Three Words in my Notes App
Three words sit together in the Notes App on my phone, enticing me. I typed them into the same note, one after the other, on March 10th. The words are:
Sumptuous
Web-weaver
Bold
If I were writing a bio about myself, like the kind musicians always dread writing, I would want these words in it. I want to embody these words. Be these words.
I want a sumptuous life. I want to savor things. I want to feel strong and well and energetic so my body can experience all the lush richness life has to offer. I want to sleep well, eat well, spend time reading, and spend time enjoying the sound of birdsong in the fresh morning air. I want to recognize that every day I am surrounded by absolutely indescribable beauty, and I want to hold myself in that recognition so I never take any of it for granted.
I want to be a web-weaver. I want to love people and build a community one connection at a time. I want to introduce folks to one another and watch relationships branch out around me. I want to weave webs of connection through telling stories and casting song spells. I want to take people by the hand and show them the things I care about, and invite them to show me what they care about.
I want to be bold. I want to be unafraid to proclaim who I am to the world. I want to know that I do the things I do because they light me up and make my soul ring like a bell. I want to always recognize and honour my own voice, and do the same for the people around me. I want to be boldly supportive of the wishes and dreams of my people, exclaiming “why not?” to every zany, magical idea they have. I want to live boldly alongside the people I love, all of us carrying our own unique flags, all of us in it together.
What about you? What words would you write in your bio? I would love to know!
Upcoming Events
April 20 - NatureNurture: An Evening of Art for the Earth - tickets
April 6-7 & 13-14 - Dear Future Songwriting Workshop - info
Meet the Artists of NatureNurture
I’ve been sharing lots of info about the artists of NatureNurture on social media but realized I hadn’t shared much here. So, without further ado, here are three short stories - one about each of my co-collaborators - to help you get to know them a little from my eyes.
Whitney O'Hearn and I met during a Masters program at the University of Ottawa. We sang opera together, attended the same parties on occasion, but lived in parallel but separate worlds. We reconnected a handful of years ago because I noticed we both commented on the same Instagram post and I reached out, leading to our creation of a climate book circle.
I knew at school that I respected and liked Whitney, and that they had an incredible voice, but this reconnection has been such a delight because we have so much damn fun together, all while supporting each other through climate grief and talking about the real, worldwide issues that most people don't want to talk about in their day to day lives.
Whitney has a voice like burnished copper. They are generous and gentle, with a wicked sense of humour and the best style of anyone I know. She lives in Toronto with her husband Billy, creates spectacular Instagram cosplays, is currently working on a Masters degree, and is my chosen bog witch coven-mate.
I found Jakeb Daniel on Instagram during COVID lockdowns, a time when strangely I expanded my local artist circle substantially. I had never seen Jakeb in real life but I stumbled upon videos of him noodling virtuosically on his piano. He was really good, I followed his profile, and left it at that.
Until.
Early 2022 Jeff Bray, co-founder and heart and soul behind the Cultivate Festival, hired me to open for Lemon Bucket Orkestra for his Launch event, and asked if I knew any other local artists he wouldn't have heard of. I sent him to check out Jakeb's Instagram and he hired him for the same show. We met that night, loved each other's sets, and went our separate ways.
More than six months later I was putting together a songwriters circle and invited Jakeb to join as one of the artists. We decided to collaborate on a few songs to make it more fun and interesting, and when the show was done one of the audience members hired us to perform as a duo. And we've never looked back.
Jakeb is a stunningly beautiful guitar and piano player who also annoyingly sings like a beast and is a prolific writer of songs. Truly, he can present a new song to me in rehearsal every time we see one another. Sometimes three. I have told him many times since we started playing as a duo, "if your talent wasn't so beneficial to me I'd be really annoyed by it." Jakeb is a Cobourg local, a music teacher as well as performer, and a light-hearted nature lover who takes coffee far, far too seriously. And if you see him without a Perrier in his hand, call for help.
MERKAT/Katie Hoogendam is my partner in crime in dreaming up this event. Katie and I were two-thirds of the We3 project during COVID (hi Saskia Tomkins, our beloved third!). We met weekly via Zoom to support and encourage one another, to share our art, and to dream big, juicy, weird creative dreams. That project made a creatively fertile space for me in the lockdowns, and was the breeding ground for my EP, In Spite of Everything.
When I say that Katie is one of the most original thinkers and artists I have ever met that might be an understatement. When I read Katie's poetry I often realize I am holding my breath. I am so, so moved by her point of view, and the way she can put herself into both poetry and visual art media is seriously stunning.
Katie is funny and humble, quirky and loving. She is connecting, connecting, connecting, always finding ways in her art to tug at the threads of the human-to-human bonds and the human-to-natural-world bonds that we ignore at our peril. She is a canary in the coalmine and a fierce warrior voice on the front lines.
Once you've experienced her art, in whatever form, you will be changed.
***
Creating with these three beautiful humans makes me giddy, and I am honoured to be able to share this event stage with them. Tickets are available on Eventbrite now and more event information is rolling out on the Facebook event page every few days.
xo
Shannon