November News

From Gene Burnett

My new album “From The Temple To The Street” as well as last year’s album project “The Way Of All Things”, as well as the rest of my recorded music, is available for listening or downloading free or with a donation here: www.GeneBurnett.com  It’s also available on iTunes, Spotify, CD Baby, and other e-retailers of music.

FYi: My site has been updated and our new player and download system is much better than the old one. Just click on the “Download or Play Songs” button for any album on the Musical Recordings page and a player will open that will let you listen to that album. There’s a little arrow at the right of each tune. Just click that arrow to download that song.

The pandemic hasn’t affected my T’ai-Chi income at all. I teach one-on-one in the park as part of my “low overhead” strategy in life, so I was able to keep going full force. But my music income, such as it was, dried up nearly completely. This will be the first year that I make less than I spend on music. My albums are simple but they do cost money to make. So if you’ve gotten any value from my music, please consider buying one of my songs from your favorite online music store or tipping me at my website or paypal me here. https://www.paypal.me/GeneBurnett 

My music is free at my website, over 30 albums, please take all you want. All I’m asking is that if you feel it and can swing it, please make a small donation or buy one of my songs from any of the various online retailers of music. 

If you have Spotify, look me up and listen to one of my albums or songs there. The streaming income is minimal but every little bit helps.

And while you’re at it, buy a song from one of your other musician friends. It only costs a buck, it gives them a little encouragement and support and, you get a song that you like to listen to for the reset of your life.

There’s a video of me making more or less the same plea at the top of this post.

As usual. I have been enjoying recording videos for our “Virtual Sunday Night Open Mikes”. I miss the bar but I don’t miss the noise. It’s nice to record in a quiet environment and it’s easier to pretend people are listening when I record my sets at home. I posted another 4 of them this past month, all on the theme (more or less) “Portraits of Women”. I also posted a video of a new song “The Day That Willie Nelson Dies”…a “Songwriting During The Pandemic” video, the above mentioned “Help Tip Me Into The Black” video…a video about “Practicing Under Stress” and a video of something I think was some kind of wild turkey fight.

For info on all of these videos, please see the “Videos” section below…

 

So here we go…I’m going to start with local events in case you’re in the Rogue Valley and then proceed with the usual information about where to find my music, videos, and pictures, including information about new projects.

There is so much to listen to and watch on the net these days…I’m amazed anyone even gets this far in the newsletter let alone watches or listens to anything I’m doing. I’m sincerely grateful for every view, every listen, and every nice comment I receive. I’m happy if anything I post truly reaches even one person. I’m offering all this stuff in a “just in case you’re interested” spirit.

Upcoming Shows:

None!

For more info about these and all of my shows, and to confirm that there have been no cancellations, click here: Calendar

Since I'm putting this newsletter out once a month, it's possible there may be a cancellation of a given show by the time it happens. Please double check with my web calendar if possible to be sure the gig is still happening. I'd hate to have you come out for nothing. Also another gig or two might be added or times or locations might change, so do check the calendar for the latest info.  

Recorded Music

All of my over 30 albums are available for downloading free or with a donation at my website: GeneBurnett.com

Videos In General

Overall Mission: I post a lot of videos on youtube, over 1000 so far! I'm not trying to build a fan base. In fact, I'm not trying to build anything. I'm not expecting you or anyone else to follow what I'm doing or watch all of these videos. Posting videos is just part of my overall plan to make my music (and my T’ai-Chi and Nature videos too) as freely available as possible and see what freely comes back. I think of each video as sort of like a message in a bottle...and more I toss out there the more likely one of them will land on a friendly shore and something good will come back to me.

A Note on Monetization: I won’t be able to monetize my videos on youtube anymore. Monetization seems to be an option youtube wants to reserve for bigger more ambitions channels. I’ve always had mixed feelings about having ads on my videos, so to some extent, this is actually a bit of a relief. On the other hand, it was nice to make a little money from my videos and nice to think of “views” as adding slightly to my income. But such is life. I’m happy to be rolling free and clear of ads. With the help of some savvy facebook friends, I was able to ad this paragraph to the descriptions on all of my videos at once: 

I hope this video has been helpful to you or touched you in some way that leaves you a little better off for having watched it. This is not a big time channel and I have no plans for it to become one. I’m too small to have ads on my videos and I’ve always had mixed feelings about them anyway. If you would like to support and encourage what I do here, you can make a donation to me directly via paypal. No donation is too small, (or too big!) and all donations are very much appreciated. Paypal Me

So here are some video links in case you're interested

How to Find My Videos: First of all, I've set up a Videos Page on my website with a menu similar to what you see below as well as a digital tip jar in case any of you want to contribute to my cottage industry. Every little bit helps and not just financially. 

I've also set up some blogs that make navigating and viewing my various videos much easier. You can go to any of these blogs and see thumbnails for all of the videos posted there. Scroll across the thumbnails and you will see the titles of each video. Click on it and a page will open that will let you watch the video right there without going to youtube. My latest videos are always in the upper left hand corner.

To see all of my Music videos in one easy to navigate place, click here: The Unforced Videos

To see all of my T'ai-Chi videos in one easy to navigate place, click here: The Unforced Movement

To see all of my Nature videos in one easy to navigate place, click here: The Unforced Nature

For a quick and easy way to sort through, listen to, or download all of my albums free or with a donation, click here: The Unforced Music

To see my regular blog “The Unforced Life”, click here: The Unforced Life

To visit my youtube channel and possibly subscribe, click here: My Youtube Channel

To see all of my youtube playlists click here: My Youtube Playlists 

To see a youtube playlist featuring all my Pandemic Open Mike sets and songs click here: Pandemic Open Mike Sets & Songs

And here are links to my individual album youtube playlists.

From The Temple To The Street

The Way Of All Things

Slow Down Fast

Thunder Moon

Love & Heartache

Better Off Broken

Crooked Love

Doubles Hitter

Already There

Why Start Now?

Where I Belong

Have A Wonderful Miserable Life

Too Busy To Worry

No Other Life

See No Evil

Brand New World

Up For Grabs

Flow More ~ Force Less

Undiscovered~Parts 1 & 2

Maybe Nothing’s Wrong~Parts 1 & 2

Without The Moon

Nothing’s Impossible Now

You Are Wrong

My Song Now

Terms Of Surrender~Parts 1 & 2

Undiscovered Country

Plan B

Where Will You Sleep Tonight?

New Videos

I’m going to do something a little different with this section of the newsletter. Rather than provide individual links to each video, I’m going list the titles to the videos followed by a link to a blog I’ve set up for that category of video. Just click on the link and you’ll go to either my Music videos blog, or my T’ai-Chi videos blog or my Nature videos blog. Once there you’ll see a wall of thumbnails. The ones in the upper left corner are the most recent posts. You’ll be able to scroll over any of these thumbnails. It will flip over and show you the title of that video. Click on it and you can watch that video without leaving the blog. This method is much less time-consuming for me and actually, I think, more convenient for you. It might sound complicated but it’s very easy. Give it a try.

7 new Music videos:

Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #29

Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #30

Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #31

Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #32

Songwriting During The Pandemic

Help Tip Me Into The Black

The Day That Willie Nelson Dies

These and all my music videos are right here: The Unforced Videos

 

1 new T’ai-Chi video:

Practicing Under Stress

All my T’ai-Chi Videos are right here: The Unforced Movement

1 new Nature video:

Wild Turkey Fight?

All my Nature Videos are right here: The Unforced Nature

Pictures


I've stopped posting as many pictures on facebook, (for many reasons), and started posting them instead on Flickr, which I like much better.

Here's a link to my "home page" at Flicker: Photostream.

I have many photo galleries there but a few of my favorites are:

Small Miracles (mostly Nature related stuff)

The Dish Whisperer (I started posting a daily picture of my dish stacking work over a year ago. I recently crossed the 3000 straight days mark. I have no idea how long I’ll keep doing this. I’m so used to it, it hardly takes any effort at all to continue. I made a video for my song “I'll Do The Dishes Tonight” that featured a slideshow of the first year.

"Humor" 

"Me Playing Music"

Trippy Clouds

 Hydras


Website

I continue to offer all of my albums for downloading, free or with a donation at my website: www.GeneBurnett.com I started doing this about 10 years ago and considered it a 5 year creative experiment. Well the 5 years passed and I decided to start calling it my "ongoing creative experiment" as I have no plans to stop. Since I returned to my folk roots and stopped climbing, or trying to climb, the industry ladder, I've been enjoying music in my life more than ever before. And enjoyment, rather than achievement or worldly success has always been dearest to my heart anyway. So now I focus totally on what I love most: writing, recording, performing and sharing what I create. If other people like it, so much the better, but getting other people to like me or what I do is no longer my goal or focus. I'm out to please myself first. I want to do my music exactly the way I want to do it and see who likes it that way, not figure out what people will like and try to do it that way. I put it out there freely and see what comes freely back. So far so good. I've never had more success and appreciation than I have since I started doing it this. Go figure.  

Thanks, as usual, for your support and well wishes!

GB

www.GeneBurnett.com

To Thine Own Self...

 

Be True

I've always been happy with my no debt, low overhead, no kids, "the best investment is friends", KISS (keep it simple stupid) lifestyle, but never more than this year. The calamities I've worried about most of my life have finally showed up and so far I'm doing OK.

No judgement against people with mortgages, dojos, and/or kids...but I knew at a young age that I had to do what I loved in this life, and it wasn't going to make me much money, so I budgeted accordingly.

Debt has always scared me because it's planning on having money in the future to pay it off and I could never confidently make that plan, so I never borrowed more than I could pay off in the very short term.

Overhead scared me too. 20 students just to turn the lights on? So I teach one-on-one in the park. No rent so I can keep private lessons affordable for people and pressure to recruit new students is at a minimum.

Making albums also scared me...big outlay of money against unknown future sales. So I recorded very simply at minimal expense. Until this year, I always made more money than I spend on music.

Kids? Forget about it. I knew I could barely keep my own ass above water, so I had a vasectomy when I was 29.

I didn't dream big or grandiose, I dreamed small and practical. I didn't live large, I lived small. I didn't set my fears aside and aim high. I listened to them and aimed low. I just wanted to do my work, have a little fun, and make enough to continue. So far so good.

It could be that I didn't make full use of my talents. That I didn't reach nearly the number of people I could have. But isn't that the case no matter what we do? In order to be happy I need to be myself. And myself is scared of taking on things that scare me and complicate my life. All these fears, which I would also call being realistic, led me a life that so far I enjoy and that has held up well against tough times. 

If you're reaching for the sky, more power to ya!

If you're reaching for the ground like me, more power to ya!

October News

 

From Gene Burnett

My new album “From The Temple To The Street” as well as last year’s album project “The Way Of All Things”, as well as the rest of my recorded music, is available for listening or downloading free or with a donation here: www.GeneBurnett.com  It’s also available on iTunes, Spotify, CD Baby, and other e-retailers of music.

FYi: My site has been updated and our new player and download system is much better than the old one. Just click on the “Download or Play Songs” button for any album on the Musical Recordings page and a player will open that will let you listen to that album. There’s a little arrow at the right of each tune. Just click that arrow to download that song.

Just a few days after posting my last newsletter blog we had a catastrophic wildfire here in the Rogue Valley. A combination of very high sustained winds and very low humidity at the end of a dry summer made us very vulnerable to fast moving fires. Some of them may or may not have been caused intentionally, they’re still sorting that out, but the weather conditions were ripe for any fire of any size to explode into a conflagration and that’s what happened.

A brush fire started at the far north end of Ashland and raged through the nearby towns of Talent and Phoenix. Many many homes and businesses destroyed including those of several of our good friends. We were just lucky to be on the right side of the wind. Although the damage was horrific, people around here have really pulled together to help each other out which has been great to see. Following the fires there was a week of the worst smoke in the air that I’ve experienced in over 20 years here. It was not the usual forest fire smoke we get around. This was more toxic stuff from the dwelling and businesses that burned. Because I teach outdoors one-on-one, I haven’t lost a day of work to the pandemic, but I did end up getting a week off due to the horrible smoke.

Samarra and I took the time to stay in and work on organizing and continuing to fix up our new place but it was weird to look out the window and feel like we were fogged in in London. Strange days indeed.

Now the smoke has cleared and our weather is moving towards the usual fall patterns. We still get some smoke from first down south and we’re not totally out of the woods yet, but we’ve had a little rain and things are slowly returning to something like “normal”. Meanwhile the rest of the country seems to be going nuts, with the strangest and most important election ever coming up…and now Trump has tested positive for the ‘rona. I’m fully expecting Godzilla to appear for Christmas.

As usual. I have been enjoying recording videos for our “Virtual Sunday Night Open Mikes”. I miss the bar but I don’t miss the noise. It’s nice to record in a quiet environment and it’s easier to pretend people are listening when I record my sets at home. I posted another 4 of them this past month, each on a different theme. I also posted a couple of “How To Play” videos for two of my older songs. See the “Videos” section below…

So here we go…I’m going to start with local events in case you’re in the Rogue Valley and then proceed with the usual information about where to find my music, videos, and pictures, including information about new projects.

 

There is so much to listen to and watch on the net these days…I’m amazed anyone even gets this far in the newsletter let alone watches or listens to anything I’m doing. I’m sincerely grateful for every view, every listen, and every nice comment I receive. I’m happy if anything I post truly reaches even one person. I’m offering all this stuff in a “just in case you’re interested” spirit.

Upcoming Shows:

None! 

For more info about these and all of my shows, and to confirm that there have been no cancellations, click here: Calendar

Since I'm putting this newsletter out once a month, it's possible there may be a cancellation of a given show by the time it happens. Please double check with my web calendar if possible to be sure the gig is still happening. I'd hate to have you come out for nothing. Also another gig or two might be added or times or locations might change, so do check the calendar for the latest info.  

 

Recorded Music

All of my over 30 albums are available for downloading free or with a donation at my website: GeneBurnett.com

Videos In General

Overall Mission: I post a lot of videos on youtube, over 1000 so far! I'm not trying to build a fan base. In fact, I'm not trying to build anything. I'm not expecting you or anyone else to follow what I'm doing or watch all of these videos. Posting videos is just part of my overall plan to make my music (and my T’ai-Chi and Nature videos too) as freely available as possible and see what freely comes back. I think of each video as sort of like a message in a bottle...and more I toss out there the more likely one of them will land on a friendly shore and something good will come back to me.

A Note on Monetization: I won’t be able to monetize my videos on youtube anymore. Monetization seems to be an option youtube wants to reserve for bigger more ambitions channels. I’ve always had mixed feelings about having ads on my videos, so to some extent, this is actually a bit of a relief. On the other hand, it was nice to make a little money from my videos and nice to think of “views” as adding slightly to my income. But such is life. I’m happy to be rolling free and clear of ads. With the help of some savvy facebook friends, I was able to ad this paragraph to the descriptions on all of my videos at once:

I hope this video has been helpful to you or touched you in some way that leaves you a little better off for having watched it. This is not a big time channel and I have no plans for it to become one. I’m too small to have ads on my videos and I’ve always had mixed feelings about them anyway. If you would like to support and encourage what I do here, you can make a donation to me directly via paypal. No donation is too small, (or too big!) and all donations are very much appreciated. Paypal Me

So here are some video links in case you're interested:

How to Find My Videos: First of all, I've set up a Videos Page on my website with a menu similar to what you see below as well as a digital tip jar in case any of you want to contribute to my cottage industry. Every little bit helps and not just financially. 

I've also set up some blogs that make navigating and viewing my various videos much easier. You can go to any of these blogs and see thumbnails for all of the videos posted there. Scroll across the thumbnails and you will see the titles of each video. Click on it and a page will open that will let you watch the video right there without going to youtube. My latest videos are always in the upper left hand corner.

To see all of my Music videos in one easy to navigate place, click here: The Unforced Videos

To see all of my T'ai-Chi videos in one easy to navigate place, click here: The Unforced Movement

To see all of my Nature videos in one easy to navigate place, click here: The Unforced Nature

For a quick and easy way to sort through, listen to, or download all of my albums free or with a donation, click here: The Unforced Music

 

To see my regular blog “The Unforced Life”, click here: The Unforced Life

To visit my youtube channel and possibly subscribe, click here: My Youtube Channel

To see all of my youtube playlists click here: My Youtube Playlists 

To see a youtube playlist featuring all my Pandemic Open Mike sets and songs click here: Pandemic Open Mike Sets & Songs

And here are links to my individual album youtube playlists.

From The Temple To The Street
The Way Of All Things
Slow Down Fast
Thunder Moon
Love & Heartache
Better Off Broken
Crooked Love
Doubles Hitter
Already There
Why Start Now?
Where I Belong
Have A Wonderful Miserable Life
Too Busy To Worry
No Other Life
See No Evil
Brand New World
Up For Grabs
Flow More ~ Force Less
Undiscovered~Parts 1 & 2
Maybe Nothing’s Wrong~Parts 1 & 2
Without The Moon
Nothing’s Impossible Now
You Are Wrong
My Song Now
Terms Of Surrender~Parts 1 & 2
Undiscovered Country
Plan B
Where Will You Sleep Tonight?

New Videos

I’m going to do something a little different with this section of the newsletter. Rather than provide individual links to each video, I’m going list the titles to the videos followed by a link to a blog I’ve set up for that category of video. Just click on the link and you’ll go to either my Music videos blog, or my T’ai-Chi videos blog or my Nature videos blog. Once there you’ll see a wall of thumbnails. The ones in the upper left corner are the most recent posts. You’ll be able to scroll over any of these thumbnails. It will flip over and show you the title of that video. Click on it and you can watch that video without leaving the blog. This method is much less time-consuming for me and actually, I think, more convenient for you. It might sound complicated but it’s very easy. Give it a try.

6 new Music videos:

Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #25
Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #26
Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #27
Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #28

How To Play “Fuck The Sun”

How To Play “Busy Doing Nothing”

These and all my music videos are right here: The Unforced Videos

No new T’ai-Chi videos:

All my T’ai-Chi Videos are right here: The Unforced Movement

No new Nature videos:

All my Nature Videos are right here: The Unforced Nature

Pictures


I've stopped posting as many pictures on facebook, (for many reasons), and started posting them instead on Flickr, which I like much better.

Here's a link to my "home page" at Flicker: Photostream.

I have many photo galleries there but a few of my favorites are:

Small Miracles (mostly Nature related stuff)

The Dish Whisperer (I started posting a daily picture of my dish stacking work over a year ago. I recently crossed the 3000 straight days mark. I have no idea how long I’ll keep doing this. I’m so used to it, it hardly takes any effort at all to continue. I made a video for my song “I'll Do The Dishes Tonight” that featured a slideshow of the first year.

"Humor" 

"Me Playing Music"

Trippy Clouds

Hydras


Website

I continue to offer all of my albums for downloading, free or with a donation at my website: www.GeneBurnett.com I started doing this about 10 years ago and considered it a 5 year creative experiment. Well the 5 years passed and I decided to start calling it my "ongoing creative experiment" as I have no plans to stop. Since I returned to my folk roots and stopped climbing, or trying to climb, the industry ladder, I've been enjoying music in my life more than ever before. And enjoyment, rather than achievement or worldly success has always been dearest to my heart anyway. So now I focus totally on what I love most: writing, recording, performing and sharing what I create. If other people like it, so much the better, but getting other people to like me or what I do is no longer my goal or focus. I'm out to please myself first. I want to do my music exactly the way I want to do it and see who likes it that way, not figure out what people will like and try to do it that way. I put it out there freely and see what comes freely back. So far so good. I've never had more success and appreciation than I have since I started doing it this. Go figure. 

Thanks, as usual, for your support and well wishes even if you don't make to any shows.

GB

www.GeneBurnett.com