Hey, much to my surprise "paper tiger" got some airplay on 10/19 on Mike Hansen's fine "whynotjazz" radio show here in Toronto. He even mentioned the website on-air. Thanks!

He does a great show 7am-11am Wednesdays, but you can listen to archived mp3s of each show at this site.

For the first time ever, cc3 failed to make our gig tonight. We commute about 40km down the main highway out of Toronto to get to the gig, and while traffic is never good, we all get there. Tonight we didn't. So I had to decided to cancel the night when I was there by myself more than 30mins past downbeat. I can't remember the last time this has happened to me, if ever. I've got to gigs to find out the bar had cancelled us, but I've never had to cancel out on a client.

Anyway, it sucks. I feel bad for all involved, including myself. To those that came out this week, while I am sure you would have enjoyed 3 hours of solo drums :), please accept my apologies on behalf of Eric and Mike that we couldn't bring the music like we always do.

See you next week.

Page 162 of the new Modern Drummer magazine (12/05 issue) mentions my latest release, the fruits of our limitations. Download it here. I'd love to sell it to you, but iTunes is dragging its digital butt about uploading it, so it's free for the taking here at my site.

You can see some photos of my new Tempus drum kit @ chriscawthray.com. For those gearheads out there, here's what's in the photos:

TEMPUS drums:

7x12 tom (blue)
10x15 floor tom (orange)
11x22 bass drum (gold)

SONOR drums:
6.5x14 ferro-manganese Phonic snare drum

PAISTE cymbals:

14" Alpha custom hats (SoundEdge TOP, Power BOTTOM)
16" Alpha crystal crash
18" Innovations crash/ride

hardware:

SONOR Designer Series hihat and bass drum pedals, + a vario clamp (for tom)
SONOR Phonic tom arm
Pearl and Yamaha cymbal stands
Pearl snare stand
Gibraltar flloor tom legs, tom suspension mount, bass drum spurs

I'm typing this post from onstage @ the Gladstone Hotel in Toronto. The building has WiFi, and I'm running some Reason files from behind the kit tonight. It's definitely a luxury to have WiFi onstage. I feel like I'm in Peter Gabriel's band or something. :):)

Come down tonight, if only for the WiFi! The music's gonna be great too. Here's the link with all the info.

Tonight is Chip Yarwood's CD release gig for his really really excellent record, one fork. It's like Dylan's "Time Out of Mind", but with a worldbeat sensibility. I like it a lot, and I'm so glad to be playing this music live. We're rocking out on a few things that are somewhat more ambient on the disc. Also, tonight will be my first time playing my new Tempus drums. I'll take some pictures once they're set up at the gig. So far I've been tuning and tweaking them in my basement and am really impressed with the bass drum. I don't think I have the right drumhead combo for the toms (I have a 2ply coated head on the 15" floor tom and it seems to be choking the drum a bit). The shells are so thin, perhaps they need thinner heads to really sing. No worries, they may open up beautifully in the brick/wood room at the Gladstone.

Anyway, if you're in Toronto, come down to the Gladstone Hotel tonight (Queen/Dufferin), first set is at 9pm, cover is only $5, or $10 and you get the CD too.

see you there,

I'm getting things going on drumLAB. It's going to be a "nomadic" drum school, running at various (temporarily rented) locations. I'm working on bringing up a VERY COOL artist for a clinic. Stay tuned...

cc3 hits tonight, and my new Tempus drums should be here tomorrow (I missed the FedEx guy today).

Great gig last night. A small but appreciate audience came out, and the venue and its staff treated us very well. It was a real treat to be able to play with Ed and Mike, each of them so generous to my songs and my ideas in their own way. I'll try and post a video clip later this week from the gig.

I'm starting to get a clearer picture of how to make this project work. For instance, the club normally provides a sound tech for all gigs. The tech last night was a very capable and helpful guy, and by all reports the gig sounded good. But, his fee squeezes the venue's margin to make any money. We don't need a PA to do this music, so Ken from PJC and I already decided that when we return we'll do it without a sound tech. As such, a small but appreciate audience (that is also thirsty and hungry) can make it a great night for all involved.

There were so many great moments last night where Ed was playing completely off-mic and filling the room with his tone. The soundman told me he could have turned the PA off at times and no one would have noticed. I take that as a compliment. I read in a great Bill Frisell Trio interview in DownBeat years ago that they used to set-up onstage so they could hear each other, and then let the soundcrew do whatever they want. They didn't worry about monitors or anything.

Anyway, we'll be back at Pepperjack's in a few months I hope.

The rest of this month starts to splinter into different foci:

-Completing the tap dance piece with Paula Skimin (we perform Nov. 11 at the Living Arts Centre in Mississauga, ON)
-rehearsing and performing Chip Yarwood's CD release (Oct 25 @ The Gladstone Hotel, Toronto)
-attempting to get a new workshop/performing initiative off the ground, drumLAB

Plus, of course, dance classes @ ESA and PSB and the cc3 hit @ Canyon Creek.

Check back later for the video from last night...

MikeB, EdZ and I rehearsed this afternoon, and we're all feeling great about tomorrow's show at the fruits of our limitations but also manages to bring out other shades of the material. Mike and I go way back musically and personally, so it's a good fit. I think Mike's digging it too.

Now it's your turn to dig it! See you at the show, 8pm start time.

On a whim I went and checked out the Juno Award submission regulations. The Junos, as some may know, are the Canadian recording industry awards. Anyway, it would be neat (and not much more than that, just neat, maybe neato), if "the fruits of our limitations" got nominated. What category? I guess some sort of Jazz.

Anyway, I'm too futuristic for the Junos. They don't accept download-only releases for submission. More specifically, they only accept submissions on CDs, and the CDs must be manufactured, not burned promo copies. So, I'm out of the running.

My opinion is that digital is here to stay, and physical CDs are a waste of valuable resources to the independent artist like me. I want to make the music and get it in your ears, I don't need unrecyclable plastic discs and cases to do that anymore.

The Junos still do.

My new article (part 2 of 3) is out in the October 2005 The Dance Current. I got two pages + graphics this time! Also, my dear friend and collaborator, Arwyn Carpenter has an article in this issue.

I rehearsed with Ed and Mike today and it was great, we're going to take advantage of Saturday's gig being cancelled and get together and play that day too. I really hope you can make the show in Hamilton this Sunday, show starts at 8pm, $5.

my music is now available at MSN Music

i've done a new poster for pepperjack's this week. see it here

see you at the show!

yeah, so October 15 is going to be cancelled.

The hit in Hamilton on 10/16 is still very much happening, and I think it's going to be a great time. The story on 10/15 is that the plug is being pulled because the show was likely going to underwhelm the venue financially, not to mention yours truly. To solve that issue would require energy that I want to devote to the music itself, instead of marketing and other non-musical things.

Which is what I'm doing. MikeBowell, EdZ and I get together tomorrow, and I'm very much looking forward to it. We'll put all of our stuff into the Hamilton show, and hope that a Toronto venue becomes a possibility. To the very few people that were going to be able to make the 10/15 show, please accept my apologies.

Ok, I've edited together a 6 minute demo medley of cc3. You can hear it and/or download it here.

I'm getting worried about the 10/15 show. I'm worried there'll only be 3 people in the audience. I'm not worried about this because I want to be popular; my concern is that it all amounts to a big waste of time if no one shows up.

If there's no one there, no one buys drinks (which hurts the venue), and then they get sour on having music at all. Fact is, I am really starting to push myself to focus on making music, not organizing events to sell beverages or whatever. No disrespect to the venues, none at all; but I didn't get into drumming to sell drinks. I have no issue with performing at such venues, I just don't want to be involved with that side of it.

My music should have a value that I can sell to the venue/promoter, and they can make money however they wish. I want to be concerned with creating this value in the music, not with the back end. This is not idealistic, this model is in place and I am working as such all the time with cc3 and HBS. The irony is that my most personal projects always require me to feel like I'm planning a wedding, and the preparation of the music takes a back seat.

Anyway, the Canopy @ Birds and Beans is a great idea, and I hope it happens; but the next few days will tell me whether it's going to start with me, or not. (Simply put, if i can get 15 confirmed guests, I'll go ahead and do the show, and happily lose $ in the process. If I can't get 15 folks to make it out, I'm not doing it.)

I have a moment here on the last day of my 30th year.... I did a session yesterday for Kevin Cooke, it's a record he's been working on for quite some time, a "solo" album for saxophonist Mike Skinner. Basically, it's the Kevin Cooke Band, but MS is featured (it's an instrumental album). Anyway, due to some ProTools magic, my conga track on one tune went missing; so I went in to replace it. I played it down twice and did a third pass on the ending. Kevin seemed happy, and I was too. Then I replaced a tambourine track that MS had done. It was the outro of a gospel-ish version of Wayne Shorter's "Adam's Apple".

One thing that I find folk rarely mention is simply how DIFFICULT it is to play good tambourine. It's an elusive instrument, and requires a huge amount forearm and wrist strength to do it musically. Anyway, the outro was a doube-time thing, and I was grooving with that, but THEN, I had to double that, so I was essentially playing fast 32nd notes, all by wiggling my wrist back and forth. I believe it is the EXACT method to acquire carpal tunnel syndrome. :)

This week includes a rehearsal with tap dancer Paula Skimin, seeing the master Steve Jordan hit with John Mayar, the regular cc3 hit, and hopefully rehearsing with EdZ and Mike Bowell for our October 15/16 gigs. The gig on the 15th is presenting a difficulty in that it require advance tickets to be sold for it because there is limited space. While I've had lots of interest from y'all, there's been no online ticket sales to date. So, I may have to re-think this. Make sure you send me an email if you are planning on attending and I will draw up a guest list.

Also, I'm getting anxious for my Tempus kit. It's a week or two overdue from the original projection, and I really want to start using it!