Studio

I'm sure you've heard the news.

The band has a name. The Bright Lights.

After years of discussion and brain storming and crossing out lots of pieces of paper, we've arrived at this new name of musical enlightenment!

Have you seen the new "Meet the Band video?" It's the first in a series. Check it out! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygjn7T4h5iE

In other news, we have been working hard the last month in the studio on what will be the bands 4th Cd (and my ... 14th).

This, as of yet unnamed record, will be released this Spring - if all keeps going to schedule.

We're all very excited about these recordings. They're some of our favourite newer tunes. And we've been able to experiment and flush out these tunes. We even have Tibetan bells on one of the tunes!

Keep tuned in for more info as we progress in this process!

Restaurants

I talk about food a lot.

I realize this. Many of my posts from the road are about food and restaurants. It's my little way of promoting good places that are vegan or are kindly to vegans.

There are a lot of them!

Every now and again, I come across an establishment that is quite hostile to the non-traditional western dieter. A Bob Evans experience my good friend had shortly after going vegan where they told her to "go someplace else," comes to mind.

I don't really fault these people. We live in a society that is wary of anyone different than ourselves. Many folks are raised to believe that different equals wrong.

That doesn't change overnight.

Also, every establishment has the right to serve whatever it wants. Though I would love to see every restaurant have a viable veggie option, each place has their own market, niche, and clientele.

This is why I never visit a steakhouse or a seafood place, etc.

What does confuse me though are when asked about their options, a place turns hostile.

Usually, when someone is rude, there are a whole host of things involved in bringing about that side of someone.

But can we change that behavior? Should we?

When rudeness dwels from a place of ignorance or lack of information, is it our place to educate someone?

Sadly, we can't send the ghost of Christmas past, present & future after ever act of rudeness... can we?

No, probably not.

My advice for rudeness is typically to look past it, and to send prayers of compassion to that person. We all need more understanding. We all need more compassion.

So, I ask you to send some thoughts of compassion to the manager at the Courtyard in Brecksville.

I have to admit, that the rudeness I experienced there (including "is this just some lifestyle thing? no, we dont accomodate special needs.") riled me up a bit. I wanted to tell everyone I knew to go out and either vocally boycott the place or that everyone go in asking for vegan options.

But then I thought, what would that accomplish? It would satisfy my wounded ego, but would it be a constructive way to bring about change?  Would this man be helped along to a place of greater understanding?

Doubtful.

So I am sharing my experience. Do with it as you wish. And please send this man, and the countless more out there, the seeds of compassion.

Winter

I breathe.




This breath hangs in the still cold air like a bird hovering in an air current before finally fading out into the patches of falling snow.



And I breathe in.



I breathe in calmness, and a warmth, despite the frost on the air. I breathe in the songs of the crows, and the songs of the trees. Their stories fill the forest like story time when we were in 2nd grade.



To many, there is only silence. The occasional wind-whipping through the pines. But to me, a tale older than any of us is unwinding, with all the vividity of any poet or campfire teller.



It says, “Come listen to my story.”



And so I walk on, snow shoes digging into the deep snow. The forest is already surrounding, and the mountains loom above, though today, the snow clouds are low, and the mountains can freely hide behind their curtain.



The powdery snow reaches up to my knees. No one has been here yet, since the last snowfall. I am breaking ground, blazing a trail into the forest. The tracks of a coyote dash out from behind a near tree, and cross my path, disappearing behind the brush on my left. The scene still playing like a ghost. It is a playful moment for the canine, mouth open in a near-smile, looking for a good time, and perhaps a chizzler. So it heads into the brush, it’s fluffy tail healthy and tinted with a rusty orange flare.



I can almost hear him yip in the distance.



All of the air has stilled now. Too cold for even the wind to be out.



But the mountains are peeking through the clouds, as though the clouds were a tattered old pair of blue jeans.



The sun is even spreading through the cracks in the sky. It throws shadows in every direction, and spots the air with colour.



“Reminds me of a day many years ago,” says a near pine. “The river froze early that year. Bison still wintered by here. Their snorting was a kindly lullaby. We would all close our eyes and just sway to the rhythm.”



The pine stretched into the sky, poking through a cloud. Its branches were full and green, even under the fuzzy sweater of snow.



A swan flew by out of the corner of my eye.

Another deep breath. My feet began rising and falling again, and soon I could see the bend in the river.



It was not frozen though. True, the sides of the river were frozen, but a good-sized channel dashed through. It roared softly as it passed.



A duck of some sort swam lightly by the opposite bank. It didn’t look cold, but I would have traded places.



The mountains were now mostly in view. The river came from that direction. There was a large field between us. In the summer, it would be full or bright yellow flowers and Indian paintbrush. And sagebrush. And the more than occasional grizzly bear.



But right now, 10 feet of snow lay of all of that.



The nearest pine extended its limbs and with a generous embrace, whispered, “Welcome home.”

Valentine's Specials!!

Want to get the perfect special Valentine's gift for your special someone?
Look no further!
You could have me come to your house and sing some songs for the 2 of you!

It's a Z-Valentine!

This is a special offer to all my wonderful Facebook blog readers!

Here are some options, suggestions:
1. I play a 35 min set of songs for you, and you get a copy of my newest record, Mountains & Meadows! ($75)

2. I play an hour set of songs for you, you get a copy of my new CD Mountains & Meadows, and I bring you some vegan chocolate & flowers! ($150)

3. I play a 90 min set of songs for you, you get a copy of my new CD Mountains & Meadows, and I bring you some vegan chocolate & flowers! ($250)

4. I play an hour set of songs for you, you get a copy of my new CD Mountains & Meadows, I bring you some vegan chocolate and flowers, AND i prepare a dinner for you! ($350)

4. For $1,000, I'll play all night for you!

(Prices are subject to negotiation)
Email me at zach@zachmusic.net or facebook message me. Dates and times are filling up, so reserve your spot today!

Mountains and Meadows Winter Western Tour 2010

The sun is setting (earlier each day), sending streamers of rose and tangerine across the marshmallow sky. Said sun sitting somewhere in that small window between the clouds and the ocean - that wee line of blood orange that stretches as far as the buildings will allow a view. Rain sprinkled here and there on and off for the afternoon, but it wasn't enough to dampen much. The waves still rolled against the sand. The cars still rolled along the freeways. And the traffic lights were all changing to red.

I can taste the salt.

Which feels good. My throat and sinuses have been in less than good health for the last week. The direct result of nearly 2 months without adequate sleep (and by adequate I mean 2 days in a row with more than 4 hours of sleep). Thanksgiving filled my belly and luckily my throat lasted through the 2 shows I had that weekend, giving out in a little Chinese restaurant in Dayton, and finally returning 2 days ago.

But it's the holidays. And I am thankful for many things.

I am not in Ohio right now. For one.

I am in the 70 degree ocean sunshine of southern California.

My little reprise from the real winter, which I will be experiencing in the extreme in 8 days as I venture up to Salt Lake City and Wyoming.

So every minute here is well-appreciated!

Getting into LA in time to do a short house concert, tasking my voice, I was able to rest a day and fully regain a good 65 percent of my vocal cords. I spent the day working on Peace Project and other musical endeavours, including planning another totally new Love Initiative set at the civic Theater in early Oct! (It will BLOW your mind... you will need to be there... i mean it).

My friend I am staying a few days with had the television on as I was waking up and gearing up for my big house concert in Pasadena. There was a show on about a father that pushed his very disabled son on 100's of marathons, placing 1st or 2nd in his age group in most of the events. His son was able to use a device that helped him communicate, where he could type out messages with his head. Despite his many disabilities, he communicated very well, and was a deeply compassionate person. He even graduated Boston University as the first nonverbal disabled person in the school's history, and he lives basically on his own, though he has no ability to move anything other than his head. Such a moving story. And the fact that his father is now 70 and still doing full marathons, triathlons, etc, is quite inspiring. And the pair has inspired other families to do the same thing. The capacity of the human heart is so great. It is so much bigger than the simple bodies that we see. The compassion we hold defies all odds, and cant be contained in just flesh and bone.

And from there it went on to a show about people who've won the lottery. I was only partially paying attention here. It seemed like mostly inspiring stories of folks who truly needed the money and used it or saved it wisely. And then it went on and on about a doctor who won it, and blew some $600,000 grand on home renovations and such.

Money.

The green God of America.

I revere and respect all spiritual paths, as they all rise toward a similar god of compassion.

But I will not bow to that paper god.

However, I would like to interject right here that I do have 3 CDs currently available (What I Meant to Say, Lost + Found, and Mountains & Meadows) along with comfy hoodies, t-shirts, buttons, and stickers that all make such wonderful gifts for the holidays! AND that January is the PERFECT time to host a house concert, because what else is there to do in January but have wonderful music and friends fill your home with joy and laughter and Love! (Email me... we'll make it happen!)

The house concert was in beautiful Pasadena. In the historic section of town.

This show was one of the main highlights of coming out to the West Coast this winter. My friend Randi Driscoll, who is amazing (I recommend going online and buying her new live CD - it really highlights what she does best, i think!), was headlining the event. Also there was Lisa Sanders, a great writer and heavyweight in the San Diego music scene. I had done a show with both of them in the legendary Java Joes in San Diego this past summer.

We divied up the show so that i played 4 songs, then Lisa played 4 songs, then Randi (and her percussionist extraordinaire, Noah) played a good 45 minutes, and then we repeated the process.

I loaded up on some marinated tofu cubes prepared by Whole Foods, and totally delicious, and then kicked off the show. The space was tight, as tends to happen in house concerts (especially with 60 attendees), and we had a beautiful fireplace as a backdrop. This always makes me slightly nervous, as on the mantelpiece sat several clay bowls and dishes from deep in the ocean and incredibly irreplaceable. That and there were candles. Lit candles directly behind me.

But I made it without damaging anything! And I still got to dance in the little aisle way.

The crowd were wonderful and utterly brilliant scientists from Caltech. I must say, i was deeply inspired to be in a room with such huge brainpower (folks there had species named after them!).

Something in the ether of the room really aided my guitar work. Some of my best guitar playing at a show, in a long time. I love when the bar gets raised!

Randi and Noah joined me for their favourite song, Distracted. And it rocked. Noah is amazing with a djembe, a pair of bongos, and a hi hat. And Randi sang lovely harmonies, taking the song to another place, which is always the best place for a song to go!

A major highlight: (and having nothing to do with me) they passed a hat and had everyone write some sort of scientific term down, and then Randi would pick the terms out of the hat and incorporate them into a song! She is pretty adept at improv, and pulled together this amazing, ridiculous and spectacular version of Blue Christmas (involving Love Waves - yes there is such a term -and ironically it referrers to an aftershock of an earthquake... - Bob Dylan, and several words none of us could pronounce!

That and her version of Dont Stop Believing ("even scientists studying the bottom of the ocean - or the moon - know this song") in which she vocally did the famous speedy guitar riff in the intro.

Brilliant.

The night ended with a rousing version of Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes" which brought back me, Lisa Sanders, her singing partner "Brown Sugar", and Randi's husband "The Whistler." We got a rhythmically-challenged Pips-style backing dance together - showing off our true talent (or lack thereof)!

If anyone reading this is in southern California, I highly highly recommend you coming out to our show on the 12th in Escondido "Randi's Jingle Bell Ball!" It features all 3 of us again, and will be so much craziness and fun, you wont know what to do with yourself!

I hope to bring Randi and Noah out to Ohio sometime this year, quite possibly during Peace Week (she has written a major theme song for the Matthew Shepherd Foundation and does a lot of work with this great organization). So if you see me posting that she's coming to Ohio, or anywhere else, you should go. You will enjoy.

Well, so it happens. My time is about up here in the cafe. My tea is out, and my car meter is nearly over. I'll check in again soon.

Until then, be the change you wish to see!

Namaste.
Zach   

Thoughts on a Tuesday (pt 2)

Peace Week.



Back in February or so, my friend Bekey Hewit came to me and said she wanted to do a concert at Musica on Oct. 2nd to celebrate Gandhi's birthday. She asked me if I'd like to be involved, and if I'd like to help. Of course i did! So in our little organizing session, we wondered if we could get the city to declare that day Akron Peace Day. Which then turned into Akron Peace Week as we discussed things we could do.



And then the city loved the idea!



And named Sept 25- Oct 2nd as - officially - Akron Peace Week!



As we began putting the week events together, we decided we wanted to do more than just this to cultivate nonviolence in the community, so we came up the Akron Peace Project.



I've been studying nonviolence for the last 3-4 years quite intensely. Spirituality has always intrigued me, and every religion honestly says the same thing - if you strip it down to the basic levels. It all boils down to 1 thing: Love. Love is the Ultimate. With Love as the Ultimate commandment, we cannot condone violence ever. I was turned onto Tolstoys brilliant writings on the subject of Christianity. His "Gospel in Brief" where he strips the Gospels down to their most basic, and "Confessions and other Religious Writings" both were deeply changing for me. One of the great things about Tolstoy is that he gave away his wealth and estate and lived as a poor farmer - practicing what he preached. Something very hard for anyone to do. From there i jumped deeper into Buddhism, the Gospels, Hinduism, and Native American wisdom. With each, I found that Love is the only goal, and that divisiveness, hate, and violence are unacceptable, and uncondonable.



This is where I came into reading Gandhi. Gandhi was never taught, nor even mentioned my entire school career (including college). So it was like opening up this amazing door of truth. And as I got more ingrained in his life and principles, our society was growing more and more divisive. As I step back and look at adults in this country who harbor secret hatreds, us and them / for-us-or-against us mentalities, absolute right and wrong mentalities, I see this epidemic as inherently needing understanding, needing a new Gandhi to step forth to remind us that together we are brilliant and able to achieve anything, that we are all of us the entire universe, that we are all one.



That no one holds a monopoly on truth.



Each side of a debate holds some aspect of truth.



And I couldn't sit back and do nothing. Yeah, I write happy little songs and sing them to 20 people a night, but i felt sure that there are other ways I could get the community together to celebrate all of us, to champion nonviolence.



Thus, the Peace Project begins.



The first step is to look within. This is an ongoing step. We must constantly challenge our views and opinions. We must constantly work to bring about our own inner peace. If we are violent in thought, then we will be violent in action. It is inevitable. If we can develop compassion in our minds and ourselves, than that is how we will build our relationships, and that will be the world we will build with our words and hands and hearts.



We partnered up with the Art of Living to help people gain some sort of mediation skills. They are a wonderful organization started by His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. They are a major force for peace in the world, and also inside us all. Mediation is a deeply powerful state and tool. We all mediate now and again. It has many names, and we often don't realize that we are meditating. Things like singing, dancing, praying, hiking/walking/running are all forms of mediation. The goal of mediation is the simply bring the mind to the present. To fully engage in this very moment. It's not just clearing the mind. That will come with enough practice. But it's about identifying and recognizing your thoughts. And it's infinitely healing and rejuvenating.



We will be helping bring the Art of Living's Yes+ course to Akron on Oct 29-31st. We've partnered with the Center for Conflict Management to do this. You really will want to attend this event. I've done a few small mediations with this group, and they have been dramatic. And they were just small little 15 minutes sessions! (More info will be at www.akronpeaceproject.org)



Love means nonviolence toward anyone. It also means recognizing that animals are sentient beings as well. They have the same nervous systems and pain receptors as we do. They have emotions and social structures. Until Constantine, Christians were vegetarians. It was inseparable from the Gospel of Love. Hindu and Buddhist traditions sanction vegetarianism as the way, since we are supposed to not harm each other. So, to be nonviolent, we must be vegetarian (at least - vegan cuts out all harm to our animal brethren). For it is like having violent thoughts and saying you are nonviolent. This basic level of violence perpetrated everyday cannot be reconciled with nonviolence.



So we tied in a dog walk event to Peace Week. It is a reminder of Gandhis sentiment "You can judge a nation by how it treats it's animals." We are also co-sponsoring a discussion with author Will Tuttle, author of the World Peace Diet, on Oct 28th at Kolbe Hall, Rm 51, in the University of Akron at 7pm. It is free. Once our hearts are opened to compassion they cannot accept the hardness of their previous state.



Most importantly, nonviolence is something we can all practice and spread. It takes a lot of strength, inner and moral strength. Far more so than violence does. But through our own lives and actions, and treatment of others, it spreads. It spreads because it works, and because it is naturally that state of humanity.



So I ask you to be a soldier in our modern satyagraha.



Namaste.

Thoughts on a Tuesday (pt 1)

Well it has been a summer.

I say.

Ups and downs and back again. Since returning to Ohio from the Western mountains and big sky, I have been working hard organizing "An Evening for Chuck," my benefit for pancreatic cancer research in my dad's honor, as well as "Akron Peace Week," a week of events designed to spread and cultivate nonviolence in the self, the home , and the community. I've also been writing a good deal, and working out some of the new material with the band. And I formed a little sideband, The Bodhis.

Looking back, I guess that does seem pretty busy.

Firstly, every year when I return from the Mountains, I get depressed with the hiking options in Northeast Ohio. This year was no exception. I typically hike 10-15 miles a day in Wyoming, all up into the mountains - to meadows plush with wildflowers, little glacial lakes high up in a mountain, where at least part of the trail is still snow-covered. Hikes that include seeing bear, moose, elk, bison, marmots, wolves, eagles, and other amazing critters. I've yet to find many trails in this area that are over 4 or 5 miles (except of course the Buckeye trail). Most of the trails here also have little views, though they are pretty in their own way, there aren't the kind of entrancing views (save a couple of short waterfall hikes). But  to my joy, I found a nice trail in Brecksville metro park that I really do like. It's nice and secluded, it has some elevation, and though not really many views, it is a nice little trail to hike. This discovery fueled some much needed happiness in early August.


Evening for Chuck.

We typically spend the better part of the year planning and organizing this event. We had the opportunity to bring in Isa Moskowitz, the famous vegan chef! That is until she backed out less than 30 days before the event. But we soldiered on, and had one of the most fun events we've thrown. My good friend, Brandt Evans (head chef of Blue Canyon), brought a few amazing dishes, as did Cilantro, the great new Thai place downtown. Mrs. Julie's Kitchen made some wonderful pumkin bread/rolls, and the Mustard Seed make a jolly cake. And of course Theresa's famous cookies (of which i think i seriously had 40!) But the real hero of the food day was Pita Pit. They were so kind as to donate a large batch of veggie pitas, and then came back twice to deliver more each time the wraps ran out! 

Magic Mike made some uber-festive balloon hats, and Zumba seriously got us going! Dr. Shankar gave a wonderful presentation about the need for altering our diets to fight and combat cancer and many other diseases.

And the music!

The Bodhis had their world debut, which was so much fun! I love singing with Courtney! And Cameron's beat box just takes everything to a new level! Plus, David had on his cool Bodhis/Piratey shirt. It was the first show of many to come. Actually, we may be doing some sets on Nov 18th at Northside, and for sure at First Night Akron (at the Polsky Building 9:30-11:30pm).

I was so happy to have Brian Lisik involved this year. Kristine Jackson is always great! She knocked her set out of the park! The Tofu Fighters got the crowd up and rockin! Even having Bill Hall singing along!

The Love Initiative. It was a lot of fun to put a modified version of a Love Initiative set together with my band. If you missed the Akron Civic show, I dont know what to tell you. It was beautiful. So, I decided to try something like it with the band. We did it differently and more focused on the music than the Civic show was, but it worked very well! Plus, it debuted the video for Shoulder! (If you haven't seen it yet: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuK1L8rI4-A) And it debuted several songs besides Shoulder, songs like Anyway (a duet with Maurice Martin of Winslow). And then there was the finale! Ever After and Sundown with HORNS!! Oh yeah. Oh. Yeah.

In the end, we've raised over $6,000 this year! Which brings our grand total to over $32,000! A small dent in the problem of this cancer.

In the Part 2... Peace Week!
Stay tuned!