My World
The goings-on of my life outside of business. Musings about my creative process; about my band, Ben + Vesper; poetry; knitting–whatever I’m putting my hand to at the time.
Two weeks only–commission a pen and ink drawing for $100
Posted on 02/24/10For TWO WEEKS only (2/24/10-3/9/10), I am offering $100 pen and ink drawings in the subject of your choice. Get that tattoo design you’ve always wanted, or get a gift for that special someone. Contact me at vespersongs[at]hotmail[dot]com. Time is limited, so think of your subject and let me know.
To see examples of my work, visit http://www.vespersongs.com and click on “Portfolio” (or look at the backgrounds). Remember, this is black and white work.
Thanks–and see you on tour! Visit http://www.soundsfamilyre.com for tour dates.
Luv,
B+V
Check out Legumaniac (my friend Jean’s farm blog)
Posted on 02/12/10
My great friend Jean Pauly-Jennings and her husband run an organic farm in New Hampshire. Check out her blog and her super-cute portrait with a red onion. If you’re in the Portsmouth area, meet them at the farmer’s market.
GORGEOUS sock pattern
Posted on 02/12/10I can’t believe this sock gorgeousness on today’s Knitty surprise:
Skew Sock by Lana Holden
It’s toooo bad I’m totally burnt out of making socks. But if YOU like that kind of torture, you should knit this one! Wonderful artistry, Lana Holden!
New Ben + Vesper EP Releases tomorrow!
Posted on 02/08/10Ladies and Gents,
May I present to you the new, the dream-fulfilling, the ecstasy inducing…
LuvInIdleness by Ben + Vesper, produced by Sufjan Stevens.
It all came about this past summer as a mixture of preparing for a Midsummer Night’s Dream festival, playing a residency at Sycamore in Brooklyn, and collaborating with our friend Sufjan Stevens over peanut butter cookies. No one had any idea how it would turn out, but we were all looking to make some music without consequences.
Ben and I had recorded a full-length album earlier that year (stay tuned), and wanted to just lay back and say a happy goodbye to the dog days of summer. So after a show one night, we and Sufjan talked about getting together to simply play music and see what would happen. Sufjan had played on our previous releases, but we wanted more of his input and less hoo-ha about getting a million players together. Ben wrote all the songs in a week. We set aside a week to record, and Ben and I mostly took turns going to the office, laying down simple guitars and vocals. Then we’d come home, and around midnight, a new and crazy mix would show up in our email and we’d freak out. The result was the synthy, feel-good mishmash we fondly call “LuvInIdleness”.
We did a limited homemade run for our residency, but then our label picked it up and we got to use neon and metallic Pantone® colors. And that was a very happy thing.
Enjoy!
SCBWI Conference
Posted on 02/01/10What a whirlwind of inspiration and information!
Vesper and Jane Yolen. Check out my necklace by Angela Houk!
First of all, if in any way you have even the most remote desire to be in the world of children’s publishing, attending at least one of these conferences is a must. Joining SCBWI is the first little baby step you must take. It’s uber-cheap ($85 for the first year, $70 each year thereafter), and will clear away common misconceptions, fears, loneliness and bad breath all in one magical formula. But seriously, one of the resounding themes I heard among my peers is that the conference did so much to clear away that bad friend, Fear of Failure. Come on, when someone like the titan Jane Yolen gets up and tells you that, after 300 books, she still gets rejections, it clarifies the fact that it’s just a system like any other. I keep telling myself: People Make a Living At This. They do. It’s just as hard to do it well as any other career. Sure, there’s a whole lot more self-motivation involved, so if you are used to a 9-5 job where you are given your tasks and you dutifully do them as you are told, it may be a hard learning curve. Or if, like me, you’ve gotten the last ten years of work merely by word of mouth, you just need to remind yourself that, in a way, you’re making a lateral move to another branch of your industry. It means meeting a new set of people, dusting off your interpersonal skills, and taking some chances, but come on: after eight years of art school and countless critiques, what is a rejection letter but a helpful suggestion in the end?
As I was walking to the conference on Friday, thinking about placing my portfolio in the juried exhibition, the thought occurred to me that the life I have chosen, being a freelancer, is one constant audition. There’s a sense after you get out of college, or get a steady job, or if you haven’t had to pound the pavement in a while, that your days of auditioning are over–that somehow, if you can land that One Big Break, you’ll never have to put yourself out there again–that no one will be able to reject you (ahem, that is, your work, not you) ever again. Thank goodness that Jane Yolen exposed that theory. In another post, maybe I’ll give you some of her 20 rules of writing. I’m not sure if that’s kosher, so I’ll just put up some of them.
Vesper and Paul O. Zelinsky
I also met Paul O. Zelinsky, who gave a really interesting opening address detailing some of his work methods at the Illustrator’s Intensive (again, a must if you are getting ready to do this). Even though I don’t really have the desire to paint as meticulously and classically as Paul does (though Swamp Angel is a work to be reckoned with!), his gorgeous princesses evoke in me that same feeling as did Hilary Knight in his Cinderella–the book that taught me how to draw. I would copy that book endlessly, trying to get every detail, every curve exactly right, as if I were in a Master Class with Knight himself. I’m just crazy about Zelinsky’s work, and I plan to go back to “school” with his Rapunzel and Rumpelstiltsken.
One more highlight I’d like to point out was hearing (and meeting) the inimitable Jaqueline Woodson speak at the luncheon address. I cannot believe this woman writes for children (mostly YA fiction). What I mean by that is, her writing (and the memorized recitation she did of her work) is so poetic, so real, it had me openly weeping several times during her speech. I promptly went to the first bookstore I found and grabbed a copy of If You Come Softly, a beautiful depiction of first love between people of different races. It challenges your unconscious assumptions without becoming a diatribe. I bought it yesterday at 5:00 pm, and by 7:00 I was almost done. If I hadn’t fallen asleep so early last night (these conferences are exhausting–be prepared!), I would have finished it. I had the pleasure of meeting her, and recommending to her (based on her children’s book, Show Way) the beautiful book by Libby Hathorn and illustrated by Benny Andrews, Sky Sash So Blue. Both books are about slaves piecing together fabric to create treasures for their families: in Woodson’s book, quilts; in Hathorn’s, a wedding dress. Woodson was approachable and warm, and I am now 3 degrees removed from Pete Seeger himself. (I’ll leave that a mystery.)
I’ll be blogging more and updating my website in the weeks to come, so stay tuned. In the meantime, visit me on Facebook and Twitter.
