Pamme Swan: Notions

Mike Jaquays, writer for the Mid York has a new review out on my 7th CD, Year Of Firsts. Please click my Press and Review link to read.

WOW! Starting the New Year off to a great start! While cruising some of my favorite websites, I ended up at the Adirondack Museum's site to learn Craig Brandon, author of Murder In The Adirondacks, Grace Brown's Love Letters and The Prison Diary and Letters of Chester Gillette to name a few, is scheduled to lecture at the museum on January 15th. So, I went to Mr. Brandon's site, got his contact info and emailed him about my song Boom Town. He responded that very afternoon and linked my site to his! I'm thrilled to say the least!

2011 has been a roller coaster year to say the least. Everything got in the way of this CD but alas, it is done and is available through iTunes. Look for the link on my home page. Snippets of the 13 songs with the exception of Year of First's, Lucky Lou, Spirit House and Dr. Bronner (which are full length versions as I'm feeling some Christmas generosity) have been uploaded to my Swan Song page. Enjoy them as I will edit the audio times to shorten them back to song samples on December 6th. 

I'd like to thank my old band mate's Ed Vollmer and David Williams for their ukulele and washboard skills on Dr. Bronner. And Steven Skollar for his mandolin work on Damselfly, Year Of First's and Woodchuck And Crow. A HUGE hats off once again to Rich Grant who has spent endless hours mixing my music and editing my art. 

May your holidays be filled with fine food and drink, togetherness, great music and less packaging! Shop Local and download, download, DOWNLOAD!

I usually post to my blog, The Traveling IndianLily which can be reached by going to my links page. But have decided that really cool news should be blogged here. I've been asked to perform my song Ode To Anne at Anne La Bastille's memorial service Saturday, August 20th. I'll likely catch the 2nd shuttle in Eagle Bay and perform around noon. I'm quite excited and very honored with this and also a bit emotional. The last time I was at Anne's Lake was when I zoom recorded the thunderstorm that opens her song. Adirondack Life magazine also posted my email and link to my website on their letter's to the editor page in this month's issue. I'm very much looking forward to playing Anne's song on her sacred Adirondack ground.  

Year Of First's came to be two years of firsts. Oh well! Can't force creativity! Songs happen along when they do in their own sweet time. There is a song Year Of Firsts on the CD which I'm now naming Hooked On Folk. I just couldn't come up with art work for the cover that correlated with Year Of Firsts. Sitting here at my mac after moving my studio back down stairs where it belongs, and after getting Mom's rugs up on the wall for sound absorption. I realized the CD had to be called Hooked On Folk, as the rug with the bone ivory guitar pin, the last thing my father gave me was pretty much slapping me in the face hanging on the wall right next to where I do my recording. This CD has been in the making for 3 years. Proof of my aging ADHD! It'll be good to get on the other side of it and onward...ta la. 

Now that these holidays are OVER and my kids are some what settled. Nick is in Ithaca scraping by and Aurora will be moving into an ole house that her and her buds are working hard at cleaning up. It's time to wrap up the CD I've been recording since before my father died. It's taken quite a while to actually wrap my head around this reality. As sick as he was, It was a sudden shock. So with Skyway plans pretty much underway and scheduled for June 11 this year at the Hooks Wiltse Field in Hamilton, it's time for me to get the other 7 original songs recorded. This is my first CD where I'm mixing originals with some of my favorite old folk song covers. It seemed such a shame not to add these songs as they bring me a pure sense of gratification in performing them and my listeners, the simple joy of hearing them. While performing last summer at the the Long Lake Author's night, I pulled "Stewball" out as I noticed a lot of younger children in the crowd. I used to sing Stewball to my kids when they were little as it was a favorite of mine being a normal horse loving child myself. While I was packing up a young girl around the age of twenty ran up to me and told me how happy that song made her! She and her family used to sing that song in her childhood whenever they went camping. She said she hasn't heard it since. Well this of course made my day. Driving back down the moonlit dirt road to Stillwater was when I decided to record these favorite covers of mine and get them on the CD. They have been a good therapeutic "balm for sorrow" in dealing with the tornado of feelings I've been beat up with since my father's passing. Funny how these songs come out before the tragedies happen as I wrote Balm For Sorrow a good year before my father passed. 

So! I'm gifting myself with a new CD and my birthday is my new release date! May 19th, 2011 The new disc will be called Year Of Firsts even though it won't be released well into year two. post Dad.

To get to my Traveling Indian Lily Blog please click on Blinks on the home page. Ta La!

I mostly use my blog which can be found under the blinks link at The Traveling Indianlily.
Other than my monthly gig at the Georgetown Inn. I have a New Years Eve folk gig at the Mountain Top in my home town of Sherburne.
I'm rooting through my writing basket and do have a new crop of songs to record this winter. If I feel like it. I'm looking forward to snow! And lots of it...really!

The music will continue on through the night from 7 till 9ish with musicians performing at these venues in Hamilton.

Club Ed ~ The Colgate Inn
Same Blood Folk ~ Nichols and Beal
The Hook ~ The Barge
Steve Golly ~ Rusch's
Tommy Hoe and the Barn Cats ~ The Hour Glass

Skyway is September 12th starting at 11:45 in the Hamilton Village Green in memory of Craig Getchonis 
Skyway Bands
2009
Hosted by Meredith Leland Getchonis
and Chris Cashion
And This years Skyway Performers are!

Adishakti Dancers
Tumbleweed Gumbo
Zach Fleitz
Commander Cockroach and the Mexican Bus
Emilee Smith
David Chlad
Putter Cox and Friends
The Mark Shiner Trio
Matt Nakoa
Earthman Embassy

This years Skyway chair built by Bill Brown and painted by the young artists of Kathy Herolds Center for the Arts
The chair is on display each Saturday in the Farmer's Market on the village green at Adrianna's Thoughts in Wool. Raffle tickets can be bought there for 5 dollars to win the chair
We are looking again for businesses to donate gift certificates or whatever they can to raffle donation
The raffles will go on through out the day with the Skyway Lounger being raffled off last at the end of the show
Donations can be in check form and sent to The Friends of Music PO Box 143 Hamilton 13346
Skyway board of director are Pamme Swan Jimmy Wunderlich and Meredith Leland Getchonis
www.myspace.com/skywayfestival

Finally its done!
Sorry to take you all back to winter in this video!
A Good Horse was recorded back in 2004 on my Once Sated CD.
It's one of those sad but true songs that just fell into my lap.
Thanks to Reyna Stagnaro for her mandolin, her home setting and Fred the wonder horse!
Thanks To Jimmy Wunderlick of Orbital Sound for his harmonica.
Big Thanks to Rich Grant of Digital Media and Design.
What would the town of Hamilton do with out Rich!

For woman's her-story this year I chose two different woman to sing about.
Two woman as different as day and night having left strong historical footprints here in Central New York.
The first woman once lived in a farmhouse on a hilltop overlooking the valley between Waterville and South Hamilton not far from my home. In the early 1800's, she bore 10 children who were highly educated but as corrupt as they could come. She beat them not because they stole but because they got caught and rewarded them when they didn't.
This rowdy family of outlaws recruited many others and roamed throughout Central New York and other neighboring states stealing horses, guns, wagons, jewelry and pretty much anything they could get their hands on.
They counterfeited money, made illegal whiskey, burned down buildings and went as far as murder when people got in their way.
The woman who helped mastermind this gang that grew to be over 200 strong was none other than Rhoda Loomis

The second woman who has greatly inspired me was as good and Rhoda was bad.
I discovered her while sitting at the hard times cafe randomly pulling her Woodwoman II book down from the bookshelf over table nine while waiting for breakfast one stormy morning in Eagle Bay.
I became addicted to this woman's life's story right away and now have most of her books.
Unlike Rhoda Loomis this woman had no children but dedicated her life to conservation and health of the Adirondacks and wrote about the ecology of many places around the world. She took twenty five years in which she studied and made the cause her own but sadly witnessed the extinction of a loon like bird called the Poc or Giant Grebe which once nested on Lake Atitlan in Guatemala.
This woman never married ( but had some steamy affairs) and lived in a cabin she called Thoreau II inside the blue line of the Adirondack Park.
Still alive today, this womand and is truly an amazing strong woman who has lived and incredible and meaningful life.
Her name is Anna La Bastille

“Songs From Mountain East And West” has been a wonderful, inspirational journey back into the stories of the lives of several characters from the Adirondack
Mountains and Central New York. I’ve spent many hours reading and researching the following characters that I’d like to send up thanks to. Chester Gillette and Grace Brown to start. Noah John Rondeau and the whole Loomis clan. Thank you for calling out to me to read your stories and to the many authors who’ve written and researched their lives.
Anne La Bastille my new heroine in my older age! You are with me on every excursion into the Adirondacks.
A huge thanks goes out to Rich Grant and Leigh Yardley who spent many hours helping me in my Dell to Mac transition.
Also on my thank you list is Robert Hankey for giving my folk music a home for the past two summers and to Catherine Light for her marketing help and insightful artistic direction.
Thank you Jimmy Wunderlich, Reyna Stagnaro, Anne Leone and Steven Skollar for your fine musicianship and recording skills.
Songs From Mountains East And West was recorded at Orbital Sound Studio, Colgate University and my home studio here in the Hamilton area.
For the past two years I’ve had fleeting feelings of the terrible, lonely sadness Grace Brown must of felt as she and her unborn child floated down to their death in the back corner of South Bay on Big Moose Lake.
It helps me to think she was reincarnated to my Grandmother who raised five children with a loving husband and in a loving home.
So, I’d like to dedicate this collection of songs to these two woman. Grace Brown, March 20th, 1886 ~ June 12th, 1908 and my grandmother Eleanor Celia Brown-Swan,
September, 28th, 1913 - .

I know! I know! I should go out an get a real job. I honestly had this intention! Get a simple little cooking job or go back to bartending. I've been wanting a normal life after being so busy this summer. Tommy Hoe told me I would never have a normal life. He's right along with this little voice in my head that says. Screw it an stay home! With the price of gas and living so far out it wouldn't be worth it anyway!
So much for that degree in Landscape Design! I don't need to be shoveling snow!
I'm just having so much fun these days staying home and feeding my free range bunnies, kayaking and hiking, reading and writing.
My daughter Aurora is going to school in Ithaca and has been calling me every now and then requesting recipe's from dinner's I've made in the past for birthdays , holidays and drama club overnighters. Which got me thinking! So I'm having a ton of fun here uploading some of my favorite recipe's to my White Swan Gone Green blog which you can find under Swan Store!
So this blogging addiction I now have will have to be blamed on Aurora. Thanks honey!
I'm also selling my Uncle Milty chair turned Skyway Lounger. You'll see a link for that also under Swan Store Link!
The CD is pretty much done!
Few more things to wrap up.
It'll be for sale on line soon through Tunecore.
Most of the songs not in their entirety of course are already here on this website.
Hope you like.

On behalf of the Skyway, I would like to thank the following people for the behind the scene efforts to make the 2nd annual Skyway a success.
David Grace, David Williams and Jimmy Wunderlich are on the top of this list. Grace for updating the band schedule and getting the lovely Skyway sign to its spot in the park each morning and Williams for donating his time and sound equipment.
Jimmy Wunderlich! You out did yourself. Your stage organization floors me and thank you for all the time involved with manning the website!

A HUGE Thank you to Linda Sybist of Van Tine Imaging for the great posters!
And of course Van Tine Imaging for the Skyway banner that really made the stage.
Thank you handyman men Bill Brown and Ford Seymour for your erecting of the Skyway Banner.

The small things that tweaked this years festival will not go unnoticed either. Thank you to Perry’s, The Earlville Opera House, The Palace Theater, Subway, Sushi Blues. Big Apple Music and Greg Yates for their raffle contributions.
Thanks to the Colgate Bookstore for the ad in the Mid York and the use of the money box and the Stahl family for tending to the raffle table all day!

Hugs to artists such as Rich Grant for the lovely horse on canvas print, Bill Brown for the 2008 Skyway Lounger and to my dear friend Leigh Yardley for painting it!
Thanks to my mother, Audrey Swan for the 2008 Skyway hooked rug. Nice hooking Ma!
The Adishakti Dancers. You ladies are just beautiful!
The bands this year were all wonderful! Hats off to Dangerboy, Craig’s last band for their 2nd year performance, the Silent Fury from Syracuse, Robin Schade, Bruce Pegg, Peter Leone, Captain Morgan and the Rhythm and Keslie and the Rhythm Makers.
A special thank you to Reyna Stagnaro, JImmy Wunderlich and Steven Skollar for this summer’s porch practices at my home.

It was Jimmy Wunderlich’s idea to have some of last years performers in venues though the town in the evening. Thank you to the Colgate Inn and Same Blood Folk for their rocking performance out front.
Tommy Hoe and the Barncats! Bless you and the Hour Glass and your contribution! Awesome!
The writers! Sami Martinez, Mike Jaquays and David Hollis. Without your words and stories. Skyway wouldn’t be half as special as it is.

This years festival wouldn’t of been possible without the financial help of renting the park. Thank you Charlie and Sally Getchonis.

Meredith! Hosting Skyway is your calling! Great job!
Eddie thanks for the zoom lesson! Hope you are feeling better!

To all the people who bought raffle tickets, and or wrote out checks to keep the next generation of kids in music. You know who you are. We thank you!

Skyway is an on going process as is the music program in all schools. As Sally White kindly said, Every little bit helps with costs of things that pop up during the school year.
I’m just glad to help and applaud these kids and the older musicians for getting up there and sharing their music.
Sincerely,
Pamme Swan

It was a strange coincidence that the 2nd First Friday Folk Festival (that was actually the 2nd Friday as the first Friday in July was the 4th) was a the anniversary of Grace Brown's murder and that I had special guest Robin Schade. Robin generously gave me his Grace "Billy" Brown song that goes over so well at the Moose.
We both did our version this past Friday an the crowd loved it!
So The Big Moose Inn is doing really well this summer!
With gas prices so high I thought tourism would be iffy. Thank goodness I was wrong! The dining numbers have more than doubled and Mr. Hankey has informed me the room packages are selling out.
Which will keep me playing every Tuesday. Playing on the front porch of the Big Moose Inn is really the most heavenly gig I've ever had! The sun sparkling the water and the many different boats, kayaks, canoes and an occasional seaplane floating in is just beyond words. I'm so lucky!
So I packed myself up and headed out to Stillwater to play on Mother Marion's deck the next day an as always had a grand time with a packed deck of Stillwater locals and other people from just about anywhere.
I met a young fella by the name of Joseph who was hanging out in the parking lot with his guitar. So I got him over his stage fright an got him up. An incredible player!
And only 22 years old. Really so many gifted people out there. I hope to see him again somewhere.
Joseph is from outside of Philadelphia somewhere.
Sunday I had planned on heading out to Norridgewock to do some exploring and writing but the weather just wasn't co-operating so I bagged it an went home. Which ended up being a good thing as it poured an all my windows were wide open.
As good as it is to get out of the house...it's always better to return to my serene valley nestled in the hills of sunny south Hamilton. Love my home.
Beaver River! I'm coming!
Its a beautiful July day. Getting my gardens weeded and hanging out with my bunnies an cats and of course Ed.
I have a parade of animals following me wherever I go around my yard which is really quite comical! If I still had Ducks...well there you have it! Pamme's Ark!
Skyway "begging for bucks" letters are stamped and ready for mailing in the morning.
I'm really looking forward to this years Skyway and at the same time really looking forward for it to be over as well! Lots of time goes into planning.
My CD...It's coming along.
I planned on keeping it as simple as possible but some of the songs deserve more. So its back to Orbital Sound with Reyna and Steve on mandolins, Jimmy on acoustic and Scotter on percussion.
It'll be sweet.
For now!
Happy Summer!

How could it not be!
With the most beautiful setting on the Big Moose Lake. With the delicious summer salads and grillings of Chef Brian. With my folk music echoing out over the lake. With the bull frogs and the sea planes and the loons. And all the people who turned out with canoe and kayaks.
The Porch was packed!
I'm really looking forward to the rest of these lovely Tuesdays through out the summer.
The first group of people I met where from Swan Hill Road in Glen Aubrey NY!
The road named after my grandfather and where I spent my first 13 years. I was floored!
Small world. God only knows who else I'm gonna meet up there in them magical mountains!

I'm so looking forward to another season of kayaking, camping, hiking and music in the Adirondacks this summer.
My husband and I have re-organized and re-packed our camping trailer adding a smaller tent to kayak out to some secrete out of the way places we have discoverd on our travels.
There's no place I'd rather be!
Well actually. I've discovered some jewels right in my back yard that I've been exploring. The Brookfield Horse Trails are gorgeous! And Nine Mile Swamp! I'm ashamed that I've let the word "swamp" hinder me from going there. Just the word made me shudder with thoughts of spiders and gloom.
Was I wrong! I've re-named this lovely meandering peaceful river Nine Mile Bliss!
It makes me want to re-read the Loomis Gang all over again.
I'm concentrating on my new CD "Songs From Mountains East and West" and hope to have it out this summer with a some new musicians. More TBA on this project later.
Skyway is under way! Please go to my shows and events to see this years line up.
The First Folk Friday this week at the Big Moose Inn this June 6th with special guests, Same Blood Folk.
This is my third attempt to get these fine musicians up there and every time the weather did something dreadful.
If it snows in June...well that would be a very bad sign.
Onward!

Reading the Syracuse Post Standard on March 24th I was surprised to read an article by Debra Groom about the 100th anniversary of the electrocution of Chester Gillette this upcoming March 4th at the Cayuga Museum in Auburn.
I've done a lot of reading of this American Tragedy over the summer an it just so happens that this week I finished recording my song "Grace's Ghost".
I've uploaded the full song to this website and a short video under my You Tube in memory of Grace.

What ever the weather is doing in the Adirondacks you can pretty much bet it'll not be the same down on the flat land! It snowed fat an happy up here and iced glazed everything down south.
So much for the February First Friday! So the night was spent enjoying a night out snowed in at the Moose.
Quiet times of reading and writing is a must these days.
While staring up in to the dark winter sky watching the snowflakes fall and hit my face I realized that I haven't seen flakes this big since my childhood.
So the next first Friday in March will be packed with musicians. As long as the weather holds out!
The Line up is The Rusty Doves out of Utica, Rory O'Bannion out of Camillus and Same Blood Folk from Hamilton. There is also a Wilderness Weekend scheduled here at the Big Moose so theres lots going on for the March First Friday.
Recording is coming along in my new studio! How have I lived with out a Mac all these years? I'm currently recording a fun little tune I wrote called Happy Valentines Day along with the funky cowboy voice of Tommy Hoe.
March, March, March! The Keys! The Keys! The Keys! Out of the snow and the sound of buzzing snow-mobiles to color and warmth and ocean.
I'm so fortunate.

Sunny San Hamiltonio is stampeding up to the Moose! Line up for February's First Friday is Maren Van Tine with her lovely voice and acoustics and Zach and Jenny Collins of Same Blood Folk.
Its gonna be a fun night with some great music!

I'd like to thank everyone who came out to the Big Moose Inn this past Friday. The first First Friday was a complete success!
I'd like to thank the two Brians, John and Tommy Hoe for their great performances.
Next month I'm hoping some Hamiltonians will trudge up the dark and twisty (RT 28) with their instruments for a folk jam.
I'll be uploading the new Up The River Cold version with a lovely violin track played by the multi-talented Anne Leone. Anne's violin has added a golden thread through out the song that Noah would be proud of. It truly makes the song.
Happy New Year everyone!
Something tells me 2008 is gonna be great!
I'm starting it off with a new I Mac with a 24 inch screen and a new recording program to learn! Love the challenge!

I'm thrilled to be managed by the talents of this wonderful woman, Catherine Light. At long last...Managment!
http://www.bluelinebydesign.com

Looking forward to this down time to get some recording done on my new CD entitled "What It Is" Songs from Mountains East and West
Money is still coming in to support Skyway which supports music for the next generation at the Hamilton High School here in Central New York.
Looking forward to my Music at the Moose open Folk mic night and getting my list of performers together.
Stay tuned!
Happy Holidays

Wow! Too many to thank and too much going on!
But thanks to everyone who has hired me and/or helped me in some way ...You know who you are..
My first ever organized music festival Skyway was a huge success and the beginning of many more.
The mountains have been very good to me this summer and my music has a new home at The Big Moose Inn!
The eastern gigs brought a brand new Martin and Ibanez!
Garage Sailing through western San Bernardino Mountain town of Crestline brought an antique Hohner Melodica to add to my music collection...
I have a Line 6 Variax guitar for sale if anyone is interested.
Getting ready for the leaf peepers up in the Adirondacks.
Tube Steak Tuesdays have turned to Tequila Tuesdays at the Big Moose.
I've written a few new songs for my next CD ...that will be finished when it is....
Onward!