What is a house concert? Simply put, it's musicians playing for a roomful of people in someone's house. It is a great way to enjoy live music. The musicians have a chance to really interact with the audience, with no sound gear to come between.
Can I host a house concert? Sure. At its simplist, all you need is a performer, a room, some chairs, and friends to fill those chairs. Refreshments never hurt. As people come in they drop a donation in a jar as a contribution to the musicians. If you are interested in something more elaborate, lots of sites on the internet have guides to hosting house concerts. Google "house concert". Here's just one link to get you started: Concerts in Your Home and they have a nice video introduction.
Checkered Past really enjoys performing at house concerts, and we appreciate Karen, Lee, Carmen, Fred, Cheryl, Linnea, and Mark for helping us get started and introducing us to their circles of friends at house concerts they hosted.
Awakening the Dreamer, Changing the Dream June Holte, once a vocalist and bass player in Checkered Past is now leading symposiums for this amazingly effective program. The aim of the Symposium is not merely to learn more about the world, but to grapple and come to grips with the very assumptions that underlie the way we ourselves see the world and our place in it, and with what each of us can do - both individually and cooperatively - to move the world in this new direction. See also: The Pachamama Alliance
Communiversity has hosted classes in Jamming by Martha and our friend Mike Walker, and Lynn has shared her interest in Solar Cooking. We are hoping someone will step up and offer a class on canning, now that we are interested in locally grown food. Approximately 9,000 people take Communiversity classes each year. Since 1970, each issue of the Communiversity catalog has introduced people to a world of classes, seminars, events, services and articles unique to Kansas City. Our friend, Rick Mareske is Director and Official Folk Jazz Guitarist of Communiversity.
The Land Institute in Salina, Kansas has been working on sustainable agriculture for many years now, in particular, they are developing perennial grain crops using selective breeding like farmers have done for millenia. For example, if we had perennial wheat its deep roots would hold the soil in place all year long. Because it would need no plowing, erosion would be virtually eliminated. I could go on and on, but you'd do better to check out their web site. Our friend Grant Mallet works to spread the word about the Land Institute.
Kerr-Cole Sustainable Living Center and Solar Cookers International. Lynn met Barbara Kerr and Sherry Cole in 1976 when Barbara was experimenting with every kind of solar cooker that she could find. By working locally, persevering and networking, Barbara's and Sherry's work has made a difference to people around the world, and especially to women in the equatorial regions. Ask Lynn about solar cooking if you want your ear talked off.
Americana Music Academy, Building Community Through Music. K.C. is president of the Board of Directors, Lynn is a past Directors, and Martha's picture at an Americana jam made it into the paper.
Country Club Congregational United Church of Christ, An Open and Affirming Congregation. K.C. was a member of this church when she lived in Kansas City, and they have invited us to play for them on occassion.
KC Folk Music and Songwriters Circle of CrossCurrents Culture, Kansas City's Folk Arts Alliance. Martha and Lynn met at a Songwriters Circle meeting and have been jamming together ever since.
KKFI 90.1FM our fabulous community radio station, where the programmers like to feature local musicians and songwriters.
Rural Grit Martha is a regular at the Rural Grit Happy Hour Mondays at The Brick.
Mudcat and Digital Tradition provide a database of folk music lyrics and a forum to discuss folk music on line. K.C. met the rest of us through connections she made via Mudcat when she moved from Wyoming to Kansas.
Phoenix Folk Traditions Music Festival Music-lovers are treated to blues, folk, Celtic tunes, country, cowboy, bluegrass, gospel, even children's music. The festival also features several unusual genres, including hobo and railroad music, sea songs, women's Western music, an African songfest and African rhythm workshop, and filking -- folk music with a science-fiction twist.
Barbara Kerr and Amber Faith shared music and poetry with Martha and Lynn in the March, 2007 visit to Taylor, Arizona.
Here's some of the people with whom Martha and Lynn met or reconnected at the Phoenix Folk Traditions Music Festival: Lon Austin, The Artichoke Sisters: Andy Hurlbut, Barbara Herber and Anne James, David Baumann, Chuck and Barbara Giamalvo, Bob and Dierdre Frank, Rik Palieri, Rick Nestler, Rick Meisenheimer, Bill Burkett.
Red Lefty, our friends playing regularly in the Lawrence area. K.C. can attest that they are a lot of fun.
Jim Herrmann has created a Songwriters' event called What Would Woody Do? It gives today's songwriters in the vein of Woody Guthrie a venue expressly for topical and political songs. Audiences at Toto's Coffee House, the Main Street Coffee House in Independence, MO and Johnson County Community College have see performances by artists such as Checkered Past and Joe Carr, Jim Abel, Holly Taylor, John Mitchell and Matt Powell as well as Jim. Jim bills himself as a "Politically Progressive Singer Songwriter" and he is active in the Kansas City songwriter community.
Garry Bury has a voice made for cowboy music and a handlebar mustache to match. He is the lead singer with the Blackbury Band, and has a couple of very interesting projects: The String Band Rendezvous, a small festival near Lawrence in the Spring and Front Porch Radio, streaming internet radio featuring musicians from the Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, Kansas in September.
Rik Palieri - Rik is a storyteller extraordinaire, a songwriter and a multi-instrumentalist. He has a TV show and is a member of U. Utah Phillip's Rose Tattoo. Martha and Lynn met Rik on a cruise along with about 25 other musicians gathered together by Barbara and Chuck Giamalvo, musical networkers extraodinaire.
Scott McLewin and Shawn - Jam buddies of ours and creaters of a website extraordinaire to help musicians find jams. Check it out!
Barclay Martin is an astounding musician, singer and songwriter whose work crosses over many genres. Kerry and June played with Barclay before coming to Checkered Past.
David Hakan, founder of the Kansas City Songwriters Circle, is a remarkable songwriter. He's had a profound influence on songwriting in our town. We perform "Coyote Song" written by David.
Bill Langsdorf and his wife, Pat Berge have hosted a house concert series at the WriterHouse at Lake Waukomis. Checkered Past played there before Bill was a member of the band.
Contact the band and/or the web master: info@CheckeredPastMusic.com
