Been in Martindale (just south of Austin, Tx.) for this past week. Visiting the family, plus one House Concert that turned into another house concert! You missed the one in Martindale at my brother’s house last saturday, but we had 2 great shows. TOMORROW – Friday, June 15 (incidentally my birthday) I’ll be closer to town playing at Grace Newman’s house. Grace was the artist relations person at D’Addario & Co. (www.daddario.com) up until recently, and is just the most amazing person to know. Contact me and I’ll get you details if you’re in the neighborhood and want to come to the concert.
Also, spent some fabulous time playing a few Collings Guitars yesterday (www.collings.com) . Oh my god. I’ve picked out a C10 as my next guitar hero…and speaking of that – we just got my nephew McCoy the Guitar Hero II for his XBox 360. I played it at the summer NAMM show last year (http://www.nammsummersession.com/) and was immediately hooked. What a cool video game. You must check it out. www.redoctane.com is the company that makes the thing.
COVER TOONS – For me, it seems they pick me. I start with a song i LOVE. Then, I think about tunings that might have the ‘quality’ of the feeling of the tune (are you still with me?)….then I let my creative muse take over. I wish I could be more specific, but I don’t think I can. For instance, Marvin Gaye’s ‘What’s Going On’ (http://www.amazon.com/Whats-Going-Marvin-Gaye/dp/B00007FOMP) is just a really poignent song. It is a classic with a strong emotional content as well as that delicious ‘Marvin’ groove and vibe. I use the tuning, C G D E A D and have it capoed on the 2nd fret, so I’m in the key of D. I feel that I’m a LOUSY imitator, and so I’ve always been dedicated to creating truly unique arrangements of cover tunes, when I do them. The groove that I came up with is completely different, yet I think it lets that original message come through. You can here my version on the new CD here – www.cdbaby.com/cd/genfan3.
Then there’s Norwegian Wood by the Beatles ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norwegian_Wood_(This_Bird_Has_Flown). I was inspired by a great fingerstyle guitarist, Jacques Stotzem (http://www.stotzem.com/). We toured together in Germany and he creates very interesting arrangements of cover tunes, often with dramatic tempo changes and different sections, almost like an orchestral arranger. I was inspired to do something like this with the arrangement of NW, and still feature the ‘vicki tapping technique’…this resulted in having a basic slow, rhythmic guitar accompanyment for the verses, and pretty much the whole lyric, but going into a wilder and multi-tempo tapping, strumming ‘break’ in the middle of the tune. That was alot of fun. You can also hear a slice of that on the cdbaby page. You can see a live video of it at www.youtube.com/vickigenfan
In the works – I’ve proposed recording a new CD with the label in Germany who recorded my ‘Live’ CD, Acoustic Music Records (www.acoustic-music.de). It would be ALL cover tunes and would feature 3 or 4 of the fantastic female artist’s that I’ve met while touring in Germany and the UK (So far we’ve got the ok from Kerstin Blodig www.kerstinblodig.com, Christina Lux www.christinalux.de, and Sally Barker www.sallybarker.co.uk. I’ve been picking out tunes, so far on the list are: Groovin, Summer Breeze, Horse with no Name, California Dreamin’….and more. Of course, they’ll all be ‘vicki-fied’. BTW, the tuning for Norwegian Wood is D A D E A D – I’ve got the capo on the 5th fret, so I’m in the key of G.
Last but not least, I’ve dropped in the lyrics to one of our National Anthems, ‘My Country ‘Tis of Thee’ to one of my brand new songs, ‘My Country’. Come out and hear it LIVE in NYC next week! Friday June 22 at Mo Pitkin’s House of Satisfaction. Details on my gig page of my website http://www.sonicbids.com/epk/epk.asp?epk_id=12283&poll_id=&name=calendar&skin_id=4. We’ll be featuring John Mettam on percussion/drums and all the way from Boston, Jeff Song on bass!! Special 2 hour set from 7 -9pm….celebrating my birthday too, so there will be some ‘gift’s’ to give away to you audience members….
That’s it for now, please pass this on to anyone you think might be interested…
PEACE and love,
Vicki
