Photos & Performances
Salvage Club
We were invited to play at the RSA in Ashburton on May 5 2024. This was our second time, and it was nice that some of our audience remembered us!
Our performance of african drumming-singing-dancing
April 13 2024- The start of our premiere of our group in Christchurch, NZ :)
I started out wanting to play the drums, and found a night class on Monday evenings at The Muse. It was fun, a bit chaotic because we learned so many moves, and beats which we later learned were 'songs'. We come from a Western point of view and are not used to listening to the drums to tell us what dance moves comes next.
Our teacher, Agbeko De Souza, is from Ghana originally. His friend went to Ghana on holidays in January 2024, and we were asked our measurements for our costumes. I mean, we were surprised that we were even thinking of performing to people... we thought we were just having a bit of fun on Monday evenings.
I can say that Blair (my partner) and I are probably the ones that needs just a bit more practice :) But hey, this is called COMMUNITY MUSIC, and it is inclusive. The group carries you forward!
Flamin' Dees
This photo was used for our promotion for playing at Kaipoi's Working Man's Club.
White Rabbit
This was performed in front of friends at a New Year Get Together
January 2 2024
Jefferson Airplane was an American rock band based in San Francisco, California, that became one of the pioneering bands of psychedelic rock. (from Wikipedia)
Flamin' Dees
We were named this because a friend called Dierdre had cancer and died. She used to play with us, and we decided to play a few songs at her funeral, and we just kept on playing. Until Dec 2023 when we separated.
Rae-Anne-Uke. Malcolm-uke, Blair-mandolin, Bruce-harmonica, Judy- guitar, Mike- banjo, and me on bass guitar. The dog's name is Jippy!
Jesse's Gang -- Open Mic at Dunedin't Folk Festival Jan 2023
We practiced that day, and had a jesse sort-of song :)
Performed at our Open Mic
Dusty Box Wall is a great song with a simple bassline which I was able to just play and have fun with. What I mean by that is that I can relax and watch the audience while my hand is on automatic pilot!
November 3 2023
My first ad (Oct 21 2023)
I've been listening to James Eager and Toby Goodman talk about "How to Start Playing with Other Musician"
That was a really useful hour of recording
What I got out of it was:
1. Search FB for jamming session. I went one step further and put an ad!
2. Play 3 solid songs that you know inside & out before going to a jam and expecting to play.
(I actually bring my uke to figure out the notes that they are playing as I have no confidence yet with bringing my bass... )
3. Ask other musicians who their favourite sax player is if they play sax, or drummer if they are a drummer.... basically take an interest in other people.
4. Don't over play (that's not too hard for me:)) Nobody cares that you can play those fancy dancy fills (phew!)
5. Help musicians pack out -- I actually find useful tips when I help them out.
6. Do not hand out tips! --- When I first started playing bass and thought I knew a bit, I was commenting about their "bad" hand technique (not to them just to my friends) ... I now know keep it to myself
7. Talk about their gear if you don't have something nice to say about their playing
And if they play brilliantly, they don't need their egos stroked (although, that really depends...)
8. The most useful tip, really, for me was to ask a pianist or guitarist/ drummer if they could play some stuff with them... arrive early to a jam, perhaps, and have a bit of a play
9. Personally, I recommend to learn how to play blues in different styles (reminder to myself!)
10. Get over yourself. One or 2 bad notes wont start a war, only with yourself.
Studio Bell (National Music Centre) in Calgary is probably thee best music museum, recording studio, Canadian music history and a real collection of a variety of instruments.
Randy, guitarist for The Guess Who, explained how his guitar was returned to him after 45 years being ‘lost’. He kept that guitar under lock and key, literally, until he let a roadie load it into the truck- the roadie let it out of his sight for 5 minutes and the guitar was gone! Below are some pictures of my visit!
StudioBell
I love the quote from NickelBack
The Story of the lost guitar. 45 year later....
Love this quote on the wall..
Randy teaching me guitar.
Monthly challenge!
Always nice to get recognised for the hard work one puts into a song. Thanks to EbassGuitar for posting the challenge! and picking me too :)
Red Right Hand at Waimate Folk Festival
Nick Cave and The Black Seeds sang this (Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds )
Martin told me that he listened to the song that many times, that it had to come out :) All he needed was a bass player at this small folk festival.
My challenge, would I take it?, was to play this with him on stage the following day. Saying this, we all arrived on Friday evening, and he gave me a brief introduction to the song on Friday night. It's a relatively easy piece (4 bar blues), but still, I never did this with a singing metronome! - read the description on YouTube for more :)
Played at the Little River Pub
Diamonds 'N the Ruff
We played at Little River Pub on April 22, 2023.
My first every PAID gig! ~ enough money to buy 3 beers and some chips!
Different feeling to playing at a festival. We even got clapped after our songs. I mean, people listened! :)
Blind date performance
This is our Blind Date song. What’s a blind musical date?
Play with a bunch of people who you just met a day before!
Canterbury Folk Festival, NZ 2023
Six Ribbons
It definitely wasn't me who made this song sound amazing!
Just looking at this, I think that I need 1) to stand up, 2) I need to, at least, bring my music stand, and 3) not make a face when I play bad notes!
Waimate Folk Festival - February 2023
You Are My Sunshine
Inspired by The Dead South's version. Fun to play although I left the stage a bit defeated as I knew that some notes that I played were incorrect... did anyone notice? I was tapped on the shoulder during the festival saying that they liked my bass playing. She said that just when I thought that stage playing wasn't for me!
Canterbury Folk Festival 2023
At A Rolling Stone, Christchurch, NZ
I played in a pub! I wasn't nervous really because I was just looking down and making sure that I was playing the right notes. I was finished before I knew it!
This was part of my After 3 Jazz Community Programme. October 2022
The Hokitika Blues
Played on the West Coast of New Zealand. I was inspired by my friend who always does situational video of him playing his ukulele!
January 2021
Natalie on the ukulele
Coming back from Bandcamp in August 2020, Blair and I stopped near Kaikoura, NZ and decided to have a bit of a play to send to my friends and family who were still in lockdown!
PS I hadn't started playing bass yet! Little did I know....
The Flaming Dees
This is a group of friends, me on bass, who meet every week, and practice a few songs. We practiced for a few months to play at a festival, and we were asked to play at the Folk Club in Christchurch. We sounded pretty great if you ask me!
The Dallington Duo
I thought that it would be fun to play with my partner, Blair. We practiced a little and this is what we came up with.
Ukes in Cafe in Geraldine, New Zealand
around 2022