Guardian Angel Music
Dear p(ARTNERS) in Songbird Radio.
I wanted to tell you about my Guardian Angel! When I was about 5 months old, my biological father, singer and songwriter, Billy Masters passed away. He played that guitar really well and traveled all around the world with the Christian Music Sensation, The Archers.
His music publishing company was left to me and is called Guardian Angel Music! I feel that I really do have a guardian angel and that singing and songwriting is my calling.
Thank you for singing with me!
Launch of Songbird Radio
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Posted under: Altaer, ArtEvolve, ARTner, bikesalon, Genius Collaborators, My Favourite Collaborations Ever, Songbird Radio, Uncategorized
Hello M-Audio,
I am interested in a creative p(artner) collaboration with you towards Songbird Radio in pursuit of expanding creative ARTnership using our voices together to inspire people worldwide! Last weekend I had the wonderful opportunity to be the first ever girl to dangle from a tall bike and sing original songs from an aerial hoop at the Bay Area Maker Faire! This month I will also perform an original number at the Oakland Metro for a monthly variety show that attracts 500 people! I plan to sing and use aerial again in this piece and I need your help to make my performances more awesome. I have the dream of getting everyone in the audience to sing and record and loop the content we are making together while performing aerial and singing!
Okay so how did I get here wanting to help people everywhere sing from their he(art)s?
My name is Lauren Larken I am a Songbird. I own a 22 year old parrot that I adopted when I was 8 years old. I grew up in theatre and attended a performing arts boarding school in high school, USC for theatre school and between April 1, 2007 and April 1, 2008 I wrote, collaborated, performed, recorded and published a song everyday for a year. It was a LEAP YEAR so you can find all 366 songs at 365Songbird.com
During the Song of the Day project I was living at a performance collective called The House of YES and pursuing my MFA in an interdiciplinary program in it’s first year that combined computer music, interactive programming, radio, film, television, theatre and art at Brooklyn College. I am always surrounded by amazing people and that year I collaborated with hundreds making song of the days.
House of YES is the kind of place where you go to sleep not knowing what you are going to wear and a gorgeous Kayti Bunny hippity hops home wearing a swarovski encrusted shimmering body suit the night before your concert that fits perfectly and Kae Burke of Make Fun studio sews up some sparely fabric. A couple of nights before I had had a dream about a Golden Birdcage (but told no one) and the proprietris of the house, Anya Sapozhinikova whips it right up. All of us in the community were singing, feeling amazing and I was about to Graduate with my MFA in Performance and Interactive Media Arts!
The song of the day project itself was conceived in an attempt to overcome my fear of song writing. I considered myself mostly a vocalist and didn’t realize how powerful the body is as an instrument. One of my professors, David Grubbs, told me to just start with the voice and hence the song of the day project was born! Tom Leger, a friend heard my ambition and work and gifted me a M-Audio KeyStudio and my ability to make music sound cooler became exponential. I became a composer and a song writer! Or when my talented dj, beat making, key board and percussionist friends came over they could really rock it out on the M-Audio KeyStudio.
A week after the Song-of-the-Day Project ended we had a celebratory concert at the House of YES featuring the crowd pleasing hits from each month. Amazing hilarious performances ensued including conceptually rich acts from the: MTAService Specialists, Impersonations of my Mom, Dennis Collective and Winkle Naughty Hilarious Themed Sing Alongs, Sappy Duets with Justin Lange and a Golden Birdcage, my perch, suspended from the ceiling.
Two weeks later I was in Denmark and England presenting my Thesis and something very strange happened. For a year we had safely hosted dozens of circus skill shares and events with fire performances but an electrical fire sparked in the kitchen and quickly filled a giant puppet head and destroyed all of our belongings and killed my orange kitty, DJ Pilgrim.
SONG OF THE DAY CONCERT: APRIL 6TH, 2008
SAME ROOM and OUTSIDE, APRIL 22ND, 2008
This M-Audio KeyStudio keyboard was sitting on my desk during the fire.
For the past 4 years we have been re-building our lives and The House of YES performance collective has evolved into a professional thteatre space that houses: Make Fun (a diy puppet and costume lab), a recording studio, and The Sky Box theatre a 50 foot ceilined aerial dance and movement theatre that hosts workshops, classes and almost nightly performances. I’d like to become a featured artist and use M-Audio equipment in my daily new show: Songbird Radio, This is Real Life! Each week we feature episodes of Bike Salon, ARTnership, Creative Alarm Clock & Missions with OCCUPY BEAUTY. This show is in response to people’s desire to sing from their he(art), attract and invest in sustainable lifestyles through everyday choices.
In exchange for the use of cutting edge M-Audio equipment I can offer: a tax write off, custom M-Audio jingles, and product reviews and tutorials.
Please contact me at your earliest convenience! The SF Bicycle Music Festival is June 23rd and I’d like to churn out some new beats to bump from my bike speaker!
OUR BIGGEST FEARS
Dearest ARTner,
My biggest fears off the top of my head:
10. Undergoing an Abortion or Miscarriage. (I don’t even know if I ever want to have a baby, and I am in no fear of becoming pregnant anytime soon so no worries on this one.)
9. Doing everything right and still something very bad happening. Ie: right before the house fire of House of YES I bought a $200 screen door and kitty door to improve the quality of my kittie’s life and ensure his safety but neither thing helped it survive the fire.
Or the idea that no matter what we do, no matter how many organic veggies we plant or how safe our cosmetics are that we are doomed!
8. Always putting other people’s needs first.
7. Being homeless
6. Being unable to overcome my addiction to coffee, sugar and wheat
5. Being stuck somewhere far from home because my bike gets stolen or broken.
4. Not being productive
3. Killing myself with Stress.
2. Loosing my eyesight or hearing or forgetting how to sing.
But the #1 Greatest Fear of the Week
was that after my my bird will flew away for the second time that it wouldn’t come home—but it did!
….so I didn’t want to, but I clipped it’s wings…
Tunes I am Loving Right Now
Dear You,
I know you love good music. So here’s what I am jamming out to while dancing around my apartment. This is the music that is giving me a Total Eclipse of the Heart, Sun, Moon and Life…..
Songbird Radio Recommends:
To Shed Old Skin, Move to Musical Mantra: Mama Crow-Indigo (the whole albumn!)
To get my Musical Theatre Fix: Inara George-Right as Wrong (an Invitation with Dyke Parks)
To please my Bird and Diet on Ancient Soul Soothing Healing: The Gamelatron, Hive Mind
To Yearn deeply for someone or something: Nikki Borodi (soon to be released-stay tuned)!
Songbird Radio Band Photo
I am thrilled to be performing high in the branches of el Arbol, an amazing tall bike powered tree at twilight on May 19th at the Bay Area Maker’s Faire! More on this story at: http://bandofbicycles.com/2012/05/10/songbird-makes-debut-in-el-arbol-at-the-makers-faire/
BIKE SCENE
Hello Artners,
I know you agree, bicycles are a great way to transport anything! Everyday I use my bike to transport: Myself, Art, Bike Blenders, Music! I towed dozens of amazing vegetable and herb baby plants from Spiral Gardens to become the first bed of edibles in our Eco Food Forrest at Golden Gate Co-Housing! We envision being able to grow most of the food we need to eat and herbs we need to heal. My bike towed about 25 plants including: mustard greens, kale, echinacea, parsley, speariment, beets, mache, arugula, straberries and a raspberry tree. We planted them two weeks ago and today I harvested the first yummy spicy mustard greens!
Here are a few photos:
People cannot help but smile when they see a garden rolling down the street! What do you tow by bike? What is growing in your garden? Everyday is a good day for a bike scene! Keep it rolling ARTners!
vintage brynn ronning window drawings
Dear ARTners:
Between 2007-2008 I wrote, performed, recorded and published a song for everyday of the year. On day 3, I got stuck overnight in Chicago, where I met up with the fabulous Brynn Ronning who helped me make the song of the day. Quickly after that she began a 365 day Window Drawing Project.
Here is our first collaboration!
Brynn Ronning sees the world in such a unique way and I love her frame of reference. She currently resides in Durango, Colorado where she creates drawings, glass work and magic at Jailhouse Arts.
Brynn reminds me that: Art is everywhere, it’s just how you shape your gaze!
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