Big Public Events Coming Up

I’ve three big shows coming up very soon to fill you all in on…

This weekend (Saturday 5^th and Sunday 6^th of May) is Clunes International Book Town! It’s a huge event with authors, book dealers, illustrators and various experts on one topic or another to do with books and thousands of people converging on the small Victorian town to talk about and share their love of books. And I’m playing kids music for Children’s Book Town in the Clunes Library at 10am and 1pm (40-minute sets plus a chat) on Sunday the 6th. The Library’s been done up to look a bit like CS Lewis’ Narnia, complete with a wardrobe entranceway, so come along and travel into a world of stories and songs with me and the many other great presenters. Thanks to Clunes Book Town and publisher Wilkins Farago for having me!

The following weekend I’ll be helping keep the little kids entertained while big kids and adults run in the local Mothers Day Classic. (I’ve been advised to say that if you plan to run and bring your kids, you’ll have to bring someone to provide supervision for them). It’s on out at the Ballarat Turf Club at Dowling Forest and is part of a collection of similar events running all over the country in aid of Breast Cancer research and support. I’ll be providing roaming entertainment, greeting people as they arrive, and doing a set performance at the band tent at 10.30am (and doing a bit more roving after as people make their way to lunch after the run)! You can register to run, make donations or get more information (including prices) here: https://register.eventarc.com/event/view/7473/tickets/mothers-day-classic-ballarat

The last, but not least, of the events I’m playing this month is for Simultaneous Story Time an event being organised by the library association of Australia that involves the same story being read out to people at the same time at different places all around the country! The Wendouree Library is running the local event at Stocklands, Wendouree in front of Coles. It’s a free event and the story being read is “The Very Cranky Bear” by Nick Bland. I’ll be playing music about bears and other animals before and after the story at 11am on Wednesday the 23^rd of May.

That’s all the public shows coming up for now, but I’ve heaps of other exciting things I’ll be telling you all soon.

Earl

PS Here’s a sketch of a rocket by my friend Sebastian Ciaffaglione (the relevance of which will one day be revealed). Check out his site for a pic of a bear with a sweet mustache and a cape plus more!

Nephew Uncle Uncle Nephew

I’ve made quite a few posts about my own kids on this blog for a number of reasons: I love them, I enjoy sharing their antics and they are a constant and major source of inspiration for the work I do songwriting and performing. But obviously they’re not my only inspiration; I read, I listen to music, I perform for many other children and adults and I have other wonderful family and friends. It all makes for a soulful soup of creative nourishment.

For example, I have a nephew who is awesome and sure can stomp!

Charlie’s a very active and lucky little boy. As well as having my wonderful big sister, Julia, for a mum he gets to play with crocodiles because his parents run the Ballarat Wildlife and Reptile Park (he does not actually play with the crocodiles. Yet).

Julia did ballet when she was younger and her boy has inherited the talent for dance, I think. Although he seems to prefer blues (and dinosaurs and wrestling). Him and Jasper grooved up a storm at a John Chamberlain gig one time and Jules brings him to my shows when she can. And she asked me to play at his second birthday.

It was a pretty big deal. I love playing birthdays, even though they’re often the most difficult gigs, and playing for family felt particularly gratifying. Especially since I can tell Charlie genuinely loves live music. Sure most kids do, I know that perhaps better than most, but I can sense that sharing music with Charlie – the feelings, the stories, the secret, great, lost and significant bands – is something we will do. Just like my Uncle Ian shares his appreciation of music with me.

As a nephew to an uncle and an uncle to a nephew, I thank them both.

The Sock Bag

Other than a few knock-around party/jamming high-school acts, I first started playing live music as part of the duo “Dave & Earl” (later renamed “The Butler Did It”). This is Dave.

Davo & I started playing together at the Bridge Mall Inn upon the suggestion of Pat McCabe and other people whom we couldn’t argue with despite not liking one another at first… (we’ve been great friends for 16 years now). We played serious sounding songs including Leonard Cohan covers & the theme from M.A.S.H but also occasionally got more goofy and wrote (or improvised on stage) jaunty tunes will silly lyrics because we were criminally under prepared (and a little too self confident) most of the time.

One of these songs was “The Sock Bag”. It was about a bag of odd socks. We played it once.

I’m not sure if it was Davo himself, or his brother Chrisso (whose band, The Rye Catchers I would later join & are still singing for these days) or our good friend Paddy O, but someone suggested I put all the particularly foolish songs of mine in “The Sock Bag” and leave them there. It was a good suggestion.

These type of songs never suited Dave & I, or The Rye Catchers or The Red Cents (the band that The Butler Did It eventually morphed into) but since I started playing kids music I’ve pulled out one or two songs from the sock bag, darned them a bit, and given them new life.

“Jam Maker” (a ska song about a man who makes jam) is now a particular crowd favourite. I’m still working on “The Sock Bag”.

I like to think this cow with a Rorschach test on its face understands the importance of keeping some kind of record of your creative efforts & notions; be it in a journal, a notepad, a sketchbook or on your computer. You never know when the inspiration or situation may come that allows an idea to be completed.

A note…

This post that I started to write last year is dedicated to Paddy O (1972-2011). I often played my new songs to him first because he always gave the best advice. I wouldn’t be half the musician, or man, I am today without your encouragement, mate.

Songs About You – A Friend’s Pozible

One of my friends and heroes in the songwriters category is running a crowd funding project to support the printing of a collection of his lyrics.

http://www.pozible.com.au/index.php/archive/widget_2011_1/5554/34939/011277

Hap (as many of Justin’s friends know him) is a fantastic guy; funny, deep and considerate. He’s been a great supporter of mine throughout the years, from when I first started on the local scene to when our bands The Rye Catchers and the Dead Salesmen toured together and right up to and especially my switch to focusing on playing children’s music. He’s bought his kids along to many of my shows and always gives great critical feedback on my performances.

And his lyrics are fantastic.

As his (incredibly funny) project video addresses, he also started song writing thanks to a suggestion that the activity could be helpful for dealing with depression. While my teen issues weren’t specifically depression, I was also encouraged in my high-school poetry and music efforts by some folks for similar reasons and are as likewise grateful as Hap for the encouragement. I don’t know where I’d be without music; Hap’s especially.

I took a photo of the hose attachment in the bath. I thought it looked pretty,

It is part of my dreams as a writer/performer that playing music for little kids now will be in someway helpful for them in the future as well. Maybe as inspiration. I don’t know.

I do know, though, that I support the “Songs About You” project and hope you will too.

Awesome Costume! Awkward Photo!

Hey,

So much has been happening since last time. Have a new job (contract) I’ll tell you about. Rosie’s walking, kind of. We re-painted Jasper and our own bedrooms. And I played another Begonia Festival!

Erin Santmaria made my Octopus Costume. It looks great and was actually very easy to still play guitar and sing while wearing. Hard to take a photo of oneself though!

I really enjoyed this year’s festival. Had fantastic crowds each day and was so pglad that the three new songs I wrote especially for this performance all worked!

This is the kids and I “Diving in a Submarine”, but we also swam like fish and octopus, scuttled like crabs and sung like wales! (It was beautiful).

I had a dad approach me at another festival this weekend and say his daughter really enjoyed the shows and that he thought it was great that the city arranged an activity for little kids to do as a group. I agree! So, thanks again City of Ballarat and Pilkinton Poductions for having me back (especially to Lisa Cressey for all her help with the preparation and props).

Oh yeah, the props!

Borrowed these from BLOC (thanks Lyle). They were originally for the local production of Seusical (which my cousin Jack Richardson – a ridiculously good actor – was Cat in the Hat for) but they repurposed as the “Octopus’s Garden” quite well.

Lyle and Jim do most of the prop making for BLOC and share my “let’s see what we can use this again for” approach. I’ve used the same ladies scarf for my mad hatters hat band, monkey king neckerchief and pirate bandana and plan to start building more robust props of my own, as soon as I clean my shed!

Til next time, reduce, reuse and recycle!

Earl

Jasper Knocks me Out at Story-time

Was running late for Jasper’s bedtime last night, had to skip his read story and tell his tell story (we normally have one of each) while getting him into his PJs.

“Once upon a time there was a very, very large rabbit and a very, very small hippopotamus…” I began

“And a very fast monster truck!”

“there was a monster truck, and it was very, very quiet and there was also a very, very fast… tortoise” I said.

“and a very, very thin dinosaur?” he suggested, picking up on the pattern.

“that’s right, and a very, very fat, um, snake”

“and a very, very dark light!”

Whoa. Nice one Jasper. It took me a moment to recover and the rest of the story, which ended up being about a party where everything was done a bit differently, didn’t quite reach my boy’s benchmark there.

But story-time with my son is definitely one of my favorite times of all.

10 Things I Know about Pirates!

1. The hugeness of their popularity waxes and wanes but never disappears.
2. Movies made about them are seldom historically accurate.
3. The treasures the old school pirates pursued were chiefly tea, sugar and gunpowder (all of which were worth more than gold by volume).
4. They say “argh”
5. There still are pirates but the real ones aren’t anywhere near as fun or sympathetic.
6. Possibly because the fun ones look like Keith Richards.
7. They dislike Ninjas & Zombies even more than regular people do.
8. Even when they’re clearly the bad guys, such as in books like Treasure Island and Peter & Wendy, Pirate Captains are still well liked.
9. I’ll be dressing as a Pirate Captain the next three Sundays and two Wednesdays (8th, 11th, 15th, 18th & 22nd Jan) to play music out at the Tangled Maze near Creswick from 11am each day.
10. I’m expecting some of the kids will have better pirate costumes than me

I’m really looking forward to it. Argh.

Flutter Byes!

So, I know I’m not the only one who’s noticed the huge number of butterflies around this year. I’ve seen heaps of the orange ones within Ballarat and as far afield as Creswick, Millbrook and Rokewood in those directions. Although I think they might actually be moths (because of their folded wing position in rest; a useful though not always accurate way to tell the difference). I tried to take a photo of a flutter of them flittering around the garden but wasn’t quick enough.

I’ve been wondering why their numbers are so high this year but, in a rare mood for me, haven’t wanted to research the answer as I’ve preferred the mystery and speculation.

Butterflies have great creative significance for me. One of my favorite movies as a kid was The Last Unicorn and when I watched it again a few years ago with Rach she observed, jokingly, how similar I am in some ways to the character of The Butterfly.

I choose to see his positive attributes. (I really must read the book one day). Also, when I was preparing my Ladybugs Picnic show this year I wrote some words to the tune of The Beatles’ “Eight Days a Week” about Butterflies: “Taste with Their Feet”.

I’ll probably never be able to record it
for copyright reasons, but here are the (scientifically accurate) lyrics:

Oh I like butterflies
yes you know it’s true
I hope you like butterflies
I can tell you do

They flitter and flutter
flitter and flutter
But did you know that butter-
Flies taste with their feet

They fly from flower to flower
To eat the pollen
But the first thing they taste with
Is not their tongue

They flitter and flutter
flitter and flutter
But did you know that butter-
Flies taste with their feet

They taste with their feet
All the lovely pollen
taste with their feet
When they land on a flower

They flitter and flutter
flitter and flutter
But did you know that butter-
Flies taste with their feet

Taste with their feet!

The Tangled Maze

This is list of challenges children are given when they visit The Tangled Maze the nice little tourist destination aspect of the Misty Downes Nursery at 2301 Midland Hwy, Springmount (between Daylesford and Creswick out side of Ballarat).

I was thinking about places other than schools, libraries and childcare/kinders that might want some kids music a while ago and gave them a call. They were interested and said for me to come out for a meeting. I’d actually never been there even though it’s nearby. Before we had a chat, Judy (the co-manager) suggested I have a look around for inspiration. So I had a go at the challenges.

It was really fun and, well, challenging. I found the answer to one of the challenges where I expected something else to be.

And couldn’t figure out how to get to the top of this platform.

Even though I cheated.

Kids were running all over the place with teachers hot on their heals. Back outside the maze I’d seen other kids enjoying the big chess set and mini golf. I was surprised how busy it was for a Wednesday, actually, but apparently school groups are their biggest customers (along with seniors clubs, weddings and business functions) and I’m not alone as a relative local who’d never been (which is part of why they were interested in having me play). While all the kids were clearly having a blast, I was starting to get a little desperate.

Until I found a nice fountain with a statue, a couple of benches and some fish and had a bit more of a sit and think. What kind of kids music show could I do out here? Quite a few classic themes would work. Three of my existing shows – The Mad Hatters Tea Party, Lady Bugs Picnic & Ranger Earl’s Aussie Animal Adventure – could be rejigged to fit easily enough. But I prefer to do new things and started wondering about Neverland. I easily found my way out of the maze after that and Judy and I had a great meeting.

I’ll be playing five shows there this month, Sunday’s 8th, 15th & 22nd and Wednesdays 11th & 18th of January at 11. I’ll be dressed as a pirate. I’ll play some songs, we’ll make some pirate hats (it always comes back to hats with me) and have a treasure hunt in the maze. I encourage you to come and bring your kids (in costume if there’s time. Although I’ll be a pirate anything Neverland – mermaids, lost boys, fairies – would work) especially if you live nearby and have never been. My show is included within the regular entry price on those days and should only add to the fun.

And don’t worry about your kids getting lost. I’ve been practicing.

Baby Led Weaning

Rosie, as delightful as she is, has been one of those babies who are difficult to feed. She had never taken a bottle (even of expressed breast milk) and generally closed her mouth and turned her head no matter what was on the spoon in front of her.

Her silent reflux may have had something to do with the development of this habit but we still had to do something about it. In researching what to do Rach discovered the pretty obvious concept of baby led weaning. It basically just means give the baby graspable chunks of food and let her feed herself (keeping an eye on her of course).

The photo above is her eating some tuna, mash-potato and avocado balls I made up a while ago (with a few strips if pasta). But she’s also eaten veggie chunks, lots of fruit and entire lamb cutlets that way. We’ve still tried to feed her in other ways too. Just today we tried spoon feeding her some yogurt (she still cant quite manage a spoon herself) but gave up and just gave her the tub.

The advice we got from our doctor and Healthcare nurse was that the method was fine as long as we were careful and prepared for mess.

Things haven’t got anywhere near as grubby as I’d feared.