Lady Vagabond checks in (long)
Got an email today asking me if I know of any WoW filkers. The truth is I'm not sure whether I do or not, so speak up! Anyone? Bueller? You stand a chance of getting featured in the "World of Warcrafts" column on WoW.com if you tell me yes--it was one of their columnists who emailed me in search of WoW filk.
It's been amazing, getting to know the wild, wooly, wonderful cross-section of the Filk community I'm blessed to have met, over the past several months. I'm grateful for all of you.
I switched gears back from the filkishly fun toward the loosely liturgical these past two weekends. (Normally, I start playing a lot of Pagan events in the spring, but this year, all of my festival concerts and shows at Pagan venues have ended up in the fall. Heavy on Lughnasadh-Yule this time around. I will see what this turn of events has to teach me.) In Denver, I performed at Witches Brew, which is like a one-stop Pagan everything: concert and workshop space upstairs, downstairs ritual space, a gigantic and wonderful store which includes booths for local crafters and artists (including my brother Gypsy), AND a coffee shop all in one. It's massive and gorgeous, and everyone there was glad to see me. Proprietress Kantis is a goddess, indeed, so I'll be returning there for another show on Friday January 8th. Just this past weekend, I attended for the first time Gaea Goddess Gathering in eastern Kansas, a women's retreat hosted by Camp Gaea, the same site that hosts my beloved Heartland Pagan Festival each spring. I gave both a workshop and a concert, I made a couple of really amazing new connections, I got to catch up with sister Wendy Rule for the first time in almost exactly a year, and I got to hear Wendy play with her cellist Rachel, who is just a delight to be around.
I've tried to put a cut in here three times, and LJ's html just continues to break it. I'm giving up. Sorry for the length.
omnisti drove me to Camp Gaea from our Topeka motel and dropped me off on Friday at noon. Elaine, Beth, and Monica, babes of schlepping, helped me unpack into my cabin. On the gravel road I met up with the lovely scarletandjade , who proceeded to make my entire weekend easier by volunteering as my cabin mate and roadie, lending me her gorgeous-sounding djembe for my concert, and generally saving my ass again and again without a single drop of prompting. We were inseparable, she and I, and for all the time and muscle and sweetness she donated to me from Friday through Sunday, I am eternally grateful to her. This was the first festival in a very long time that I'd come to as a performer without my love, without my band, without anyone.
Thus unpacked, at kenllama 's enthusiastic online behest, we sought out Catherine Martin and her yoga workshop on Friday afternoon and had our Prana thoroughly tickled. "Does this feel like a yoga class?" Catherine asked us all at one point, as we slithered and danced and breathed and smiled in sun-dappled shade. The answer was a resounding, laughing "No!" Catherine and her beautiful mother Mia are goddesses made out of starlight, and I am so glad to have had the chance to meet and interact with them both. Ken, my love, I will have big hugs to deliver to you from both ladies on Sunday!
Ladies in KC, Catherine is holding a Sun & Moon Retreat for women October 2-4 this year, in Parkville, MO. Definitely go to this if you have the time and the means. I wish I could go with you!
The evening's main ritual was one for Kuan Yin, and the ladies did a truly beautiful job with it. One priestess told me, "compassion surrounds you and finds its way out to those around you. Be open to the blessings that come your way." Later in the weekend, before and after my concert, I visited the home-built and truly lovely Kuan Yin temple on site. I truly felt filled up with grace and peace there, and I read the following words:
You are seen from above and shine like all the stars of heaven.
Be mindful of who you are.
Saturday morning, we headed to breakfast with Wendy and Rachel, where I drank at least a gallon of hot mint tea trying to wake up my throat as well as the rest of me. Wendy and I schemed to share tour activity next summer if at all possible, and Jade and I enjoyed discussing the possible origins of Biscuits and Gravy with our Australian and British songbirds, among other things (Wendy maintains that you can eat the berries of the Russian Olive tree, and that they're just as good for you as Goji berries, but free). Breakfast achieved, Jade and I headed up to merchant's row to break out my CDs and books. Our booth (which Jade provided, like magic, out of the back of her van) was gently mobbed through the afternoon, and I saw lots of smiling faces. At 1:30, I headed over to the big pavilion to present a workshop of my own devising, called Exploring Emotion and Healing Through Sound (from the festival brochure: SJ will guide and share with participants as they try out different sorts singing across a wide range of emotions and intent). This was only my second-ever full-on workshop as a solo presenter, and I was largely winging it--I've done rituals and panels before in plenty, but only two actual workshops now, by myself. The formula worked fine, and the 10-13 ladies who attended all told me they'd loved it and had had a great experience when it was over. I was thrilled that most of the women who came to my workshop were not singers, themselves, especially when they bravely came up onto the stage with me when invited --the stage's large wooden surface was much better than the pea gravel on the ground for our purposes.
I had my circle of women warm up extensively first, lots of breathing, then lying down and relaxing, then I talked a bit about my path and how music relates to it, how it's in everything for me. I touched on the fact that, as animals, as humans, if we can hear and speak, we rely almost entirely on those abilities to communicate, how there's a lot of power there. Then I got them up and walking around and between each other, similarly to how we used to warm up before every play rehearsal when I was in college, making belly "HA" sounds and sighs, stretching facial muscles and limbs gently. Then we circled up, and I asked each woman to choose an emotion or concept. I chose 'strength', took a breath, and sang out 'strength' on my own, just vocalizing on an 'AH!' syllable. Then I asked the group to join me in 'truth.' We all just took a breath in and let it out in whatever sounds 'truth' had to say--no words, just sound. I could feel the dynamics of the circle change with each new concept, and when I asked the ladies if they felt this also, they said yes. We continued around the circle, clockwise, stopping at each woman to find out what we sounded like for whichever emotion or concept she had chosen. I remember that we vocalized for joy, gentleness, unconditional love, peace, happiness, hope, and more. The energy was different each time, the sound always beautiful and never the same twice, even though we had more than one lady choose 'peace', for instance. Several ladies had a lot to say afterward, a lot to share in response. Mia said that she would make more sound more often, now that she was mindful of the choice to do so, and other ladies said they understood their own little noises more now, their own expressive, every-day noises (like Jackie, who literally barks at her house renovating team when they don't do what she asks). The lady next to me said she'd never felt so much energy all at once, that she was amazed and needed to ground and center (at which point I said "we'd all better do that now!"). Everyone in attendance said that they felt the energy rise, fall, and change throughout the course of the workshop. I asked the ladies to remember the experience, and to remember that the transformative power of sound is always in them and will be there when they choose to call on it. I was grateful for the chance to show someone else even one aspect of the raw power that I touch and form and work with, each time I sing for an audience.
All the meals were exquisite and filling throughout the weekend. The Gaea kitchen-witches know what they are about, and Susan will forever be the Cobbler Goddess in my mind.
I had the distinct pleasure of getting a quick massage from Aislinn before my concert on Saturday evening--the first time I've managed to slow down enough to let her work on me. She promises me that I will be the first on her table at Festival of Souls in Memphis next month. Fawn and the women of our sound crew were angels and they did an amazing job. My concert went just about flawlessly, if the reaction of my gorgeous, dancing female crowd was any indicator.
I apologize for having slacked off on my setlist posts all summer. I hereby bring them back!
GGG 2009 Setlist, Saturday evening:
For Love of All Who Gather/Witch's Rune
Daughter of the Glade
Hymn to Herne
Archetype Cafe (cover, with apologies to Talis)
Wendy on Board/Red-handed Jill
LGPA Alma Mater
In the House of Mama Dragon
Wicked Girls (cover, with enthusiastic permission, and with some grimacing on my part due to frequency of bar chords: Seanan)
Firebird's Child
unexpected encore: In the Name of the Dance
Highlights of the concert included the pack of little girls playing limbo with a pole they'd made entirely of glow-sticks, and the gorgeous dancing crowd during Herne, Firebird, and In the Name of the Dance. Not for nothing were most of the afternoon workshops focused on drumming, singing of some sort, or dancing of some sort for those willing and able!
Wendy and Rachel brought me back up onstage at the end of their set to drum and sing along on "Earth, Air, Fire and Water," which I love to do. The stars were bright and plentiful, and I knew despite a little bit of trouble with my voice that everything was all right. Later in the evening, I spun fire with one of the KC girls, who did a bang-up job with poi while wearing rainbow stripey socks. After a poi spin and a staff spin for the ladies around the fire, I headed down to my cabin bed. After brief and sweet goodbyes and a visit to Herne's Hollow (the path into the forest was COMPLETELY DRY. I am going to visit Gaea in the fall from now on, man!), Jade loaded me up and gave me a ride into KC on Sunday, where omnisti met up with me again. After a stuff transferral from van to Golde, Jade, K, Uno, Carissa, and I went out to dinner and bid each other farewell after calories and laughter and hugs were had.
We're safe in St. Louis now for a couple of days, before heading up to Ohio to nab stealthcello from the airport and head out to the Earth Warriors Festival in Clarksville. The leaves are changing, and it feels good to be in my home time zone again for just a little while, even on a cloudy day. I'm hoping I can get back to the zoo again this week, tomorrow or Wednesday. mamaduckers has asked for a visit for her birthday tomorrow, and I'm really looking forward to seeing her again. moonferret, if you've got some time for a visit, let me know! I'd love to see you.
GGG ladies and Pagan phamily, east and west, thank you for giving me the opportunity to sing and be with you. I wish each of you well! Extra thanks go to Aislinn for bringing me to GGG this year.