I promise I will get back to my series “Our Moving Adventure” (yes, we are still ‘between houses’ and we’re doing fine) … but just had to post this article written by Michelle V. Rafter, because it doesn’t just apply to editors/writers but to almost everyone I know in the music business too. Or in the entertainment business, in general. Maybe it just applies to everyone in business!

Click here to see:

25 Reasons Editors Don’t Get Back to Writers Faster

Enjoy!

Many of you asked us to write about our Big Moving Adventure of 2009, so I thought I’d better get started before the year is over.

It began in February of this year (09) when each one of our songwriting classes, workshops, seminars — one-by-one — canceled. We knew this was due to “the economy” or “the recession” because we’ve never had things get this quiet.

It was scary.

We realized the lease on our rental house in Canyon Country (just north of Los Angeles) was coming up for renewal in the Fall. [When we'd first moved in, only a couple years before, things were flowing, relatively, and we never would have predicted our business would slow down like this.]

So, John and I researched our options and decided we would MOVE OUT. PERIOD.

We decided to put things in storage … and not move in anywhere else for awhile. We hoped to stay with various friends around Los Angeles, until we could find another solution.

We rented 2 STORAGE LOCKERS (not far away, in Van Nuys) and stored all of our household belongings. And all the while, we didn’t know how long we’d be living without our ’stuff’ … it’s already been 4 months … which is why I’m writing this for you now.

The first thing we did was to have a yard sale. It was 107 degrees that day. No one could have predicted that. So, sales were not as brisk as we had wanted. Duh! But the process got us started.

John Braheny and I had years and years of accumulated stuff in the garage… books, record albums, CDs, cassettes, VHS’s, file folders, photos (in albums and not), artwork … we even found a couple wedding presents that we’d forgotten about. (We celebrated our 25th anniversary this year!)

We had office supplies (file cabinets, desks, chairs, shelving) and boxes of new Pendaflex folders — who uses those anymore? And we each had boxes from our 4 parents who have passed on, and left family artifacts and relics for each of us. We were overwhelmed … and made several trips (8 or 9)  to charity shops … with our car stuffed to the brim.

We sold a carpet and a guitar on Craigslist. We listed other things that didn’t sell. We sold several boxes of LPs to a collector … we donated songwriting & music business books to The Songwriting School of Los Angeles … and John is still donating organization archives (LASS & NAS) to USC … with more to dig through first.

We gave away furniture (not all, but a lot) to neighbors who helped us along the way … including donating all of my beloved plants … and linens, dishes, etc. …. to various friends and loved ones. It was wrenching … but we knew we had no choice. We had allowed ourselves the luxury of being pack rats for much too long.

So this was our first step. And the more we let go, the better we felt. Our Moving Adventure continues …

[Photos: Sorting through photos on the floor; sorting my mom's silver. Canyon Country house we left in August 09. Looks small but was 5 bedrooms & 2 baths.]

[Photo: Painting seen in window on Abbot Kinney in Venice, California... 2009]

Many of you know that John (Braheny) and I are out of town, driving from LA to Nashville and back again … over a couple months … doing songwriting & creativity classes for songwriters groups.

Our next stops include Austin, Texas, Albuquerque, New Mexico, Phoenix, Arizona, and maybe a side trip to Santa Fe, if we can fit it in before being back in Los Angeles for the annual Taxi.com Road Rally (Westin LAX hotel) during the first week of November ‘09.

Thank you for your emails and Facebook posts, etc.

I’ll be ‘blogging’ about the trip just as soon as I get time/energy/quiet, and putting up some photos as well.

But, in the meanwhile… I found this article, CLICK:

“21 Ways to Be More Creative” by Christine Kane — and agree with almost every point (difference is that some TV programs are superb) … so check out the article.

Let me know what you think!

Enjoy…

Many of you have already downloaded the schedule directly from the NSAI (Nashville Songwriters Assn. Internat’l) Songposium site… but here’s the write-up of what I’ll be teaching. I’m truly honored to be among the many dynamite guest speakers and teachers who will be there.

Thursday, Sept. 24, 2009 – 11am-12:30pm

Warner Bros. Records Conf. Room (Nashville)

What’s My Next Step – and Why?

Instructor: JoAnn Braheny

4 basic Career Paths are explored, revealing your personal motivation, perceived obstacles and realistic rewards. JoAnn uses practical tools to assess your individual work-style and ideal collaborators. Whether you’re solidly going toward your goals, or feeling torn between them, you’ll find this class valuable. You won’t get this anywhere else! The most frequent word people in her last class used to describe it was “Liberating!”

THEN, on the next day ….

Friday, Sept. 25, 2009 – 11am-12:30pm

Warner Bros. Records Conf. Room (Nashville)

Finding Collaborators You Can Stick With

Instructor: JoAnn Braheny

Collaborations go well beyond co-writing into every area of your life. JoAnn uses her Disney Imagineering team-building experience to show how you can find the ideal collaborators to balance your creative projects – based not only on your music styles, but on how each of you contributes in complementary ways. Includes a quick quiz (no grades!) to help identify your personal work-style preferences. You’ll find the information you get here valuable far beyond your musical collaborations.

Happily, there are already many attendees registered… sign up ASAP! See y’all in Nashville!

Every now and then, I see something (this was passed along from Bob Baker’s “Buzz Factor”) that I assume we all should know … like the answer to the question: CAN YOU COPYRIGHT AN IDEA?

Just click that link to check out the brief article … it’s quick and relatively digestible!

Enjoy!

People confess to me, more often than you’d believe, that they don’t feel they are “creative.”

Then, of course,  I must ask, “What do you mean by creative?

I already know their answer will be: “I don’t paint, I don’t draw, I can’t sing, I don’t write music or play an instrument, I’m not in theater, I can’t dance … etc.”  And then they wait for me to nod and acknowledge by agreeing with them that, ergo, if they can’t do any of those things, they are not creative, end of story. WRONG! You know I won’t let them off the hook that easily.

Take a look at this article. It cites 11 traits. But I think there are many more than that.

One, for example, not on this list (well, not exactly), is CURIOSITY.  I can’t tell you how important I think ‘being curious’ is — and I do know that we get that from our parents and those around us, as we’re growing up. So, do your kids a big favor and encourage/allow them to be curious about their world. It’s critical … essential … for a healthy brain.

… Click: Do you Have These 11 Traits of Highly Creative People

Enjoy!

[Photo by me: Beaded Brahma Bull, approx 3' high, at a gallery in Culver City, CA 2009]

Lucinda M. Dugger wrote an excellent follow-up article (today) to add to my post a couple days ago, called “Where’s My Audience — NEA Survey” …

Hers ran in the blog CopyrightAlliance.org, click:

ARTS PARTICIPATION, LESSONS FROM ‘GOOD WILL HUNTING.’

Worth reading the whole article — I especially agree with Dugger on this:

Watching a clip from a concert on YouTube and seeing that same band ‘live on stage’ produces two completely different experiences. Similarly, seeing a Norman Rockwell in person is euphoric compared to viewing the many reproductions online or in books.

I think a great determent will be had if society chooses to access art through one venue over the other. Art is meant to be experienced in a variety of formats, and we need to embrace the accessibility that the internet gives us with actual in-person experiences.

So, take your friends and/or family … visit your local museum (find out which days have free admission, if necessary), and attend musical performances! That’s an order!

Enjoy!

Zzzzzzz … oh, excuse me, I must have dozed off!

And how wonderful to learn that I can enjoy it even more since I read this brief article about how Creative Problem Solving is Enhanced by REM (Rapid Eye Movement) Sleep.

G’night now!

Yes, we’re going through a recession … and some things, by necessity, will need to be left by the roadside. However, I was thrilled to read about Michelle Obama’s Jazz Series at the White House …for young jazz students.

It’s only by participating in the arts, or becoming an avid fan, that we teach our citizens the value of what we artists-performers-musicians-dancers-songwriters-playwrights-actors-directors-producers do for a living.

And if you wonder about where your audience has gone, take a look at this SURVEY OF PUBLIC PARTICIPATION IN THE ARTS by the NEA (Nat’l Endowment for the Arts), for 2008 — showing why we, Americans, should be concerned.

Recap COMMENTS from Nate Chinen on NPR:

– Jazz Concertgoing Is Down: And other life-affirming news from the NEA, which released its Survey of Public Participation in the Arts on Monday. A PDF document has the quick breakdown.

Among the jazz highlights: only 7.8% of Americans saw a jazz show in 2008, down from 10.8% in 2002 and 9.6% in 1982; the median age of the jazz audience is now 46, a steady increase from from 29 (!) in 1982; the college-educated jazz audience has dropped 29% since 2002; 14.2% of Americans listened to jazz records or watched/listened to a jazz broadcast last year.

Of course, any downward trends can be in large part accounted for by the recession and the decline of fine and performing arts attendance at large (less than 37% of Americans attended an arts museum or arts performance in 2008, a statistic that seems incredibly low to me). And the net, inflation-adjusted amount of money being spent on arts admissions is still rising — the U.S. population is growing. But it’s also a poor sign that jazz attendance is dropping, most markedly among 18-24 year olds, 17.5% of whom saw a jazz show in 1982 (really?) and 7.3% of whom went in 2008. Dear peers: peace to the 7.3% nation of gods and earths, but we can’t do it alone, you know.

[“As the soil, however rich it may be, cannot be productive without cultivation, so the mind without culture can never produce good fruit.” Seneca (Roman philosopher, mid-1st century AD) ]

We (John Braheny and I) made this video (approx. 28 min.) a couple months ago…

I figured maybe you’d like to see it!

I cover 5 tips for how to look at where you are & where you might want to go next in your career … especially in these difficult times. Thanks for watching! (And many thanks to Douglas E. Welch for recording this!)