Jazz has never been my strong suit when it comes to playing music on the instruments I perform on. I have played in jazz bands before, and I can simulate the style with ease, but when it comes to improvising a riff, forget it. My creativity goes to hell in a hand basket.
I am an extremely creative person in many areas of my life, but when it comes to music, the area I have studied the most, an area that one would call creative, is one that I feel stifled in due to my classical training. I am highly glued to the written page.
I recently joined the group pictured above as a permanent sub on Sax to work on my sax chops since it is the instrument that I probably get the least performance opportunities on. It is a jazz orchestra, but it doesn’t require much to any improv, thank the heavens above. But it will at least help me to hone the jazz style once again to help me become even more versatile.
These are pictures of the two musicals I have played that have required the most instruments in one show. The first picture is from the one I just got done playing this past weekend. As of right now, I own 10 different wind instruments. I recently did a photo shoot with all of my instruments. The photographer is still working on tweaking the photos, so I don’t have them yet. Unfortunately, I forgot one of the 10 when we went for the shoot. Which drives me crazy. So I am looking for an excuse now to purchase another auxiliary instrument so I can do a reshoot with her to get it right.
The photographer’s boyfriend mixes different sound clips and makes his own beat samples and has been talking about having me come up with some wind instrument riffs to go along with his beats. This is DEFINITELY an area I have not ventured down yet, but am open to, as long as he is willing to work with my ignorance and noviceness. Hopefully this is something I can get decent at if I keep trying as it would open even more avenues for me. I have been gaining a ton of followers on Twitter that are music producers and business promoters etc. that look for this sort of product. So I feel that I already could potentially have the connections without even trying. I have gotten very lucky on Twitter with visibility and have several verified followers and many people in the music industry following me without me seeking it out. It would be great if this all fell together somehow.
My birth cousin was looking for someone to compose a little diddy for a play she was directing at a high school. There were lyrics written where a landlady was supposed to sing a little song to herself but there was no music to go along with it. I composed a little two verse Melody for the written lyrics for the play. And I have never been much of a composer. So I am proud of myself for giving that a shot.
This picture was from one of my first important performances back in high school. All-State Honors Band. Lately I have been sacrificing my performance career for “the good of my family” because the husband has been working all the time and that makes more money then my sporadic performances. But I am no longer wiing to sacrifice my performance career. It makes me happy. It does make me money. And it could be more steady, but it takes a while for me to get there, and I need to keep building my connections, my auxiliary instrument inventory, my playing skills and my resume in order to make that happen. And I will never get there by constantly turning opportunities down just because I don’t have a built in babysitter at my disposal or because his work has always taken more precedence because it makes more money, even if that money gets squandered away when it’s in his hands.
One day at a time 