The Album Is Complete and I Want to Say THANK YOU!
Today is a warm and significant day for me. I am thrilled to announce to you that my album is complete —- the one you helped to create with your support (back in August 2013!). On Monday evening, while sitting by my Christmas tree with Jerome — my dear friend, producer, and partner on this journey —- we pressed “GO” and ordered the duplication of our album, “Waxwing”. Just like that —— After three years (including pre-production, raising children and making a living) of epic moments, huge life changes, mountains of tears and laughter, guts, arguments, practicing, arranging, playing, editing, mixing, mastering, photo shoots, lots of focus and the creation and transformation of friendships and partnerships —— one “CLICK” on a mousepad and “Thank you for your order!” …. It struck me that the computer’s mousepad doesn’t know the difference between the “click” of ordering socks for Christmas morning stocking stuffers versus the “click” of ordering what feels like a carbon copy of my heart, soul and life’s work.
This album took more time than I anticipated to say the least (not much longer, mind you, than most professionally produced albums take on average). But it’s as simple as this: That’s how long it took to get it right. And by “right” I don’t mean perfect … I mean authentically RIGHT. This music is …. well … me. Every note and word. It is not separate from me. It is not a job I go to. It is not an identity that I put on at 9:00 a.m. and take off at 5:00 p.m. It doesn’t leave me when I go to sleep at night or when I play with my daughter or jog in the woods or eat dinner with friends or fight with a significant other or cry on my bathroom floor or laugh after midnight.
…And all of that …is hard to get “right”.
There’s a line from a song called “Breathe” by Anna Nalick that might sum up much of what I’m trying to say:
“I feel like I'm naked in front of the crowd
Cause these words are my diary, screaming out loud
And I know that you'll use them, however you want to”
Yup. Exactly. … And how long do you think it would take for you to feel ready to release your diary? For me, every note and word had to feel authentic to who I am and where I am. It could not have been forced to completion; that would have ripped it of it’s value to me. It had to feel “right” and there had to be a clearing in my life to let it go. And that’s what I feel today.
I started writing the “thank you” section in the liner notes to the album this past August. I kept coming back to that section and revising it on a weekly basis. …And it was the last edit I made … a re-wording of a ‘thank you’. Point is, it is important to me that you understand how much I THANK YOU, the donors of this album. Embracing your support was one of the most powerful experiences of my life. I know that the monetary and energetic support you gave me will boomerang its way back to you in some wonderful way. And I do hope that what I have to offer in this music feeds your heart and soul in some way.
This is a verse from one of my songs, “Alive”, from the album that I feel very connected to as I prepare to release my “diary” to you:
Here before the crows I shake
In towers all my own
The land beneath is yours to take
The master let it go
Long before this broken day
I held myself inside
But now before this world I wait
To see what they will find
In this sacred place of mine
That now becomes alive
Much love to each of you! I will let you know when the album lands in my hands and will get it out to you during the holiday vacation.
!!!!THANK YOU!!!!
Love, Chrissy