A busy few days.
The appearance on The Flip Side show was brilliant, though took quite some setting up. I needed to have the keyboard to play live, set this up in front of the screen, and connected it to my audio interface. Then connected the mic to the other channel. Lighting involved three lights; amber, cyan, and white, plus a fourth disco light behind me, where I hung a painting rather than the usual blank wall there.
I made a special stand for the camera (seen with the wood base above) so that the camera appeared level with the faces of the presenters on the screen; thus my eyes would naturally be looking at the camera as I talked. The show itself started at 7pm, and at least half of the day involved preparing for it. The hosts kindly involved Deborah a lot too, and we performed a live rendition of Clown Face, but the spoken audio was quiet. Without headphone monitoring, this was difficult to get right. I should have worn headphones here.
A delightful and friendly show, but the other Flip Side episodes I've seen were/are too. It was a joy an honour to be part of it.
I spent Friday morning writing a little more to my painting book, but the chapters and structure needs work. I've re-written the same thing many times, each in a new chapter with more depth and information, but I'm unsure if this is at all a good way to do it.
In the afternoon Deb and I went to Chester to meet the miniaturist David Lawton, who has become a good friend over the years. With most of my friends, I hardly ever see them, and often don't communicate for months or even years; yet whenever we meet it's always a pleasure and like we've never been apart. After our chat about many artistic matters; artists, techniques, sharing our recent works; we went to Sabine Kussmaul's graduation exhibition which opened yesterday in Chester. I've not seen Sabine since before Covid (that threshold of our shared lives) but again, it was like we'd not been apart at all. Artistically, we've both moved more towards music over the last few years.
It was inspiring but I'm still feeling a little lost. Painting, writing, music, and even programming, all competing. I enquired about showing work in the Crewe community art space and was told that they'd have to check out my portfolio - which felt like a rejection by a place which shows scribbles by school children. Perhaps, I could assume, my work is considered too adult, rather than them not having a clue about any aspect of my art. Well, we met Estella Scholes yesterday and with kind words said that I should be aiming higher than Crewe; true. If my work is to be seen, I must be the one to show it. Of course, the vast majority of my exhibitions have been like that.
Some kind soul on the video show asked if one artform inspired another and I was reminded that this has often occurred. Music Of Poetic Objects was an album of music for paintings, and I often wrote poems about each painting. Perhaps then, I don't need to be torn. Perhaps I can criss-cross and make paintings about songs, and songs about paintings and it can all be one gesamtkunstwerk. My life is a Gesamtkunstwerk - we really need a snappier word for this!
My emotions have been wrangled by getting a new mobile phone, a gift from my mother, as she bought one too, but hers was a different and worse model, which filled me with guilt. My old (merely from January) phone was/is terrible, and so full of bugs it was barely useable. This one is still full of bugs and flaws, but better than the other one (I still managed to find a crash bug in the first 2 minutes). Mum's is more awkward to use, and the lettering is tiny; but both phones were rather expensive. I would, could, should have warned her to be careful with things like phones; they're so technical and such a gamble to try or buy! Much research is needed. Sigh. Well, it is done.
Today, after a slow start I've been working on music, a song called 'More', which I started a few weeks ago. It needed guitar parts and recording these, and experimenting with them has taken all day. I've made rather screechy sound, like the guitar in the Beatles' 'Tax Man' with a setting of ATA on the guitar (away, towards, away, all three pickup active). It's very buzzy/hummy, but this can be all be part of it. I've hardly edited it, all of the noises and hums can remain.
Hours, over an hour, was spent with a mute-strum of one string, with lots of experimental settings, lots of plectrum choices. In the end, I only used it for the verse and ditched a lot of complex parts that were in the chorus.
