Almost Here

Just got official word tonight about the world premier of the 99 Bottles video.  (actually I knew this already as I had found the Somerville Arts Council website and saw it mentioned there, but tonight I got my official word from the artist, so I'll share that with you)  This is a lyric video for Amy's song "99 Bottles", from an album from last year.  What that means is as the video plays, the lyrics to what part is playing are seen on the screen.  (if you want to sing along I guess) I heard about it through her newsletter, but I know she also posted a YouTube video promoting it, and it seems she got word out on other social media as well.  She invited people to create artwork for this, either something with lyrics shown that would appear in that part of the song, or just any art and she would find a way to use it.  Amy's college training is in fine art (I was her teacher and her classmate at different times), and she has since earned a living as a musician and song writer, but has used down time caused by the pandemic to learn digital video editing, creating a standard video for a song from her last album.  I assume that's what got her to here. This local arts organization (Boston area where she now lives) had a particular theme they are emphasizing this year, she found a recent song that seemed would fit, and put the word out.  I like a good challenge, so knowing less than you do now, I invited her to send me a line of lyrics to illustrate, the result of which can be seen above.  I sent it in on time a few weeks ago, and she wrote back to say how pleased she was with it, impressed with the fact I had done a woodcut for the occasion, as she expected that much of the work would be drawings in gel pens and arrangements of refrigerator magnets.   Having seen much of the work as thumbnail images on the site we submitted them to, I know she got a lot better than that sent in.  Very creative and very diverse- how it will all fit together I have no idea. (my initial thought was an interesting free form combination of music and visual art that made me think of the early days of Sesame Street) I think that my contribution is good, but so are many other ones I've seen, and I look forward to seeing the results.

But we'll all have to wait until then.  The premier is scheduled for 8 pm on Wednesday, when the link to the video will be posted online.  As we get closer, I'll probably post my own links as well.