Thanks to everyone for coming out to the Book Mill, and my apologies to those who weren’t able to get in. I had a great time – next stop California. If you have friends in the Bay Area you might let them know:
Thursday, October 22nd, 7:30 pm
Omar Sosa Quartett featuring Tim Eriksen
San Francisco Jazz Festival
Herbst Theatre, 401 Van Ness Avenue (at McAllister), San Francisco
Tickets: $25-65
Friday, October 23rd, 8 pm
Opening for Chris Smither
Freight & Salvage, 2020 Addison St., Berkeley
tel. 510-644-2020
Tickets: $20.50 in adv., $21.50 at the door
Saturday, October 24th, 1-4 pm
TE teaches Early American Shape-Note Singing
Freight & Salvage, 2020 Addison St., Berkeley
tel. 510-644-2020
Tickets: $25
Sunday, October 25th, 7:30 pm
Solo acoustic show in support of the new CD “Northern Roots Live in Namest”
Cayuga Vault, 1100 Soquel Ave., Santa Cruz
tel. 831-421-9471
Tickets: $14 in adv., $17 at the door
NEW PHOTOS
I’ve finally come around to the realization that in my line of work one needs to have nice photos of oneself. I have some here by a great photographer, Michael Murphree, recently of NYC now relocated to LA. What do you think? Any favorites? I’d love some feedback, since my inclination would be to draw a stick figure with a banjo and I don’t have the kind of business apparatus to insulate me from such decisions. I’d be happy to return the favor with my opinion of whatever baked desserts you’re currently unsure about and feel like sending me samples of. (Don’t pay much attention to the captions; they are only there for easier reference.)
1. Green. Photo by Michael Murphree
2. High-contrast headshot. Photo by Michael Murphree
3. On Mt. Pollux. Photo by Michael Murphree
4. Singing with Banjo. Photo by Michael Murphree
5. Singing with Fiddle. Photo by Michael Murphree
6. Portrait at a Barn. Photo by Michael Murphree
7. Holding the Fiddle. Photo by Michael Murphree
FINALLY, A REQUEST FOR SONG TOPICS
Also, I wonder if anyone has an idea of something they think ought to be a song. In a songwriting class I taught last year at Amherst College I wrote a song based on such a request, to which a student replied “well, I picked tomatoes yesterday.” I bashed out a song about picking tomatoes and it has since become one of my favorites. My most recent songs have concerned a creepy Finnish children’s book character relocating to the Quabbin reservoir, and a love song involving black trumpet mushrooms and singing gravestones in the Pelham woods. In retrospect these topics seem kind of eccentric. What else do people write about these days?
does this creepy children’s book character happen to be a moomintroll by any chance?
hmm, there are things to like about each pic, but things I don’t like too… mostly the clothes are too busy, especially the t shirt with the face on it. From that standpoint, #2 is preferable, but I don’t like the hard shadows. The barn is probably the best backdrop for a simple headshot. Maybe try different lenses (depth of focus) to see if you like it better with the barn in focus or out. The natural backdrops in 3 & 4 are also really, really nice, and help to say something about you as a person that a plain barn wall doesn’t. #6 is most like the kinds of portraits I try to take, or maybe #5.
Don’t know if this helps, since it’s not a simple thumbs-up or down!
S
Hi Tim,
My favorites of your new photos are numbers 3, 4, 5, and 6. I like #3 and #4 because the backgrounds in nature are so beautiful and effectively project the inspiration for your music. I choose #5 because I can almost hear you singing. And I love #6 because it looks exactly like you. If that’s too many, someone else will have to pare my list.
Luv you, Chloe
Go with the portrait at the barn. It is clean, simple, and stylistically neutral yet charming.
Hey Tim,
No. 1 is the best commercial shot. Could easily be the cover of an album. The black of your jeans against the bright green is striking.
However…if you’ll notice, the branch behind your head appears to be going “through” your head, in a Steve Martin arrow-esque sort of way. This would be simple enough to photo shop out.
And I like the grin in No. 7.
Looking for a concert from you in Rochester, NY.
~gloria
I like # 3, 6, and 7. #3 and 6 are my favorites — 6 is my most favorite — and 7 is OK. I’m not fond of the others for various reasons which I could tell you if you wanted details.
I don’t know about song topics. How about loss, change, mutability? Or about someone who moves far away, builds a life, then moves far away again because of various things and starts another new life? There’s probably a lot of song material in that.
#3 for sure, since you look at peace. I vote violently against the second as it is not very specific– you could be conducting and orchestra or penning a genre novel– and would look odd if printed on a black-and-white or low-toner printer. (Let’s think of the venues!)
By the way, I actually like the idea of a stick figure with a banjo. Your drawings are interesting and idiosyncratic, and they make for interesting CD art. You could still put your photo on the back.
Tim, I like the 2nd photo.
I’d love to hear a original folk song about hunting or about the harvest moon (two of my favorite things this time of year)!
Tim,
Photo #5. Hands down favorite. This photograph captures, for me anyway, the immediacy of your performance. You are seemingly at arms length yet telling a story that feels so distant. There is a pleasing anachronistic quality of this photo that mirrors my impression of your music: you’re modern in a long-lost era.
I also really enjoy #3 and #4 because they make me feel as if we’ve just come upon these scenic spots, which will soon be the backdrop for some stirring music.
Stir away, my friend.
AK
P.S. I love that your videos came up in my google search “mt pollux” as I confirmed it was somewhere in Western, Massachusetts. Keep filming in nature. Northern roots among the roots.
Hello Tim,
I like the quality of the light in #3, but I might like it cropped more closely. I also like #5, but agree with Sarah about the face-shirt.
They are all good pictures, but those are the two I like the best.
I am going to ask my 6 year old son for song topics, because he always provides surreal and surprising material.
I am really looking forward to the Santa Cruz show (I can walk to it!) and I wish that I could make it to the workshop in the East Bay.
Peace,
Eliza
I’m fondest of 1, 4 and 5.
I love the way you rise out of the green, and how the trees and your body line up. The lushness and saturation feel aquatic, and fecund.
Four, by contrast, while actually being aquatic, feels stark and raw and somehow punk. Takes me back to when you had hair, and I could still hold my own in a mosh pit. The boots, the jagged rocks, the plaid and banjo, the sweeping curve of the shore and trees, combined with the silver sky and lake. The more I look at it, the more I like it, and the more it seems a great shot for you.
And Chloe is right; five carries your voice directly to my brain. It captures the very intimate experience of your face in song, with its characteristic motions and shades of intensity. And I think the IO shirt works here, even as it adds to the business of the shot.
A song topic suggestion: Sleep, or the lack thereof…
Hey Tim
My two favorite photos are the #1 Green, and #6 Portrait at the Barn.. #7 is good too because you are smiling. It’s nice to see you smile brother.
btw.. I can’t quit watching the “old song from amherst” video.. It’s been like medicine for my soul. Thanks.. I needed it.
Tim,
I like #5 photo the best also because I can just about hear you singing with that image. I agree the shirt is too busy.
Song topic- health care or lack thereof.
1, 3 and 5! are the best!
Hi Tim,
As for song topics.. Love your video on the marching wild turkeys. Any thoughts about a song about wild turkeys? Looking forward to seeing your show in Hartford ,CT. Good luck in CA.
I like 1, 2, and 7, though to be honest there are a few on Facebook that I prefer.
Maybe try some more without an instrument in them? In several of these, the way you’re holding the instrument looks a little self-conscious in a way that makes the photo look overly literal.
Facebook ones I particularly like:
http://www.facebook.com/notifications.php#/photo.php?pid=767979&id=27966272629
http://www.facebook.com/notifications.php#/photo.php?pid=767972&id=27966272629
2, 3 and 4 are the strongest of the bunch.
# 3 gives the best feel for you in an appealing natural setting. # 1 is a bit more mysterious, exotic, less traditional and good too.
No. 2 is an incredible, highly professional portrait. No. 3 conveys a relaxed, musical feeling in nature. No. 4 too dark. No. 5 appears to be popular, but I don’t care for the facial expression. Agree with others about the 2nd face in the last 3. Of those, I prefer No. 7.
Photos 1,2 or 3. With regret I will no longer be playing your music on my folk show at kbcs.fm. I have resigned in protest after 24 years due to gross mis-management of our wonderful community radio station.
Dru
Sunday Folks
Sept 1985-Oct 3, 2009
I like 3,4 and 5 the best. Please, please come to the Tampa Bay FL area! I’m a transplant from Amherst MA.
#1 unfortunate attention drawn to pelvic area
#2 is a definite NO; very unattractive shot.
#4 is best for a cover as it :
is attractive; shows you in a good light; shows you doing what you do, and with an instrument and stance associated pretty uniquely with traditional rural music; shows an environment reflected in your music.
#6 would be good as a head shot, w/ the photo cropped just above the head image on the t shirt(said head is intriguing but distracting for a portrait of you.)
song topic suggestions:
-graveside ramble, from the dead to the living
-graveside ramble, “what I learned from you”
-the concept of contemporary people being ‘old souls ‘ from another time and place
- kids’ song that incorporates expressions containing animals, i.e. the cat’s meow; dog-tired;monkey business; doe eyed………..
Wow, what an amazing and helpful bunch of observations. Thanks so much for taking the time! Again, if you have any baked goods you’d like my opinion on…
One more song idea: I’m sometimes caught up in the mystery of the fact that the people who lived before us, many of whom we remember and celebrate in Sacred Harp or other contexts, were once here, walking this earth just like we are now. They ate; smelled flowers; felt pain, sorrow, joy; and in many ways their lives were a lot like ours. Yet, they’re shadowy figures to us now. I sometimes try to imagine what life was like for them. And then to think that we also will be like they are now, and we also will one day be shadowy figures to people in the future, and yet our lives are very real and present to us now and it’s hard to imagine that this will not always be this way.
“Remember me as you pass by:
As you are now, so once was I.
As I am now, so you will be:
Prepare thyself to follow me.”
(From an old tombstone, I’ve heard.)
And another one:
“The glory of the world; the beauty and the power; the shapes of things — their colors, lights, and shades: These things I saw. Look ye also while life lasts. ” (Also from an old tombstone.)
#3 is a lovely shot. Maybe you could perch a banjo-laden stick figure on your shoulder.
My son’s ideas for songs: a wolf in your heart, and the crystal eye of a dragon. What to do with those?
#1 and #7 are the best in my opinion. I would love to hear a song about a good dog. You know- “Old Blue” for the new millennium. Or maybe it’s the above “wolf in your heart” comment that made me think of it.
All pics are wonderful.
1, 3, 5, 6, 7 are the best!
I don’t bake, but La Boulange here in SF will give you plenty of free baked goods if you play a few songs for them
tis true!
Hey Tim,
Since you asked, my 2 cents on the photos for marketing use (take this with a few pounds of salt–and with the big warning that I don’t know the specific visual context and conventions most in play in your specific genres, either):
1. Might work. I like the verdant/woodsy setting and direct-on pose. The fiddle could strike some as, well, a bit phallic…just a heads-up….
2. Nice portrait; but a caveat, somehow the high-contrast light and the hands combine to make it seem kind of heavy and angst-ridden, despite your fairly neutral facial expression. Could work well if you want to convey that kind of seriousness/thoughtfulness for a particular use.
3. More sedate/peaceful/pastoral/picnicky/light in tone, good in that sense when that’s what you want to project. Seems to say “situated in/from the countryside” (hey, at least musically) in a particularly clear and rather general way, when that’s what you want to say. It does seems to say it in a way that’s really broadly scoped, and thus wouldn’t necessarily differentiate what you do from what, say, a conventional old-timey or even country/crossover band might do.
4. Kind of as above, but more dynamic and less of a stock setting (in my limited experience of images in your worlds). I like the fact that you’re playing and singing, not just contemplating; and I feel like I can almost hear your voice echoing wonderfully across the lake in my mind’s ear. Overall, this would be my second pick.
5. My definite favorite as an all-purpose/iconic image. Fiddle says “tradition,” t-shirt (etc.) says “not stuck in the past but willing to mess with things in artistically productive ways,” playing and singing are dynamic/active/engaging, facial expression says you’re deeply engrossed and invested in what you do and the sounds you make–and beyond all this, the shot will read well at small and large sizes in almost any context of use, online or off.
6 & 7. These read more to me as candidates for secondary/supporting/complementary images that could work as alternative (not first-listed) options in a press packet (PDF or download page) or on a CD-insert back or interior, as a counterpart to an active image showing you making music (but maybe not #5, since they’re so clearly from the same shoot–although that wouldn’t necessarily rule out using them together). Either of these could work in that type of combined context, say with #4, as a way of saying “hey, look, I’m an approachable person, too, not always deeply lost in my inner world of music-making”–the latter sense of musical investiture being a great, different, and more primary point I see being made in #5 and in other images that work like it does.
Well, hey, that’s a lot of gratuitous advice; just thought I’d kick it in on the fly for whatever pieces it of might resonate with you…or not….
Tim, you’ve already been inundated with data, but I’d still like to give my 2 cents.
Shots #6 and #7 are the most appealing to me because you are smiling. I find these particular photos more engaging, welcoming, and charming than the others. I agree with other folks that the t-shirt underneath your otherwise stellar overshirt makes the shot a bit busy and distracting (you know, whose face should I really be looking at?). I like the barn, but it’s not a primary consideration; only for it’s neutrality, nothing immediately thematic.
I like the green of #1 as well as your forward stance–you have a lot of presence and it is immediately apparent here, but there is a crotch thing going on.
#3 is nice, but something keeps me at a distance. This may be what you want to project, don’t know.
More power to you if you can solicit song topics, write words from those suggestions, and make it all work put together with music. I think it’s a hard thing to do.
I like the idea of the Spirit of a Place; poems put to music (very dicey as these can become strident, preachy, or overly sincere); Death; Nature (elements of which you have already mentioned and seem already to incorporate into your songs), especially water; Salvation, you know, not even in a religious sense, but in the sense that we all crave something and look for these cravings to be filled. As far as eccentric lyrics go, do you know Robyn Hitchcock? He makes all kinds of strange things work. Your comment made me think of him. Even some of the Beatles later lyrics are pretty trippy. Tom Waits is a great lyricist and what does he write about? Vagrants, drunks, misfits. These are good American characters, like Kerouac’s. They work for me.
Good luck. I look forward to seeing what comes of all this.
I like #2. Har har. I like that it captures what you are usually doing with your hands when they’re not occupied with an instrument. #1 is great too, but looking at it so small on the screen your eyes look dark. I’d like to see it larger.
Number 6 is great, except I’m distracted by the IO shirt.
I’m not as fond of the other “nature” ones. To me they look more like a stereotypical “I play traditional music so I have to be photographed in nature” thing, whereas #1 suggests a more ambiguous relationship with your surroundings.
Today I’m changing the hardware on my kitchen cabinets. Must be a song in there somewhere. Putting a new face on old junk or something.
–Kelly
N0.2 & N0.5 are the strongest photos of the group!!! N0.3 is runner up to those.
highlight the hands in the high-contrast portrait. try not to show photos that cut off your legs, and get some light on that instrument! The fiddle, I mean.
-LN
beautyschooldropout
Hey Tim,
#1 is nice, I’m used to seeing #5 so that sticks out. #3 is sweet, but I think too sweet for you and your music: too posed.
Write a song about love and loss; about what you learn through them and about hope. Who can’t relate to those themes???