Author Archive for Erica

45 minutes of freedom

Published
by
Erica
on 8 May 2008
in The-Dailies
. 8 Comments

Today I am breaking the silence. I find myself at 4:15 in the afternoon with forty-five minutes until my first student arrives.  The voice inside my head is asking, “what do you want to do with the  next 45 minutes?”  This is a question which circumstances very rarely allow to even come to the forefront of my brain.  I won’t go into the reasons why that is…I will just say…mother of two children by day and wannabe rock-star by night. Look out Hannah Montana!  I looked over at the empty desk where Chad is usually parked in front of the computer.  I sat down.  I logged in.  And a brilliant idea occurred to me.  I should blog!  That may sound silly for most of you seeing as blogging is as much a part of your daily routine as drinking coffee in various forms is a part of mine.  Anyhoo…here I am.

What to blog about….the first thought that came to my mind was to share about a moment I had this week while preparing for the recording process.  So, here goes.  Many of you may not know this, but Chad and I have intentionally set up a process in our household with the express purpose of giving him time to write songs.  It goes like this…I wake up on Monday morning and plan some insane activity/day-trip for the kids, thereby getting the house completely empty for Chad to create his art.  Some of these activities have included Disneyland trips, trips via Amtrak to Santa Barbara. trips to the Getty, trips to the beach, etc.  It has been affectionately named, “Monday Fun-day.”  Well, since all of these trips involve me, by myself, with two children under the age of 5, at the end of Monday Fun-day, I am completely wiped out.  Chad is equally exhausted from the “pulling-from-the-void” that is the songwriting process.  So…we put the kiddos to bed, Chad plays me what he is working on, I make dinner, and we park it on the couch to check our brains at the door of some form of entertainment, be it TV, a movie…you get the drift.  I tell you all of this to get to my point, I promise!

So two days ago it becomes apparent to me that, during the upcoming recording session, I am going to have to sing the band  through one of the songs that Chad has written for my voice.  The song is entitled “The Tide” and it is a song that was born awhile back during a much needed, night away at the Hotel Del Coronado.  We came up with the music of the song together, but Chad had written the lyrics on his own in the weeks that followed. Keep in mind, I have been listening to these tunes over and over on my ipod, but, as we all know, listening is quite different from singing.  So…he lays into the piano part, gives me the intro and I start singing it for the first time.  I barely made it halfway through the first chorus before I started weeping.  Puzzled, Chad looked up from the piano.  All I could say in that moment was, “It’s so beautiful.”  The lyrics, the melody, the way he seemed to get inside my head, connecting with my soul and writing a song that I could communicate to an audience…not to mention that fact that he wrote a song specifically for me to sing. I was so overwhelmed.  

I am sharing this because I want to express to my appreciation.  I want to give props where props are due.  Many times I would come home from “Monday Fun-day” and listen to Chad’s “work for the day”, and I would treat it as less than it really deserved to be treated.  These songs are special.  You’ll know what I mean the minute one of them manages to pierce the shell of the mundane and hit right at the core of the soul.

Well..my 45 minutes is up.  Happy blogging!

50 Reasons why I need a Sterling in my life

Published
by
Erica
on 17 August 2006
in life and miscellany
. 3 Comments

So…the intern at El Dorado…Sterling. He Rocks. He is just out of school where he studied Audio Engineering. I can only assume that he studied things like microphone placement, wiring, signal chain, tracking audio in Pro Tools, etc. He moved out here to Burbank about 8 days ago, knowing no one, and found an apartment close to the studio. He has found himself transplanted here in lovely Burbank, Cali at El Dorado Recording doing things like running for food, helping with instrument set-up, making lots and lots of coffee, etc. and is doing his time as an intern while eagerly anticipating his moment to show what he can do.

So…here come the reasons why everyone needs a Sterling in their lives.

1. Every time I reach for a water bottle in the fridge, there is a complete line of waters stacked as if one has never been taken. I love that.

2. After Chad has eaten his Poquito Mas, Sterling stealthily comes behind him and wipes his crumbs off the tablecloth.

3. He pays attention…close attention.

4. Closely related to number three…he realizes the importance of fresh coffee.

5. He readily responds to the seemingly insignificant requests. Things like, “Hey Sterling, can you please go into the piano room and hold down the top of the Wurlitzer while Chad plays in this part?” or ” Hey, when you go to Trader Joes, will you pick up some half and half for me to have with my coffee at home?” (Are you sensing a theme here? Coffee, baby…muy importante).

6. Ok…so maybe I won’t rattle on with 50 reasons…. although it is not for lack of writing material, just time.

7. Here’s the scoop. I very rarely see a young person with that amount of perspective on the world that is still able to maintain direction and focus. It does my heart good. At one moment in a recording session yesterday, there was some discussion as to the quality of sound that was coming from the playback. We were in a discussion with the band and the engineer that lead to an unanswered musical/engineering question. For some reason everyone looked at Sterling and he piped up, “I’m sorry, I am not qualified to answer that question.” Of course our immediate response was mass hilarity. Later we were talking about his experience in school and he explained to us that his teachers had told stories of Assistant Engineers being fired for expressing even the smallest of opinions to the musicians (or the Engineer, for that matter). I found it so inspiring that he had heard the important things that his teachers had to say (well, one at least). I found it especially admirable because I am a teacher of sorts. I think all too often we have goals and dreams but are not willing to make the sacrifices necessary or take the baby steps that HAVE to be taken before those said dreams can be realized. I have learned a lot from Sterling this week.