In mid-November, I went back to the North East Regional Folk Alliance (NERFA). NERFA is one of several regional branches of Folk Alliance International (FAI) which has been meeting in Kansas City. FAI was always huge. I attended twice when my first CD “Love on the Line” was released on Signature back in the 90s. It was fun but definitely out of my league.
I went to three NERFA conferences in Stamford CT. In 2020 the entire conference was held online due to Covid and I actually really enjoyed that. When they began planning to resume the in-person conference, the hotel in Stamford upped the cost. It became financially impossible. This year’s meeting was at a new location in Asbury Park, New Jersey. I was appropriately nervous about COVID. Sitting in hotel rooms with 20 other songwriters singing and breathing seemed scary. I wore a mask as often as I could. While I thought my cloak of obscurity was still functional, some people still managed to recognize me. But I didn’t catch COVID. Overall I had a great time and will be back. With the new location and changes, we are all adapting. I almost said growing pains but the plan is to keep the NERFA conference smaller and more sustainable. All good.
Why I went: I’m trying to ask myself “why” before I do stuff, especially things that cost a lot of money: like making a CD; promoting a CD; or buying new equipment. Going to a conference or music camp these days is not cheap. So I wanted to have realistic expectations. Going to jam with friends wasn’t enough. Since I finally had a new album out called Don’t Be Discouraged I thought it would be a good place to plug some of the music at showcases. Network. Hear new music. Learn some new things and refresh some of the things I had forgotten. I did sign up early for the conference so that saved a few dollars. Sue took care of my dog, Banjo so that saved some money as well. I brought some food. That helped a little.
Generally, I don’t seem to get booked for gigs at NERFA. If it happens great! Many smaller venues didn’t attend the conference for a variety of reasons: Cost, COVID, and inconvenience being a few. Most of the folk radio DJs I know don’t attend for similar reasons. There were some complaints about the layout of the facility (formal showcases were at the Stone Pony, a rock club down the street). So I try to think wholistically about why I am going and spending all that money. I also believe it takes a few years of cumulative jumping up and down for someone like me to gain “traction”. True, I’m not getting any younger but I feel really positive about the contacts I made there.
Handouts: At previous conferences, I went through a lot of trouble to have promotional materials to hand out. One year I bought a new printer to print custom-burned CDs. I created a package for those CDs with promotional info. And I printed my list of showcases on the folder and on the back of my business cards as well.
This year I had my new CD on hand but as expected, I handed out very few of them. People just don’t have CD players anymore. My old Rav4 has a CD player but I can’t get it to work. I did make sure the promo material I printed would be useable year-round at gigs. This new postcard has space on the back for a download code from Bandcamp. Most of the folks I offered a CD to took the download card instead. I needed a new business card anyway, one that ties into this website.
The Hotel. This reimagined NERFA was based at the Berkeley Ocean Front Hotel. It was built in 1924 and is located across the street from the boardwalk in Asbury Park, NJ. This is the hotel around 1930 or so.
It turned out to be beautiful weather for most of the weekend so I took a few walks on the boardwalk and on the beach. The hotel was the biggest part of the expense. It usually is. The room was nice although I should have brought a coffeemaker. The staff was friendly but understaffed for this type of event. Luckily I checked in early because there was only one guy with only one luggage cart to help everyone move in. That would later be a problem when I tried to leave.
Thursday, On the Griddle. There were a few workshops on the first day, Thursday. I went to the On the Griddle workshop. The concept is that a panel of radio professionals react to a short snippet (about a minute) of a song. Based on that snippet: Would they play it on their radio shows? Would they listen to other songs by that artist etc? Generally, I enjoy this type of thing. In the previous years when NERFA was at Stamford, a few of my songs got “grilled”. Their comments were helpful.
Long intros. One thing that I should have remembered from other years is that the DJs may only have time to listen to the first 30 or 40 seconds of a track. So if there is a long instrumental intro or longwinded verse, they are likely to move on. I’ve been told my album was fine. But I want to think about my future recordings with that in mind. Even if we dismiss the future of terrestrial radio, listeners have a short attention span before they move to the next track on a playlist.
Confusion. There was quite a bit of confusion about how to submit our tracks by email. My email with a link to one of my tracks kept bouncing back. Later I was told the emails were actually going through to the volunteers cueing up the songs. The sound and acoustics in the room were also a problem. Folks listening online couldn’t hear much of anything, apparently. As it turned out that would be the case for most of the other workshops too. The speakers on the panel had to be reminded to speak directly into their microphones. Kind of funny that DJs needed a primer.
Thursday, DJ Showcase. The DJ Showcase has always been one of my favorite events at NERFA and other regional conferences. When the Folk Alliance Regional Midwest (FARM) was held online during the pandemic I was honored to be selected to perform.
The Dj showcase happened in the hotel’s Johnny and June Room. Johnny and June Cash lived in Asbury Park for a few years. So one of the larger spaces was named for them. Each performer is selected and introduced by a folk radio DJ. There were some excellent performances although again the sound was pretty bad. There were lots of feedback problems. I wasn’t a fan of the light show they tried to use. It was as if they wanted to show off how many colors the lights could produce without fitting them to the music being performed. But the music was fun.
Private / Guerilla Showcases
I did play in several private showcases and heard some incredible performers and songwriters. These typically happen late at night into the early morning in hotel rooms. A few of the events were held in other function rooms downstairs.
Thursday
My first showcase was Brad Yoder’s Music Chairs. Brad is a multi-instrumentalist and an amazing songwriter. I met him several years ago at Falcon Ridge and we have met up on several virtual open mics. In his showcase, he picks three other performers in addition to himself. He played sax on two of my songs. My friend Tina Ross was part of the round as well as a new friend Owen Walsh. Later that night, just before midnight I was part of North of Nashville run by two Nashville songwriters, Stacy Antonel and Lucy Isabel. Both are fabulous writers and performers and have some great videos on YouTube you should check out. I got to hear Stacy and Lucy as well as my old friend Kate McDonnell. Kate was part of the original Folk Next Door crowd when she lived in Connecticut. Around 1 AM I performed for Ron Olesko’s Down the Shore Showcases. Ron created the online folk radio network called Folk Music Notebook. He recorded our sets for his radio show and video also. I got to hear nice sets by my friends Grace Morrison and also by Pat Wictor.
Friday
I performed some songs at the Rhode Island Songwriters Association (RISA) Rhode Trip set up by Terry Kitchen. I tried to do a few of my more controversial songs there because it felt safe. From there I ran down to Anything But Guitars. This has become a highlight of my NERFAs because it helps get me out of my comfort zone. Sam Edelston is an amazing dulcimer player who will try anything on the instrument. I’ve seen him play blindfolded and three or four dulcimers at once. As you can guess no guitars were allowed. I played Don’t Be Discouraged on my little banjo and Please Mr. Squirrel on my uke.
Saturday
I performed at Rigby Summer’s All Music Starts Local. Rigby is an excellent songwriter. She wanted applicants to talk about what they were doing to promote music in our local areas. I was able to talk about my open-mic experiences with the Vanilla Bean Cafe. In my round were two excellent acts. I thought the Duvals were a husband and wife duo. They met after experiencing bad breakups and renting apartments in the Duval Apartment Building one above the other. The other act was Marisa Levy, a fabulous performer. One song was touching about meeting an old friend as a result of the pandemic. In the other song, she did a “fade” which is common on recorded tracks. She did it by gradually singing softer and softer and slowly sitting back down in her chair. Very funny. The audience was very attentive in that room. After midnight I did a few songs at a showcase called the Homegrown Brownie Bash and made some new friends there.
Beep………..beep. When I tried to take a nap one day my smoke alarm battery decided to give out. I called the desk. They said, “We’ll let engineering know.” I couldn’t sleep so I left for a few hours. I called again about three hours after my first call. Another hour later I went down to the front desk. I tried to be nice. It wasn’t anyone’s fault. Finally, a guy came. Stood on an overturned wastebasket, and removed the battery. I have no idea if he came back later with a fresh battery.
The Stone Pony: The big formal showcases were held a few blocks away at a nightclub called the Stone Pony. Apparently, it is one of the places Bruce Springsteen performed. The first night I took a shuttle bus because it was raining. It was interesting but painfully loud. My decibel meter on my phone was registering 93 dB and that was after I moved way off to the side of the venue away from the speakers. Wouldn’t you know that I had brought my custom earplugs to the conference but they were still in my car? I didn’t care for some of the more high-powered rock groups but some friends did great sets. I left early to get ready to perform. Saturday night I had my earplugs and they announced that earplugs were available for those who wanted them. There must have been other complaints. I still left early to get ready for my showcases.
The Ocean: One of the highlights of this conference was being by the ocean. I had forgotten how much I love being near a beach, listening to the rhythm of the surf and the wind. I shot a lot of videos of clouds and waves in slow motion and time-lapse. Then I realized this would be a good setting to do my next lyric video for my song So Far, So Good. The song has some weather references so it made sense at the time but I wasn’t really set up technically to do the lip-sync part of it. I couldn’t hear the song well enough to sing it in sync with the recording. The sound of the surf was just overpowering the sound coming from my iPad near my feet. It was worth a shot. I did use some of the wave footage for the lyric video. So, all was not lost. Play the video by clicking below.
Workshops: I attended a number of workshops in addition to Thursday’s On the Griddle mentioned above. There were some workshops and peer groups that I went to and realized I couldn’t hear due to the bad acoustics of the high ceilings. In some cases, I just moved along to other rooms. A few panels that worked well, had a microphone for each speaker. The panels where they were passing a microphone back and forth and responding as if in a conversation were pretty hopeless. I did enjoy a workshop on Recording Remotely. They talked about working with outside musicians. And because I was at this workshop I missed Vance Gilbert’s Performance Workshop which has been a big part of my NERFA experience. I’ve been Vanced two times in person and during the online conference. Instead, I was planning to go to what was billed as a “performance workshop” with David Amram the next day. That turned out to be a song swap between David Amram, Jay Unger, and Molly Mason. Interesting for sure but not participatory. I did enjoy workshops about planning record releases and one about house concerts. I’d love to play some house concerts. And at some point, I would love to be a presenter if we had the right kind of space.
New video. My friend JB Nuttle of World One Video returned to NERFA to share his videography skills. This is the third song he has recorded at a conference. I decided to do “Don’t Be Discouraged” the title song from my new CD. I really enjoy working with him.
Jams. One of my favorite parts of events like NERFA or Falcon Ridge are the jams. This year Jay Unger and Molly Mason were in the house and I think they stayed up later than I did!
Check out. The only other negative experience with the hotel came trying to check out on Sunday. I had wanted to attend the workshop Dar Williams was giving on songwriting. So, I went down around 9 to check out. The desk person asked if the room was empty and I said I needed a luggage cart to move out. Apparently, they don’t lend them out and the guy who had moved me in would be up to help me. I sat there for an hour or so. I went down and asked again. They said they would send him up. Then I saw the other folks on my floor struggling with their instruments, CDs, and equipment dragging everything manually to the elevator area. We set up teams holding the elevator doors open so the stuff could be shuttled in. Eventually, I slid all of my stuff into an elevator while someone held the door. At the bottom, friends helped me pull my stuff out of the elevator and into the lobby. It took several trips to my car to load it up. I parked my car again and checked out. By then Dar’s workshop was pretty much over. And I was tired and grumpy. I did catch the tail end of the Wisdom of the Elders workshop before heading back home. Next time I’ll bring my cart and a coffeemaker (although there was a great coffee roaster across the street in the convention center on the boardwalk).
So overall it was a great conference considering it was a new hotel and location.
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