Faun Fables: Light of a Vaster Dark

The Faun Fables record Light of a Vaster Dark is out today. You can hear my violin (as well as auxiliary background singing, stomping, and yipping) through most of it.

I spent several remarkable years touring, recording, and healing with these folks. We came to many crossroads; we danced and sang and laughed and feasted.

Words won't convey how honored I was, or how grateful I remain, for that experience. So I will just say thank you, Dawn. Thank you, Nils. Thank you, Kirana. Thank you to everyone I met and befriended through this music.

Love always,
Mer


Standing in front of Half Pint the Winnebago. Salt Lake City, 2007. Photo courtesy of Mattson and Stefanie.

Dr. Grordbort Dinner Music

Click image for more readable size.

I'm providing a bit of retro-futuristic musical ambiance for this. Violin, possibly theremin if we can find me one in time. (Currently too broke to afford the horrific 6000 mile shipping costs for my own beloved Etherwave Pro.)




EDIT: Foster theremin found! Deep thanks to Melissa from The Crimson Club for the kind loan.

Tearing it UP at Nerd Prom with AFP, Fluffing Hobbits in New Zealand

Just wanted to quickly put up this clip of a performance with my old friend Amanderrrr at the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund part at the SDCC a couple weeks ago. We played the shit out of "Missed Me" if I do say so myself! (I don't usually like to boast... but seriously, duders. This is a rare and special bit of passionate hamming.) Check it out:



These past few weeks have been hectic to say the least, what with packing/shipping/storing/moving from Oakland to San Diego to New Zealand. My fella and I now reside in a cozy two bedroom flat not far from Weta Workshop. Landed in Wellington this morning. Sitting on a squishy couch by the window by the harbor with a cuppa tea. Feeling giddy and exhausted and very, very happy. Thanks for reading and listening, and check in soon for more updates on my music-related adventures.

Beats Antique: Contraption (EP Vol. 1)

My friends Beats Antique have a dreamy new EP* out and I'm on it.



You can hear me playing theremin and a janky antique Stroh named Augustus on the opening track, "Oriental Uno" (also featuring Fanfara Kalashnikov).
Yeah! Come get some.

*Artist Andrew Jones' cover might remind some of you of my old Parlour Trick logo. One of those odd zeitgeisty coinkadinks. It would seem we're feeding off the same nectar.

Performing in "The Rootabaga Opera" at this year's Crucible Fire Arts Festival

This is that project I've been feverishly rehearsing for these days. Not to be missed:

The 2009 Fire Arts Festival will feature the world premiere of Dan Cantrell's Rootabaga Opera, a narrative musical presentation inspired by the children’s stories of Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and treasured American folk music historian Carl Sandburg. This one-act musical journey weaves individual stories into a narrative arc staged in a theatrical format. The material will be informed by the diasporic culture of American immigrants during the dramatic turning of the 19th century as seen through Sandburg’s stories.

Through a unique blend of early American, Chinese, and Eastern European music, this opera will explore the roots of the Bay Area’s musical and cultural identity. Compositions will be complimented by an interdisciplinary collaboration of fire arts, puppetry, dance and theater. The piece will reflect the ideas, characters and text found in Sandburg’s Rootabaga Stories and his collections of American folk music while venturing into new areas of collaboration and musical exploration based on the interaction of the diverse range of performers.

The musical ensemble, directed and conducted by Emmy award-winning composer Dan Cantrell, will feature some of the Bay Area’s finest talent in a dynamic and ethnically diverse folk orchestra. Featured artists will include women's vocal ensemble Kitka, renowned for their specialized vocal technique, described as exotic, elegant and eerie. Co-directors, Larry Reed and Christine Marie of ShadowLight Productions will add another layer to the production with giant projected shadows featuring metal shadow puppets created by Mark Bulwinkle.

The commissioning and production of this world premiere is made possible by The Wallace Alexander Gerbode Foundation and The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation Emerging Composers 2007 Initiative.

"A Table Forgotten" music video

Directed by Lara Miranda. Cinematography by Joe Stillwater, Lara Miranda and Op D.A.S. Post production by Ri Crawford and Lara Miranda. Production assistance by Nicole Redden, Michael McCamish and Penny Allman.
(c)2009 Drag City Inc.

Faun Fables is the main project of musician Dawn McCarthy, a dancing, stomping, strumming master storyteller with one of the most unusual and haunting voices I've ever heard. She, her hubby Nils Frykdahl (of Sleepytime Gorilla Museum), multi-instrumentalist Kirana Peyton and I toured the U.S. and Europe together throughout 2007-2008, and recorded "The Table Forgotten" EP for which this video (directed by Lara Miranda) was produced. We had WAY too much fun shooting this up on Mt Diablo over a series of weekend campouts in spring/summer 2008.

From a letter to a friend written during that time:

Imagine being on top of a mountain at dusk in a huge field of golden grass and ancient oaks. Sunset is a blazing pink and indigo. A thick fog rolls in underneath the peak you are standing on, so it feels like you are standing on cliffs overlooking an ocean of clouds. Night falls. Something is glowing under that ocean of clouds. A drowned city.

A huge, healthy pack of coyotes sang to us as we built a fire.

I slept on the roof of our RV and could see nothing but stars. Milky way band, the summer triangle.

Today I sat at the highest peak of a huge pile of boulders called "Elephant Rock" on a fucking naturally occurring stone THRONE. I shit you not. A throne. It was covered with lichen and moss and cradled me. I hated to leave. I have never felt so regal in my life and probably never will again.