Hello and welcome to the first newsletter of Curt Siffert, the brand! I'm still getting used to speaking in "official" voice, so have patience. It's taking all my willpower to fight off the usage of the royal we, but I'm sure you'll agree with me that the royal we-ness is best avoided.
There's still some kinks to be worked out here, including the possibility that this email might arrive a bit garbled. If so, let me know (works for me). But for now, here's the haps in the curtsiffert.com-land.
Many of you may know that I've been running a podcast for a while now of my various piano improvisations. The pieces are raw and with bobbles, but the point is to use them to explore the creative process, and get some interesting ideas out. I've since found that quite a few people enjoy the pieces as finished works, and it has something of a following now. I wrote about the project and its history on my site - It's called "Piano Musings", and it was on hiatus for a time, while I worked out some technical issues. I've started it back up and am finding that the subscriber base is increasing - I have close to 100 regular listeners now, and am starting to market it a bit more. Many of these pieces may turn into more finished works on future recording projects. I've also added a new improv named "She Owns A Boat" (click to listen or download), which has been downloaded about 200 times at last count. If you're interested in how to join the podcast, you can read about it, or if you have iTunes installed, you can actually subscribe automatically simply by clicking here.
One other interesting development is that I've started collaborating with an artist in Las Vegas, Kasey Baker (hi Kasey!). I've mentioned this briefly on my site - she's quickly coming up with artworks to be paired with several of my improvisations, and we're also looking at various ways to package them and show them - there are several exciting possibilities here. Pictured here is the painting for Insects Crossing Ice, an improv I came up with a few months ago. Several more paintings are coming soon.
Other than that, I'm basically networking around town. I'll be writing more about the various Portland musicians and groups I come across, as well as my own efforts to get a repertoire of original songs and arrangements together, so keep checking out the website. We're also coming up on gig season for my band, Deja Nu - expect gig announcements when they're relevant.
Thanks for your support!
Curt
curtsiffert.com
