Been a REALLY long time…

Hard to believe its been several months since I last wrote a meaningful post. Lots and lots going on in life but I just haven’t felt the inspiration to blog lately. Time to catch up…

I’ve had some really cool artistic experiences over the past month. Our weekend services have been in the series “MyFaves” – bringing back favorite services as an outreach tool for people to invite their friends and know the service will be a home-run. One weekend we brought in a 3 piece horn section and did some old school Chicago tunes (“Does Anybody Know What Time It Is?” and “25 or 6 to 4″), one weekend featured a vocal power trio doing Natasha Bedingfield’s “Unwritten” and Danny C with “Bravest Surrender”, and this past weekend we were BLESSED to have Drew Holcomb and his wife Ellie with us. Drew is the nephew of our lead pastor, Steve Andrews, and the talent level of this husband/wife combo is unreal. I don’t remember ever being impressed by husband/wife – usually one obviously carries the weight. But these two are the real deal. I have a video of the closing song from the day that will go up on my website in a few days. Check them out!

Our production designer and lighting chief, Eric Wolfe, has been hitting it out of the park this year with our staging at Kensington. He’s finally updated his Picasa site with more photos of the past 6 months and, trust me, this is a MUST SEE. Eric is so gifted at visual design – week in, week out the looks are fresh and striking. You really have to check it out!!!

http://picasaweb.google.com/egwolfe/SetDesignPortfolio

We launched our fall season of Chapel Studio last Friday night with a bang. Chapel Studio happens on the first Friday night of the month through the Fall/Winter/Spring months and features many of the best artists in the Detroit music scene. We do the show in our 250 seat room chapel that is built off the main lobby. It has such an intimate atmosphere and the acoustics, audio, and lighting are all top notch. Many of the artists who we have hosted comment that it is likely one of the best rooms in the country for this type of show. Chapel Studio is both an awesome outreach opportunity for our arts team with the local music community and a fun atmosphere for us to focus on technical excellence in support of these artists. This year I’m serving as the tech director for the events, which basically means I handle the advance with the artists and promoter and then lead our crew for the event. More often then not that means knowing when to step into something and when to stay out of the way so our gifted team can just do their thing.

This past show was nothing short of magical. From the best lighting design I’ve ever seen in the Chapel to artistry that had the audience in the palm of their hands, the entire night was such a great example of the excellence we are blessed with at Kensington. The mix just happened – one of my best in the room thanks entirely to really great musicians.

Here’s a few photos of the night. If you’re ever in the area, come check it out…

Other stuff. I guess that after a year on staff, my honeymoon period at Kensington where all I have to worry about is operating services has come to an end. This summer, our director, Kristin Twilla, led a reorganization of our department to better facilitate the growth we’re having due to campusing (23 staff techs as of this writing) and my responsibilities have now expanded to leading the audio department. I’m wading through what that actually means and what our audio team, staff and volunteer spread out between 4 locations, need in order to achieve a higher level of excellence. I’m glad to be able to invest into others the way my mentors invested into me as I was growing in my skills. More on all of this in a later post.

Thanks to the idea from Dave Stagl, I’m trying out a set of Etymotic Research Musician’s Ear Plugs for long rehearsals and other shows in order to keep fresh ears. Initially I just purchased the universal fit version (a steal at $12 a pair!) but have liked them so much I’m planning on purchasing a set of custom molds before the holidays. The plugs came with this cool little case and I just carry them on my key ring so I always have them and can use them as necessary. Since my livelihood is dependent on my hearing, I’m realizing how important it is to take safety seriously.

Speaking of safety, we finally put Kensington’s first official volume policy and SPL limits documents to bed in the past few weeks. I’m glad we have something like this in writing since it is not uncommon to get questions or concerns regarding volume levels in services, especially when the style gets “harder” – Gavin Degraw, Puddle of Mud, etc. Here’s links to the finished documents. You’re welcome to use as you see fit and your mileage may vary. Our documents will not defuse a situation once it has escalated into a hot button for someone – the goal is to ease concerns as they first come up so that they do not have the chance to magnify and intensify.

open-letter.pdf

volume-policy.pdf

I’m proud to say I’m now a member of the iPhone club. This month brought a few well-timed, successful eBay sales of old studio gear that’s been sitting in my basement for several years and the proceeds helped purchase one of the most amazing pieces of tech gear I’ve ever touched, let alone owned. After trying the latest and greatest Windows smartphone (T-Mobile Dash) for a few weeks, the iPhone is a joy to use in the same way using a mac is far superior to a PC. I was driving home today and had the thought that I can’t believe I am able to carry on my belt that holds a nice music collection, videos, YouTube, a mobile web browser that’s actually fun to use, email, calender, camera, and address book. And it actually works, doesn’t crash, does what it needs to do, etc. etc. Amazing! I need to buy some Apple stock…

Lastly, my beautiful daughter turned 2 a few weeks ago. Happy Birthday, Maddie!

This has been fun – I’m going to try to get back into blogging with more regularity. We’ve installed a new PA system processor over the past few weeks (BSS London Soundweb BLU-16) that I would like to dialog about, along with a Yamaha PM1D software update released this week. More later…