The Unforced Life: July 2021

Saturday, July 31, 2021

August News

From Gene Burnett

My latest album “By Ear~20 Songs From 2020”, 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 at many e-retailers of music as well as Spotify. I’m really happy with this batch of songs and I hope you’ll visit my site and check out a few. I also made videos for all of the songs. Here’s a link to a youtube playlist with all of them: By Ear~20 Songs From 2020 Youtube Playlist

Not much to report this month. Life goes on. We lost our musical friend Steven Lindley and had a beautiful memorial to him under a huge oak tree in the park. We sang, cried, told stories, and reconnected. Then, a little more than a week later, a freak wind storm blew that tree down. It was one of favorite trees in the world, just as Lindley was one of my favorite people. Life goes on.

We’re having a hot dry summer but I seem to have found something that really helps me deal with the heat: cranberry juice. Discovered this by accident but it’s really working for me. I get “Just Cranberry” juice, pour about an inch into a tumbler, add a little sweetener (or not), and fill the rest with water. I drink one or two of those a day and the heat is much easier to take. Not sure why but I don’t care. Nothing else I’ve ever tried has had any effect whatsoever.

On July 7^th, I turned 64. Whoa. I’ve been upping my pull-up max to 8 from 7 lately. I wanted to do 8 on my birthday. The square root of my age. I was doing it but the eighth one was always a little dicey. When my birthday came, I took the day off the previous day so my arms would be fresh for the big event. I ended up doing 9! But in keeping with my no-strain, don’t overdo it policy, I’m just working on doing sets of 8 now. Maybe 9 can become my new normal next birthday.

Meanwhile, I posted another ton of videos to youtube this month.

As usual, I have been really enjoying recording videos for our “Virtual Sunday Night Open Mikes”. I posted another 3 of them, each with a different theme. We had to skip one week in there, otherwise I would have done 4.

I also posted 2 virtual open mike sets for Southern Oregon Songwriters Association (SOSA).

I posted another songwriting tip bringing my total up to 13.

I posted a two part video tribute to my buddy Steven Lindley who passed away in July.

I also posted 2 cover song videos: “Free Fallin’” by Tom Petty and “Jungle Love” by Steve Winwood.

I posted one Nature video of the fallen oak tree in Lithia Park.

And I posted 5 new T’ai-Chi videos as well including my 64^th birthday pull-ups.

For links to all of these and more, 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 2000 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.

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 And Songs

And here are links to my individual album youtube playlists.

By Ear~20 Songs From 2020
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.

10 new Music videos:

Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #68
Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #69
Pandemic Sunday Night Virtual Open Mike #70

SOSA ZOOM Open Mic#11
SOSA ZOOM Open Mic#12

Free Fallin’ (Tom Petty Cover)

Jungle Love (Steve Miller Cover)

Songwriting Tip #13

Steven Lindley Tribute~Part One
Steven Lindley Tribute~Part Two

For a youtube playlist of all 13 of my songwriting tips, click here: Songwriting Tips Youtube Playlist

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

5 new T’ai-Chi videos:

64^th Birthday Pull-ups
Power In The Right Spot
The T’ai-Chi Of Uphill Biking
Embody Your Principles In Physical Practice
The Mossy Wall Concept

These and all my T’ai-Chi Videos are right here: The Unforced Movement

1 new Nature video:

Fallen Oak

This and all my past 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 "Albums" page at Flicker: Albums

I have many photo albums 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.

 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!

www.GeneBurnett.com

Saturday, July 3, 2021

July News

From Gene Burnett

It’s looking like live music is finally coming back to venues around the Rogue Valley and while I’m very happy for all my musician friends who’ve had a tough year not being able to play out much, when I see video clips of them playing in various non-listening environments like coffeehouses, parking lots, bars and wineries, I find I have zero interest in joining them. It’s not a judgment or a feeling that I’m “better” than those gigs. I’ve played and enjoyed them for many years. I just don’t feel like doing that anymore. It’s a lot of work to actually reach very few people. I reach the same small number of people online, maybe more, but it’s much more fun and takes a lot less time and energy. So yeah, I think I’m done playing those kinds of gigs which might equate to not playing out anymore. I’m OK with that as long as I can make my youtube videos. And of course, if anything comes along that’s better suited to what I do, I will do it.

I have been writing quite a bit. I’m about 15 songs into my next album project which I’m hoping to record in the fall. The weather has been pretty hot here lately, but nothing I’m not used to from over 20 years living in Southern Oregon. We are, like much of the west coast in the middle of a drought, and that is more worrisome. After our catastrophic wildfires last summer, people are getting nervous about how dry it is out there. There are already a few fires in our general area and we’re starting to get a little smoke from those. We will see how it all shapes up.

Meanwhile, I posted another ton of videos to youtube this month.

As usual, I have been really enjoying recording videos for our “Virtual Sunday Night Open Mikes”. I posted another 4 of them, each with a different theme.

I also posted 2 virtual open mike sets for Southern Oregon Songwriters Association (SOSA).

Bob Dylan turned 80 last month and I decided to post a series of songwriting tips. I ended up with 12 of them and I’ll likely post more as they occur to me.

I also posted 2 cover song videos: “Roll Me Up And Smoke Me When I Die” by Willie Nelson, and ” and “Back In The High Life Again” by Steve Winwood.

And I posted 5 new T’ai-Chi videos as well.

For links to all of these and more, see the Videos section below…

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

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

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