Feel like belting Stephen Foster

...when I see a sign like this one, which I spotted on the T this afternoon:



To my old Kentucky home far away, and the city I love here in M-A.

L'chaim.

Remembering Utah Phillips.

Many times I have shared with friends and audiences my favorite Utah Phillips quotation: "The only way to make a million dollars as a folksinger is to start out with two million." Not only is it funny, to me this quote embodies the sense of humor and dedication of a true troubadour, the man who coined it.

So naturally, when I heard that Utah gave up his battle with poor health this weekend, I was struck by the news. I wanted to post something to honor him.

The folk community came out in force to raise money to help pay for his rising medical bills in the past year. A number of presenters and artists hosted benefits, and people all over discovered his music for the first time in the process. I hope he knew how much he will be missed.

Here's to the memory of Bruce "Utah" Phillips:





Sincerely,
Rebecca

Don't know if I mentioned...

Kim and I have set up a mutual tour blog in addition to the one I have here, where we will both be posting. I just added a new entry over there, and wanted to make sure you knew about it.

Follow us on the road at http://davidsonkatz.blogspot.com!


Rebecca

P.S. Hope to see you at our house concert in Somerville on Saturday! We're looking forward to a big send off with friends and fans! :D

Get yer Boston Baltimore Tour t-shirts!

Hiya everyone,

As I mentioned in my first post, my friend and SUPER songwriter, Kim Davidson, and I are headed to the Baltimore/D.C. area June 7-16, by way of NJ and CT. And we are selling t-shirts! FUN!

As Kim points out on our joint blog--here, where you can follow us on the road throughout the tour--each shirt equals approximately 3 gallons of gas for us, which will take us a long way. We would love to have your support, and we'd love for you to have a shirt! :D

Here's the design--click the button below to buy:

(As a writing tutor, I feel compelled to tell you...we've fixed the comma typo in the image! This is just a preview! :P)

Here is a complete list of the stops we will be making up and down the East Coast:


Saturday, June 7th @ 8:00 pm - Free!
Trenton, NJ
THE COOKIE COTTAGE
3697 Nottingham Way #A

Monday, June 9th @ 8-10pm
Fairfax, VA
WGMU
Interview w/ John Campbell
**Listen live on the web at http://wgmuradio.com**

Tuesday, June 10th @ 8:30 pm - Free!
Baltimore, MD
BALTIMORE CHOP
625 Washington Blvd
<http://www.myspace.com/baltimorechop>

Wednesday, June 11th @ 8:00 pm - Free!
Washington, D.C.
KRAMER BOOKS/AFTERWORDS CAFE
1517 Connecticut Ave NW
<http://www.kramers.com>

Thursday, June 12th @ 7:30 pm - $5
Washington, D.C.
EBENEZERS COFFEEHOUSE
201 F Street NE
<http://www.ebenezerscoffeehouse.com>

Friday, June 13th @ 8:00 pm - Free!
Baltimore, MD
READ STREET BOOKS
229 W. Read St
<http://www.myspace.com/readstreetbooks>

Sunday, June 15th @ 6:00 pm - Free!
Milford, CT
CAFE ATLANTIQUE
33 River St
<http://www.cafeatlantique.us>

In addition to the dates above, we will also be stopping in with deejay Gene Godfrey to record an interview on his program, Classic FM. The interview will broadcast Friday, June 13th between 8 and 10pm on Z889 WBZC. And you can listen to it live from anywhere in the world via the station's live webstream at http://www.z889.org. (You can listen to our WGMU interview on the web too; details are above!)

Before we hit the road, we will also be playing two local shows to rock out with our Beantown friends:

Saturday, May 24th @ 3:00 pm - Free!
Acton, MA
CAFE ZIBA
340 Great Road
With Kim Davidson!
<http://www.cafeziba.com>

Saturday, May 31st @ 8:00 pm - $10
Somerville, MA (walking distance from Porter and Davis squares)
GIANT ANT HOUSE CONCERTS
With Kim Davidson!
For reservations and directions, e-mail marshall@giantantconcerts.com.

...And that's all the news. (We have shirts! How cool!)

Hope to see you out there!!


Sincerely,
Rebecca


P.S. I will make up for this all-business post soon with a zany, more blog-appropriate rambling soon. Promise.... ;)

Invert no word order.

One more picture for you. This one is from my March trip up to Portland, ME with Teresa.

I thought this sign was really charming:


"Kindle no fires." Mmm.

Makes me want to sit with my notebook on my lap and write.

And check out the name of the place. Kettle Cove? How can you not love that? I love Maine.

Just wanted to add that. Now it's off to real dreams for me. Goodnight!

The animals of Philly, and (stuffed) vegetables of New England.

So, I have a little bit of retrospective blogging to do.

This March, I met several fuzzy friends whose pictures I would like to share.

Kellie Lin Knott and I spotted this handsome carriage horse during our mid-March jaunt down to Philly. He was working in front of Independence Hall, sporting his St. Patrick's day gear:



And elsewhere in the historic district, we spotted this gorgeous St. Bernard, a real sweetie, named Buddy:



Then later...up in Maine and New Hampshire at the end of the month, Teresa Storch and I had company from a certain stuffed gherkin....

Here he is--Mr. Pickles--sunning himself in the window of Teresa's room at The Highlands Inn in Bethlehem, NH:


And here is the view from Mr. Pickles' window:




(Yes, this is what really goes on on tour. We take pictures of stuffed cucumbers in our rooms. Now you know.)

Anyway...Mr. P was a gift to Teresa from a marvelous singer-songwriter, John Linn, one of the few folksingers I know who throws even MORE hammer-ons into his guitar parts then I do. And, he recently co-wrote a song with Kellie. (TINY folk world, isn't it?)

And now, it's time for me to stop writing! (I can already tell; this blog is going to be way too much fun....)

More posts will be headed your way shortly, so check back soon!

First post!

Well, friends....

The past few months I have started traveling fairly regularly to venues farther afield to share my music with new folks. And with this great adventure comes great responsibility: a blog!

Yes, you can now follow my exploits and musings from the road here on blogspot.com. Pretty soon Kim Davidson and I will be taking off on our Boston to Baltimore Tour (June 7-16), and we will, of course, be putting up pictures and fun stories from the road. More on that in a future post, coming soon!

Anyway, just wanted to welcome you to the blog and say: thanks for caring about my music and all the wonkiness that comes with it.

More entries will be coming very soon. Hope you'll stay tuned....

Sing OUT, sing loud,
Rebecca