I once had a tiny Russian voice teacher who liked to tell me, as she pushed her little fist into my belly, “The other girls, they can be lazy, but you, you have a huge machine, you cannot be lazy!” (I can still hear her insisting — insert your own favorite Russian accent here — “You khave a khuge maCHINE!”) And I do have a huge machine, a huge drive to use my big voice to bring other people’s voices, other people’s songs into the world. But how to keep such a huge machine going?
Using Kickstarter to raise the funds for my new album, and thereby inviting others into the album-making process, has taught me one part of the answer to that question. There I was in the recording studio the other day when my phone rang and my text message buzzer buzzed with dear ones letting me know that my Kickstarter project had reached its goal. Seeing the number of backers and the number of dollars add up, receiving this kind of support for bringing my songs into the world feels like filling up the fuel tanks on that huge machine. I am so grateful to every one of my 123 backers.
Whether they contributed $1 or $1800 they have given me not only their money — and used email and Facebook and Twitter and podcast waves and word of mouth to bring others in as well — they have provided a clear sense of fellowship in this (otherwise potentially isolating) process. We (yes, we! I and all 123 stakeholders) are 104.5% funded and very much looking forward to being able to put these funds to good use: studio time, album design, pressing, printing, postage.
If you’d like to be kept abreast of this and other projects as they unfold, please put your email address in the little box on the sidebar where it says “Care to hear from me?” In the meantime, I continue to brim with gratitude for each and every one of the 123 luscious souls who are helping me give voice to the songs that move through me.
