Every other Wednesday Traditional Irish Music Sessions

Posted on by Thor

I sketched at Claddagh Cottage Irish Pub (4308 Curry Ford Rd., Orlando, FL) on November 4th. Every other Wednesday, Vicki Gish, and Scott Vocca host a traditional Irish music session at the pub. Kathleen Cavanagh, has been playing the uilleann pipes for years. These three are members of Crooked Road, which keeps the traditional Irish music alive in Central Florida. 

An Irish Session is a gathering of
musicians playing traditional Irish music (occasionally including other Celtic
genres such as Scottish, Brittany, Cape Breton, and French Canadian) on
traditional Irish instruments. Traditional Irish music is made up of dance
tunes such as reels, jigs, hornpipes, slides, and a few other miscellaneous
forms including polkas, set dances, airs and songs. It is not so much a performance, but a sharing of
traditional tunes among the musicians and those who care to listen. The
instruments might include fiddle, flute, accordion, uilleann
pipes (pronounced ILL-in), concertina, tenor banjo, whistle
(a.k.a. penny whistle, tin whistle), mandolin, bodhrán
(pronounced BOW-ron), guitar, and sometimes piano.

At this session there was a visitor from out of town. He was visiting from Minnesota and he found this Irish session to help him celebrate his 30th birthday. He had with him a bodhrán and his beat helped enliven every set. This is fairly common for musicians to visit from out of town.  There is no pressure to keep performing, so between tunes, musicians would relax and sip Guinness. I glanced at the bar several times to consider ordering a pint, but didn’t see a bartender. Once I started to sketch, I was lost in thought. Vicki got up to order and she bought me a pint. Which I didn’t expect, but I’m grateful.

Sketching at an Irish Music Session is a delight. I tap my foot to the beat and sway a bit as the sketch progresses. Perhaps traditional watercolor is more appropriate for a Irish session, but I used the tablet since I had come straight from teaching digital art to my students at Elite Animation. A little girl kept struggling to see what I was doing but her bigger sister kept pulling her back to be polite. A patron at the bar decided to pose in the archway behind the musicians so I could include him in the sketch.  Everyone laughed at his gesture.

Mark your calendar, the next Irish Music session is November 18th, followed by December 2, 16 and 30.

ODD 5 at The Brass Tap

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The fifth Orlando Drink and Draw (ODD) was held at The Brass Tap (Mills
Park 1632 N Mills Ave, Orlando, Florida). Mills Park is a new
development featuring apartments and a strip mall near the theaters on
Princeton. There used to be a tiny store on the corner of Mills and
Virginia called “Cash Lust Translator“. That store sold of cash
registers and the owner held on to the store for the longest time which
held up the development project. I regret never going into Cash Lust
Transactor to sketch.

Having never been to Mills Park, I got a bit lost looking for The Brass Tap.
In all about six artists stopped out to drink and draw. I was pleased that
two new artists came out. Audrey Zindler and John Nadeau are regulars at the Crealdé
sketch classes. John sat at the end of the bar and as I sketched l debated if he was an artist or not. He does wonderful loose oil paintings in the figure drawing classes. Audrey showed me his work on her phone. She is now running the Sunday Morning
sketch sessions and I’m encouraged to start sketching from models again.
The Sunday morning sketch sessions are from 10am to 12:30 pm at Crealdé
School of Art, 600 St Andrews Blvd, Winter Park, FL. The cost. $10. I
need to loosen up my digital sketches and this seems like a great way to
do that.

Carlos Basabe was working on a sketch of a steampunk penguin with a jet pack which I believe is for a beer label. He recently shared a beer label design for Chiberian Warmer and it is hilarious. Vote for it if to like it. I had the notion of having artists do quick 5 minute sketches of each other, but by the time everyone had arrived, I was contently working on my sketch and I couldn’t stop, so I let everyone drink and draw in piece. My beer for the night was Funky Buddha and I had a pretzel to munch between sips. When my sketch was done I joined in on a conversation about the Walking Dead. I like having the opportunity to see what other artists are up to and being able to wind down after the sketch is done. Usually when I sketch each night, I pack up the art kit and head home once the sketch is complete. 

Mark your calendar. ODD 6 will be held December 7th starting a 6 pm at The Falcon Bar and Gallery. If you know an artist who likes to drink, draw or both, let them know.

Mel’s Bad Girls Club Art Show

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I stopped by City Arts Factory to see the volunteer team effort involved in hanging new shows. There are four galleries as well as the long haII way in which to hang art. That is a whole lot of wall space. In May, when this sketch was done, they were hanging, Mel’s Bad Girls Club Art Show. Tamere Parsons was getting all the labels ready for the show. I don’t think most artists are aware of the amount of work that goes into hanging each show. One piece that really caught my eye was a black frame that had physical branches breaking up the inner dimensional space by artist Chelle Shannon. Maura Luchesse had one of her sensual recycled magazine mosaic pieces titled “Catch Me If You Can.” The price was $8000 which is reassuring since that implies that some people in Orlando are paying a reasonable market rates for art. Laura Williams “Gypsy Mermaid” on the other hand was marked down to the minimum wage, bargain basement price of $300.

On a black and white photo on the wall, a homeless woman holds up a sign that says help please. This is much like the common perception of “the starving artist.” Local artists bicker and fight over scraps rather than banding together and empowering each other. A weekend away in NYC reminded me of what a vibrant arts scene can be like. I met 18 like mine artists for a Sketch Crawl in Washington Square Park where we documented a huge police violence awareness rally and then sketched the huge variety of performance artists in the park. In Orlando performance art is outlawed or rather limited to a few blue box locations that are in isolated locations downtown. I’ve never actually seen an artist use one of the blue box busking stations. Instead, Lake Eola has a speaker system that pipes in Disney white bread music for the swans to listen to.  The Creative City Project livened up the streets of Downtown for one night, but then the silence returned.

The Mediteranian Deli has great gyros.

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The Mediterranean Deli, 981 W Fairbanks Ave, Orlando, FL, has consistently great tasting gyros and Mediterranean salads. If I find I have time for a bite before sketching in Winter Park, I always stop into the Deli. The proprietor always shouts out, “How are you my good friend!” Its like going to Cheers, where everybody knows your name. I always order a gyro and salad along with caffeine. If there is enough time, I do a sketch, because this hole in the wall deli deserves all the credit that it gets. There is almost always a line but they keep the turn around quick. There was a new assistant at the register and he was doing a fine job. There was also a help wanted sign in the window since there is so much demand at the noon and 5pm rush hours. The Deli is a short drive west off of the I-4, Fairbanks exit. Anytime I’m in the neighborhood I stop in. Quite honestly, I sometimes drive a little out of my way, to stop in.

Weekend Top 6 Picks for November 7th and 8th.

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11-15-13BallSaturday November 7, 2015 

3pm to 6pm Free. Facility Tour and Tasting. Breyting Community Roaster 1220 Biscayne Blvd 145 North Woodland Blvd, DeLand, FL. Breyting Community Roaster celebrates the Grande Opening of its 4,000 sq ft state-of-the-art coffee manufacturing plant in DeLand, FL capable of producing over 3.4 million pounds annually in two custom built 2,400 pound roasters. Organic certified production is slated to begin in the Summer of 2016. The roastery’s upbeat, socially conscious and avant-garde coffees have met with rave reviews, sparking considerable national buzz.About Breyting Community Roaster & Our New Location.

Breyting Community Roaster is a socially responsible, mission-driven business that seeks to align their coffee brands with worthy causes and support non-profits through an innovative fundraising program. Their long-held business strategy is to build brands that have modest, yet consistent, earning power with good returns on equity and support these brands with worthy causes, talent and honest management.

7pm to 10pm. $150 Neanderthal Ball. Orlando Science Center, 777 E Princeton St, Orlando, FL.  Party like it’s 100,099 B.C. at Orlando Science Center’s 9th Annual Neanderthal Ball on Saturday, November 7. Benefitting the Orlando Science Center and its mission to inspire science learning for life, this event is part of Orlando Science Center’s year-long 60th anniversary celebration and promises to be an evening of prehistoric fun for everyone! New this year, Mayors Jewelers presents: Champagne on the Rocks with the chance to win a diamond necklace by purchasing a glass of champagne to toast the Science Center’s 60th anniversary.

7pm to 10pm. Free. Monster Bash with B-52s Fred Schneider. In celebration of Breyting Community Roaster’s Grande Opening come join us for the Monster Bash After Party with Fred Schneider, frontman of the iconic rock band, the B-52s.

Fred Schneider’s caffeine-crazed monsters are back from remote villages with the perfect coffee beans for the fire-breathing dragon to roast Fred Schneider‘s Monster Blend to a frighteningly intense flavor.To celebrate this galactic find, join us to taste what’s been roasted up and party down as Fred DJ’s the dance mix. Space Vixens will be serving cosmic coffee cocktails: Godzilla’s Kiss, Rodan and Rum and Yetti Freddy.

To prove you were actually at this party, take a selfie with Javapussrex or one of the other monsters. Grab your best pals and rocket on over to Fred Schneider’s Monster Bash to celebrate his out of this world coffee and party like it’s 3015!

Sunday November 8, 2015 

11pm to 1pm Donation based community YogART class: 7 Chakra series. Artegon Marketplace 5250 International Dr, Orlando, Florida. Every 2nd Sunday of the month YogART will be hosting FREE Color Therapy Yoga classes for the community at Artegon Marketplace (located in the community room across from section B6 – use movie theater entrance)

We are excited to bring you our “7 Chakra Series” that will focus each class on each individual chakra: breaking down it’s color, meaning, location and function. This particular class will revolve around our second major energy point known as “The Sacral Chakra”.

Color Therapy glasses will also be provided for those who wish to experience the effects of color therapy. Orange will be the primary focus for our Root Chakra but you may wear any color you want to work with.

This is an ALL LEVELS class which incorporates stretching, breathing exercises and light yoga poses geared around the Sacral Chakra.

We also have a color wheel on our site that explains the benefit of each color (glasses) Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet. http://www.yogartinc.com/color-therapy-chart/

Please bring your own yoga mat and prepare to unwind.

11pm to 5pm. Free. The Japan Association of Orlando’s 15th Annual Orlando Japan Festival. Village at Hunter’s Creek, 13574 Village Park Drive.

Performances include:

one-hundred-member Japanese Taiko drum ensemble

Koto (Japanese harps)

Iaido (Japanese swordsmanship and martial arts)

Nihon Buyo (traditional Japanese dance)

Edo Satokagura from the National Theater of Japan’s Wakayama Performance Troupe

Experiences:

try on Yukatas (kimonos)

participate in the cosplay contest

play Japanese-style carnival games

watch a Judo demonstration

enjoy Japanese music and dance

observe a traditional Japanese tea ceremony

learn Japanese calligraphy

enjoy traditional Japanese cuisine

3pm to 5pm Free. Open Art Party. Kissimmee Lakefront Park 201 Lakeview Dr, Kissimmee, Florida. There will be Hot dogs, Hamburgers, Chips, Soda, and Water. Free for Artists. Please tip the chef. It will be held at the Heron Pavilion. Please RSVP with the amount of people you will be bringing or inviting. (We want to make sure we have enough food for all!!)

For more information please contact Tee at 407-732-3846

FAVO Motel Art Studios First Friday Art Show and Exhibition

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Mark your calendars. On the first Friday of each month, Faith Arts Village Orlando
(FAVO) 221 E Colonial Dr, Orlando, Florida, hosts its First Friday Art Show. There are 36 open studios, childrens
activities, live music, food trucks, and more. The weather is
cooling and the holidays are coming. Stock up on locally created gifts
for loved ones, family and friends.The next FAVO is Friday November 6th starting at 5:30pm. 

I love making a monthly pilgrimage to this event to see artists at work and to quickly check out the latest local art. There is a wide variety of art showcased and I almost always discover something new. The motel room studios are all rather small so I seldom sketch inside, but all the large glass windows appeal to the voyeur in me. I m always shocked at how early the Christmas decorations go up at retail stores, but at Faro you will find local art which can be a very thoughtful seasons gift. 

While artists are being evicted from studio spaces in Winter Park an Ivanhoe Village, FAVO is a rare case of renovating an old motel for artists. Not many of the rooms are full time studios yet, but every month the place lights up with activity. At this Friday’ FAVO, there is a Living Room Theater Preview in room 236. Banks Helfrich and Tisse Mallon present 10 minute previews of Living Room Theater throughout the evening.  Living Room Theater is a unique, experiential show which focuses on fun, connection and authenticity.
A few things for you to know:
– While not lewd or vulgar, this show is recommended for ages 18 and up
– The preview lasts 10 minutes
– There will be 4 different version of the preview which will be on rotation throughout the evening. See just one or all four!
– No charge for preview and donations will be accepted.

National Dance Day with a Hip Hop flair.

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At National Dance Day, most of my sketches were done in the main rehearsal hall in the Orlando Ballet Central Campus. The room was always packed. Local artist and arts organizer Cole Nesmith was in the back row trying on the hip hop moves for size. The instructor slowly taught a entire dance routine by giving the participants new moves that built onto what they already had learned. I had already sketched an establishing shot that showed | entire rehearsal space, and now [ was loosening up and trying l catch the energy of the dancers gestures.

The woman right in front of me was having g blast learning the moves. She not only we learning the routine, but she gave it her own personal flair. This is what separates great dancers from goo dancers. They demand attention because they are loving an at they do. I’m sure that. true of any art form. In these looser sketches, I switched to using a pencil which gave the lines more life_

Bring theater to your living room.

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Banks Helfrich, Jack Graham and Tisse Mallon present experiential performances in living rooms.
This unique 50 minute show consists of short segments focused on fun, connection and authenticity. I went to a performance at Tisse Mallon’s home in the quiet College Park neighborhood. Daylight savings time meant that it was dark when I arrived. A table was set up on the walkway to her front door and there was a bottle of red and a bottle of white wine along with wine glasses. For a suggested donation of $5 I had a cup of red to loosen up my line work.

I was a bit anxious since I knew that there would only be 50 minutes to sketch the show and I’m used to having two hours to complete most sketches. The living room was only about 12 by 12 feet. I sat on one of the two couches and about 18 people squeezed in. Folding chairs were set up until everyone had a seat. There were familiar smiles and some people I had never met before. In Victorian times long before TV invaded our living rooms, people would perform for each other for entertainment. These improvisational performances harkens back to those simpler and more creative times.  


Tisse is a talented photographer and life coach and Banks is an independent film producer and director. I had never met Jack but quickly learned that he is a talented acoustic guitar player and actor. The separate acts were tied together by a common thread of connectivity built from honest incidents from the actors lives. In one particularly powerful  scene, Tisse sat alone on stage and silently looked at each of the audience members. I paused my sketch as she looked at me and I felt her smile widen as we looked at each other. She addressed everyone letting then know she felt they we beautiful and she acknowledged how we tried to always get it right. “Darn right” l thought. “This sketch isn’t turning out like I’d expected.” Perhaps always struggling to capture the moment keeps me from appreciating the true warmth of being in the moment.


In another scene the living room went pitch black. l stopped sketching. The actors were warming up their voices and started setting a beat by pounding the floor. I joined in by pounding my unfinished sketch. Everyone in the audience joined in. There was a primal, playful joy in that moment. Scenes were separated by the sounds of birds singing the trees. It felt like seasonal separations that marked the moments of our common experiences. Scenes addressed love, compromise and betrayal.  In a rather dark scene, Banks lay on the floor claiming that his spine was severed. Jack, as his brother reassured him. In an unexpected turn he offered his fallen brother fresh pancakes. Back in the kitchen, off stage, we all heard him moan and then fall to the floor. Banks called on to his brother but never rose. Once again the birds chirped as the room went black.


In the talk back after the show, Tisse explained that rehearsals had established how long each scene was but how each scene unfolded was different every time they performed. Tisse came up with the concept of Living Room Theater and they hope to bring the show to everyone and anyone’s living rooms. There is no cost to book your living room as one of their venues. They also hope to someday take performances on the road. It is a great idea. The intimate setting makes you feel like you are on stage, very much a part of the action. The fourth wall is broken. There were a few moments when I felt an awkward pause as an actor searched, trying to decide how to react and where to take the  scene. What was never lost however was how fearless and honestly connected they were to each other. Mark Your Calendar, the next Living Room performance is Saturday November 7th.

A Digital Artist in a Digital World?

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On October 22, I  went to Parker Sketch‘s monthly Artist Critique at the Barefoot Spa, 801 Virginia Dr, Orlando, Florida. This group of artists and art appreciators gathering to help each other grow as artists. You don’t have to be an artist, or show art to participate in the discussion, and meet the artists! It is a supportive and constructive discussion group about art. We look at the work of about 12 artists in the evening and talk about it. The opportunity to show art is first-come-first served. If you are interested in art and want to meet other people who also enjoy art, this is the event for you. The art can range from the purely abstract to representational. I always learn something new each time I go.

The reason I wanted to show art this night was to see what other artists felt about m using a tablet to start creating my sketches done on location. I’m excited a bow the possibilities in the digital medium but Terry says she cringes every time she sees a digital sketch on this site. I decided to show one of my sketchbooks and the sketch [ did on the tablet of the critique. sketching digitally is still difficult because [ waste so much time looking for tools and menus. Recently I’ve bee streamlining my work flow by learning how to use my tablets keys to select the most common tools. I asked everyone if it made sense to try and recreate my watercolor sketches in the digital medium. Most artists felt that the traditions sketch had more spontaneity and they could clearly see that a digital sketch has z different look. Parker suggested that I take an entire different approach to the digital work, accepting the difference. He even suggest using the tablets camera as the starting point and built the sketch over that. When I confided that the tablet seems too small, Bethany Taylor Meyers suggested I do a traditional sketch on paper, then shoot that with the camera and start painting digitally. I love that idea since I can us a bigger sketch pad and maintain the traditional feel of pencil on paper.

Other artists critiques also inspired me to push in new directions. One artist is trying to pull away from dark line work. Although I love line, the digital medium seems to favor blocking in colors as if building up an oil painting. I’m convinced that the digital work will inspire change in the traditional sketches and vise a versa. Someone suggested that I start using gouache on my traditional sketches and ironically the is something I’ve been considering for  some time.

There was so much amazing art shown that night, and having feedback from fellow artists is indispensable. Parker showed a large “Falling Man” painting. I’ve seen other paintings from the series and they are usually monochromatic. This falling man was fractured into vertical strips and had intense bright colors like cadmium yellow and bright pink. The image is a haunting reminder of 9-11 for me and the bright Peter Max inspired colors seemed a stark contrast. Parker did the painting live at Artlando with constant interruptions as people asked questions.  He said the colors were happy accidents because they just happened to be the colors he packed that day.

If you click the subscribe button over in the right column, I will keep you informed next time there is  an artist Critique.  The subscription is for a weekly AADW e-mail newsletter.

Tenafly High School 35 year reunion.

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I flew up to New Jersey over the weekend for my 35th High school reunion. It was held at an expensive restaurant called La Jardin  (1257 River Rd, Edgewater, N.J.)  just south of the George Washington Bridge. The best thing about the restaurant was its view of upper Manhattan which sparkled at night. Something about the place made it feel like a mob run establishment. Perhaps the equestrian theme hinted at race bets that had been rigged. Classmates gathered in the bar area to welcome people as they arrived. I recognized a few faces but was lost as to who people were most of the time. I might have insulted Barbara Kim Silber when I couldn’t recognize her. I tried faking recognition, but that got old fast. We each got a name tag with the yearbook photo but even that left me a bit confused. A classmate bragged about how much money he was spending since life is short. I lost interest and went to sketch.

Another unique thing about the restaurant was that it had menus that glowed when you opened them up. I’m not sure how that was done. The reunion food was fairly decent but certainly over priced and it is in no way authentic French cuisine. Dinner at this place will set you back 65 to 75 dollars. The party gradually migrated from the bar into the reception room. Mylar balloons in the school colors, orange and black were over the fireplace along with elementary and middle school class photos. I wasn’t in any of the photos. Near the entrance door there were photos of the 5 classmates who had died since graduation.

I blocked in the sketch as people chatted. About six different classmates told me that they had just driven past my childhood home at 363 Knickerbocker Road. My family used to carve over 200 pumpkins which mere illuminated on the front yard. I constructed a coffin with a Dracula puppet that would rise up and a dancing skeleton for the porch. This Halloween display used to stop traffic and police often came out to keep the chaos under control. A ghost was rigged up to fly down towards passing cars. It was constructed with a volleyball and a sheet. A brick was taped inside the ball to get the ghost to fly down the line faster. When the brick broke free, we decided that a more leisurely flight would have to do.

The invitation asked that we refrain from wearing jeans and I packed some nice shoes and pants for the occasion. Jefferson Boone Williams was the most unique classmate at the reunion. He ignored any dress code, and wore a tattered old hat, jeans and had shoulder length hair. I wish I had hair that long, hell, I wish I had that much hair. Anyway Jefferson is a fossil collector and he runs a business called Super Sonic Geophysical. He is one of the geologists who investigated the 4,000-year chronology of earthquake
disturbances within the uppermost 19 feet of laminated sediment of the
Dead Sea to determine the exact date of Jesus’ crucifixion. He discovered that Jesus, as described in the New Testament, was crucified on Friday April 3, 33 A.D. Jefferson’s daughter is an artist and is dreaming of becoming an animator. Jefferson gave me a fossilized Sand Dollar. I tried to refuse it, but he insisted.

The great thing about sketching is that people approached me, so every few minutes I’d chat with classmates one on one. In a large group , I can’t even hear individual conversations especially with the loud background music. Some people, I did recognize, like Cari Kelly and Susan Hemberger who lived a block away from me in Tenafly. Elizabeth Lee said the sweetest things claiming I was always good natured kid in high school.  John Keohane ran a raffle for swag bags. My number didn’t come up, but it would have been a pain packing that stuff for the flight back.

Just like a wedding reception, the dance floor heated up after everyone had eaten. Susan Hemberger was  on fire on the dance floor. Organizer Debbie Thompson had her niece taking pictures. I can’t wait to see the group photo so I can figure out who I had met that night. Don Holmes who had been my friend from middle school through high school sat next to me. He had also been my best man at my wedding at the National Arts Club in NYC twenty four years ago. Once when he visited me in Orlando he showed me a photo of a woman he was dating. The photo was of him and my nephew’s wife. He claimed that she met him at clandestine locations. My wife got quite upset and called family to find out what was happening. After Don left to go back to New Jersey, he called me on April 1st. The photo had been an elaborate April fools joke executed a week early.  After that, I didn’t talk to Don again. He was at the reunion however and as I left he asked for forgiveness. He didn’t recall what he had done but he knew he must be to blame. I said I’d “friend’ him on Facebook, but I haven’t done that yet.  I’m not sure if I should. Is a reunion a place where retribution and forgiveness are mandatory, or is it a brief look back at a time I coasted through under the radar.