Elson, live @ the Lotus Festival, Sunday July 11, 2004, 7pm

1. Hearts
2. Sunshine
3. Love Fall Down
4. That girl (Stevie Wonder cover)
5. Let's Go Outside
6. (Encore) Improv Jam!

Finally.

After about six months preparation and only about four rehearsals, I've finally performed my live act at the Lotus Festival this past Sunday.

I never get stage fright, but I always get stressed to some degree before my shows. Always forgetting something, always something that turns up. All the band members (and myself) made it there on time, and the artists' parking lot actually was patrolled this year so I finally found a space! For some of the band members, this was their first time here, but they enjoyed the vibe and had a good time.

You know, I was waiting for that one big gaffe that would mess up the show, but it never happened. The songs not only went well, but sounded amazing (aside from not enough guitar for most of the set and Lisa's background vocals not heard for the first two songs). they even felt well -- The song "Sunshine," for instance, fit the weather, the location and time of day perfectly.

My friends who came out told me that people were definitely diggin' it, some were even dancing in the crowd. The surprise: The crowd wanted an encore, and we didn't have one ready. But Vince (the guitarist) suggested we do a jam, so... "Okay, what key? G?" I told the crowd we were making this up but we soon proceeded into a funk jam. I scoured my mind to find a good hook to sing. Alas: "Groovin' / On A Sunday afternoon" (done to a different tempo and melody). I even surprised myself. I gave Mike a sax solo, Vince a guitar solo and Mark a drum solo. Chris didn't want a bass solo (I kinda knew he didn't want one, but just considered out of courtesy).

One a one, we ended the song. Mission accomplished. It has finally happened.

A good number of my friends came to the show, enough that I felt there was enough support, and enough to spread the word later on. I also made some new fans, a couple of people who wanted my autograph (ha!) and asked me to sign their festival program. I sold a couple of EP CDs, I even had some old e:trinity CDs for sale (bargain basement price of $5 - price only good at my live shows, folks...). Some people signed on my mailing list, but none of them wrote their email addresses, oh well.

So far so good. It sounds good, it feels good. Most of all I'm grateful to the five members of my backing band who all have wonderful talents and pleasant attitudes and know how to make it all sound good. You folks rock.

Sorry for the hiatus. Today is October 25. One month and counting until my 32nd birthday...I'm actually busy working on the Elson CD (Elsongs 1), having completed recording two songs in the past two weeks; including one written in 2000 (and finished just recently) and a ballad written in 1993 (likewise just finished recently). I don't plan on any performances until 2004 and speaking of which, I'll be making some "big" announcement around New Year's '04...

Things are both great and not-so-great...but sometimes you need an emotional earthquake to trigger some renovation and revitalization in your life.

Hello, LTNS (long time no see...). I was in for a minor scare just a few minutes ago, when perusing what I thought was this site...I entered www.xanga.com/elson and saw a familliar-looking page but no-so familliar looking text. I thought my page was hacked until I realized my page is actually called "Elsongs." Ugh.

Anyway, yes, it's been a while. Last Thursday at the cafe I didn't play my acoustic music but instead played an unannounced e:trinity show playing nothing but improvised beats. It's just something I felt like doing.

This week, I do plan to do the acoustic bit again, but I haven't grabbed my guitar in a while. I've also been struggling at finishing some unfinished songs...music is easy but lyrics, at least for the past decade or so, have been difficult for me. I was far more prolific writing lyrics prior to 1998 or so, part of it attributed to "writer's block" but I also felt that I wasn't honing the other aspects of my writing talents. More on this another time.

Stay tuned...

THE BETA TEST

Okay, I performed on Thursday night...it felt great. There were only about a half dozen folks in the place, but I got an okay reception, and some people got it; one dude came up to me and gave me props for doing a "Stevie Wonder meets James Taylor thing," which is acceptable enough for me. Being used to performing for most of my life, I never get stage fright. But I was real hesitant about starting up, especially since my repertoire was like 90% love songs, and a group of transplanted quasi-bohemian types walk into the room (you'd think they wanna hear something more esoteric and "underground...") but I'm the performer here, so they were gonna have to deal with what I play.

I followed my rule of "Never starting out with a cover song (unless you're actually a cover band)." And to minimize my hesitation (mainly since I have never played a full set of music on guitar before, me being of the ebony-and-ivory instrument persuasion), I started off on some originals on my Alesis QS6 keyboard. Then I got into the covers and it was rather smooth sailing from there.

So here's the rundown:

GEAR LIST: Yamaha steel string acoustic; Jasmine Takamine nylon string; Alesis QS6 keyboard.

SET LIST (not exactly in order):

Sunshine (original, 1996)
The World We Left Behind (original, 1994)
Ribbon in the Sky (Stevie Wonder)
The Ghost In You (Psychedelic Furs)
At Your Best You Are Love (Isley Brothers)
Jingle (original, 1994)
Hold on to the Dreamers (original, 1992)
Blue (Wham)
Footsteps in the Dark (Isley Brothers)
A Single Raindrop (original, 1988?)
Let's Go Outside (original, 2000)
If You're Not The One (Daniel Bedingfield)

Connecting with the audience was real easy, though I didn't take advantage of that consistently. Sometimes I'd just play a song, but others, like "Jingle," I introduced as, "This is my rejection song...all songwriters have a song about rejection," which got a holler of agreement from someone in the audience. By the way, "Jingle" was about a girl back in college who didn't want to go out with me. For some reason that devastated me, and I not only wrote a song about it, but wrote a *newspaper column* about it in the campus paper (I was a rather popular and controversial feature columnist at my university at the time). Oh yeah, she read it. :)

So the prognosis looks good...I'll probably have my formal launch next week or later this month. Remember, you read about it here first. -ET 

Test...check...1-2-3...(feedback). Ouch. Okay, turn it down a little...sibilance...sibilance...There.

I'm a little nervous but excited, I'm gonna make an informal debut on my solo acoustic soul act this evening (check  the EVENTS section for details)...I've been culling together original material and scouring the net for lyrics sites and making out arrangements on acoustic guitar. I'll also be playing some keyboard as well, since there are certain songs I just can't play on guitar.

I'm not really telling a lot of people about this thing, because it's just a test. I don't know how people will react to it...so I'm just gonna roll it out quietly. It's mainly a confidence-builder for me, so if I do feel confident about truly going public about this act, then I'll do it.

What is "Coffeehouse soul?" Well, it's like acoustic coffeehouse fare, but I do R&B/soul originals or covers, or interpretations of non-soul songs in a soulful vein (such as the case of a certain Psychedelic Furs song). Some people I talked to immediately brought up the name india.arie...well, I guess so. You know, I'm not your average boy in your video...oh wait, I'm digressing.

Last night I did a Google search for "coffeehouse soul." I came across this review of this SoCal dude who now lives in Melbourne, Australia. I didn't really check out his music but there was a quite in the review about the beautiy of a solo acoustic act, namely, one man and an acoustic guitar, and how it was an intensely personal, emotional thing, and how many people do it to let go or express some emotions. I have a lot of emotions to express lately, some recent, some very, very old and dormant. My most well-known act, e:trinity (www.e-trinity.org) does the live electronic dance music thing. It's cool, but it doesn't give me the release I'm searching for...This way I get to express myself more. And that's why I'm an artist...to express myself in creative ways, which in turn inspire others to react in various ways, which in turn inspire those they come in contact with to react, which makes the world go 'round...