Uncategorized - Monica Schley

Harp Escape Vol. 1 & 2

Posted on September 2, 2019September 2, 2019

Harp Escape is an online place to relax. I began my monthly video series, Harp Escape, this Spring. Each video includes tunes intended to relax the listener, and bring a breath of calm into their environment. Because of the chronic stress, relentless noise and dousing of bad news our modern world exposes us to, life can be downright hopeless feeling some days. Therefore, it is essential for us to take breaks throughout the day and, as I like to say, floss your ears.

Happy Apple – The Daphnes
Harp Escape vol. 1

It is vital for our individual health to stay balanced, so that our communities and Earth can be healthy too. When we feel stress all the time, that stress becomes a homeostasis, or the state of normal being. Without any stress reducers, our bodies take on a “fight or flight” state, and we may never get out of that feeling of constant stress and overwhelm. Music is the oldest form of human communication, and sound is also one of the most basic forms of healing. It is with these sentiments that I bring you Harp Escape.

Seattle Harpist — The original Happy Apple

Volume 1 of Harp Escape is a song called Happy Apple. Originally, the inspiration for the piece came from a childhood toy of mine that my mother sent to me when I had my own child. The Fisher Price Happy Apple was a very popular chiming wobbly toddler thing of the 1970’s. Its sound was still pleasing to me decades later, so I wrote a song about it. In vol. 1 of Harp Escape, I slow the composition down and change it to an instrumental version. You can listen to The Daphnes recording of Happy Apple on our album Braids of Kabuya.

As a Certified Clinical Musician, I have studied how certain intervals, musical modes, and tempos can have a particularly soothing effect. I merge this ancient healing knowledge with my skills as a life-long musician and harpist of 25 years. As a songwriter and improviser, I bring relaxing arrangements of a variety of songs and styles for the intent of healing with Harp Escape. If you have any song requests, let me know!

Foggy Dew – trad. Irish
Harp Escape vol. 2

As a harpist, it is impossible to avoid playing Irish tunes! A harp is the national symbol of Ireland, after all. Vol. 2 of Harp Escape is Foggy Dew, the song of choice to teach my students this March for St. Patrick’s Day. Many of these old ballads can be short. So, I expanded Foggy Dew and wrote an additional melody in the relative major key of G. Interested in an arrangement? Just send me a message.

Motherhood v.s. Creative Time

Posted on May 10, 2019

Time is on my side, and yet it is my greatest challenge!

I am always on the lookout for how creative mothers make their way through the world – I don’t have any other day job; my work is based on writing and music and I have two young children.

There is a real need for artist mothers to share in their creative process in my opinion – for encouragement, creative tips, support, and just sharing how its done in a practical sense. The world doesn’t always make it easy for artist moms to continue on their journey once they’ve had a baby. The path suddenly gets very bumpy. The road bottoms out. You don’t know how to go on. I would read Dr. Seuss’s “Oh the Places You Go” to my daughter and think – Oh, this is real. This is exactly what I’m experiencing.

Seattle Harpist

When I had my daughter 8 years ago, I was really searching for some creative support written by and for someone like me. I didn’t find anything of the sort. Now I know of at least three podcasts: Rachel Zucker’s Commonplace; The Longest Shortest Time by Hilary Frank; and musician Laura Veirs’ Midnight Lightning. I still haven’t found any written material that deeply addresses how new mothers adjust their creative process and how to support it, which is not to say that it doesn’t exist. I just know I’d still like to read a book like that. However, when you are multi-tasking making dinner, a hands-free podcast is just the ticket! (and these three mentioned are great).

I used to have a more elaborate system of writing poetry and prose. I would handwrite in my journal, then transfer to a more refined notebook, then type it up, print it out, and workshop the writing. Since having children, I don’t have time to do practically any of that!

With a baby, I always feel like there’s a ticking timer at nap time. I try to squeeze in moments to write or practice, but I never know how long it will be. How long will my creative freedom last? If I start to record, will I be interrupted with a cry? Certainly, when kiddos are school-aged, time opens up. With more than one child, time must be blocked out with more commitment.

I create lists of how to prioritize. There is the weekly one and the daily list. For example today is – #1 practice music for gig tonight; #2 transcribe a piece for Sunday’s Mothers’ Day duet with pianist Josh Rawlings (that I can use for Harp Escape as well); #3 blast out my album to one agency; #4 write something. If I can do that much – that would be AMAZING! I always aim high. Sometimes only one thing gets accomplished, and if someone has a fever or a field trip, forget about it. I have to be real about the current daily situation of food, laundry, school lunch, diapers, etc. that I have.

When I had my first kiddo, I blended my writing and music together, sort of by accident. Once I stopped gigging late night shows, I began songwriting. The poetry morphed into lyrics instead. I had to become selective about what I said yes to. Would I take a club gig at 10pm? No way, not unless it paid well (ha ha ha). Eventually, people stopped asking me, but that’s ok. Because I changed.

I won’t lie. Sometimes I find myself lamenting over the artists who have more freedom than me. It takes so much time to polish a craft and I never feel like I have enough anymore. I don’t have a creative stuckness; I have a restriction. This is interesting though, because motherhood is also the blessing that allowed me to open up into a new form! When I stopped saying yes to all of the club gigs, I put my energy into songwriting. I started singing in public. I wrote enough songs to record an album. I formed a band (The Daphnes) and now I can be leader and call the shots to what fits my lifestyle. I probably wouldn’t have organized it all this way if it had not been for motherhood “restricting” me. Plus, it always seems like half of my songs are inspired in someway by the process of being mom. So – its a two-sided coin. A yin-yang.

I feel like its now or never these days, pretty much all the time. Its sort of Zen, but its also sort of desperate. I am very of the moment. After the baby boy fell asleep today, I checked my email and immediately blasted out a response which has turned into this blog post. It always feels so good to re-purpose something.

Being a musician mama means that I sometimes practice for 5 minutes with a squirming toddler in my lap, I cram in my own practice time between students, or I have to accept that I might be winging it at the gig a little more.

Its maddening! Its terrifying! Its exciting! Its the gift of a lifetime.

Music and Motherhood

We Did It

Posted on September 17, 2018

Last week, we finalized the CD production of Braids of Kabuya! With over 50 backers, we reached our Kickstarter goal. This is amazing. I have never done an art project like this in my life. The list of thank you’s is long and the gratitude I have for everyone who helped out is HUGE!

At the end of the week, we took care of last tweaks of the mastering, boosting bass here, adding reverb there… the final edits took longer than expected by a few days, but we are still right on target!

The Daphnes - Braids of Kabuya — The Daphnes – Braids of Kabuya

Oct. 1st a digital version of the album will be made available to you. Right now, I’m just waiting on some codes to be assigned to the songs for digital streaming and downloads, and then I will be posting the album up on CD Baby and Bandcamp (The Daphnes EP is up here for now). I will post the links here, at my Kickstarter page and on my website when they are available.

I will also be publishing a book of Braids of Kabuya lyrics with digital download of the album. I expect to receive the books mid-October. First, I publish the CD for duplication (check). Second, I send in the album for digital distribution (pending). Third, I publish the book (in current edit mode).

My self-imposed deadline is to have all this new material for Harp Seattle, Dusty Strings’ three day harp fest I’ll be presenting at Oct 5-7.

Autumn Harp News

Posted on September 26, 2017

Autumn is upon us! This summer was HOT and BUSY. Now, I’m taking time to SLOW DOWN and enjoy some of the work I did over the last few months.

For a review of this past spring/summer, I playing something like:
– 15 wedding ceremonies
– 7 public concerts
– 3 corporate parties
– 1 poetry reading
– 65 harp therapy sessions!
– Who knows how many hours in the recording studio working on The Daphnes album?

Speaking of which: THE DAPHNES ALBUM: BRAIDS OF KABUYA is currently being mixed and mastered!!!! I am SO VERY EXCITED to get this music into the ears of the people. We finished up recording this summer, and since WE are doing most of this work on a small budget (aka ourselves) … things move slowly… ALSO, I am 36weeks pregnant!!!

Current practice is that of humility. I thought I could pump out TWO BABIES this year: one album; one human. Between playing many shows and growing a person, my body has set some limitations… and here we are: mid-production. I feel more comfortable with no deadlines at the moment, but I will keep you posted… and as ever… I AM GRATEFUL FOR YOUR INTEREST AND SUPPORT!

Baby is due mid-October. Now, I am wrapping up all work and will be taking a maternity leave from Oct 1 – until December(ish). I may take a few last-minute holiday gigs… Feel free to ask me after Thanksgiving.

Lastly, I wanted to share some “freshie” songs with you:

These were recorded live by Haley Freelund at Couth Buzzard on July 28 (2017) for the posthumous book release event of my mentor and friend, Crysta Casey. She was a painter and poet – this particular HOT NIGHT brought together a LOVELY COMMUNITY. Disclaimer: You can hear fans running… it was sweltering! The ambient sounds will take you back to the heat of July/August.

A Month In Reverse

Posted on June 2, 2017June 2, 2017

No matter what my aspirations are, my blog continually only gets monthly posting. So, what have I been doing this past May? A month in the life of a mama musician looks something like this:

Friday – Played for hospice clients in North Seattle. Came home for lunch, did reports and corresponding before getting daughter from school. A lovely day, we took our time walking back home.
Thursday – Kind of a mix-up with childcare, but otherwise a very good day.
Wednesday – Great gig with my band, The Daphnes, at Stone Way Cafe. You can catch us there again on Fri. June 23 at 7pm.

Tuesday – My motivated high school student came at 8am for her lesson so she can get orchestra credit! Home cleaning and organizing, then teaching more students in the afternoon.
Monday – Memorial Day! Enjoyed a hot holiday off with my family at Folklife Festival and got to hear a few friends playing music.
Sunday – Not one, but TWO last minute gigs! I had gotten a call on Friday to play a wedding that another musician cancelled on. Then, at 7:30 am I got a call from a church choral leader in Ballard to sub on keyboard. I ended up doing both performances and had a fabulous, positively fun day. Also last minute: neighbor friends came over for dessert in the backyard.
Saturday – Very hot day. My kiddo was moving quite slowly and no one wanted to go to Folklife Festival that day with me, so we took a walk to Open Books on 45th where I got to nerd out about poetry with staff. Ice cream! Then, Jeppa, Eli and Lutra came over for a backyard picnic dinner.
Friday – Evening recording session for my album with awesome accordionist, Scott Adams!

Thursday – I have no idea what I did this day.
Wednesday – Wed. Sing! Nate Omdal and I play two sets of bass/harp duets for a cocktail party/art opening in Issaquah.
Tuesday – Played harp for hospice clients and taught students at home studio.
Monday – Went to Bellevue to play two client patient visits as therapeutic musician (one for Providence Hospice, another for Family Best Care)
Sunday – Flew a butterfly-shaped kite with the family at Gasworks Park. A solo eagle soared with it! Mostly a day off, then recorded violin tracks with Julie in the evening.
Saturday – Violin/Harp duets with Janet for a wedding on the MV Skansonia Ferry after going to the 125th Anniversary Carnival for BF Day Elementary School (Seattle’s oldest school) and teaching a morning lesson at Dusty Strings.

Friday – Content writing and editing for the new Musicians’ Union website.
Thursday – Played a terrific concert at The Neptune Theater with Evan Flory-Barnes’ large ensemble. I love his projects.

Wednesday – I slept so poorly the night before and had insomnia. I felt like a zombie most of the day, but did some parent volunteering at my daughter’s school anyway, met with her teacher and did some teaching of my own at home studio.
Tuesday – Teaching. Parenting. Rehearsing at Cornish for the Thursday concert.
Monday – Writers In The Schools (WITS) is a wonderful program through Seattle Public Schools. My daughter has learned how to read and write poetry from talented professionals and tonight was the end of year K-3 poetry reading, which couldn’t have been more adorably heartwarming.
Sunday – Mother’s Day. I got some new stylin’ sunglasses because a particular young person always breaks mine.
Saturday – Gamelan Pacific Concert at The Chapel. A positively uplifting event, listening to Indonesian music and featuring a tribute to composer Lou Harrison.
Friday – I had a funeral to play for one of my past hospice clients, at a Catholic ceremony in Bellevue.
Thursday – Chaperoned for my kindergartener’s field trip to Seward Park. It started raining when we got there and never stopped.
Wednesday – Morning hospice clients and afternoon harp students.
Tuesday – Rehearsal with Janet on violin for wedding in a week, picked up my kiddo from school and came straight home to teach students.
Monday – Office day. I usually start off the week with a chunk of time corresponding from the home office, scheduling, and decompressing from weekend gigs.
Sunday – Harp Recital Day! Hosted my first ever harp recital for students with great success.

Saturday – A nice hot spring day. Took daughter to a birthday party. I tried to practice but felt so distracted. A semi-productive day.
Friday – After working on various projects from home, went with the family to a friend’s art opening in Columbia City and I also picked up some money from my last gig at Columbia City Theater.
Thursday – Doctor’s appointment in the morning, and in between parent pick up at school, I taught five students at Dusty Strings.