An Update on my Music.

I’ve spent lots of time over the course of 2020 re-evaluating all of the things, particularly my musical trajectory, aka what I see as the “base” of my multidisciplinary artistic practice.

An abridged version of the journey so far; 2018 was the year of doing all the things but going nowhere fast. 2019 was the year of purposefully doing nothing in an attempt to really truely recover from burning out and 2020 was the year of building a sustainable foundation so I can do more music making.

What foundations did I build exactly? I added a specialist career coach to keep me on track and talk through my music industry issues and how I can create actionable steps to work through them (Her name’s Kerri and she’s a Wizard - you can find her website here) I started collaborating with other professional creatives so that my little DIY project is becoming a DIY with friends.

Most importantly, I’ve started filtering everything I want to do in a professional capacity through a lens called “This just needs to be better”. Now, don’t mistake this for perfectionism - I don’t possess the necessary idiosyncrasies for that. No, this way of looking at my creative output was inspired by a saying I saw on sewing Youtube.

I don’t remember exactly who said it, and If I do, I’ll be sure to link appropriately. Nor do I remember the exact words. The sentiment however has been cemented in my head and goes something like this “ The difference between a beginner and a home seamstress is the willingness to unpick a seam. The difference between a home and haute couture seamstress is the willingness to unpick another”

Behind the scenes I’ve been unpicking my seams like crazy. I rerecorded my solo flute EP (out March 1st) I’ve also rerecorded my vocals on another EP. I’ve deleted mediocre blog shoots, learned to see the difference between a good photo and an iconic photo then proceeded to only release iconic photos to my clients. I redesigned my website again. I redesigned my logo again and I took down past content that no longer represents the quality of my work, and most importantly, when I feel the frustration of working too long on a project, I no longer “call it” there. I *get this* take a break, and come back to it when the frustration subsides.

As the distance between current me and my university degree expands, I feel an increased maturity in my workflow, which was born out of accepting the resources (or lack-thereof) I have access to. I feel really proud of this new found creative maturity, and looking back over 2020, perhaps it wasn’t the creative write off I thought It was.

Speaking of music related shenanigans! I have gigs coming up in the very near future.

FEB 18th is a sweet little event called WAX LYRICAL, hosted by newcastle’s finest Photo of the Moon. I’ll join them, As of Sky and some other creatives for an intimate night of story telling, poetry and music. Tickets: $20 BOOKINGS ESSENTIAL

MARCH 6th is my very own concert and workshop! I’ll be sharing my songs and stories, then running a music workshop on folk tunes and composing! Tickets: $5 Concert only $10 Concert and Workshop BOOKINGS ESSENTIAL

About the look: I made everything here but the shoes I’m wearing. I’ve said this before, I feel the most “me” when I’m wearing clothes I’ve made. The shirt was made from a 3/4 metre remnant. I wish I had more of it, it’s such a comfortable knit fabric. The pants are my first in a long line of “Jen actually learns how to draft pants for real” experiments. Shoes are Dr Martens (I wish I could make these!)