November Newsy News!
Click Hello, friends and fellow music lovers – I hope you enjoying this beautiful autumn day.
It’s a big week over here at BW world headquarters! Here’s what’s coming up and I hope you can join in on some of the fun!
WEDNESDAY, NOV 3 – Joyful Measures Do-Over Livestream with Jesse Terry! You may have tuned in a couple weeks ago when we tried our livestream and had technical difficulties (and we thank you for hanging with us!). We’ve decided to try again because WHY NOT!?! I started this livestream series called Joyful Measures during the time of isolation last year to create a space for beauty, solace, connection, and celebration through word and song while also getting to reconnect with my friends! Jesse Terry is one of my favorite people in the world, and also one of the most positive people and one of the most hard-working musicians I know. Plus he is an amazing writer whose songs stay in my head for days and days and hearing him sing always lifts my spirits and dangit, I miss my friend! We’ll swap songs and tell stories, giggle, and talk a little bit about what brings us joy. You can tune in here on my Facebook music page. (You do not have to have a Facebook account to watch).It’s free to watch and donations are joyfully accepted at Venmo: @bethwoodmusic and Paypal. We are starting early at 4:30 Pacific time which means a reasonable hour for our East Coast friends! Jesse and his wonderful wife Jess have a daughter Lily and we want to respect her bedtime! 🙂 4:30 Pacific/5:30 Mountain/6:30 Central/7:30 Eastern. We’ll go for about an hour, and then we’ll meet up for an after-party with our Patreon communities on Zoom. Click here to learn about signing up for Patreon!
Guess what y’all, FRIDAY, NOV 5 is release day for a new single!! I teamed up with the amazing Naomi Laviolette for a holiday duet – we recorded my song “Love Is Love (The Christmas Eve Song)” and it will be available on all streaming platforms and Apple and Amazon for digital download on Nov 5. If you use Spotify, will you do us a favor and click here to pre-save the single? It would help us out a lot! I am SO exicted for everyone to hear it! I first met Naomi when we both worked on the Lullaby Project, a program of the Oregon Symphony that pairs songwriters with parents experiencing housing insecurity to write lullabies for their children. Naomi heard my song (we follow each other on Patreon, YAY), and asked if I would like to release it as a duet and I said a resounding YES!! We got busy arranging our vocal/guitar/piano parts, and Naomi recorded her beautiful felt piano at home. Then we spent a really fun day at Grange Recorders studio here in Sisters, and Mai Bloomfield created and recorded her cello parts at her home studio. Then the amazing Gus Berry mixed it at his Berrytown studio in Portland, and Naomi made this gorgeous video and my heart is subsequently overflowing with joy and gratitude and happy tears!!
When I wrote this song, I was living in a new town — too far away and too expensive to travel to visit family for Christmas. I was walking my dog Bailey in the park early on Christmas Eve morning. It was frosty and the holiday sights and sounds were all around. I had just read a news story about the city moving a camp of houseless folks. Where were they supposed to go? Weren’t they travelers looking for a place to rest, just like Mary and Joseph? The first few lines of that song came to me fully formed as we were walking, and we rushed home so I wouldn’t lose them. Then I sat at the piano and followed the thread.
I was feeling so alone that morning writing that song. And then the music worked its magic and brought all of this wondrous collective effort together, and now I can’t believe how that little idea grew. Much love and gratitude to Naomi for her generosity and amazing musicianship and hard work on this, and to Gus and Keith and Mai for adding their beautiful talents to the recording. Here’s a little preview… and here is Naomi on Patreon if you’d like to learn more about her and her wonderful artistry.
And SUNDAY, NOV 7 is our very first She’s Speaking Live concert at the Alberta Rose Theatre in Portland!! I can’t even describe how inspiring and spirit-lifting it has been to collaborate with these amazing women! We’ll have eight women songwriters across genres paying tribute to women through song – both original songs and songs by women artists we admire. You don’t wanna miss this! Here are all the details…
Featuring: Edna Vazquez, Arietta Ward, Bre Gregg, Kristen Grainger, LaRhonda Steele, Liz Chibucos, Naomi LaViolette and BW backed by a killer band. Doors open at 6/Music at 7. Tickets: $25 Advance/$30 At the Door. For the health and safety of everyone, at this time, entry to the Alberta Rose Theatre requires proof of a full course of COVID vaccination. Masks are required in all indoor public spaces per the current State of Oregon mandate. Click here for more details and tickets!
I’ll have my monthly virutal song circle on Wed, Nov 10 and also my monthly virtual feedback song salon on Monday, Nov 22. Please see my website for details and email me at bethwoodmusic@hotmail.com to reserve your spot for those.
And finally, I am excited to tell you about a special retreat I’ll be co-leading in December with my friends Kirstin Anglea and Alan Claassen. It is a Winter Solstice retreat (virtual) called Threads Of Light, based on the Circle of Trust approach developed by the Center for Courage & Renewal. We co-led this retreat last year and it was incredibly nourishing, inspiring, connecting, deeply moving, and fun. I am very grateful and humbled that I get to weave again with these amazing humans. We’ll have poetry, music, reflection, and invitations for sharing, and a beautiful closing ritual. Here is a link to lots more information including how to register if you are interested. I hope you’ll consider joining us!
I also have some fun bonus news to share… I got a part-time job at our local bookstore, Paulina Springs Books! I am so excited to learn and read and get to know more people in this community. I feel lucky to be able to find work that is meaningful to me and supportive of my creative endeavors! So if you’re ever in Sisters, please stop by and see us! Or if you’d like to check out the bookstore online, you can visit here. You can even order books from us online!
As we turn toward these shorter days and darker, colder nights, I am steeped in gratitude for my community, for the vital connections that music and poetry and art bring into my life, for new opportunities and for letting go, and for your support throughout the years. Thank you for walking beside me and cheering me on! May you find ways to lift and nourish your spirits. With heaps of gratitude from your fan,
Beth
PO Box 551
Sisters, OR 97759
BW World Headquarters: www.bethwoodmusic.com
Holler at me: bethwoodmusic [AT] hotmail.com
Come join me on Patreon, a subcription to my music and poetry!
Take a listen and won’t ya follow me on Spotify?
Here I am with my face on Facebook.
Find me on Instagram: @bethwoodmusic
Here’s my face singing songs on Youtube
I’ve mostly given up but sometimes I say things on Twitter She’s Speaking on YouTube
She’s Speaking on Facebook She’s Speaking on Instagram: @ShesSpeakingsongs
And p.s. here’s the Hannah update…she’s still cute and we’re working on separation anxiety and she eats dead mice and throws up in the car and I still love her!! We went to the beach and she loved it!
