Tag: Nashville

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Of Weddings and Music

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This past weekend, my brother Barry Walsh, a fabulous keyboard player in his own right (who has a wonderful instrumental CD that’s great inspiration BTW), married his love of many years, Gretchen Peters.  That the two have always made incredible, beautiful music together is a given within Nashville and the Folk and Country Music Communities.  Gretchen has an amazing voice, crafts songs of such intelligence and power, and as importantly, Barry doesn’t just play along.  He listens, adds his interpretation, and accents each song perfectly.  I’m what you might call musically illiterate but even I get that when watching them.

And it’s not just on the auditory level that these two relate.  They are wonderfully matched in so many ways … both very smart and intellectually curious, quirky, and fun, and it is so great to see them together and obviously, this happy together. It’s been a bit of a journey for them but I can proudly say I knew from the very first that this day would come.

And this was a wedding noone that was there will ever forget, if only for the perfection of it.  The night before, a whole slew of us were bused out to Green’s Grocery in Leiper’s Fork.  It’s a lovely intimate venue that harkens back to the 30s and 40s in its simplicity. There, Barry played for Gretchen (and the lucky audience) a song he wrote for her and she answered with her song about him “The Way You Move Me.” As if that wasn’t enough, others played, including the dynamic Marshall Chapman, Gretchen’s fellow “Wine, Women & Song” partners Matraca Berg and Suzy Bogguss, Rodney Crowell and Jeff Hanna of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.  Supporting them all night was Christine Bougie, a wonderful steel guitar player from Toronto.  I love that instrument anyway and her style was just wonderful.  We went home happy, full and sure they couldn’t ever top that night.

But they did.

Planned beautifully, the ceremony took place right after the 6 p.m. bells rang at Assumption Church in Nashville where we all stood in the churchyard below.  Unplanned but uncannily perfect was the appearance of an old invalid who rode by on his scooter, surveyed the goings-on, waved and went on his way.  My brother Barry waved back as fellow siblings nudged one another just knowing it was the ghost of our father who loved to play pranks on us while riding his own scooter before he passed away four years ago.  I’m sure it was him, giving Barry & Gretchen his blessing. To top off the emotion of them saying their vows, Rodney Crowell performed an acoustic version of a lovely song he written about life and family entitled “I know Love is All I Need.”  I’m told video taken from behind me of his performance shows one of my arms holding the video camera up and the other hand coming to my eyes with a tissue.  Frequently.  It was moving.

Then there was the first dance.  Gretchen has written with Bryan Adams for many years and formed a tight bond of friendship.  He made a promise to her, arranged his schedule, and was able to come in for it.  And he sang their first song.  It’s funny, my hubby and I married to one of his songs (Everything I do), my sister got engaged to that same song, and now, our brother was having Bryan peform their first dance (Heaven), live!  After this, there were more performances by those who’d been there the night before and other great musicians.  Our family got jammin’ when Rodney launched into Elvira accompanied by Jeff Hanna and a flock of singers joined in.  We stayed up there on the dance floor and joined hands to sing along with “Will the Circle Be Unbroken,” and I swear, at that moment, I didn’t think anything could top this weekend.

But then there were the sky lanterns.  Two dozen of these wonderful things were lit by the wedding guests and sent skyward over the Nashville night sky.  Reading through tweets she follows the next day, Gretchen saw some neighbor observed the presence of several UFO’s above Germantown.  I enjoyed seeing the lanterns fly off but even more loved the warm glow that lit peoples faces as they were lighting the lanterns.   Ahhhh.  Just beautiful.  Every last minute of it. 

So with all excitement, I’ve done no painting at all lately.  Just haven’t had it in me.  But I am itching to get back to it.  So stay tuned!

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The Golden Triangle

Coming from a background as a photographer, I recognize so many principles that relate to both photographic and painterly images.  Lightstalking Magazine, for professional photographers, has some great content that applies to those using a brush as well, such as this one, on The Golden Triangle in composition.

Busy day, heading out to paint with the C.A.N. girls today and then errands before heading up north for the holiday weekend.  I sure hope Earl doesn’t mess with our plans too much.  I’m looking forward to plein air painting from my sis’ cabin in the mountains.

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Miss Hazel on National Public Radio!

I am not sure if this made it nationally or was just a local feature, but it sure does make me proud to know Hazel King has been recognized!

WPLN’s feature on Hazel King

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Tom Jones’ Workshop: Fantabulous!

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Based on a Tom Jones painting and workshop

Never having been to a workshop before, I didn’t know what to expect.  I thought it would be a great learning experience but had no idea just how great it would be!

Tom Jones is a fabulous nature landscape artist who represents and is representative of some of the finest producers of art supplies in the art world – Arches paper, Rembrandt paints, and Jerrys Artarama.  So when I heard he was coming to our local Jerry’s to put on this workshop, of course, I signed up and put down the names of my fellow C.A.N.* girls.  The only one who was unable to join us was Barbara, but since we’ve got miles to go to catch up to her caliber of painting, we figured it was only right.

Tom was a great and inspiring teacher.  He had a gentle, matter of fact style that didn’t pull punches but showed me (on more than one occasion) how to fix some major goofs in my work.  The painting he chose to have us do was challenging and really pushed us out of our comfort zones, but I watched with relief and joy as Lynne, Lucilla and Margot moved from frustration to anxiety to pleasure at learning the new process.  Safe to say we all got a lot out of it.  My painting (I brought it home and doctored it up slightly after all the gaffs), is above.

We also got to meet Tom’s lovely wife Bonnie, a strong watercolor artist herself, and she showed us some batik paintings she has done recently that are beyond exquisite.  We are hoping to encourage either Jerry’s or our Centennial Arts Center to enlist her to teach a batik class in the future.  And of course, we want Tom back.  Again and again.

I learned so much in the class I came home, spent and exhausted but dying to try more.  But I’m willing to share a few of my strongest impressions here:  Arches 300# paper kicks a$$ when it comes to durability, workability, presentation quality, etc.  You know when you are working on it that it is just.well.golden!  And at $10 and change, it wasn’t nearly as expensive as I thought it would be for a full sheet since you can split it into smaller sheets.  Lush.

Several lessons I got from the workshop:

  1. Tom taught us to lighten the palette.  By that I mean don’t use a huge number of different colors, but few and mix between them to maintain unity in the painting.  
  2. When laying in a stand of trees, you want to do just that — lay in the color in a freeform block and don’t worry about trunks and branches until you’ve got the basic shape.  Then go in and lay in a few here and there.  
  3. Let the watercolors do the job, don’t you do it by brushing.  Just shape it, smooth it, etc. within 15 seconds if you can.  
  4. The detail work, which means the difference between a good and great painting, is accomplished in the last 15 minutes of any painting, no matter if you work on it for 30 minutes, five days, two years, whatever.  It is absolutely that last 15 minutes that makes the painting.  
  5. Use tissue instead of paper towels to blot and blend and smooth areas out, and if you need to go back to white paper, a stiff toothbrush and tissue and water are your best friends.  
  6. If you, like me, go way overboard with the paint and need to take off even more, a spray bottle with a strong stream is your even better friend.  Spray and let the water and paint run off the paper and start over. 

There were loads more things to learn and I filled a couple of pages of notes, but you’ll just have to take a class yourself! 

I loved the rockwork!  It is much like painting large flower petals.  Lay color at one edge, use a clean (water only) brush and sweep that color across the remainder of the area to be covered, ensuring one edge has strong definition.  Tom noted that I had too many rocks and it made the painting look too busy.  He suggested I merge a couple here and there into larger boulders and I may well do that later, but honestly, I’m kinda proud of the rockwork, I kept them as they were this time to show my hubby and show off on my blog.

On the waterfall, I am ashamed to say I cheated.  It was a mess to begin with but he used a new product offered at Jerry’s called “Aqua Cover” that did a great job on leveling off the water, creating a better spill area below and such.  But with 20 students and limited time, he could only do so much, and I wanted to wow my husband when he got home later last night so, after resting when I got home, I got out my (dare I say it) acrylic white paint to complete the fix. I rationalize that now I can effectively call it a mixed media work and honestly, it looks pretty good, I think. The Aqua Cover is a great, amazing product though and would have done the job but I didn’t purchase it and figured the acrylic application was next best thing.  So sue me for cheating! 

Final note on the painting: Tom’s painting did not include, but I did, a tree stump sticking through the edge of the waterfall and another area where water spills over a giant rock.  I am kinda proud of that improvisation and the overall work, even if the rocks are too busy.  I will be making a few minor changes to this work sometime when I get a chance, and thankfully, because of the great paper, I can.  But I wanted to get the near-finished painting up here with the workshop review while it was all fresh in my mind. 

Tom, if you ever grace my blog with a visit to read this, know that I got a tremendous out of you workshop and really appreciate your painting style, teaching style and the generous, genuine and decent person you appear to be.  Keep up the great work and hopefully, we Nashvillians’ll catch another of your workshops before too long.   Bonnie, we’ll be working on yours too, OK?

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A link to recent Watercolor studies, and Hazel King’s Birthday today

>Since painting with the Collaborative Artists Network, I’ve done some enjoyable watercolor studies.  They are visible in this album posted at my facebook site “Moesse the Eclectic Artist.”  If you’ve not “liked” Moesse but have a facebook page, I’d appreciate it if you would do so.  You know, share the love.

Heading into Nashville to the Centennial Park Art Center today to celebrate Hazel King’s 92nd Birthday.  Can you believe it?  What a gem.

Update – 4:02 PM:   Have returned from a really enjoyable pot luck birthday party for Hazel and will post more later, but have to correct the record.  She’s 91 this year.  Still drives, lives alone, and inspires so many still through her art education.  A real treasure.

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A grand day with fellow painters yesterday

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Barbara with a painting from more than 20 years ago!

The Collaborative Artists Network (C.A.N.) is getting geared up!  We painted at Barbara Rembert’s studio in her home yesterday inspired by some glorious instrumental music, great, great food, and the artistic and creative energy that flowed like a bubbling stream.  Barbara has a tremendous learning library of books to borrow, and we were treated to a private show of her collection of works.  She has some brilliant work over the years, and happily, we got the up close and personal tour, including explanations behind some of the loveliest of paintings.  Her methods are so varied, and yet all convey so beautifully what message or meaning she is trying to illustrate.  Pure wonderment!

Another surprise treat was a painting Margot pulled out that she had done back more than three decades ago!  And to our joy and amazement, it was done using the same strokes, colors, and style she uses today.

We didn’t talk much about our organization today, preferring just to paint, but the idea behind it is to organize as a non-profit, obtain grands or other funding to provide a safe, comfortable place to paint, the resources to do so, the opportunity to teach others less fortunate, and to sell our works to self-fund our endeavor moving forward. It will surely be a long road, but with we five, I think we C.A.N., no pun intended.  We recognize women typically give up so much to raise children, care for family, or meet other challenges that typically come from lacking that second X Gene, particularly economic ones.  And each of us has faced tremendous emotional, physical, or monetary challenges, or a combination of all three, to get to this point in our lives, and we feel it is time to put our experience to good use, identify a forum, and ultimately, give back.  Down the road, I hope to write more about our organization’s progress.