Team,
We had a great first call last night. I am sending this video to Billy Weathers, a hip hop artist, Sydney Lett, a singer/songwriter, in Nashville, and Jara Johnson, a singer songwriter now running the Opera House in Pella.
Can you meet again in conversation on Wednesday, January 3 at 4 p.m.?
We shared a bit of background with one another, and talked about how to best utilize our time together in Okoboji.
Mary Skopec director of Lakeside Labs, is going to see if she can find grant money available for school programs the week before the retreat, and the Lakes Art Center was represented by Rachelle Fratzke, Performing Arts Director. She does a masterful job of providing programming for the community. My hope is, based on the enthusiasm we had on the call, leaders of the lakes area will do what they can to make this all come together.
I was thinking after the call, about some of the panels it would be good to have doing the retreat. Something on collaboration might be of interest, of course, the music business, and promotion, should be an important topic. Let me know your other thoughts.
More on all of this later, but I hope you have a chance to listen to one another’s music.
I meant to say on more thing last night, because it is a thread of the story about how I came up with this idea.
A few years ago, I was on a tiny island in the Bahamas, called Elbow Key, in Hope Town. It was February, and it’s colder than there than tourists like, so it’s usually a slow time in their season.
A group of songwriters from Nashville talked a local resort with a dining room to put them up in exchange for performances around the island.
As I said, it was historically a slow time there, so the proprietor said, sure.
There are about six restaurants in the settlement, and they each took a night to feature the songwriters.
Today, you can’t book a room in Hopetown during the week the Nashville songwriters are in town, because it’s become so popular.
The beauty of it is, patrons are coming to LISTEN to the music, not have it as noise in the background. The songwriters get to hang out together in paradise, and the folks who come to the shows buy lots and lots of merch.
Win. Win. Win.
I believe if we handle this well, and set the foundation for success, we are embarking on what could be a wonderful tradition for musicians and the area.
Feel free to email me your ideas!
Juliegammack@mac.com