asheville trip with matthew january 2010

Greetings, friends and family,

Thanks to Josh, Cindy, Sam, Sara, and Matt I am now the proud owner of an HP laptop computer which is why I've decided to put this baby through its paces and send out this daily blog about this little trip to Asheville, NC. I hope you enjoy these posts. And just for the record, most of what you are about to read is true!

This journey has come about because of younger son, tenor-sax player extraordinaire, Matthew. He has decided after many frustrating years to give music a full-time try and, after some research, he has decided to make Asheville his base of operations. To prepare for this sea-change in his life, Matt has dedicated himself to his music. For the past 6 months or so, he has been practicing at least 5-hours a day, has memorized over four hours of performance ready music, including that cool cello piece by Bach you've been hearing lately on many commercials. Hearing it played on a tenor sax is quite remarkable. It actually works! He has tackled both the technical and the artistic aspects of the music and the saxophone. He calls himself "a caged animal" and can't wait to play full time whether it's on the street, in a club, with a group, solo, whatever.


Why Asheville? Well, for Matt's purposes it would seem to be perfect. It's an artsy-craftsy kind of place with a strong music "scene", lots of clubs, etc. The weather is quite tolerable most of the year, and there is a generous municipal attitude toward street musicians, which is how Matt will begin his efforts. Also, the cost of living in Asheville is quite a bit less than most of the rest of the planet which gives Matt a fighting chance of making a go of it.

I am truly excited for him (nervous too, naturally) and I know that a very special friend of mine will be rooting for him as well. She always did and she always will.

So we're off this Tuesday in the late afternoon. The weather forecast looks favorable and our plan is to drive straight through at a leisurely pace, making stops when necessary, switching off to sleep, so that we arrive in Asheville sometime late Wednesday morning. We have a few apartments to look at on Wednesday and on Thursday and through the weekend, Matt will begin his "investigation" of the city and its musical possibilities.

I'll sign off now and will be back "on the air" sometime on Wednesday. I'll even try to post some pictures using the impressive array of IT and computer skills I have amassed over the years. (actually I'll probably just call Josh if I can figure out how my cell phone works.)

Thanks for following my (our) progress on this and other recent journeys. Raise a glass to ol' Matt if you think of it.

Much love,
J