Sparks from the Fire

WFM Listening Room Opens in NYC
A Howling Success!

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaooooooooooooooooooooooohhhhhhhh!

Pardon me if I howl a trifle, but occasionally things go even better than one dreams.  The Watchfire Music Listening Room debuted this past week to a sold out audience and by the end of the evening clearly became a dream defined.

Here is an idea whose time has truly come.  A place where one could come and spend an evening in intimate and elegant surroundings, Jenkins House Concerts just off of Central Park on the West Side of Manhattan, and do little else than simply listen to great “live” music in an un-mic’d setting.

Here was music at its natural best, parlor performed by two multi-talented ladies.  The audience was a wild mix of melting-pot New Yorkers – young and old, professionals and fans, black and white, and all went home full of good food and rich blessings – and only for a $15 ticket.  Such a deal! (more…)

Making it. Here is probably the most misunderstood term of the entertainment industry – and probably, for many, the most important.  As creative director of an Inspirational music company, I encounter this confusion on one level or another nearly every day.

Many artists are obsessed with the idea of “making it”, but if you were to ask many of them what they meant by this, you would receive a myriad of divergent answers.  It is a term that is pretty much an entertainment industry concept only.  We rarely hear of a chemical engineer, a doctor or a school teacher making it.  (more…)

Watchfire Music, working to find new and innovative ways to bring Inspirational music to the world, will launch its beta of a Lifestyle and Music App for iPad, iPhone and Computer this coming fall.

Now, for the first time online, get Help!, the Musical Handbook for Life, in a new and revolutionary delivery system. You’ll be able to download musical solutions to some of life’s most challenging moments.

Each chapter of the handbook is an Inspirational superabundance of solutions to some of the age-old problems of life.  Filled with inspiring lyrics, new and classic songs, quotes, tips from the masters and in-depth advice, Help!, the Musical Handbook for Life, is a necessity for anyone battling through the 21^st century. (more…)

I’ve just spent the last two and a half weeks working on Julia Wade’s new Inspirational music CD, Every Day. (Read more about Julia’s new CD at her Inspiratus blog.)

She took a “vacation” from her job in Boston where she is the soloist at the world headquarters of the Christian Science Church.

It’s one of those jobs where people think she shows up on Sunday and sings a couple of services and that’s about it, but, in reality, it’s pretty much a full-time job considering all the preparation, research, rehearsal and administrative work she puts into it.

So the perception in Boston is that Julia is on vacation, but the reality is that she moves from one difficult, totally time consuming job to one that is probably at least twice as intense.  That’s the job of recording an album.

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I’m excited to announce the beta of a new series of house concerts for Inspirational music right here in little ol’ NYC.

We’re calling it the Watchfire Music Listening Room. WFM artist, Julia Wade, will do 3 nights in the next 3 months celebrating and developing her new CD at Jenkins House Concerts just off of Central Park West.

Thursday, August 19th @ 7:30
Thursday, September 16th @ 7:30
Thursday, October 7th @ 7:30

Opening for her will be singer/songwriters Rebecca Minor in August, Megan Neale in September, and WFM artist and composer, Margaret Dorn, in October.

The purpose of the Watchfire Music Listening Room house concerts is to allow WFM artists to develop their music in front of a live audience. (more…)

As creative director of Watchfire Music I usually spend my time touting our own artists, but recently I downloaded two CDs of inspirational music that are out of the WFM box and now deep in my waking and sleeping consciousness.

Two of my absolute heroes are Peter Gabriel and Bobby McFerrin and their music has been coursing through my brain now for days.

Ten-time Grammy Award winner/vocal innovator Bobby McFerrin surprises us yet again with VOCAbuLarieS, his first new release in eight years. Like his #1 worldwide hit song Don’t Worry Be Happy and his multi-platinum duo album Hush with cellist Yo-Yo Ma, VOCAbuLarieS is based on Bobby’s experiments with multi-track recording and his ceaseless exploration of the potential of the human voice. (more…)

Just got an iPad for my birthday.  Amazing toy, tool, whatever…  Watchfire Music is developing an app for the iPad, iPod and iPhone that will blow some minds and bring further inspiration to the masses, so I thought I ought to own one.

I had heard that it was an unnecessary toy – a sort of in-betweener somewhere between the iPhone and the computer, a toy for rich kids, but I’ve had it for a week and excuse me if I now write an ad for Apple.  This thing is fabulous.  Try to wrestle it from me and you’ve got a fight on your hands.

The Missus got a Kindle about four months ago.  She just about sleeps with it under her pillow.  She won’t leave home without it.  She’s a big reader on the train she rides to Boston every weekend and swears by it.

I downloaded the free Kindle app for my iPad.  Now we can share some of the books we read.  I dropped my book I was halfway through reading the other night getting off the plane.  Never knew it until last night when I settled down to read for an hour or so.  Couldn’t find the book.  So I downloaded it in literally 15 seconds into my iPad and got cozy. (more…)

Just thought our readership would enjoy some of the responses to a recent post entitled Subway Chanteuse.

As a fellow new-yorker, i’m right there with you on the train, peter. i’m sure i’ve seen that woman, or someone like her, many times, and like most of my fellow subway riders, have, in most cases, chosen to look away. after reading your moving account, i realize now that the reason people do things like that is because they are reaching out for recognition, and love. perhaps we are embarrassed to look at them because these folks remind us so much of ourselves. we may express it in a more “socially acceptable” manner, or hide behind a sophisticated demeanor, but bottom line is, we are all hungry for the same.

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