Earth Tone Flutes

2006-09-21T09:29:00.000-07:00

The Death Of A Blog...

Well, it's official. I'm just too busy to keep up a blog with anything approaching consistency. Pathetic, I know, but there it is. I just came home from Flute Quest in Seattle, and by all accounts I should have a great deal to say, but I'm forced to keep it short and as sweet as possible. So here it goes.

FluteQuest: Beautiful setting, great performances, reasonable turn-out (its the first FluteQuest, so it started modestly), lots of fun. That's it in a nutshell. Hats off to Brent Haines of Woodsound Flutes for being the mover and shaker--Brent shouldered the huge task of organizing a major event, assisted by a small but dedicated posse of friends and family, and for a first year event it was an impressive accomplishment. I, for one, will be returning to FluteQuest next year!

I had my stage debut as a percussionist, sitting in with Jeff Balls band for a full set and being a guest percussionist for Ron Warren. Tremendous fun! Can't wait to do it again!

There is more to tell, but I can't tell it right now--ironic, isn't it? The blog gasps and wheezes, staggering in slow motion before total collapse...

2006-08-10T10:57:00.000-07:00

2006 INAFA Convention was a hit!

Whew! I'm back home after the whirlwind experience of attending the 2006 INAFA convention and I honestly think it will take me a week or so to recover. I brought back a lot of great memories (and a bit of a cold that was being shared around) and I got to meet a great many fluties for the first time. I've posted a few pics on my website, though because I was sitting at my table most of the time I didn't get much variety :-(

Nonetheless it was fun to chat with my fellow flute makers and to see so many happy participants. I'm told the workshops were excellent and the evening concerts (which I was able to attend) were a treat. Some great performances! Check out www.naflute.blogspot.com for a comprehensive view of the convention and lots of pics--this is the blog of Mike Oitzman, head of the Northern California Flute Circle. He was on the spot with his camera and laptop computer, and he was blogging on the convention as it unfolded, posting pictures as he went--very cool!

I got to hang out with Stephen DeRuby and Brian Revheim, which is always a pleasure, as well as my old friend Mac Lopez. I met a number of other fine makers for the first time including Leonard McGann, Tom Stewart, Jeff Calavan, Butch Hall, John Stillwell, Michael Allen, Keith Glowka, Gary Kuhl, Kent Bush and Utah Ferris. Everyone was so nice and supportive of each other that it was a pleasure to be a part of it all. My good friend Colyn Peterson was greatly missed--he had to cancel his trip due to other committments, but a LOT of folks were sorry he wasn't there.

So the secret is out: Jeff Ball and I announced the creation of the Native American Flute Portal (www.fluteportal.com) , an interactive, user-powered website that is going to be opening later this month (hopefully). I've been hinting about it in this blog, but now it is scheduled for launch.
Sign up on the Earth Tone Flutes mailing list, if you haven't already, and you will be informed when it is actually supposed to hit the streets. I'll be posting a synopsis of it on my website for those who want to know more about what it is and what it can do.

On a more somber note I wanted to take a moment to honor my friend Deborah White who passed away last week. I met Deborah because of her interest in the Native American flute and over the last couple of years we spent a lot of time talking about flutes and life in general. I became acquainted also with her talented sons Jared and Shayne (the three of them formed Distant Oaks, popular performers of Celtic music based in Santa Rosa), and have kept in regular contact with them ever since. Deb will be missed.

2006-07-13T21:39:00.000-07:00

I Nearly Melted...

Despite the 100 degree heat, the gathering at Mary's house was a great success--lots of fun was had by all. It just goes to show the dedication of serious flute enthusiasts when not even blazing heat and tropical humidity can keep them indoors when there is a major flute event taking place!

I was going to write a bit about the event (I even took pictures!) but I decided to save up a proper "review" of the experience for (drum roll) the promised launch of the new (and so far semi-secret) website that Jeff Ball and myself will be unveiling before the end of this month! So stay tuned and check back periodically--we'll be sending out the promised announcements when the time comes, so if you are on the Earth Tone Flutes e-mail list, you will be in the know (wink).

All in all, a great trip that obliged me to do a fair bit of driving through San Francisco and Sacramento. Living like the country mouse that I am, it is good to be reminded what it is like to participate in a rat race. Wow! I forgot what real traffic was like...

So I'm afraid this is destined to be another fairly low-key (read: lame) blog entry. I'm still recovering from travel and I'm going to be preparing like mad for the INAFA conference in less than three weeks. I probably won't be doing much blogging until that is over, but then hopefully I will be less distracted and able to actually write something that is interesting to read. No promises, mind you.

For those of you attending the convention, I'll look forward to seeing you there. For those who cannot, hopefully you will be able to read all about it on the secret new website!

2006-06-11T22:44:00.000-07:00

Back To Sac! Earth Tone Flutes returns to Sacramento!

I'm not really known for being much of a traveller, and friends and family have often despaired of getting me anywhere that required more than a few hours in a car or (God forbid!) getting on a plane. However, there is still hope for me as my recent trip to Sacramento proved.

I had so much fun hobnobbing with fluties that I'm playing a return date for Mary Youngbloods yearly gathering (B-day!). Last summer I met up with my friend Dan "Noisy Bear" Ricketts and we haunted Mary's back yard (actually we stood under a shady tree) talking flutes and having a ball. The P.A. system had been set up and open mike was happening all afternoon. Later in the day Elysium Calling dropped in for an impromptu concert that wowed the audience, later being joined by Mary.

Well, this summer (July 8th is the gathering) I'm heading back and I'm going with a whole rack of special flutes. I'll have a variety of keys, as usual, but I'm bringing a few surprises along with me, including some ultra-low, side-blown flutes and some low drone flutes (and mid-drones as well). Flute circle members will receive a special 15% discount, so if you belong to a circle or one of the NCFC clans, drop by and see what there is on offer (plus you save on shipping when you get a flute in person--nice!)

I've been busily preparing for this ho-down (which is why my blog has been rather quiet lately) in addition to dealing with lots of summer projects. I'm seriously looking into getting some goats (yes, goats). I've always wanted to keep some goats for milking and weed control (though if I want good tasting milk I'm told that I need to be careful about the "weeds" they are allowed to eat--no poison oak, for example). Anyway, I'm getting down to earth with a greenhouse and some goats, and who knows what the next phase will be?. Soon I'll be wearing coarse, home-spun robes and wandering the meadows with my flute and a pack of goats, living the simple life...

However, in the meantime I'm getting in a shipment of special Western Red Cedar. I have a supplier in Canada who deals with the finest quality instrument woods for luthiers--salvaged, old-growth WRC from high in the mountains. It grows so slowly that the wood is amazingly dense (tight growth rings) and unbelieveably resonant. I haven't gotten wood from him in ages, but it really spoils you as a maker. Most makers and players I know simply love good quality wood, and it doesn't get any nicer than this stuff. I'm going to be making a number of the bass flutes that I'm bringing to Marys from this same wood.

So there it is folks. Thanks for droppin' by.

2006-05-25T22:15:00.000-07:00

Mary Youngbloods CD Release Party!

This last weekend was a busy and exciting one, taking me down to San Francisco and Sacramento on a (literal) flute journey! Part of the journey was me gathering "content" for this fabulous new website that I hinted about in my last blog entry--more specifically, I set up my mobile recording rig in Mary Youngbloods back yard and did a very enjoyable audio interview with her. This interview will be "broadcast" from our website at the time of launch, coinciding with some other major events.

In any case, the whole thing was pure serendipity from start to finish! I didn't know that Mary had planned this weekend for her CD release concert--I just called up to arrange the interview and she said "Hey! I'm doing this concert and going to a flute gathering...you should come along!" Well, believe it or not, she didn't have to twist my arm! I made the trek down and we had a really nice chat about her music, from her past musical "roots" up to the "branches" of her present endeavors. As it turns out, the timing was perfect in another way since Mary just announced the formation of her new "all girl" band: Mary Youngblood and the Sisters of the Earth. We talked about this new musical incarnation, as well as the new CD and much more, so be sure to check it out. As I mentioned in the last blog, if you want to know when the site is launched and the interview available, sign up on the Earth Tone Flutes e-mail list.

As it happens, I used to live in the same neighborhood as Mary--a place called Fair Oaks, CA. As I was driving to her place I was having a fit of nostalgia for this vegetarian "fast food" place I used to go to with my friends called "The Sunflower" (in the village of Fair Oaks). When we finished the interview Mary suggested we go get some lunch, and where did she pick? Yes indeed, the very place I had been thinking of revisiting! Too good to be true.

From there, it was back to her place to get ready for the concert. This involved sitting in with a shaker during a rehersal she was having with her new guitarist to get ready for the evenings performance, all the while gazing around the practice room at an UNBELIEVEABLE flute collection. As a flute maker, it was impossible to resist trying to identify all of the different makers!

Then we all caravanned down to a local park to meet with the members of the Loping Wolf Flute Circle (a new branch of the Northern California Flute Circle)-- a sort of "tailgate" party before the show. Then on to the concert itself which was a lot of fun and filled with a good bit of audience participation (Mary brought along a big basket full of percussion instruments which she handed out to the crowd for a few select songs). My friend Dan "Noisy Bear" Ricketts got on stage with Mary to do a duet (sporting a fine, Earth Tone Flutes low A drone I might add!). She had another student of hers (Francesca R.) join her during a different song, and ended the concert by getting about a dozen audience members to join in with their A minor flutes. The whole gig was a great success, and it was really nice to get out and rub shoulders with all the "fluties".

However, the entire trip (which included a business meeting with the web designer of the new site that Jeff Ball and I are doing---shroud of mystery still mostly intact...) took about 50 hours, so it had a sort of "whirlwind" quality to it. I'm only just recovering (lots of driving involved).

So, I'm back in the shop and getting down to business--stay tuned for the next episode!

2006-05-10T11:40:00.000-07:00

The Slacking Blogger

Well, it has been a bit longer than I had planned between blogs--I suppose it is like anything new that we try to introduce into our lives and try to make a habit of. I got side-tracked by a number of projects (giving up caffeine being one of them--I really have been moving at half speed).

I mentioned that I would be at the INAFA convention this summer, but there is more to my presence there than simply flute vending. Jeff Ball and I will be unveiling a special project that we have been working on secretly for some months. It is still a bit of a secret, but I will let out this much: It is a website, and it is unprecedented in the world of the Native American flute. The site will be launched with a considerable bang on the eve of the INAFA convention and it will be well worth stampeding to it to have a look around. I won’t say anymore at this point (keeping a certain amount of mystery is more fun!), but if you sign up on the Earth Tone Flutes mailing list you’ll get some advance notice of the launch date and the URL so you can be the first to pay a visit. Trust me, it will be worth your time!

The gears are also officially turning at the Earth Tone Flutes music studio, where an album is being recorded and slated for release by summer of 2007 (hopefully). This also, will be something a bit different and will feature some guest performances by notable flute players, so stay tuned! If things go smoothly, the release date might be pushed forward quite a bit.

Let’s see, what else is new? Lot’s of stuff going on in the flute shop in preparation for the INAFA convention, so check the In Stock page regularly if you are hunting for a flute. All of the stock that I’m building for the convention will be posted there as it is finished. Any and all of it will be available before the convention, so I hope to have new flutes up every week or so for the next three months.

That is all for now, I think. I’ll try to make my next post in a more timely fashion, particularly since this one is more of an announcement than anything. Once I stop moving at half speed writing a blog entry will be much easier! Thanks for dropping by…

2006-04-18T19:13:00.000-07:00

All Quiet on the Western Front...

Well, I'm a bit later than I thought I'd be with this entry--got side-tracked by the IRS (raise your hand if you just love them!). It seems everyone I know got blind-sided by an unexpected tax bill, either that or, as a culture, we love to complain about paying taxes. Difficult to make an objective evaluation, really. I read somewhere that you can become exempt from federal income tax if you can prove that you never use any services of any kind (including the roads). This fascinates me, but even in my wildest imagination I haven't figured out how to get by without ever using a road.

Anyway, I've ceased to rock on my heels as a result of the blow, and some semblance of perspective has returned: the world is not (as I had previously believed) coming to an abrupt end as a result of this outrage. However, I am clambering back from the brink in a manner of speaking, so be advised--if you contact Earth Tone Flutes in the next week or so and mention the "Fire Sale", you will get a pleasant surprise and may take home a flute at a bargain price! Don't wait too long, because once I'm officially "recovered" it is business as usual.

Mind you, having a "sale" does set me back a bit in terms of getting stock ready for this summer's I.N.A.F.A. convention. For those who don't know the acronym, it stands for International Native American Flute Association, and INAFA is hosting a major gathering in San Francisco the first weekend of August. I will be there, sharing a table with Jeff Ball (selling flutes and CD's, respectively) and we will be watching the thronging crowds who have come to listen to the concerts (R.Carlos Nakai, Jeff Ball, Peter Phippen, Mark Holland, Charles Littleleaf and many others) and to wander among the flute vendors (far too numerous to mention, especially in a blog that is all about ME! :-) I will be traveling to the event with my friend and colleague, Colyn Peterson of Woodland Voices.

In any case, we'll be there with bells on, and Jeff and I might even have a little surprise for those of you who attend. I'll say no more for the present, leaving it shrouded in mystery...

Spring has finally started to show itself on the north coast of California (it has been a long, very wet winter) and the sun is doing wonders for us up here. I can finally remove a layer of clothing, which is very nice. Normally, I go stumping down to my workshop dressed in a motley assortment of garments, about three deep, whose ostensible purpose is to keep me warm (which they do) and to scare the deer away from the rose bushes (which they do). There are not many people who can really get away with wearing two separate styles of plaid at the same time (especially two different colors). Sometimes I catch sight of myself in the mirror before I step out the door and it really messes with my spatial perception--I feel faintly nauseous and am temporarily rendered unable to judge depth of field. Just add a straw hat and some Wellingtons and I'd most likely be arrested if I wandered into town.

It's not always that bad--sometimes I'm quite dapper in my work clothes. They sort of travel into and out of the laundry like various planets and asteroids. Periodically there is one of those magical conjunctions where everything that I grab that day matches, and it creates a sense of cosmic purpose. It would be an interesting project (when I finally have an intern, I'll delegate this task) to chart the relationship between color-coordination in my work clothing, and flute quality. Can they be connected?

A topic for another blog, I think. Thanks for dropping by :-)

2006-04-05T19:11:00.000-07:00

I spent part of today in my music studio, taking care of some rearranging and redecorating, with a view to making it a more smoothly functioning environment in which to create and record music (yes, for those who had absolutely no idea I'm a bit of an amateur "gear head", working in a computer-based recording environment). As I lay on my back underneath my workstation, swimming amongst patchcords and cables like a sea-beast among the waving kelp, I was reflecting upon the weird nature of technology.

On the one hand, you have the flute--a result of craftsmanship (and technology, in the case of most contemporary makers) but in the final analysis a very non-techno item. In fact, one of the things that I love about the flute is that it is not a techno-gizmo (though to be fair, some of our more primitive ancestors--accustomed as they were to grunting, and throwing rocks at mastodons and the like--would probably have found the most simple of flutes to be a marvel of technology. The sad irony of course, is that they wouldn't know the word "technology" and be able to use it in a sentence. But setting that aside...

A flute is a simple construction of wood and leather that is totally at home in a field or in a forest, being used to commune with Nature, ourselves, other people...

Then there is recorded flute music. We love to listen to it, and it brings us a great deal of that connectedness and pleasure that we get from playing the flute, but it is very much the product of technology. An interesting (depending upon the mood you are in) subject for reflection, and it occupied my thoughts for all of about five seconds as I lay on the carpet (which was very much in need of vacuuming--something that becomes a lot more obvious when you roll on it).

Mind you, a surprising amount of reflection can occur in a short space, but it was more like one of those, "Hmmmm...Interesting" sort of reflections that happen quickly and then are over. More like a reminder to oneself to set aside some time later to think about it properly, when you are not trying to entangle a mess of identical looking cables, after having made the mistake of using scotch tape to label them, and then discovering that scotch tape and rubber have some weird sort of relationship at the molecular level and fuse to one another, trying no doubt (in their own, not-very-conscious way), to create a new life form: "scotbber". To make it all the more tiresome, I had made the ill-advised decision to trim my fingernails earlier today. When dealing with scotbber, getting rid of your fingernails is a bit like pulling all your teeth out as a prelude to eating a steak.

Anyway, I eventually emerged from under my desk, everything plugged back in where it belonged, and surveyed my techno-kingdom. The funny thing about building a recording studio is that I end up spending nearly as much time fussing with stuff as I do actually recording. I've built special sound-absorbing panels, weird hanging deflectors, and I'm forever installing software and plugging things into other things. In the end, I have tremendous power at my finger tips (I'm able to take the simple, not-very-techno flute and capture its voice like a Sorcerer of ancient times, and make it sing again on command! Too bad I can't get Mickey Mouse to do some vacuuming for me...) but then I turn and see one of my flutes standing in the corner waiting to be recorded, and the reflections start all over again...

Earth Tone Flutes joins the blogging revolution!

2006-03-30T19:51:00.000-08:00

Okay, I know that blogs are everywhere. They are a part of the internet culture that is here to stay, and when you come right down to it, they are pretty cool.

I'm not the most cutting-edge person when it comes to technology, but the idea of a running commentary of what is happening at Earth Tone Flutes might be of interest to a handful of fluties, so I say to myself "why not?"

You may be asking, "Are things at Earth Tone Flutes really that interesting?" The answer of course is, Yes! You've never visited a more fascinating place! There will be stories and pictures of flutes! Stories and pictures of sawdust! Stories and pictures of me sweeping up sawdust! Portraits of my favorite router bits! Reflections on the nature of glue--why is it so sticky? I'll be asking the tough questions: Why are flutes cylindrical? What's wrong with the good, old-fashioned, rectangular shape? This and much, much more!

Are you giddy with anticipation? No? Good. That means that you are not clinically insane. I'm not so egomaniacal that I really believe that anyone can be that magnetized by my day-to-day work.

Then what, you might ask, is the point of a blog at Earth Tone Flutes? To give you the straight answer: I'm not sure yet! For some people who really love the Native American style flute and are interested in stuff like flute-making, flute playing and the people that do these things, an inside glimpse of the process (coupled with my personal observations or comments on a given topic) might hold some interest.

That is what this is for--fun, information, curiosity, whatever. I'll probably tell you a bit about individual flutes that I make. This might not last. It's a bit like someone talking about the charming idiosyncracies of a favorite pet; it's not all that easy to maintain the level of focus that the owner has ("...and when Tibbles rolls on her back, she does the cutest thing! She waves her paws in the air and it looks just like shes running, only upside down! Sometimes I rub her belly and say 'Oh! You're such a clever kitty!' and she purrs even louder, which is surprising really, because when she was a kitten she had laryngitis and we didn't think she'd ever purr again, but the vet said not to worry because it didn't do any permanent damage, which is good because purring is how she tells us she wants something, like that time I brought home the fresh salmon...") Yeah. You get the idea. I won't be doing that, I swear.

So, I invite you to drop in from time to time and see what is new. I'll do my best not to have you falling asleep at the computer monitor, and I can pretty much guarantee that I'll wander off topic (you may find this hard to believe, but making and playing flutes is only part of my life! Are you amazed?")

I'll include pictures too, just to keep it interesting :-)

Thanks for dropping in!

Blessings,

Geoffrey