Touring The Ivories II - Coast to Coast

Are you interested in following our adventures for our 2013 Summer Tour from Coast to Coast??? You can do that here: www.touringtheivories.tumblr.com

Thanks for checking in!! Michele & Scott

One Week in One Post = The Recap

Where did the time go? And where did we leave off?? It seems so long since we blogged last, it’s hard to keep it all straight. Who knew that sleep deficiency on this tour would get in the way so severely?? Note to self… next tour… allow time to sleep!! Ok, so here goes… WEDNESDAY 6/20: After the Redwoods, we travelled North up into Oregon, along the Oregon coastline, on our way to Eugene. The Oregon coastline is gorgeous!! Our Eugene concert was so much fun. We played in a church, but had a small enough crowd that we pulled all the chairs up around the piano on stage and made it feel more like a house concert… way cool! We had the pleasure of playing with the uber talented Neil Patton on this concert, and the icing on the cake included David Nevue and his wife Julie in the audience! THURSDAY 6/21: After Eugene we played in Florence, Oregon at the home of our good friend, Kathy Parsons. We had a small but very enthusiastic crowd at this show and it was a lot of fun. A huge THANK YOU to Kathy for opening up her home to us and providing such a great concert experience. FRIDAY 6/22: More driving along the Oregon coastline to get to Portland the following night. The Portland show was also a lot of fun, and we played on a very beefy 9’ Schimmel which ended up being a perfect piano for Scott’s “Master Of Puppets”. The crowd was wowed for sure! This crowd also included many friends and family from my days living in Portland, it was nice to see everyone. SATURDAY 6/23: We said goodbye to Oregon and pressed on to Olympia, Washington where we played an incredible house concert. Another huge THANK YOU to Paul and Marcia for opening their home to us for this show…. this was one of our favorite shows of the tour. A great venue, a great crowd, and super gracious hosts. Happiness abounds. SUNDAY 6/24: The following morning we had to wake up at 5am to drive to Kenmore, where we could borrow a friend’s digital piano, so that we could make the 11am ferry from Anacortes to Friday Harbor in the San Juan Islands. This day was exhausting, but we made it and the ferry ride was beautiful. Not nearly as beautiful as the actual island and home that we played at that night though. The view from their house was fantastic, and the only part about the entire night that wasn’t fantastic was the digital piano. I guess being piano snobs has its drawbacks :) With an hour ferry ride too, we had nothing to do but enjoy the scenery and take pictures of ourselves LOL MONDAY 6/25: Back to Seattle the next day, we spent the evening with fellow musician friends, Joe Bongiorno, Amy Janelle, Gary Girouard, Doug Hammer, and Joe Yamada. It is always a blast hanging out with our pianist friends and we had several laughs throughout the evening. Here’s a pic of us all trying to whistle with our hands. Silly pianists. TUESDAY 6/26: This officially ended the “West Coast” part of our tour. From here we drove back to Utah to finish out the tour with two concerts at my house in SLC. But first, we stopped by Jennifer Thomas’ house to visit on our way out of town. If you haven’t heard her music yet, go check it out www.jenniferthomasmusic.com She has a new album release that will blow you away! WEDNESDAY 6/27: It was our goal to drive straight from Seattle to Salt Lake City, but that didn’t happen. With a late start getting out of town, we made it to Burley, Idaho before deciding not to brave the deer infested mountain passes in the pitch darkness of night. We finally made it to my house on Wednesday afternoon. It was really nice to be home and have a little bit of time to relax before our next shows. We also made it through the entire 3000+ mile trip without any car issues, until we got to my house. Somewhere nearby we drove over two nails and had a flat tire. Good thing there is a tire shop right by my house!! THURSDAY 6/28: Our first show in SLC… SOLD OUT! A great crowd, Scott wowed them all and ended up selling a record amount of CDs, not only on the tour, but also a Cozy Corner first!! FRIDAY 6/29: Our finale show in SLC was also sold out!! Another great crowd, this one a lot more rowdy, made the finale show one of the favorites of the tour. My good friend Pashaa took photos for us during this show and they turned out amazing! SATURDAY 6/30: The last official day of the tour before Scott left for home in California. We spent the day exploring the mountains near SLC, eating delicious food, playing piano, lounging around the house and just enjoying our last day together. Even though this is goodbye for now, this was definitely not goodbye for good…. we’re already planning tour #2 which will happen in the Spring of 2013, and many more after that. We tour really well together… we had a ton of fun… we giggled, laughed, played incredible music, met amazing people, and had an unforgettable adventure. Touring The Ivories was hugely successful and I can’t wait for the next one. Until then… :)

Sleep Deficiency = No Blogging

We have so much to share with you… and we will in due time. We’re running on empty (late nights, early mornings, and a very busy schedule) and now we’re on a long haul back to Utah before our last two shows Thursday and Friday. We will post tomorrow and share our adventures and pictures with you from this last week. Stay tuned!!! :)

Walking Among Giants

We explored the mighty Redwood National Forest today in Crescent City, CA. I’ve never seen trees so majestic before, and they were simply magical. It felt like a mystical fairy land… where Tom Cruise should appear and help save a unicorn. I loved my time here and could have spent many more hours exploring its wonders. Gotta love the pano app :) Something creepy is emerging from this tree! Scott found a ray of light in an otherwise shadowy land. And then it burned him alive! I think he blends in really well here… don’t you think? You almost can’t see him. This tree is in the way, let’s move it. This knotty formation reminds me of the Disney movie “Pete’s Dragon”. The clover here is so beautiful! Not sure climbing a Redwood is the easiest thing to accomplish, but Scott pulled it off! We found a mythical creature! We left California today, and said hello to Oregon. The first half of our tour was in California and it was beyond incredible. I am so happy to be touring here, with one of my favorite people, and we are having an absolute blast. Can’t wait to see what Oregon, Washington and Utah has in store for us. Could the Oregon coastline be any more beautiful?? Stopped for the night in Coos Bay, Oregon, where we enjoyed a lovely dinner at a surf shop diner called Shark Bites. Tonight we play in Eugene with the amazing Neil Patton. Super excited for this show. Stay tuned!!

Groovin' in the Grove

What can I say about Stout Grove in the Jedediah Smith Redwoods Sate Park? ”Wow” is about all that comes to mind. So I’ll back up my inarticulateness with some photos… Michele enjoying a circle of sunlight in a land shaded by giant redwoods I had to take this photo myself, since there was no one else with me inside this fallen redwood tree trunk. Posing as a sea stack, I’m such a poser. The Southern Oregon coastline made it hard to get anywhere, since we had to stop every other mile to take in views like this. The photo doesn’t even come close to capturing it.

Chico and the Redwoods

Before we left for Chico on Sunday, we ate Thai food at one of Scott’s favorite Thai restaurants in Sacramento. It was delicious and we ordered way too much food. One of the dishes was so garlicky that we opted to send it back and the restaurant owner was not happy. He had his wife come out and scold Scott… it was super funny. Bad Scott! Bad! :) We played an incredibly energetic house concert/dinner party on Saturday night. It was, by far, one of the funnest house concert experiences I’ve ever had. The people were so nice, so fun, and the energy was unlike anything else. At one point, Scott was playing “Sweet Child Of Mine” and the entire crowd was dancing and singing along. Afterward we sat around while one of the house guests played guitar and had a massive sing-a-long. So much fun. I had no idea that the temperatures in this area could get so hot!! Thankful for being in an air conditioned car for this leg of the journey. The Chico concert was really great. We played on an old Hamburg Steinway that sounded great in the big church chapel. The people loved the concert and we were met with smiling faces and a standing ovation at the end of the show. Our house hosts were so incredibly gracious as well and we had a really nice time hanging out with them. Their daughter is a huge fan of my music and is learning to play several of my pieces. I played a couple of songs for her on their piano when we got back to the house and it made me think… how cool would it have been, when I was 14 years old, if my favorite pianist had come to my home, stayed the night at my house, and played piano just for me on my piano. I can only imagine, but the feeling it gives me as the musician in this scenario is so incredibly grateful for the blessings I have in my life. This is one of the reasons I love being a musician and sharing my music with the world. Since Scott doesn’t ever take any pictures of me, I have to resort to taking them of myself :) While driving through Redding we saw this cool “Sundial Bridge” and stopped to take some pictures… We ate lunch at the grossest Denny’s in the history of mankind. We felt like we needed to shower afterward. It was the only option on the road and sometimes you have to settle for what you can get. We found a cute little motel in Crescent City on our way to see the Redwood National Forest. This is the view just up the road… Apparently this hotel has a pool that fits inside a door. I had no idea that was even possible… must be a pretty big door. And what is a Jacuzzie? I’ve never seen one of those before. I wonder if it’s like a Jacuzzi only more fun? Today we explore the Redwood Forest and then head up into Oregon along the coastline. Stay tuned… :)

Sweet Singalong

The most amazing thing happened last night. We performed for a small, private house concert not open to the public. Our smallest audience of the tour, 14 people. And yet, the most energetic audience of the tour. They were lively, they were interactive, and very supportive. For the first time, the entire audience sang along to “Sweet Child O Mine,” they knew all the words and sang from beginning to end. I LOVE that! After the concert, everyone stuck around to drink wine and sing around the “campfire” until one in the morning. Never has such a small audience seemed so big. Amazing.