Hi VanceFan!

Here’s some playdate stuff:

This Saturday 2/23 I’m in Bristol RI - www.stonechurchcoffeehouse.com
Then Sunday 2/24 I open for Dad, uh, I mean Liv Taylor in Milville NJ - http://www.levoy.net
Then Saturday 3/2 Oswego NY - www.oswegomusichall.org

Got a couple of minutes?

I’ve said before that I don’t often mix my music and models stuff, but this past 4 days has been Monday Muse-worthy of divergent stuff I do.

I drove up to and participated in Folk Alliance International in Montreal this past week. It’s the premiere folk trade show with showcases, jamming, panels and the like. Sure, there are highlights:

~ Alisa Amador.
Remember this woman’s name.
I remember this kid when she was just post-toddler, her and her identical sibling playing percussion and singing with mom & dad’s wondrous and stalwart world music group Sol Y Canto. I knew she was musical. But her own thing. This thing. Good Lord. At the end of the night at the Roots Agency Showcase, where she was an add-on, she proceeded to devastate the 25 or so lingering people in the room. Solo. With a semi-hollow body electric guitar. Sharkey, Josiah, and Tink, all of the Slambovian Circus Of Dreams and having a monster set of their own, sat in a row just gaping. Steve Addabo, producer of Shawn Colvin amongst others over the years, tried to leave 3 times and could not. Tim and Nick, the two principal Roots Agency agents that hosted the room, just kept mumbling “I…I didn’t know..” Mark my words and remember this young lady’s name. I hate doing this amalgam thing but yeah, Shawn Colvin meets Joni Mitchell has lunch with Amy Winehouse meets Suzanne Vega add Diana Krall in a quiet unassuming never loud package even singing in Spanish and French. Remember her name, now.

~ Anytime Alice Howe opens her mouth.

~ Ellis Paul has still got the goods. The songs perfect and incisive as usual. At his showcase I warned people I was sitting with that I would weep if this song got played. He played it. I didn’t disappoint. Still don’t.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXuREoA7DCM

~ Freddy & Francine. They’re a duo that just blew me away. And I was on stage with them.

~ How I lovingly and dulcetly butchered Bonnie Raitt’s Nothing Seems To Matter with the actual Freebo (original bass player on her version) on bass. Oh well…

~ The FAI Staff that make this thing work. FAI and its volunteers are without peer. I am humbled by the talent and connectivity that you people have facilitated our access to. I have never been more so proud to play a part in this community. Thanks again for your trust in me, and for all that you folks do.

~ My French language skills are shit. In retrospect think I said to a waitperson at the hotel restaurant that she was “a most enjoyable grapefruit”. Yeah, it could have been a particularly citrus MeToo moment, but all seemed ok. Until I referred to someone else’s hair as a "large potato". Oh well. I’m at least funny, otherwise these people wouldn’t have been weeping like they were. Or they were just sad for me. I don’t know.

~ Then Sunday I drove 2.5 hours to Quebec City to a modeling friend’s that I have never met.
I’ve known Alain through a Yahoo list called Wings Of Peace. By the description, you can tell what kind of airplane models are exclusively discussed and researched over there. He’s an original on the list, I have been a moderator there for about 12 years. We have been penpals via that list for 19 years. He is a wiry 70 years old, cleard 3 feet of snow from his front with a shovel in an afternoon. He bikes 20 - 30 miles daily. Walks an hour each way to meet his grandchildren after school, escorting them home, making sure homework is done, then walks the hour home. Has never owned a car. Was a bush pilot. Alain is to plastic civil aircraft modeling what John Prine is to songwriting. Simplest materials. Sheer genius upon completion.

All long-overlooked, civilian subjects. No, he doesn't build kits. 90% of his material is old street signs, plastic to-go container, tape, other found trash bits. And world-known historians come to him for expertise. While our modeling disciplines are quite different, I’m left breathless by his execution. Oh, and plus, his family is simply the most lovely stand of ladies, from 7 to 70. Just remarkable. We laughed at dinner till we cried all of us as I said things thanks to iTranslate on my phone and my recollection of Jr. high French like:

"I are so hungry I could eat a Beluga”. “I could have lunch with a horse!”. “If grandfather doesn’t finish, I might eat his plate and his fork...” “Why yes, I’d enjoy dancing with your library...” Yes, children snorted liquids at my proclamations. That’s my job. You’re welcome. Or as they say in French “Derriere”…

~ Here’s some hand-held pics of his work. And here’s where vocation and avocation cross. I want my songs to be like this “old white man’s” models. How lucky am I to be so cross-inspired musically and aviation history-wise. Somedays I’m just the luckiest guy on planet earth. I really am. Je suis tres joyeux caniche!!

Still taking donations for the album, as there is publicity to do. No matter what you give, your names ends up on the CD. I’ve gotten $5 to 5K.
Go to www.vancegilbert.com for details.

Soon I’ll have a per-mastered pre-release tune for just you folks here on the mailing list. Yes it is a Celtic R&B Folk album. So?

Coaching, disco swing dance instruction (actually that was true during college!), private parties upon request.

xovg