http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html Melissa Ruth: Journal Jannis' PHPRss class - http://www.jannis.to/ Sun, 05 Sep 2010 01:14:54 -0700 http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#45 Duo writes, performs-- Melissa Ruth and Johnny Leal will perform Saturday at the Coffee Cottage
By Amanda Newman
The Newberg Graphic

A husband and wife team will bring their Eugene act to Newberg Saturday with a performance at Coffee Cottage..

Acoustic duo Melissa Ruth and Johnny Leal are in the final leg of their Summer Sass Tour, which is covering the West Coast from San Diego to Tacoma.

Ruth and Leal play a blend of music they dubbed "homegrown folk-sass." Ruth writes the songs, sings and plays guitar; Leal helps with the arrangements and plays guitar, mandolin, ukulele and the occasional kazoo solo.

The two found their musical natures early in life, in their respective country upbringings. Ruth was born and raised in rural British Columbia, Canada. Her parents, both musicians, introduced her to the world of music. Growing up she spent hours listening to the family's old vinyl collection, she said, learning to love artists such as Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Ricki Lee Jones and Edith Piaf.

Leal grew up on a cattle ranch in the mountains of northern California. At the age of 13, he heard the album "BB King: Live at the Apollo" and fell in love with the blues. Throughout his teens years, he played in numerous bands with styles ranging from country to jazz.

The two met at Humboldt State University, where they were both studying music. "We became friends almost immediately, because of the similarities in our experiences in 'growing up wild,'" Ruth said.

The pair graduated in 2006, married and moved to Oregon. They accepted K-12 music teaching jobs at neighboring school districts in Douglas County and began to arrange some of the songs Ruth had written throughout the years.

In the past few years, Ruth and Leal have toured the West Coast three times. They released an album "Underwater and Other Places," in 2008 and are recording another.

Ruth sums up their music in one word: homegrown. "Although we both studied music in college and I earned a degree in classical flute performance, the music that Johnny and I play as a duo is very much an organic blend of sounds and ideas," she said. "We create music that has firm roots in history and poetry."

Ruth said she and her husband love to make music, and they love to share it with others.

"The songs that I write and the songs that Johnny and I perform are songs for people, about people and the beauty in our daily little wanderings," she said. "Part of growing up rural is being attuned to the process, you know? The cyclical nature of things, the growth before the harvest, the winter before the blossoms... all of these things I think deserve a voice, and that's what Johnny and I try to do. We try to give... a little art to the mundane."

The Coffee Cottage show will begin at 8 p.m. For more information visit www.melissaruthmusic.com]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#45 Thu, 10 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#44
Many wonderful things happening all at once, it seems. Johnny and I have been doing a lot of traveling and visiting and playing and it has been, as always, rejuvenating. My dearest friend from high school was married last month in a gorgeous ceremony overlooking the mighty pacific. The San Diego sun is a sight to behold especially as two beautiful people tearfully and joyously murmur sacred vows to the ears of their beloved. After we saw our friends off, we played a show at Lestats, enjoyed the company of old friends, and even though the Padre's lost, we still managed to have fun at that sweet bar on C and 25th that reminds me of The Alibi, only cleaner.

Modesto was our only other stop in the bankrupted Golden State and I'll tell you right now, you won't find better Carne Asada served from a truck than in smoldering Modesto. With a current 30% unemployment rate Modesto is three things: hot, ugly, and kindling for a bright and brilliant future. Ask Earl about the summer here: "yep, we know where the sun is. It's close."

Once back again in Oregon we decided that it was time, right or wrong, like it or not, to retire our old Subaru. Coughing and chugging at 200,000 mi, we finally let the old girl out to pasture. She treated us well. We treated her poorly. Such is the life of the automobile in America.

In the meanwhile we acquired a lovely little album by Ms. Rachel Ries, loved the hell out of Blackhawk's Solar Cookoff (a rootsier version of the High Sierra music festival), enjoyed the stars, enjoyed the lake, enjoyed the mountain air, and came home to a garden fragrant with purple blossoms, wasps, and lettuce three feet tall.

The album is clipping along slowly but surely and it's going so swimmingly well so far that I am already dreaming of the next record. We've been so fortunate to work with such brilliant talent the last few months that I'm grinning ear to ear in the pit of my stomach.

We're about to lauch into the next leg of our tour. It should be a fun journey through the Northwest and no doubt an adventure, banjo strings and all. I love these tidbit days and long, warm nights.



*Footnotes*

Mr. Earl Matthews, friend and Modesto resident is a hellova singer:
http://www.myspace.com/bigearlandthecryinshame


I wrote about her a few times here if you would like to consider a post humus look at our old 4-wheeled friend:


http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.ListAllCustom&friendId=182928334&swapped=true&page=34

http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.ListAllCustom&friendId=182928334&swapped=true&page=22]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#44 Wed, 15 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#42
The school year is finally winding down (or so I'm told) and we've concluded spring's concert season with the exception of the high school band's graduation obligation. All of the ensembles did well this year particularly the High School Choir who was superb in their showcase last week. They sang through unisons, cannons, a capellas, 4 parts, solos, language, spirituals and even mistakes with ease and confidence. I am so proud of the little garden of song that they created this year. From the roots of posture, poise, and attitude to the burgeoning understanding of notes and rhythms to the blossoming of vibrato, phrasing, and interpretation; this group has come a long way. And me too. The real question is, though, how to become more effective. What of my affect towards music can I imbue in my students? Not just a love and appreciation for the art but rather the type of affect that affects the mobilization of the art: activism.

Unbeknownst to me, I have a great-uncle by marriage, once removed (but for us, family is family) who plays bassoon internationally. He has toured with a multitude of symphony orchestras and as a soloist. Many years ago as a young man he dedicated himself to the music education of children through "Zuckermania"- a tour of rural schools throughout British Columbia. His sole purpose was to turn students on to the great art of classical music. My mother was recently visiting her parents and in one of those "your uncle wants to talk to you" phone hand-offs by her father, my mum spoke for awhile with her uncle Zuckerman. Excited by the fact that his young relatives were music teachers he told my mother "the great challenge for these young educators is to teach music without compromising the masters." Yes. Uncle Zuckerman is right. But how?

It's so easy to blame TV. It's so easy to blame videogames and the internet and society and high fructose corn syrup and MSG. And I often do. But blame leaves us disenfranchised. Passing the buck takes away from us our power to advocate for change and to problem-solve. It leaves us without a spade in the quarry of stone. Nowadays in order to sow the seeds of art one must first cultivate a habitable soil, a neutural places with pockets of air for life to take hold. For my students and I it is a mutual respect that helps create these conditions.

And to introduce the masters? A great challenge lies purely in the fact that so much time has elapsed since many great symphonic works were created. How do I make these works alive and relavent, current, even urgent? For this I rely on the work of contemporary masters of jazz, pop, Americana, soul, folk, rock, funk.... How to convince a fan of hip-hop that Ella Fitzgerald has anything to do with hip-hop? Play a little Mac the Knife LIVE and listen to her shout-outs. (Before the fruit must come the flower.)

I recently read Irene Nemirovsky's Suite Fancaise, an episodic work that is unfinished due to her arrest and murder by the Nazi's during the war. Her clairvoyance throughout the novel, written at wartime, about her country, France, during wartime is striking as she pulls no punches in her discriptions of her fellow-citizens. One of the works cited as a major contributing influence on Suite Francaise is Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Grey. When I started reading this book a few days ago, I became aware immediately of the similarities in prose. Both books are careful to observe the natural world; the lilacs, the pungent air, thick with roses, the fat buzzing bees, the songbirds. Nature as a source of inspiration, perhaps? Nature as an apathetic bystander to the passage of time and human events? Both are plausible, and yet create a dichotomy of sorts.

And yet isn't that just the way? Everything is dichotomous in a way. Ella and hip-hop? The Picture of Dorian Grey and Suite Francaise? Music and the roots of my veggie garden? Seriously, right?

J and I are looking forward to a sweet summer of staying at home, tending our plot. We are looking forward to touring the countryside, guitars and mandolins slung upon our backs. We are looking forward to our time in the studio, completeing our current project, eyes constantly risen towards a higher art. We are looking forward to sleeping in late with not a spell of obligation on our minds, tending only to the needs of the banal, the quotidien.

I'm not really sure what any of it all means, rather just a stitch here, a lifetime there, and on and on....]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#42 Mon, 01 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#41
And what am I yearning for? It is hard to put into words exactly because it existed before I was born. And, as a citizen of North America, I too subscribe to this casual, stripped-down version of decency but I think what has been lost is the art of being alive, the effort that went into daily ritual. The collared shirts, the hats, and the heels. It wasn't out of vanity that we dressed this way, not so long ago, it was simple manners. Why should someone have to look at my unkempt hair, my distressingly ill-fitting pants, my sagging jowls? It was simple manners. It was the simple regard for others. It was simply respect that propelled these customs of propriety.

And love was a noble thing. And men and women were noble creatures with dignity and self-respect. Life was good but to live was art. Now it is nothing but living and if indeed one tries to find art, they have to buy it at mark-up. $50 for that polka-dotted dress (it's vintage, you know?) $300 for that well-tailored suit (that cut is very retro, you know?)

And how to reclaim this art? How to recreate Paris? How to rebuild Rome?

Let's start in the cafes where all good revolutions start. Let's tip our hats to strangers and kiss the cheeks of acquaintances. Let's speak of many things, people, and places. And then let's go there and be them and see them and know them. Let's recite verses from the rafters and after lets smoke. And through our cigarettes let's toast and through our cheer, let's cry, and through our tears, let's laugh and let our laughter fill the streets. Let our laughter burst forth and tumble into the streets. Let it cartwheel across the ground and through the alleyways and into our homes. Let it entwine our fingers and the stems of our wine glasses. Let its seed take to the air, let it take wing and then let it descend upon all of the cities in all of the lands and let it grow. Yes, there is magic in the cafes as of yet. It's hidden in the coffee, loitering about the salt shaker. There is a revolution yet to be had, there is art yet to be created.

We first must realize that we need it. Then we must have the courage to want it.

Enfin, we must have the audacity to be it.]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#41 Sat, 25 Apr 2009 00:00:00 -0700 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#40
Call it Canada Syndrome; the winter is always within me somewhere, though dormant for the months of blue skies and friendly winds. By the end of January, however, it is infused like a slow burning candle that provides no warmth and no light. And so it goes every year. And every year the same, without so much as a hint of self-awareness, I manage to slip into this unrepentant gloom that only seems to dissipate with the arrival of the new grass, the new buds, and the songbirds. Every winter I am overcome. Every spring I am renewed. Every year, Canada Syndrome. I think that I am a recovering Canadian.

The trees are plump with blossoms, their aplomb is almost palatable. The garden is bursting with color, the pansies, the daffodils, the primroses, the camellia, the chives. The holy days are upon us, the days of humility, the days of reverence, the days of miracles. The air is pregnant, the pollen is potent, the rivers are full.

My pen is not still. Ink on the page is fresh and images in my notebook are sharp. I am growing too, excitedly.

I am about to embark upon another recording project. The record is tentatively titled Last Bird Home. The songs are a collection of recent works mostly dealing with everything I can think of, specifically dealing with birds and home. (How helpful, how enlightening this description. Nonetheless....) So fabulous to have aboard this project wonderful friends to provide artwork, wonderful family to provide soundscape, wonderfully familiar faces to provide a living and breathing workspace. This is the most fertile, alive musical project that I have yet encountered. It is seed. It is germinating. And I continue, in total awe and graciousness, towards a warm and unwavering light.


Concerning Canada: spring is but a final sigh away. Survival is Revival.

However, I still love you.]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#40 Sat, 11 Apr 2009 00:00:00 -0700 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#39 The daffodils are in bloom
The children are in the street playing
I can again see the moon

The wind through the trees is sighing
The way a longing lover might
As a bulb, through the cold depths of winter,
Blossoms overnight.

The skys with their clouds are a-heaving,
The mountains are all but the same;
A candy white laced up parka
Undone reveals a soft palette of grey.

The sundresses are all waving,
They are calling out your name
And with them your heart is awakened.
Oh! Beautiful springtime again!]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#39 Sun, 05 Apr 2009 00:00:00 -0700 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#38 And now to put something beautiful back into this world to counter alla the ugliness: As someone who lives for art, I would like to periodically feature the art of some of the most gifted and talented people that I have come across. Happily, thankfully and miraculously there are so many talented artists that I have an ever deepening pool to swim in.

Antje Duvekot.
Antje has the most brilliant song: Long Way
http://www.myspace.com/antjeduvekot

And another favorite of mine: Opium
www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKT-w5ohXDo
Enjoy.]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#38 Wed, 04 Mar 2009 00:00:00 -0800 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#36
i think that i was born old. as a child, i always liked talking with my parents and grandmother and i have always been petrified of roller coasters. as a child i always hated disney movies, candy, and fire crackers. i always loved alan alda. as a teenager, i never really cared much for the mtv and instead spent my time reading the backs of ricki lee jones albums and playing kuhlau flute sonatas. i am only 27 and really like being at home. i like lamp light. i like listening to old records. i like reading about gardening techniques. i write letters and send them. i like going out for an early bagel. i really like watering my houseplants. ok. 27. right.

i played a show in town last weekend. before that i hadn't played a show since november. among others, the reason for this gap-laden performance schedule that i am nursing? i am, at 27, going through an existential crises of identity (or something much less dramatic but no less traumatic). as i grow into this identity of "teacher" and out of my identity of "student" i confront this horrible anxiety regarding "age". oldening, as i like to think of it. not aging, definitely not ripening, just sort of lingering on the vine until i drop into the ground. granted, the oldening process has only just begun as i don't intend to drop anytime soon, but this feeling is persistant and nagging. it's giggling in my ear every time that i go to a bar or coffee house near campus. it's snickering over my shoulder everytime that i enter a buffalo exchange store. it's doing shots in a rubberized black mini-skirt at the back of the club everytime that i attempt to open a show for an "up and comer" who, oddly, is never me. in this college-town of eugene, in this world of up and comers, new to towners, and co-billers, i'm already an old battle-axe, a seasoned old-timer: i'm already a hasbeen! oldening, i tell you, oldening is a wicked, wicked thing.

And now to my grandmother, to whom my thoughts drift with increasing frequency and fortitude. she used to sing this song "red river valley" that i set to learning. my dad and i sang it together at the show last weekend. (aside from being a great bassist and guitarist, my dad rocks harmony lines so amazingly well, by the way.) we also did "don't think twice" and "goodnight irene". as the evening wore on, from the room trickled a steady stream of 20-somethings, and swelled with "grown-ups." (you know, the people with their pants pulled up and their shirts tucked in?) and a better reception i have never recieved at any show. ever. they were kind and we exchanged songs and jokes and love and i realized that we were all in the same boat, we were all oldening and the truth of the matter was that it had nothing to do with age. i am just beginning the process and they had been enjoying it for a little longer was all. yup. i finally found the audience. and here's the best part: they forgive fashion. they don't care much for cds; they'd rather see music in action. they love poetry. they sing along when they can. they smile with their whole mouth and their eyes too.

hmm. oldening... on second thought, i guess that it doesn't sound too bad afterall. maybe 27 will be my oldest year yet.]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#36 Sat, 31 Jan 2009 00:00:00 -0800 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#35
To that end, the song begins with a moody piano outlining a melancholy melody followed by a voice barely above a whisper.

I was on a telephone in a small white room on the other side of the pond wishing Happy New Year to my family from the future. My lips were stained with red wine and theirs with morning coffee. I was cold, I think that it was freezing outside of the shuttered window and when I wasn't dancing around in anticipation of coming days I was sharing a single cot.

Rachel's voice grows, it was doubled in production I think, and there are strings or synths to emphasize and capture the ethereal, floating Portishead quality of the loving noise.

On the other side of the pond I was walking for hours one day. A car stopped to ask directions and from it poured Euro-trance, silver-plated dance beats and shock waves. I told the car que je ne sais rien. I was just walking, after all, just walking. Then there was a sign that said to stay on the road or risk being shot by hunters.

So slowly, this song unveils itself. Self-assured, undistracted, intent, but indistinguishable.

My hair was cut unevenly while I was in the future. Many inches fell to the tiled floor, a tiled floor with a pattern that was self-assured but indistinguishable. My eyes could not make sense of the tiles and colors and why they were as they were. Didn't someone lay them with their hands? Why wasn't that green across from that green? It could have been so perfect, all of it.

The bass line doesn't recognize that it is not the melody.

I took a train from the city to the airport. There was a big dog underneath the seat across from me. It was muzzled and mean. At the airport there was rubber on either side of escalator. I don't know why. But before the airport, I was walking and talking and we had an umbrella and some old people were walking behind us. They thought we couldn't hear them but we barely could and they thought that we were Parisians because only Parisians would carry an umbrella in such a light rain. The old people didn't have an umbrella. But they buttoned their jackets and she wore stockings with her heels. They were undistracted. They didn't know that they were from the future.

The song fades into a gracious noise, an eager and beleaguered murmering. Softer and softer....

After the airport I am flying and in my headphones I watch the North Pole freezing. It is a white room behind my shuttered window-seat window. I see the sun low across the land. It is staining the white with red. Julie Doiron is murming something in my ear, undistracted. It is the same thing as when I flew to the future those few weeks ago. I roll my head over to look at the person sitting next to me. He is a musician and he is asleep.]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#35 Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:00 -0800 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#34
My 6th grade beginning band has been effectively driving me crazy for approximately 3.5 months. Don't get me wrong- each and every one of them is the next Charles Mingus in waiting, I believe. But as a group they love to pick at each other. No scab ever heals with that group, I tell ya. In our small school, each grade has one class and so most of the students have known each other since Kindergarten or younger. Hence, among other things, they know how to push each other's buttons. However, slowly, very slowly and painstakingly I have been attempting to sow some seeds with my beginning band students. "We are a group," I tell them. "What hurts one of us hurts all of us." And herein lies that beauty of music education. Those seeds of community ain't no jive; when one tall tomato plant is eaten by a bug, the lettuce no longer gets the tomato plant's shade. If you can believe it, this group of Minguses (personality and all) was ready- playing position-feet flat on the floor-horns up-backs off chairs- READY for their concert last week. They had even suspended their bickering in anticipation of the event. But, leave it to nature to throw a wrench in the mix: the Middle School/High School band and choir concert got cancelled and rescheduled for January as a result of my favorite anomoli. Like the little garden beetle, always looking for a cool place to hide, they were crushed. And me too. I suppose though, that this is the practical application of Zen.

Johnny got his record player fixed by a little old lady, one of the last of the dying breed of little old record-player fixin ladies. Since then my love for vinyl has become exponentially stoaked as our record collection spins it's way back to life. Oh, how many hours did I log away during those long, cold Canadian winters listening to CSNY's So Far and Rickie Lee Jones' Pirates? Holding the cover in my hand, pouring over the pictures and the credits and the long, winding columns of lyrics, listening for every lead and every scratch in that turning thing.... This art is tangible; I could almost taste the whiskey, the cigarettes, feel the crusty strings under my finger tips.... And here in the digital age, what here is left for me? It is all too perfect, too grocery-store glossy, waxed and packaged and hopelessly over-stimulating. Where is the grit, the grime, the filth under the fingernails, the mold on the leaves, the compost under the vine?

I once read that the thing about gardeners is that they believe in miracles. I sorta think that the thing that makes gardens miraculous is that they represent the miracle that is our daily wanderings. And vice versa.


PS-One of the houses around the block has so many glowing, blinking, rotating, shimmering objects on their front lawn that I almost think that I'm chillin on the strip in Vegas when I walk by. Fortunately they redeem themselves by having a plain brown CHRISTMAS JESUS: Remember His Birth sign in the middle of it.

I haven't quite turned that yard into a metaphor yet. But it's pretty funny.]]> http://melissaruthmusic.com/news.html#34 Sat, 20 Dec 2008 00:00:00 -0800 homegrown folk-sass - Melissa Ruth - Journal