A NOTE FROM MICHAEL
SEPTEMBER is my favorite month, because my parents worked it so I’d have a birthday with a little bit of summer left before school, and now I still have the birthday (often with pineapple upside-down cake) but I don’t have to go to school anymore. When I was a kid I’d think: when you’re a grownup you don’t have to go to school, and I could hardly imagine what that kind of freedom might feel like. And now it’s an everyday thing: I get to have my birthday cake with a little bit of summer left every year, AND I don’t have to go to school afterward. The kid inside me still has no problem summoning up this big gratitude for noschoolness. He loves being a grownup, and plans on remaining one for the rest of his life. Much easier than being a kid, especially a kid at Our Lady Of The Valley Grammar School. And of course there’s that beautiful and perfect song by Anderson/Weill: and the days dwindle down, to a precious few…
Oh yeah, I do love September. I’ve been working on a couple of CDs simultaneously, as grownups will, and neither of these are the songwriting CD I wrote about last entry. I had a girlfriend in college who used to say that I was “fickled”. I tried to tell her it was not “fickled”, but “fickle” but she never believed me, though if you look up “fickle” in your Webster’s, there’s my SPJC yearbook photo.
After I wrote the last misleading entry an order poured in, from my friend Harold Grodman in Flagstaff, AZ, bless his trusting heart. But this summer I got distracted. What distracted me was this CD of fifteen songs from Moby Dick, which I’m almost finished with. The lyrics are all culled from Mr. Melville, who’s pretty good, and I’m really proud of this one. (I’ll send it to Howard first, if you don’t mind.)
The other CD I’m working on is with some legit musicians of the first order, settings of texts I’ve found from John Steinbeck, Bertholdt Brecht, Anne Carson, Edgar Lee Masters and some other literary folks.
Then, I promise, the songwriting CD. Which will be really felicitous timing, because in October my friend Paul Zollo is coming out with a sequel to his famous and best-selling Songwriters on Songwriting, a sequel in which I am the only songwriter I’ve never heard of. It’s been a while since our interview, and so I can’t wait to see what I have to say.
Love to you all, and especially to my dear brother Peter Matthew Smith.
GIGS
Sat. Sept 24 at 7 PM
Doors open at 6:30
House Concert
De Angelo’s, Highland Park, Il
BYOB, dessert and coffee served
Email: hp_deangelo@hotmail.com
Sun. Sept 25 at 1 PM
Anne Hills with Michael Smith
SPACE
1245 Chicago, Evanston, Il
http://evanstonspace.com/shows/?event_id=6814705
Sat. Oct 1 at 7 PM
Fall Music Series
Milton Art Center
334 Edge Hill Road
Milton, MA 02186
PH 617.653.4838
http://www.miltonartcenter.org/index.php/music-at-mac
Sun. Oct 2 at 7 PM
Rosie’s Cafe Concerts
Brick, New Jersey
https://www.facebook.com/RosiesCafeConcerts/events
Rosie’s Cafe Concerts
PH 732.600.1703
Roots on the Road Concerts at Wishbone
Sun Oct 30 at 7 PM
Michael Smith Solo
Wishbone North
33oo N Lincoln Ave
Chicago Il
Restaurant PH 773.549.2663
http://www.wishbonenorth.com/news
Special ticketing through J. O’Reilly’s blog:
https://www.jamieoreilly.com/wishbone-concerts-october/
TEXAS
Fri. Nov 4 at 8 PM
The Bugle Boy
1051 N Jefferson
LaGrange, Texas
PH 979.968.9944
thebugleboy.org
Sat. Nov 5 at 7:30 PM
Selia Qynn’s Habitat House
10037 Hazelhurst
Houston, TX
PH 281.772.7100
http://www.selia.com/
Sun. Nov 6 Songwriting workshop
Selia Qynn hosts
Special reservation PH 281.772.7100
MICHIGAN
Nov 10 through 13
The 22nd Annual Lamb’s Retreat for Songwriters
Birchwood Inn
7291 S. Lake Shore Dr
Harbor Springs, MI
Directed by John Lamb at the Birchwood Inn, Harbor Springs, MI
Nov 12 Sat evening concert at 8 PM is open to the public.
http://www.springfed.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=48:lambs-retreat&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=56
FLORIDA (more details in Oct)
Fri. Nov 18
House Concert
Amelia Island, Fl
Sat. Nov 19
House Concert
Jacksonville, FL
Fri. Nov 25
House Concert
Tampa, FL
Coming in December, Wisconsin dates!
