Welcome
to Gossip, the place where we catch up on what's been going on, fun
things we've run into and whatever else we might think of. If you have
gossip you'd like us to add, please email us at changeling@madcelts.com
or click here
for our web contact form.
October
2007
Hi folks!
It is Fall in Ohio, and Changeling is back in the saddle! As many of
you know, we decided to have a year of taking things easy on the music
front to help us recharge our batteries. Well, the batteries are recharged
and we have some great stuff on the front burner, both in terms of dances
and shows and other exciting new projects, like Deborah's novel!
She's deep at work on a manuscript, so if you see her with that crazed-yet-artsy
writer look, you'll know why. :-)
Please
come see us as we get back on the road, and if you'd like to see us
in your neighborhood, please contact karl by email at changeling@madcelts.com
or though our
web page comment form.
April
2007
Heh. Well,
a few things have changed since the last time we updated these pages.
:-) Let us bring you up to date. First, we've moved back to Ohio. Sure,
you are saying "hey, didn't they just move to Iowa?" Well,
yes. Or sort of yes -- we lived in Iowa for about 15 months. But the
Ohio Library world made Karl an offer he couldn't refuse, and now we
are back and living in our new and wonderful home town of Yellow Springs,
Ohio where Karl is the director of the Greene County Public Library
system and Deborah is working on her writing. "A writer in Yellow
Springs?" you say? Yup. Just imagine the scandal. ;-)
And how
could we have possibly imagined the welcome we've received? Changeling
wanders a lot -- we've been lucky enough to play in 21 states and 3
foreign countries since we started playing back in 1993 -- but if we
ever had any doubt about where home is, it's gone now. There's been
more than one happy tear in our eyes as we've run into beloved friends
and rabid Changeling fans: we hope you know what your kindness and support
means to us. And we are delighted to have a few gigs on the calendar
to get back in touch with you. At the rate we've been getting calls,
it is quite possible we'll have a few more gigs on the caledar in the
future, too. :-)
So please
come and join us at an upcoming show, or drop us a note at changeling@madcelts.com
to say hi! We look forward to bringing you music here at home, and in
the big wide world.
And thanks
again for the welcome home. We love you too. :-)
August
2006
Welcome
back you folks who have been checking this page since March and wondering
"where the heck have they dropped off to?" More information
on that later, but suffice it to say we are alive, well, and having
a lovely time living in Iowa. First and foremost, we've been taking
a few months of badly needed rest, pursuing our other occupations (librarianing,
writing, travel, etc.), and enjoying life off of the road. Not to say
life has been without music: Karl played a concert with Frank
Claudy and Guy
Drolllinger on the LeClaire bandshell where jazz legend (and Davenport
native) Bix Beiderbecke once played; we've actually made it to the Irish
sessions in town (which is something we hadn't managed for years while
we were on the road); and we even played an impromptu set with Liz Carroll
and Jim DeWan in Bishop's Hill, Illinois.
We are
now back on the calendar with a few gigs, and starting to look at a
few more. Thanks to you all for your patience with us as we've taken
this much needed breather. :-) As always, do pop us a note at changeling@madcelts.com
if you want to say hi.
March
2006
Welcome
back to the gossip page and wow do we have some stories to tell! :-)
We have just returned home from our tour of England, and we had an amazing
time! We got to meet a tremendous number of really great dancers, wonderful
musicians (including one of the founding members of Silly Wizard, one
of the bands that made us say 'oh, we've got to play that kind
of music'), and some fabulous sights! Highlights of the tour included
. . . well, just about everything and everyone! It was a heck of a thing.
We had
a ball playing in sheer terror in St. Alban's for one of our musical
heroes, Mr. Robbie Thomas of Silly
Wizard (to learn more of him and how he and his band are taking
the great music of the American Contra Sound to England, drop by the
Cruise
Control web site . . . there are also a ton of great links there)!
We utterly enjoyed rocking out at the Inter
Varsity Folk Dance Festival (where we saw the fabulous and brain
bending Gog
Magog Molly doing dances beyond the realm of imagination) and getting
to see King's College Cambridge, where Deborah and Diane
Silver barely resisted being possessed by the spirit of Virginia
Woolf and stepping on the forbidden grass).
We had
a nail-biting road trip as Diane drove a van up (for us) the wrong side
of the road to Lichfield, where we had a marvelous dance and encountered
(a) the breathtakingly beautiful sights of Lichfield (including the
cathedral and a near passby of Samuel Johnson's house) and (b) the unforgettable
Lichfield Shove Tuesday Pancake Flipping Race (Women's Seniors Division,
First Heat).
The road
from Lichfield took us to Leeds, where we had a great time playing to
a full house! We can now list Changeling: Live at Leeds on our
credits (which is quite important to Karl, who is a slavering fan of
The Who). From Leeds we went to Alcester, Warwickshire, where an overnight
stop turned into a three day invasion for Lovely Meg, our wonderful
host. Alcester was fabulous: it included a musician's workshop, a trip
to Stratford on Avon (including the large, empty pit which marks the
site where Shakespeare's house once was :-), the jumping off point for
our concert in Bristol, and a killer dance (which included people from
all over England) which also had a full bar. Woof! We were also given
a tour of the Cotswolds, its standing stones, and a mysterious cheese
shop.
We left
Alcester to head for the last show in Bradford on Avon, with a detour
in Bath. We met wonderful contra dance musicians (who, as it turns out,
are good friends with a good friend of Karl's Mom . . . small
world) who got us pointed to Stone Henge. We finished the day with a
massive romp around England, and finished up in an Indian Restaurant
(where else?) on the Curry Mile in Manchester.
Of course,
no accout of the tour could be complete without giving huge thanks and
an acknowledgement of all of the incredible work put into the tour by
our wonderful fellow travelers, mega-caller Diane
Silver, Jim Robb (tour promoter and van driver without peer) and
the unstoppable Fabien Havas, our volunteer sound man, driver, and beloved
friend. They did the heavy lifting, leaving us free to play music, enjoy
England, and for us to generally make pests of ourselves. Thanks folks:
you made this an experience we will never forget.
Finally,
we cannot give enough thanks to the folks who took us in during our
trip: Jim and Ann, Lydia, Robbie and Holly, Hannah, David and Mary,
David and Joyce, Maggie, Lovely Meg and Bill, Brian, and David and Prudence.
You made our trip special beyond our imaginings.
We are
finishing a bit of a rest, and getting ready to play a few dates this
Spring. Drop by the calendar page for more
news, and we'll see you on the road!
Also, there is a lot of great music available out there, and Changeling
encourages fans to check it out. Good music is good for everyone, so please
click here to find Places to Go and People to See for music, art and more.
Please support these wonderful musicians and venues as they work to bring
you the music you love. Click here for links to
these musicians and venues.
