Update!

Hi folks! Here's a bit of what's been going on.

Interview
A couple months ago I was interviewed by website called Middle-Earth News. They had linked one of their articles about Tolkien inspired music on Twitter and as a response I pointed them to my SoundCloud page. They then sent me an email asking to do an interview!

Read the the interview here!

Not that I minded answering them, but I thought the questions regarding the music in the movies were kind of weird just stuck in the middle there. They had originally asked another movie question but they removed it upon publication. The question went something like this: "What are you looking forward to the most in the last Hobbit movie?" I answered, "When Tauriel dies". I'm guessing they didn't think it was as funny as I did.

It was a bit of unexpected promotion which led to a smidgen of hits on some of my sites. Hopefully there are some folks who read it and stuck it in the back of their mind so when I finally get around to releasing some kind of record online they'll be all, "Oh yeah, I remember reading something about that weirdo who sings like a troll."

Shows
Last week I played at a bookstore in downtown Blue Springs called Inklings' Books & Coffee Shoppe. They had a fantasy author signing books and I did a bit of bookstore busking on the sidewalk. I love used bookstores. It might be the closest thing to treasure hunting there is. I highly recommend you swing by for a glance at the many treasures Inklings' has to offer. In fact a little bird told me you can even find some Hobbit inspired music in CD format there...

Songwriting/Recording
I'm nearing the end of songwriting through the Hobbit. I have five more chapters to go. Two of which are in the process right now. I have eleven songs recorded, most of which are on my soundcloud page. That leaves 8 more to record. Unfortunately my Mac is in need of some repair. I think the video card went out. At some point I'll have to get it checked out, but I need to have our air conditioner fixed first! Priorities!

In the interview I hit on this when had the opportunity to talk about why I admire Tolkien. I said,

I can identify, to a degree, with his struggle between the drudgery of his vocational life and his creative life. In Tolkien, we see one who created a masterpiece in the midst of the ordinary and the mundane. Not only did he have an extremely demanding job, but he also had a large family to take care of. The most admirable thing I find is that he didn’t throw away his career and sacrifice his wife and children to pursue his amazing world of stories. It took extra effort and no doubt took him longer to finish, but that only added to the quality of his creation. I find great encouragement in his steady plodding with job, wife, and kids, than if he had been a financially stable single man with no responsibility and plenty of free time.

So the A/C comes before the resources needed to record more music. And I'm okay with that because music made at the expense of my family is bad art. If I want to create, I need to create even in the midst of the mundane.

Actually last night was kind of highlighted this in a special way. We high-tailed it out of our sauna we call home and crashed my folks' place for a few hours. During our down time I grabbed a guitar and started working on one of my songs. Normally I do my song-smithing in isolation; on break or on the road or when the kids are in bed. But I had a little time so I set to work with the family all around. I only wrote two words but it was two more than I had before. During the process I caught my daughter singing the first (and so far, only) verse along with me. You can see it below in the picture my wife took. She also asked me questions about the verse. What it was about and she dug a bit deeper into the words I was crafting. If my A/C doesn't go out, then I don't get to have the privilege of experiencing my daughter share in my creative process. She may forget this tomorrow, or she may remember this for the rest of her life. Either way, I've already been moved by it, and that motivates me to not only love my family all the more but to press on writing and creating.