadian Album on the Folk DJ Charts.

The label is currently working directly with my manager/agent/collaborator and husband (not necessarily in that order) James Whitmire on an October/November North American CD Release tour in support of the new recording. Those dates will be announced in the coming months. I also have a number of festivals I will be performing at this year including Artswells in BC where I will also be teaching a week-long songwriting course. Other festivals include South Country Fair in Alberta where I was made the honorary mayor last year, and a new festival in Ontario called the Kingsville Folk Music Festival. I’ve also just been asked to perform for the first time at Winterfolk in Toronto this Feb. 13-15/2015.

Q: Is this a first-time residency for you at Escape 2 Create? Do you have a 'typical'  writing process? Will you be writing material for the new recording on retreat? 
LM: The bulk of the material has already been written but there will definitely be some additions as a result of my Escape 2 Create residency. I guess my typical writing process usually involves juggling half a dozen things at the same time, i.e. touring, daily household activities, social networking, publicizing my performances, etc. which in itself is a full-time job. It is an incredible luxury for me to have an entire month in which to write new material and I am relishing every second of my time here. 
Escape 2 Create choses twelve interdisciplinary artists though a rigorous juried application process each year, six in January and six in February. Each artist’s private residence is donated by local Seaside, FL, community members and is tailored to each artist’s requirements. This is my first residency and having been chosen to participate has given me a sense of validation. I am also enjoying the fellowship and inspiration I am receiving from my fellow artists and the residents of Seaside. I have already finished four songs in the week I have been here.

Q: How do you know when you're ready to go back into the studio? You've worked with a lot of great producers: whose on deck for this next project? Any new sounds you'll be exploring or would like to? 
LM: I guess I know when I’m ready to go back into the studio when I have at least 15 songs that I feel are really strong. I usually like to record 12-15 and then put 10 or so on the finished release. I feel I have grown as a performing songwriter and each recording I think has illustrated that. Having the added perspective of collaborating with my husband and other co-writers has definitely helped me grow as a songwriter as well. Recording starts right after I finish my residency here. The timing couldn’t be more perfect as I will have plenty of time here to get to know the songs inside and out. I like to have them in my head and under my fingers before I record them. 
I have been fortunate when it comes to working with producers and great musicians. I’ve had wonderful experiences recording with each producer I have worked with, Colin Linden, Gurf Morlix and Marc L’Esperance. Each of them brought something new to the table and I am confident this one will continue in that same vein. 
This time, I’ve decided to work with my old friend, and award-winning producer and guitarist, Steve Dawson. I am really excited to be working with Steve on this project. We started pre-production before I left for my residency and he had some terrific arrangement ideas. We also did some co-writing together, and it just so happens one or two of those co-writes will be on the new CD. 
I’ve become really interested in acoustic blues styles and as he is well-acquainted with the idiom he’s a natural choice. I’m hoping to achieve a raw sound on this recording with real deep grooves you can drive a truck through. For me, it’s all about the groove. If the groove isn’t there you have nothing to build on. Start from the bottom up and away you go. I like to keep things pretty spare as well without a lot of unnecessary frills to clog things up. He’s a master and I know it’s going to be great. 

Q: You're a songwriter and writing facilitator/teacher. Can you discuss how you started Express Yourself Writing Workshops and how teaching/facilitating informs your own work?
LM: The idea for our writing workshop came from our involvement in the Arts and Corrections Program at California’s New Folsom Prison. My husband James and I were there for the first time in the fall of 2011, and we were so moved by the response to our visit that we decided to carry it through further with a focus on disenfranchised members of the communities I perform in. It has turned out to be a life-changing experience. In the past three years since our first visit to Folsom we have worked with approximately 1000 individuals in at-risk youth community facilities and correctional facilities. We have also worked with people in detox centers, veteran’s hospitals, and various adult correctional facilities with both male and female inmates. Our experiences talking and working with everyone involved has definitely had an influence on my writing. My new CD will include songs written as a direct result of some of these experiences, including a song I wrote with a New Folsom inmate who is serving life without parole. His name is Ken Blackburn and he is 73 years old. I think it is one of the best songs I have ever had the opportunity to be part of. Ken wrote the lyric and I wrote the music.

Q:What can listeners and fans expect after March 2015?
LM: I guess the biggest thing is my new CD coming out. I’ll also be doing some shows with two other wonderful artists in the DC area in May Mary Battiata (Little Pink is her band name) and Karen Collins. Mary and I were at a music camp this summer at the Augusta Heritage society and Karen was one of the instructors there. The name says it all: "Women on the Verge! A Night of Traditional and Alt Country."
You can find all my tour dates, music, epk and workshop information at http://lindamcrae.com

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=19A0f_69bzI

https://soundcloud.com/linda-mcrae/sets/rough-edges-and-ragged-hearts

Artist Interview: Annie Bacon's Pounding Corps

When I think of artists who exemplify The Bay Area's creative culture, I think of people like Annie Bacon. Highly original, filled with integrity and continually questing, the SF-dwelling singer/songwriter/composer/bandleader and mother has several EPs and a full-length CD with annie bacon and her oshen, as well as a highly acclaimed musical suite, The Folk Opera, to her name.  She's also sung and played on a slew of other artist's recordings and projects (Corinne West, Savannah Jo Lack), and just received an Arts Incubator award from Intersection for the Arts for her next creation. I recently caught up with her as she prepared for a benefit performance she's doing for The Liberation Institute Urban Retreat Center, Sunday, October 26, in San Francisco.

Q When did you first embrace songwriting? Who was a big early influence on your becoming an artist and who or what is fueling your muse currently?

AB: Before December of 2007, I'd definitely written songs, but I never considered myself a songwriter. I was content to play other people's music. That was the month, however, when I got Garageband, which changed everything. Suddenly I could sketch out concepts of songs across multiple tracks, and it was like a floodgate had been opened. Within a few weeks I knew that this was what I was supposed to be when I grew up. Pink Floyd and whatever was playing on the soft rock station in the late 80s ... those were my early influences. Music that was emotional. Right now I'm dealing with an Alt-J infatuation, a British art-band that does everything I love: harmonies, highly literate lyrics, dirty-grimy bass drops, ear-worming melodies, and arrangements that keep you on your toes. A few songs of theirs I love: "Fitzpleasure"and "Ripe &Ruin."

Q Tell us about the new EP and the 'community effort' it's entailed? 

AB: The new EP, which I haven't yet named, is a collection of ukulele songs that I've written across five or six years, but which never quite fit on any other release.  2012-13 were hard years for me and my family. Without going into it, I'll say that I was creatively paralyzed coming out of it and having trouble getting re-started. A kind friend set me in motion with a gentle nudge, another friend stepped forward to engineer it, and others threw down their massive talent as the OSHEN. And still other friends have offered ears, insights, and hours of talking them through. It's one of those projects that has happened for me, not because of me, which is a sweet and humbling relief. I feel really blessed by my community.

Q You just were just awarded an Arts Incubator by Intersection for the Arts. What does that mean for your work and will you build upon The Folk Opera or drum up something else altogether?

AB: Yes! This is really exciting for me. There's another project altogether that inspired me reaching out to them for support. It's a project that needs to happen within a certain framework, and to be honest I don't even know what exactly it is going to be yet, only that I'm supposed to set out to do it. I'm being necessarily vague, you'll forgive that I hope. But I do also see the potential for the IFTA sponsorship as a platform for finding the Folk Opera's next life, which is on stage. Maybe I'll find funding to get the incredible Alphabet Arts puppet production of the piece out here from Brooklyn.

Q You're doing a benefit performance for The Liberation Institute. Tell us about their work in the Bay Area (and any more details about the show) and how it's important to you.

AB: The Liberation Institute is an organization dear to my heart. I sit on their Board of Directors and am consistently amazed and impressed by how much they do with so little. Their community-mental-health model means that absolutely anyone can access their services. As an artist, I know how often I and other artists need support, but feel limited by finances, so this accessibility is a key part of what I love about them.

The show is to raise funds for their services for children, teens and families. As a mama myself now, I also have deep empathy for how necessary therapy can be in the process of both being and raising a child! Holy moly. The show will be kid-friendly, with those under 12 free to enter and the show happening from 3-5p. (After nap before dinner!) It's going to be an intimate show with only about 30 tickets available for purchase. Since it's a fundraiser we're asking $25-50/ticket, fully tax-deductible since Libi is a 501(c)3 non-profit. I'll play the Folk Opera, followed by a set of ukulele songs from the EP.  

Details: Music Is Love: An afternoon with Annie Bacon, Sunday October 26th, 3pm-5pm at the Liberation Institute's Urban Retreat Center, 1227-A Folsom Street at 8th, San Francisco. $25-50 tax-deductible donation suggested, kids 12 and under are free! Tickets available via www.anniebacon.me

Far-West Folk Alliance in Irvine Oct. 10-13

 We're heading to FAR-West 10th Anniversary Conference!! on Friday to play, schmooze and help celebrate he 10th anniversary of FAR-West.


The weekend will open with a Venues’ Choice Concert (on Thursday), and include Official Showcases, Best Of The West luncheon, Private Guerrilla Showcases, Panels and Workshops, New Voices Showcases, Susanne Millsaps Memorial Coffeehouse (which I'm helping MC on Saturday afternoon). It's a real celebration of original music and always inspiring. 


The 10th Annual FAR-West conference, October 10-13, 2013 at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Irvine CA.  http://www.far-west.org/

My schedule at Far-West:

FRIDAY OCTOBER 11, 2013

11:00pm            Bohemian Highway PGS                RM 337

12:30am            Sane Lunatic Productions  PGS     RM 335

SATURDAY OCTOBER 12, 2013
12:00am            John Roy Zat & Friends PGS          RM326

3:20pm              Susanne Millsaps Coffeehouse      Salon C (Ballroom)

Folk Alliance Region West (FAR-West) is the West-coast region of Folk Alliance International.   FAR-West is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization incorporated in the State of California in 2003. The organization is run entirely by volunteers; there are no paid staff members.

FarWest, MEOW & Little Bird

Aside from governmental wranglings, I hope you're enjoying this time of year as much as I am: Indian Summer is in full effect here in the SF Bay Area, birds are migrating and I'm just about ready to release Little Bird, the new 11-song CD I worked on much of the past year with producer, arranger and maestro extraordinare Art Khu. The CD is getting replicated as I write this (!) and the official release date is November 5. Woo-hoo! I'm really happy with how it sounds and how it looks (Harper Design Group did the graphics -see the cover above) and I'm that much more pleased and excited to get it into your hands. You can pre-order it HERE or find it at one of the shows later in the month.  

In the meantime, I've been enjoying the approaching season by playing lots of music around the Bay Area, at private functions and at home while gearing up for some travel this month to two talent-packed conferences.
First up, is the Far-West Folk Alliance Conference in Irvine. I'll be at the conference Oct. 11-12, playing a bunch of PGS rooms and soaking up all the other voices  who will be singing, playing and otherwise sharing their musical selves. Give a shout if you'll be there.
Two weeks later, I'm heading to one of my favorite cities, Austin, Texas, to perform at MEOW Con Oct. 24-26. The brainchild of music pioneer Carla DeSantis Black, who also founded the late-great RockerGirl Magazine, MEOW stands for Musicians For Equal Opportunities For Women, and is dedicated to addressing "the needs and challenges of women in the music industry today and to esnure women have a voice at every level of their music career." Thanks Carla!
And thank YOU for your interest in and appreciation for original music. There's a lot of shows coming up and I hope to see you at one or more of them.  www.deborahcrooks.com

Modesto Unplugged Music Festival June 21-29

Modesto is doing something very cool: a week-long acoustic music festival! We're heading out there Sunday to play a set. If you're in Central California, perhaps we'll see you...

Modesto Unplugged Music Festival June 21-29

The hit acoustic/folk festival in downtown Modesto returns for its second year at the end of June! 50 acts will come together to jam, both national players and local favorites. You’ll enjoy the sounds of bluegrass, Americana, old-time country, swing, gypsy, folk, anti-folk, orchestral-folk, acoustic pop/rock, Irish/traditional, roots, blues, vintage ukulele tunes, and more. FRIDAY 6/21 @ Deva Café (1202 J St.), 6 PM - $10 THE THOUGHTS (orchestral folk from Seattle, WA) Award-winning NZ singer/songwriter JACKIE BRISTOW D. Henry Fenton Fox & Woman Boscoe’s Brood Alida McKeon SATURDAY 6/22 @ Theatre 417 (417 7th St.), 4 PM - $10 THE HOT DARK (formerly Descendants Of Prospectors) Of Us Giants Indian Runner Mondo Mariscal She Killed Kurt Evan Middlesworth (from Eau Claire, WI) SUNDAY 6/23 @ Theatre 417 (417 7th St.), 2 PM - $10 DEAR INDUGU The Dustbowl Children Deborah Crooks Lino Alibani Brandon Sutton w/ Victoria Sutton Krippner WEDNESDAY 6/26 @ Peer Recovery Art Project (1222 J St.), 5pm Free songwriting workshop led by Alan Williams, doctor of ethnomusicology, master folk songwriter, and lead man of Birdsong At Morning. WEDNESDAY 6/26 @ Barkin’ Dog Grill (940 11th St.), 7:30 PM - $5 MARIA QUILES & RORY CLOUD (bay area Americana duo) Birdsong At Morning (master folk songwriter from Lowell, MA) Rusty String Express THURSDAY 6/27 @ Kane Studio (1010 Tully Rd.), 7 PM - $5 THE BREAKING YARD (indie folk from Portland, OR) National hammered-dulcimer champion DAVID MAHLER (Nashville) Rose Droll Benjamin Phelps FRIDAY JUNE 28 @ Deva Café (1202 J St.), 6-10 PM - $10 PROFESOR BURNS & THE LILAC FIELD KATIE HELL The Goat And The Feather Ryan David Orr (from Lakeside, AZ) Lila Nelson SATURDAY 6/29 @ Center Stage Conservatory (948 11th St.), 2 PM - $15 advance/$20 at door. Bay area gypsy string ensemble DIRTY CELLO Award-winning songwriter JEN HAJJ Jeremy Penick Mark Lemaire & Twilight Jill Cohn King Harobed Al Medina Rainy Escobar Savant The Airlings SUNDAY 6/30 @ Center Stage Conservatory (948 11th St.), 2 PM $15 advance/$20 at door. PATTY CASTILLO DAVIS GHOST TOWN GOSPEL The (Secret) Hitchers Rob Larkin Bourbon Legend (ukulele rock from Las Cruces, NM) Colorado Road Mali Gosney William Morebeck Patrice Webb (award winning songwriter from Sandpoint, ID) The Dandelion Massacre

Far-West Folk Alliance in Irvine

I'm heading down to Irvine on Friday for the Far-West Folk Alliance . Amid it all, I'll be playing a bunch of Private Guerrilla Showcases Friday and Saturday nights as well as at the Susan Millsaps Memorial Coffeehouse on Saturday afternoon (3:20pm). Give a shout if you'll be there!