Life and music in Maine

What’s happened this past year and more (it’s been a while since my last post)? What a time it’s been. It’s been busy and I haven’t written – but I can offer lots of photos (all the good ones taken by my wife Kim!) Here’s the photo recap. If you remember my last missive from quite a long while ago – even while continuing to be involved in music – I found myself elected as a local official in my coastal Maine town and now I’ve been serving as a Selectperson on our Select Board (in other places known as the City Council) for the past year and a half. My office: It’s an amazing job, very intensive and demanding but incredibly rewarding. Quickly counting – in the last couple years – I’ve had way over 500 meetings of all sorts – board meetings, committee meetings, individual meetings as well as working on researching the issues, town paperwork, phone calls / emails etc.. But that’s not what I’m here to write about. Let’s get to the photos. We do a lot of interesting things in Maine. I find so many of my long time Los Angeles friends keep asking – “Where is it you live again?” “How cold is it?” “When are you coming back?” But I’m slowly winning them over with photos. Cold? It’s a state of mind. Last winter we drove 45 minutes to Augusta to a movie theatre (our favorite place for films) to see a movie. (Of course that’s way shorter in time than the drive in Los Angeles to go to a theater much closer). Nice balmy weather for us: We do have other winter fun. Clearing snow is my winter exercise program: Even more fun with a shovel on the deck where you can’t bring the snowblower: This of course is a view I get very often – my son loves to throw snowballs at me: But the big fun is the US National Toboggan Championships which are held in Camden every winter. Camden has a challenge race with the Select Board in Rockport (our next door neighbor town) every year and now that I’m on the Select Board I’m one of the team members. Here’s the scoop – a thin wooden structure with a solid ice track – what seems like an hour is only 9 seconds of terror – going in excess of 30 mph – I’m on the sled with three other team members: And we took the trophy this year for the second year in a row – by 1 / 100th of a second! I know it’s weird to some – but my wife and I love winter. There’s nothing better than a snowshoe in the mountains right near the house: Ice on the car windshield after an ice storm can be a bit of a nuisance – but it’s beautiful: As is winter on the house windows: And snowmen seem to pop up in our yard every year: Now we somehow manage to occupy ourselves waiting for winter every year doing other various things. We love our favorite New Orleans coffee – even while camping! That goes along with our morning hash breakfast cooked on the Coleman stove (we gain weight when we go camping): One strange thing in Maine as opposed to California – people actually swim in water that’s not in a concrete rectangle: People also kayak in the real big pond called the “Atlantic”: In the fall gotta stop by the Union County Fair: Another excuse to see fireworks: Funny the trees get all colorful for some reason in autumn: Pretty as they are – the leaves do tend to fall on the ground – nice thing about living in the country in Maine – I just somehow forget where my rake is: That time of year people do weird things with pumpkins: We do travel a bit…..we were at the Science demonstration on Boston Common last year and this young lady hit the nail on the head. There’s important and there’s important!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! As always we drive for music – two of the highlights in the last year. “Sunday Bloody Sunday”: Mr. Ed: And with a 12 year old in the family we’re on top of what’s really important. If you don’t know Dan TDM – you don’t know anything. We had to go to that concert: But perhaps my favorite band comes every year when winter returns: Soon it’ll be time to take them out of their summer storage again! In between all the fun I do lots of reading and read one of my favorite books ever this year – can’t recommend it enough: And oh yeah I keep listening to lots of music looking for artists that are very special. Let’s talk for a moment about music recommendations. When I was single in Los Angeles I just wasn’t a fan of casual dating. I either wanted to spend a lot of time with someone or none at all. So I was single a lot of the time. My friends would start to worry about me. So they’d set me up on a blind date. I would say “Why? You know I’m weird – I don’t like dating – I’d rather be by myself.” They would say “She’s perfect for you – we know how you are and she’s perfect!” Two minutes in to the date I’d think “My friends hate me”. Music recommendations are much like blind dates. Always somewhere between horrible and terrible. A local friend emailed me last year and said –“ I heard these brothers and I like their music more than anything else I’ve heard in years. You should listen to them”. I said “ok”. And never did. Until she bugged me again. So I listened expecting a “blind date” experience. That’s not what I got. Two brothers from rural Maine Sean the older – guitar, harmonica, ukulele, songs, lyrics, lead vocals, businessman, muse. Jamie the younger – guitar, bass (both kinds), piano, drums, mandolin, banjo, fiddle, whistle, flute, electronics, songs, vocals, recording, video production You’ll see them performing in concert & at music festivals all over – including Blissfest, Lake Eden Arts Festival, Grand Lake Stream, Sweet Chariot Festival, Atlanta Dance Weekend, The Portland Raindance, Foggy Moon Dance weekend etc. Coming soon a very exciting winter tour throughout New England with some great sponsorship! They write all the songs, play all the instruments, do all the recording and make their own videos. They do it all themselves. The more I listened and watched the more amazed I was. Here’s a simple way to hear the Oshima Brothers. Videos on YouTube (remember everything you see they did themselves) – we’ve just started building an audience for them. Here are three examples “Online” (How many brothers are there? Two. How many in the video – a lot more – how did they do that?) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Gr8T1fU8fs “The Way It Goes” – Life on the road in rural Maine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33Z8lGDfrlo “Wild Caves” – Written about a friend who’s love was 10,000 miles away – halfway across the world (and filmed at 5am in the morning) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pdeIhO3Msk There are more videos at their YouTube Oshima Brothers channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOrUVb5ASpY_mD3QdMULNmg Marc PS – Wanna hear some advance tracks from the new Barnaby Bright album? Check out “Who I Am” and “Wave My Flag”: https://soundcloud.com/misharamusic/sets/barnaby-bright-2018/s-DzUtI Marc Ratner Mishara Music Website: www.misharamusic.com WordPress: www.marcrescue.wordpress.com Facebook: www.facebook.com/misharamusicLLC