I hope this finds you well. This week has been all sun and no humidity in Minneapolis. The trees are changing to red, yellow, and orange throughout our neighborhood. As I write to you I'm looking out on the vines covering our neighbors fence with beautiful scarlet leaves; this is my favorite season! Thanks to the care our garden received from friends and family while we were on our summer tour we are enjoying a huge harvest of cucumbers, green beans, squash, and three varieties of tomatoes!
I still love the travel we get to do as musicians, but after a seven week-six thousand mile summer tour it's felt good to have so many music opportunities so close to home. The last few weeks have brought us to performances on both sides of the Mississippi that are only minutes apart, reunions with college classmates and roommates (thanks for hosting us, John!), and two great youth events at camps with climbing walls and zip lines! We will enjoy another month of music making in Minnesota and the Dakotas before we head west. I’ve spent most of the day doing one of two things: one - contacting contractors to get quotes for a new roof, and two - working on plans for our tour through the Rocky Mountains and Black Hills. We still have some dates we'd like to fill in Colorado, Wyoming, South Dakota, and/or New Mexico. Anyone interested in having us add a few Advent songs to your congregations' Advent services this December? All of the details will be at the end of this email.
This week brought the completion of a project that's taken far too long. I finally finished the batik shirts for folks who pledged $50 or more to our kickstarter fund raiser this spring. Sometimes my big dreams don't fit into the typical 24 hour-a-day life, and creating 30 unique, triple dyed shirts took longer than I wanted, but the results are VERY cool. When I retire from making music, I might become a textile artist... big dreams are fun! If you are one of Tangled Blue's $50+ kickstarter supporters I will be putting your shirt in the mail in the next couple days. Thanks for waiting for me to get these shirts right; we are certainly grateful for all of the support we've received from folks this past year.
Here is where we will be performing in the coming months. I hope we get to see you soon and share a few of the new tunes we've been working on. Until then, go under the Mercy, Joel
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Tangled Blue News - August 2010
Where have the summer months gone? June seems like it was much more than just six weeks ago and July was a blur. It’s August; wow! Aimee and I are enjoying a week at home after almost seven weeks of constant movement. All of July and most of June was spent in either the Dakotas, Texas, or Louisiana! We enjoyed a full week in New Orleans and connected with lots of our southern friends along the gulf coast. There are simply too many highlights from these past months to pick from and not nearly enough photos to match to these rich memories... Off the top of my head, and in no particular order, here are a few experiences that come to mind:
*working with the Disciple Project students at TLU on an original song and leading a really great closing worship service with them (it included violin, viola, flute, recorder, three drummers, scads of guitars, and lots of great singers who blended beautifully)! Facebook users can view photos from this week at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=115108828090
*having Rob Ticherich along to play drums for two full weeks in Texas and New Orleans!
*having Matt Goodson add his wonderful piano skills to our new liturgical pieces in worship at Abiding Presence Lutheran Church in San Antonio.
*becoming God-parents to Isla Grace Anderson last week at her baptism in the beautiful Black Hills while at Outlaw Ranch.
*an evening of star gazing with Aimee in the cool, clear air of the Black Hills.
*meeting and performing for international students from Korea, Hungary, Columbia, Argentina, Germany, and Australia.
*a relaxing day on the San Antonio River Walk.
*did I mention we had a full week in New Orleans?! The combination of friends, food, and conversation were superb AND we got to enjoy the clarinet playing of the talented Tom Fischer twice while in town! You can get a glimpse of Tom’s skill here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfAYYsndt6o
*having our nephew, Nick along for part of our journey through New Orleans.
*meeting folks face to face who pledged toward our upcoming recordings on Kickstarter.
Thanks to all of the fine folks who hosted us this spring/summer in Sioux Falls, Robbinsdale, Inver Grove Heights, Minneapolis, Edina, Dickinson, Bismarck, Fargo, San Antonio, Sequin, Plano, McAllen, New Orleans, Custer, and Rapid City! You have blessed us richly; thank you!
This week at home has been a great retreat... I know, that statement doesn’t make sense for most folks, but home is a great place to retreat to after seven weeks of travel. Last summer we had a nine week tour that pushed me to the point of sickness. Aimee and I both remained healthy this summer and having this week at home is the likely difference. Our return home has included fresh veggies from our garden (Thank you to Nina, Nick, and our neighbors for watering while we were away), grilling out with neighbors, the Uptown Art Fair: http://www.uptownartfair.com/, and the Twin Cities Fringe Festival. I’m hoping to find time to take in a Fringe Fest show at the Fallout Arts Initiative titled “#Ringtone” before we leave for the next run of shows: http://www.fringefestival.org/2010/show/?id=1343
We have some performances next week in Colorado, then North Dakota, then Minnesota, then Iowa... all with a few open days in between each performance. I’ll post the details to the end of this note. Let me know if we can be part of your community this fall as we continue to refine our new songs and work on the new CD.
Thanks for making Tangled Blue part of your day.
Under the Mercy, and looking forward to the next time we see each other face to face,
Joel
joel@tangledblue.com
*working with the Disciple Project students at TLU on an original song and leading a really great closing worship service with them (it included violin, viola, flute, recorder, three drummers, scads of guitars, and lots of great singers who blended beautifully)! Facebook users can view photos from this week at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=115108828090
*having Rob Ticherich along to play drums for two full weeks in Texas and New Orleans!
*having Matt Goodson add his wonderful piano skills to our new liturgical pieces in worship at Abiding Presence Lutheran Church in San Antonio.
*becoming God-parents to Isla Grace Anderson last week at her baptism in the beautiful Black Hills while at Outlaw Ranch.
*an evening of star gazing with Aimee in the cool, clear air of the Black Hills.
*meeting and performing for international students from Korea, Hungary, Columbia, Argentina, Germany, and Australia.
*a relaxing day on the San Antonio River Walk.
*did I mention we had a full week in New Orleans?! The combination of friends, food, and conversation were superb AND we got to enjoy the clarinet playing of the talented Tom Fischer twice while in town! You can get a glimpse of Tom’s skill here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfAYYsndt6o
*having our nephew, Nick along for part of our journey through New Orleans.
*meeting folks face to face who pledged toward our upcoming recordings on Kickstarter.
Thanks to all of the fine folks who hosted us this spring/summer in Sioux Falls, Robbinsdale, Inver Grove Heights, Minneapolis, Edina, Dickinson, Bismarck, Fargo, San Antonio, Sequin, Plano, McAllen, New Orleans, Custer, and Rapid City! You have blessed us richly; thank you!
This week at home has been a great retreat... I know, that statement doesn’t make sense for most folks, but home is a great place to retreat to after seven weeks of travel. Last summer we had a nine week tour that pushed me to the point of sickness. Aimee and I both remained healthy this summer and having this week at home is the likely difference. Our return home has included fresh veggies from our garden (Thank you to Nina, Nick, and our neighbors for watering while we were away), grilling out with neighbors, the Uptown Art Fair: http://www.uptownartfair.com/, and the Twin Cities Fringe Festival. I’m hoping to find time to take in a Fringe Fest show at the Fallout Arts Initiative titled “#Ringtone” before we leave for the next run of shows: http://www.fringefestival.org/2010/show/?id=1343
We have some performances next week in Colorado, then North Dakota, then Minnesota, then Iowa... all with a few open days in between each performance. I’ll post the details to the end of this note. Let me know if we can be part of your community this fall as we continue to refine our new songs and work on the new CD.
Thanks for making Tangled Blue part of your day.
Under the Mercy, and looking forward to the next time we see each other face to face,
Joel
joel@tangledblue.com
Tangled Blue News - June 2010
I am writing to you as Aimee drives through a warm summer rain in Minnesota. We are on I-94 and will be in Mountain Time by late afternoon! If you are in North Dakota we hope to see you at our performances in Dickinson (tonight!), Bismarck (tomorrow!), and Fargo (Sunday!) this week. All of the details will be posted at the end of this newsletter. We still have a few gaps in our tour schedule we are looking to fill. We are looking for concert / worship hosts in Texas and Louisiana during the week of July 7th through July 14th. We are also looking for concert / worship hosts in Colorado and the upper midwest from August 1st through August 10th.
A BIG thank you to everyone who followed our kickstarter.com pledge drive. Thanks to your generosity we met our goal last month! The last couple weeks have been filled with the continuing work of writing and refining these new tunes for worship and collecting the rewards for the folks who pledged toward our goal. The blue iPods have been engraved with our Tangled Blue logo, and the T-shirts that I will be hand dying have arrived. We hope to send out our supporter’s rewards next week. We’ve been contacted by a few folks who missed the online pledge drive and would still like to give some support toward our new recording of songs for worship. If this describes you, here is a pledge form you can print and send into us: http://tangledblue.com/pledgeform.pdf
...speaking of T-shirts, I’ve redesigned our “con-amor” bar code logo T-shirt. It now includes a version of the icon of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Here’s a link to an image of the shirt: http://tangledblue.com/TB4red.html and more information on this image can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacred_Heart
The shirt is cardinal red and the logo is in white. I’m really into this design... so much so that I’m considering getting a tattoo of this design... though not for a while, we’ve got some debt to wipe off the slate first. You can order this shirt from the store at http://tangledblue.com.
Summer is upon us; the bumble bees are buzzing around the Veronica blossoms in our back yard and we are buzzing with excitement over the miles and melodies these days will bring. One new melody we are really looking forward to is John Hermanson's new liturgy that will be debuting at Mercy Seat Lutheran Church this Sunday evening in Minneapolis. John's music as a songwriter and as part of Storyhill, Alva Star, and The Hopefuls has been a consistent companion along our many miles of driving, so we are especially looking forward to these new tunes written around the liturgy. It's gonna be fun... you should come... details at http://www.nemercy.org/
Hopeful that we will see you soon...
Under the Mercy,
Joel
joel@tangledblue.com
A BIG thank you to everyone who followed our kickstarter.com pledge drive. Thanks to your generosity we met our goal last month! The last couple weeks have been filled with the continuing work of writing and refining these new tunes for worship and collecting the rewards for the folks who pledged toward our goal. The blue iPods have been engraved with our Tangled Blue logo, and the T-shirts that I will be hand dying have arrived. We hope to send out our supporter’s rewards next week. We’ve been contacted by a few folks who missed the online pledge drive and would still like to give some support toward our new recording of songs for worship. If this describes you, here is a pledge form you can print and send into us: http://tangledblue.com/pledgeform.pdf
...speaking of T-shirts, I’ve redesigned our “con-amor” bar code logo T-shirt. It now includes a version of the icon of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Here’s a link to an image of the shirt: http://tangledblue.com/TB4red.html and more information on this image can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacred_Heart
The shirt is cardinal red and the logo is in white. I’m really into this design... so much so that I’m considering getting a tattoo of this design... though not for a while, we’ve got some debt to wipe off the slate first. You can order this shirt from the store at http://tangledblue.com.
Summer is upon us; the bumble bees are buzzing around the Veronica blossoms in our back yard and we are buzzing with excitement over the miles and melodies these days will bring. One new melody we are really looking forward to is John Hermanson's new liturgy that will be debuting at Mercy Seat Lutheran Church this Sunday evening in Minneapolis. John's music as a songwriter and as part of Storyhill, Alva Star, and The Hopefuls has been a consistent companion along our many miles of driving, so we are especially looking forward to these new tunes written around the liturgy. It's gonna be fun... you should come... details at http://www.nemercy.org/
Hopeful that we will see you soon...
Under the Mercy,
Joel
joel@tangledblue.com
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