From Patty: Hey y’all, if you ever needed more proof (as if you would!) that Bob is “All About Women”, here it is! He’s been featured in “All About Women”, a regional magazine here in western NC. And yeah, they talked about me a little bit too. Read the article on page 14 at http://issuu.com/mtimes/docs/aawjune2013/13?e=1079716/3347233. Thanks to Sherrie Norris for a great article! Don’t forget to click “Events” to check out our calendar. Hope to see you at a show soon!

We’re working on a music project as usual, and we want to learn a song for each of the 50 states. We are not looking for an official state song, unless it happens to be a really cool one like Tennessee’s “Rocky Top” – instead, we want interesting songs that represent/mention a state. They may be obvious (John Denver’s “Take Me Home Country Roads” for West Virginia) or subtle (Dan Fogelberg’s “Run for the Roses” for Kentucky). So put on your thinking caps and send some ideas our way! Thanks for your help! Here are the states that need song ideas: Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Idaho, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin, & Wyoming.

Sound Traveler hits the road this week for Gainesville, Savannah, and North Carolina. We will be in our mountain home for about four months, breathing mountain air and playing mountain music. In preparation for our trip north, we’ve played dozens of shows in Brevard County, Florida. Many of these shows have been for familiar groups who are not only audiences but increasingly close friends. We’ve sung together, laughed together, and wished each other protection from harm until we meet again. We love going on the road, but we love our Florida home as well. We have played for so many strangers who then became acquaintances, and finally have become more like a part of our family. I especially remember something said by a dear older lady who just recently passed from this life. On the final day we sang together [...]

It started out to be a fairly typical workday for Sound Traveler: a senior facility in the morning, a lunch break, spare time at the library to work on promotion, and an afternoon show for another regular client. As we were packing after the show, the day shifted from something ordinary to extraordinary. The activity director, an energetic force of nature, quietly approached us to ask a favor. She said that one of her angels was preparing to go home to heaven very soon, and she wondered if we were willing to visit Doris’ room to play a couple of songs to ease her journey. As we entered her room, we found Doris in bed surrounded by her family who knew her time to go was rapidly approaching. The activity director took her angel’s hand as we started to sing [...]

We filed our federal income tax recently, and it turns out we owed a sizable chunk of change. Rather than being bummed, I actually smiled. It seems that Sound Traveler is doing one of the things it needs to do — make money. When you make money, you pay taxes. When you’re out of a job – you don’t. I have played music almost all of my life. I’ve played for family, friends, parties, schools, churches, and the occasional restaurant. Over the years I have made a considerable amount of money performing music — plenty to pay for musical expenses and basic musical equipment. But this past year, music became our full-time business. Now the money we make from music is the same money we use to buy groceries, put gas in the car, and go on vacations. It’s terrific [...]

Here are some recent Facebook posts to share. We encourage you to visit our Facebook page (Sound Traveler Band) so you can see the accompanying photos. While you’re there, “like” us so you can follow Sound Traveler wherever we go! 3.31.13: Sound Traveler: Parked in Paradise! Why do we love Cape Canaveral so much? Because where else can you stroll across the grounds to a friend’s retirement party, walk to an oceanside Easter sunrise service, and bike down the beach to the East Coast Dog Surfing Championship, all without reaching for the car keys? When you put as many miles on the car as we do, staying parked for a few days is a luxury. But don’t worry – come Wednesday, we’ll be all over Brevard County doing what we do best, Sound Travelin’. Happy Easter! 3.26.13: Today, during Sound [...]

Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans… Even with a carefully-organized schedule, no matter what a person may have planned to be doing at any given time, it’s impossible to know with certainty if those plans will actually transpire. Situations change, priorities shift, and the world takes us wherever we need to go when we need to go there. Take today, for instance. “Officially” right now we should be in Gainesville on our lunch break between senior home shows. Instead we’re at an entirely different kind of performance. The stage is Room 326 at St. Joseph’s Candler Hospital in Savannah, GA. Bob is the solo performer, softly playing beautiful arrangements on his acoustic guitar. His mother, Teresa, is the audience. His sister, Karen, is lovingly massaging her mother’s 90-year-old feet. I am doing something I rarely take [...]

I see him out the corner of my eye as he inches toward me. He probably once stood nearly six feet tall, but now his stooped, scarecrow-thin figure hardly rises to five. It’s next to impossible to guess his age. His slicked-back hair is dark, but his general feebleness suggests advanced years – an impression reinforced by his halting speech as he addresses me: “I usually sit in with the band when they come and play here. I play spoons. I once played spoons for the Royal Family in England. If you wait just a moment, I’ll go get my spoons.” I hesitate for just a moment, not knowing exactly how to respond to this unusual proposal. Others in the room, a gathering room in an assisted-living facility, jovially deride him. One of them quips, “Well, don’t go back to [...]

You couldn’t get a nicer night – at any time of the year. It was our gig – Sound Traveler playing The Avenue Viera’s Central Park on January 11. The temp rested around 70 degrees, the park was teeming with people, and we were just leaning back, playing music, and having fun. This would make our third performance of the day, but this was the one we had been waiting for. We didn’t have to hold anything back. It couldn’t have been scripted better. Then the water exploded in a sudden burst. Our covered stage protected us from rain, yet water seemingly emanated from every direction. First water, under pressure, entered from the back of the stage, then the sides, then the front. In mid-song, we screeched (literally) to a sudden stop. Only then did we fully realize what had [...]

The audience makes all the difference in the world. Bob & I have the unparalleled opportunity to travel around, do what we love, and get paid for it. No matter what situation we find ourselves in, be it a freezing cold outdoor show, a venue where the turnout wasn’t quite what was expected, or a struggle with something unforeseen such as laryngitis, we manage to make the best of things and have a good time. Something Bob says at most every show is this: “We would play these songs to an empty room. We’ve done it before and will most likely do it again. But having you here makes all the difference in the world. Thank you for sharing these songs that we love with us today.” And he’s right. After all, we all have only 24 hours a day [...]