Hello November!

Nov 8

The latest in my world:

October was crazy, like every year. I pushed and pushed and really struggled and tried my damnedest to get you two produced "singles" done as our "Public Release Project" experiment for October before Halloween, but I wasn't able to make that happen. I did, however, get you a rough mix of "A Welcome End," which I'm really proud of and excited about.

This was a BIG learning experience and while I am still optimistic and hopeful that I can make this work for next year, I see now how ambitious doing two right out of the gate was... too ambitious. Eventually I see the workflows coming together and getting quicker, though we're probably a good while away from being able to get two in one month done with ease, especially if I have other commitments and am doing all the editing myself.

I was trying to get this deliverable for you completed earlier in the day on 10/29 (because my attempts to finish it up earlier in the week similarly failed), because that afternoon I had our bass-playing-friend Gregory Hagen over to set up, do a rehearsal, and then do a trio livestream band performance for One Big Dark Room as a special patron-appreciation event for Halloween here at The Vault. I'm so happy so many of you were able to make it, and it was a really nice and inspiring night that made me feel like we were a little closer to making OBDR just more of a thing. If you missed it, you can watch the replay/archive here.

By Saturday I was little more than a shell, basically - underslept and burnt out big time and super SUPER disappointed/frustrated that I hadn't met my goal or delivered what I had promised.

I had been going hard for the past few weeks up until that point trying to get it all done, knowing that I had promised to take a couple days off to spend time with Eduardo for our 1st Wedding Anniversary for 10/31-11/1.

We went to bed late after the stream Saturday night, and then I was up again a little before 5am to warm up and get ready for our church gig, after which I was horizontal for a couple of days recuperating, and spent most of 11/1 sleeping.

On 11/2 I had to do major final-prep-work for the show I had here in Austin with Erin Ivey, Giulia Millanta, and Grace Pettis at 04 Center 11/3: prepping merch/counting inventory, making signage, finalizing/timing out my setlist and practicing, promo, administration, and everything else that goes into a big IRL event. I was stressed and frustrated again that I hadn't gotten to everything I wanted to do as I was en route to the gig, though those feelings were unnecessary - the show was a success: it was well attended, everyone seemingly had a good time, the sound/production elements were all "chef's kiss," we raised literal thousands of dollars for the SIMS Foundation, and the cherry on top was my husband (who can be difficult to impress) declared that solo-performance as possibly the best/his favorite live show he's ever seen from me. So, that's a big win for me!

EXTRA HUGE THANKS to the several of you that I got to see/meet/hug IRL at the show! It meant the world to me to have you there. Really.

It was challenging after such a heavy sprint to go to bed late that night, get up early again the next day, reset all of the halloween assets back to normal "Crooner Coffee Hour" themes, and be streaming on-time-ish for 10:30am, but I managed it.

Fortunately I had Saturday "off" but I basically needed to shed for the next church gig, and clean up after merch+gear-prep/packing-plus-general-leaving-the-house-Hurricane-Lex from Thursday. Then church again Sunday 11/6 (which is an up-at-5am-ish and then 7am-2pm or so commitment) and more clean-up/catch up, and then I was back gigging again yesterday at the airport. So today is really my first day that I've been able to sit down and connect here. I'll be away later this week for an out-of-town wedding for a family member, and then it'll be back to the grind again through the rest of the year.

This month's deliverable:

As the Vault deliverable for this month, my goal is to not only get "A Welcome End" public-release-ready by doing the final mixing and mastering steps that I ran out of time to do at the end of last month, but to also, hopefully, get the second song, "Carried Away," public-release-ready as well.

If last month's progress is any indication, I can realistically expect to get you a rough mix of "Carried Away" before the end of the month, with a public-release-ready version available just after. But I'd love to get them both knocked out by the end of next week so we can have the new OBDR singles publicly released the first or second week of December. A gal can dream...

Event + Broadcast Schedule:

With going out of town and quite a few IRL "gig" commitments, I don't have the time or bandwidth to restart the other non-CCH livestreams just yet (we may not be digging back into those until 2023 at this rate). I tentatively have a run-of-the-mill solo OBDR Twitch night scheduled in my personal calendar for 11/29, but I need to review what I really have time for to see if I can make that happen or not. I will probably need to end up spending that time on getting the releases ready if I'm being realistic.

As I mentioned, I’ll be out this weekend, so there will be no Crooner Coffee Hour this Friday, November 11. However, upon my return, we will be picking CCH back up for Friday mornings for 11/18 and 11/25.

If you happen to be in Austin, I'll be singing swing tunes in the corner of Ichiro Sushi and Wine Bistro in Georgetown, TX on 11/18 and I'll be singing a couple songs during Bob Schneider's Moonlight Orchestra holiday event at Moody Theatre on 11/26. All the details for these and other events are always available at the live calendar.

Next month's deliverable:

I would like to do a "Public Release Project" of a holiday single for Lex Land. It might be a little too ambitious given the time constraints, as it would need to be completed on or before December 10 to be out by Christmas Day… but now that I know what to expect, it is feasible...

But I need your help! In my vision for how we will proceed with these "Public Release Projects" here at The Vault in 2023, I'll run a poll for production contenders and YOU can decide what I work on next!

So let's give this a try for this year's Lex Land Holiday release, shall we?

My nominations are:

The Days Ahead
(Christmas Was Made) Just For Me
Almost Christmas Again

For a refresher on what these songs sound like/are, you can check out the "winter/holiday" playlist.

To cast your vote, open the poll box by clicking the "Cast Your Vote!" button below.