Mayra Calvani's Blog - Posts Tagged "music"

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Dare to follow your dreams!

Dare to be yourself!

Dare to be free!

This is the premise of Liesel Soley's inspiring children's picture book, Can You Be an Artist?

Freddie, Honey and Bae are so different culturally speaking, yet they're so alike at the same time. They all have one thing in common: they have a big dream and they believe in making that dream a reality. Freddie wants to become a violinist. He sees himself playing in a string quartet and starts practicing everyday. Honey wants to become a painter. She sees her paintings in other people's homes and begins to experiement with colored pencils and oil paints. Bae wants to become a dancer. He sees himself dancing in his home country and starts taking dance lessons. As they channel their creative energies, their behavior and work at school begin to excel.

Can You Be an Artist? is a celebration of dreams and the arts. Using an engaging, simple prose and without preaching, the author presents snapshots of Freddie's, Honey's and Bae's lives to encourage young minds to have dreams and goals and to take the steps to make those dreams come true. The book is an invitation into the world of the arts. The adorable illustrations, done in colored pencils, are filled with detail and depict beautiful scenes both indoors and outdoors. I especially loved the illustrations of flowers, gardens, animals, trees and the seasons.

This is a wonderful book that introduces children to the arts and unleashes their creativity. Especially if your child already has expressed an interest in playing an instrument, painting or dancing, this book will give them an invaluable proactive message: dreams don't become a reality by themselves; it's vital to work and practice in order to grow as an artist.

Liesel Soley is a professional violinist, a music instructor, and also an artist. You can check out her website at www.lieselsoley.com. This is her first children's book.

Liesel Soley, a graduate of the Juilliard School of Music and Fulbright scholar in Paris, France, is a professional violinist. Soley has performed solo recitals in the U.S. and France and was the violinist in the piano trio, Trio Viva. She has taught violin at the Manhattan School of Music in New York City and violin and viola at St. Petersburg College and the Pinellas County Center for the Arts in St.Petersburg, Florida.

Presently, Liesel Soley shares her love for music with children, as well as adults in Clearwater, Florida where she teaches violin, viola, and chamber music privately and in an after-school program at Shorecrest Preparatory School in St. Petersburg.

Soley has found a welcome relief from the very disciplined, intensive, and time-consuming work with the violin in her other artistic means of expression; writing, painting and drawing.

Congratulations on the publication of your children’s book, Can You Be an Artist? What got you into writing?

My first writing was when I was in Paris on a Fulbright Grant. I was struggling with the violin and life, and one day when it was very difficult to approach the violin, I just started to write some poetry with no expectations or standards to meet. This took place over a period of about two weeks. It was a kind of a relief and my morale went way up. The poems remained in my violin case for 44 years! I couldn't quite throw them away.

Then several years ago my family requested I send them personal things I had created which resulted in putting together CDs of some of my solo violin and piano trio performances, a book of my paintings, and Yes! - those poems mentioned above along with some very short stories I wrote up about playing violin in the streets which I had been telling for years! Yes, even though I am a Juilliard graduate, I have hit the streets and had some interesting and fun experiences in the streets of New York, London, and Paris! Some of my friends look aghast at some of the things I do. I just laugh!

So, this brings me to the children's book I just completed. During the summer some of my students disappear, going to camps and on vacation, so it was either do something creative or sit around and mope because of a lack of work.
"Can YOU Be an Artist?" came into being!

What was your inspiration for Can You Be an Artist?

Working with my violin students and seeing total transformations take place, sometimes quickly and sometimes over a period of years.The violin is extremely challenging and it takes tremendous discipline and persistence to play well. To see the confidence, the self-esteem, the growth of students developing as a result of participating in the arts is rewarding and exciting. Taking part in orchestras, recitals, and competitions can give such a sense of accomplishment to these youngsters. Although I have mostly seen this as a musician, I know that students in all the arts tend to excel in other areas as well, such as in school. Individuals who express themselves through the arts, who create, are happier and more successful. I know this with absolute certainty and wanted to express this.

What message you hope readers will get from your book?

As indicated in my authors note, one can create in many ways, "--- If one truly creates beauty and quality in what one does and if this translates to others one is actively being an artist."

Also - Dare To Follow Your Dreams! Dare To Be Yourself! Dare to Be Free!!

Tell us about what your writing process was like for this book. Did you outline it first? Did you edit it as you went along?

The structure, using the three different art forms and the three kids just popped up. I mocked it up very quickly. As I have a number of Korean students I wanted one of the kids to be Korean. Each child was very real to me. Because I was able to be Freddie, or Honey, or Bae it was easy to write their feelings, about their families etc. Using the first person for them seemed very natural.The few word changes or added took place after the writing was done as a whole.

You also illustrated the book. Give us a glimpse into the mind of the author/illustrator persona? Did you write the story first and later illustrate it?

The writing was done first although I had illustrations in mind. There was an original mock-up of the book with far fewer illustrations than in the completed published book. A number of people had commented that there were too few illustrations, too many words per page, that the colors were weak and there were not enough details for kids. I agreed, so the next summer (2010) I decided to handle the things that were not ok and complete the book.

It was very difficult for me. I added 12 more drawings and totally changed all the existing ones except for 2, and even those I had to do all over because the paper was different!

I would lie awake at night mocking up the next illustration - hardly slept for 2 months. I was excited and determined to finish within two months before the school season started. The work was intense. I mocked up the illustrations easily but when it came to the execution of the drawings in terms of enough color it drove me nuts. I would create the drawing rather quickly then invariably at a certain point I would have exactly what I wanted but not enough color and I would stop and move on to the next illustration! I did not have the certainty and courage to do full color right off! I was afraid I would mess up on those tiny little lines or dots or whatever, like with expressions on faces, and that I would have to do the whole picture over again!

O Man, I ended up going over these illustrations three times - the entire picture 3 times - each time adding another layer of color, each time in more agony than the previous time! It was awful! I was an idiot!

I am laughing at the whole experience. Not being trained in painting, drawing, or illustrating, this was more than a learning experience! It was literally painful! I was doing these drawings leaning over the dining room table with a lot of weight on my left arm and hand pressing down on the table while I meticulously (and gingerly!) proceeded to work with my right hand. A little before the end of the 2 months I felt like a cripple! I could not play the violin for over 2 weeks! Next time it is full color on the first shot!!! and with a decent set up!

What made you decide to publish your book with Book Publishers Network?

I had used a POD place for the book of my paintings and although I was very happy with the results it was a lot of keeping at it to get exactly what I wanted. For my book with the poems and short stories about playing in the streets I used Apple. It was nice - but expensive.

I wanted a publisher that had a team of experts, someone with whom I could communicate easily and someone who would get the job done quickly. Sheryn Hara with Book publishers Network had been recommended by an author/illustrator acquaintance as being very good for first time authors with plenty of experience and expertise and she really cared for her authors. She sent me samples of children's books which I really liked. She was exactly what I wanted. She was hooked up with a fine printer so my book was completed!

Also, I wanted a wider audience for this book- not just family and friends.

What was the publishing process like?

Things moved along very well. Sometimes there would be suggestions but my needs and wants as an artist were totally respected. It was suggested I use some kind of border around the pictures and a number were shown to me but I really did not want that and that was totally accepted. I groaned when Sheryn Hara said the cover of the book which I had done needed to be jazzed up. I told her I did not want anyone else doing any of the art work. She immediately said none of the art work would be disturbed - just the background would be made more alive. I was sent a number of possibilities and love the one I chose. I find it very aesthetic and am glad my publisher pushed me in that respect.

I was glad not one word of my writing was changed. There would have been a fight if changes had been wanted. Punctuation had to be handled! No problem! Book Publishers Network is hooked up with a fine printer and the book was completed!

What is your schedule like? How do you balance your violinist, music instructor, artist, and writer personas?

At this time in my life I am primarily teaching violin, viola and chamber music, but my involvement in my other arts has increased considerably! I teach privately at my home 7 days a week and 3 afternoons in an after school program at Shorecrest . There are music teachers meetings to attend, and recitals and competitions to arrange. Add to that violin presentations and now book signings and work on PR. I also have arranged to have some of my young students perform at book stores and libraries where I have book signings. Things are busy! The short answer to your question is - I am very focused on what I am doing at any given moment, and I work hard 7 days a week. I thrive on lots of fast action!

Do you have tips for unleashing and nurturing one’s creativity?

Sure - find something you have really wanted to do and START! Be true to yourself, maintain your integrity and do not let others throw you. Go at your own pace, keep it light and have FUN! If it is not always fun -well, so what!

Are you working on another book? What’s on the horizon for you?

Not at the moment, but I have a couple in mind. I am not setting a timetable. I have a way of doing things spontaneously at the right time for me. The future looks interesting, challenging and fun. And there are definitely unknowns! I like it that way.

Is there anything else you’d like to tell readers?

Yes, I would love to hear from you - to know if my book has inspired you or your children or your grandchildren. Also, I would be delighted to have you visit my web site and be in communication with me.

Jane Tesh is a retired media specialist and pianist for the Andy Griffith Playhouse in Mt. Airy, NC, the real Mayberry. She is the author of the Madeline Maclin Series, A Case of Imagination, A Hard Bargain, A Little Learning, and A Bad Reputation, featuring former beauty queen, Madeline “Mac” Maclin and her con man husband, Jerry Fairweather.  Stolen Hearts is the first in the Grace Street Mystery Series, featuring  PI David Randall, his psychic friend, Camden, Randall’s love interest, Kary Ingram, and Cam’s career-driven girlfriend, Ellin Belton, as well as an ever-changing assortment of Cam’s tenants.  Mixed Signals is the second in the series, followed by Now You See It and Just You Wait. Jane’s mysteries are all published by Poisoned Pen Press, located in Scottsdale, Arizona. Butterfly Waltz is her first published fantasy novel from Silver Leaf Books. All of Jane’s books are on the light side with humor and romance.

Connect on the web:

https://www.facebook.com/GraceStreetMysterySeries

https://twitter.com/janetesh

http://www.janetesh.com/fantasy.html

What’s inside the mind of a fantasy author?

An amazing amount of “What if?”  What if flowers could talk?  What if an evil creature wants to be good?  I explore these in Butterfly Waltz, but there are many more what ifs out there. 

What is so great about being an author?

You can’t control your real life, what will happen, what people do or say, but you are in complete control of your fantasy world.

When do you hate it?

I can’t think of a single time when I hate it.

What is a regular writing day like for you? Be honest!

I get up at 6:30 and go for a walk in my neighborhood.  Around 8, I get to work in my office and work until 11:30 or 12.  Then I have lunch and spend some time with my Chihuahua, Pearl, until  1.  From 1 until 3 I work some more and then I stop.  If a story is going really well, I might work on it after supper.  I look forward to being in my office.  I don’t have a phone down there, and I disconnected the door bell, so it’s nice and quiet.  Occasionally, Pearl will sit in my lap while I type.

Do you think authors have big egos? Do you? How do you know?

Hmm, well, I think authors have to believe in themselves and their work or they’d never get anywhere.  I’d say I have a reasonable ego, especially now that I’ve been published.  It’s given me the confidence to continue my writing career.

How do you handle negative reviews?

I try not to read any reviews.  Everyone has an opinion, and I can’t make people like my work, so it’s better just to chug ahead and not read good or bad reviews.

What is the usual response when you tell a new acquaintance that you’re an author?

People never fail to say one of two things, either, “Oh, I’ve always wanted to write a book,” or “My cousin/nephew/uncle/whatever has written a book about our family history/his experiences as a button collector/her life as a mountain midwife.”  Stuff like that.  Every time.

What do you do on those days you don’t feel like writing? Do you force it or take a break?

I’m usually working on several stories, so if one isn’t working, I switch to another.  If the well is dry that day, I don’t force it.  I do something different like mow the lawn or play the piano.

Any writing quirks?

As my editor loves to remind me, I use too many “just,” “some,” “well,” and “I knew.”  I’m always rooting those out.

Have you worked on your novel intoxicated? What was the result?

Nope, not a drinker.

What would you do if people around you didn’t take your writing seriously or see it as a hobby?

I’m going to write no matter what, so people can think whatever they like.  I’m okay with that.

Some authors seem to have a love-hate relationship to writing. Can you relate? 

I’ve always loved it.

Do you think success as an author must be linked to money?

The thrill of opening a box of my latest books, seeing my work in a form I can hold and put on a shelf is worth more to me than any amount of money.  I get paid royalties, but even if I didn’t, I would still write because it’s so much a part of me.

What had writing taught you?

No one takes your work as seriously as you do, so lighten up a little.

Leave us with some words of wisdom.

My favorite author, Terry Pratchett, says, “The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.”

Don’t worry about making it perfect.  No matter how rough it is, it can be fixed.  And a writer must have persistence.  It took me a very long time to get published, but I never gave up.

 

Joan Schweighardt is the author of River Aria , which is both a standalone novel and the third book in a trilogy, as well as other novels, nonfiction titles, and children’s books. She is also a freelance writer and ghostwriter. Currently touring the blogosphere, she’s here today to discuss her novel, her series, the themes in her work, and her research conducted in South America. Visit her at www.joanschweighardt.com

Thanks for chatting with us today, Joan! What drew you to write a historical series partly set in the rainforests of Brazil? What attracted you about this setting and time period?

A decade ago, a publisher hired me to speedread some of their backlist books and write short descriptions for their website. One of the books was a slim and heavily annotated true story based on the edited diaries of a rubber tapper working in the Brazilian rainforest in the early 20th century. At the time I knew nothing about rubber tapping. I found the information fascinating, not only the tapping process but also the impact the industry had on Manaus, Brazil, the sleepy fishing village which became its headquarters. And having been a devotee of jungle stories since childhood, I loved reading about the beauty and dangers of the rainforest. I began to imagine writing my own rubber-tapping-in-the-rainforest story.

I visited the rainforest for the first time soon after, specifically to travel to the territories of the Achuar people on the Pastaza River in Ecuador with a small group that included environmentalists, sustainability enthusiasts, and guides and translators. It was a transformative experience, and by the time I came home, I was ready to start doing the research my story would require. When I finished my first good draft of what would eventually become the first book in a “rivers” trilogy, I returned to South America, this time to visit the city of Manaus and to travel on the Amazon and Rio Negro with a guide to see, among other things, rubber trees.

In a nutshell, can you tell us a bit about your series as a whole and the overarching arc across the different books?

Collectively the three books cover the years 1908 to 1929 and concern two different groups of people: an Irish American contingent living in New York and New Jersey and an Amerindian/European contingent from Manaus, Brazil. Book one, entitled Before We Died, begins with the two Irish American brothers leaving New Jersey because they have heard that rubber tappers in South America are making a lot of money, and they want to try their hand at it. The results of their effort are tragic, and when one of the brothers returns home without his sibling, relationships among the Irish American contingent must bend and shift accordingly, which happens over the course of the second book, Gifts for the Dead. In book three, River Aria, a young woman—the product of an affair one of the brothers had back in book one—travels to New York with a companion in the hope of finding success in the world of opera.

Let’s talk about the 3rd and latest book in the series, River Aria. Why the title?

As noted above, the South American rubber boom is the jumping off point for all three books in the trilogy. And central to the rubber boom—a symbol of both its short-lived success and its ultimate failure—is the Teatro Amazonas, the grand opera house built by wealthy rubber barons who hoped to attract world-class performers to Manaus. But the boom came to an abrupt end in 1912, and the Teatro Amazonas was basically locked up and went unused for many years.



That’s the actual history. In my novel, I took the liberty of making some changes: namely, a European voice instructor arrives in Manaus post boom, and seeing that everything is falling into a state of decrepitude, decides that he will use his remaining years to teach opera to a handful of “river brats” who would otherwise have virtually no education at all. Local dignitaries allow him to use the grand lobby of the Teatro Amazonas for his lessons. Estela, who narrates River Aria, is one his students. Her dramatic story connects the two great rivers in the novel, the Amazon and the Hudson. Since she is a singer of arias, and since arias are by definition extended songs sung by one voice, and usually very theatrical, River Aria seemed like the perfect title.

There’s quite an array of interesting characters in your novel. Which character was most challenging to write? Which one surprised you the most?

JoJo, Estela’s “cousin,” was both challenging and a complete surprise, literally, because he wasn’t supposed to have much of a role in River Aria . He is a baby in Before We Died, the first book in the series, and he is mentioned in passing in the second book, Gifts for the Dead. I didn’t plan to do more than mention him again in River Aria either. But then a friend of mine sent me a gift for my birthday…

Often things happening in my life during the time I’m writing a book come to influence the book in some way, even if there doesn’t seem to be a direct connection initially. The gift my friend sent me was a copy of The Art Spirit, by Robert Henri. Henri was a leading figure in the Ashcan school of American realism and also a popular teacher at the Arts Students League in New York City. He and his followers were great proponents of immigrants in a time period when (not unlike now) immigrants, especially those with darker skin, were not especially welcomed. As I read this wonderful book, I began to look for ways to connect Estela to Henri’s art crowd. But I had already committed Estela to the music world; it seemed like too much of a stretch to connect her to the art world too. But then I thought of JoJo, the baby from book one, who would be about Estela’s age. Once I decided to have him travel to New York with Estela, the whole plot got messier—and much more interesting. I had to invent both a good reason for JoJo to want to travel to New York and a good reason why it would have been as easy for him as it was for Estela.

Family roots and blood relations seem to hold a vital part in the story. Is this a recurrent theme in your work?

Yes, now that I look back I would have to agree with you. I write a lot about families, and sibling relationships particularly.

You made two life-changing trips to South America over the course of writing the books. What did you discover and/or corroborated that you later used in the novels?

After my first rainforest trip I began reading one book after another, trying to learn everything about the rubber boom—and the rainforests where it took place—to support the fiction I wanted to write. But it wasn’t until I came across a book based on the journals of Roger Casement, an Irish Nationalist who had been sent by the British Foreign Office to investigate stories of the mistreatment of indigenous tribes by rubber industry bosses, that I realized that the indigenous people played a huge part in the rubber boom. The recruits the rubber barons had been sponsoring were dying left and right, because most of them had no previous experience in the rainforest and were unable to cope with its dangers. So the rubber barons began to set their sights on indigenous people, taking them from their lands, enslaving them, and subjecting them to atrocities that defy imagination. Casement’s study focuses on the exploitation of one particular tribe, but it hinted that the problem was widespread, and I found evidence of this in my research thereafter, once I knew where to look.

Having seen the way the indigenous people live for myself—the beauty of their beliefs, their regard for their lands and love for their ancestors, their spirituality—corroborated for me what was lost when the rubber barons violated them.

How do you address immigration and concerns about the destruction of rainforests in these books?

I let the history of the time period guide me. The Irish American brothers who start off the trilogy in 1908 are from Hoboken, New Jersey. They are products of their parents’ immigration story. But Hoboken was populated at that time by immigrants from Italy and Germany as well as Ireland. Since the second book in the trilogy covers American involvement in WWI, and since the doughboys left for Europe from the docks in Hoboken, it was impossible not to include the story of the division among immigrant groups caused by the war, especially regarding the German Americans, who were sorely mistreated. And that is only one of many immigrant stories that came up organically in writing about this particular time and place.

Likewise stories about the destruction of the rainforest are inherent to the time and place I’ve chosen to write about. The rubber boom might have come to destroy much of the rainforest, but it didn’t, actually, because it ended soon after it began, when rubber trees planted on plantations in English territories in Southeast Asia began to produce. Henry Ford tried to create a plantation of his own in the rainforest some years later, which would have been the size of Connecticut, but he was not successful either. The fact is, there is a blight in South America that infects rubber trees when planted close together; you can’t have a plantation there. But even these failed attempts to tap the resources of the rainforest had an impact, mostly on the people who dwell in the rainforest and along its rivers. And these attempts were only precursors to the ongoing attempts unfolding in modern times, particular regarding oil drilling and mining and burning land to provide for cattle grazing. It’s an extremely important issue.

What other themes do you explore in the 3rd book, River Aria?

I’ve tried to explore what it means to be a young artist, again in a particular time and place. JoJo can barely read and write, but he paints beautifully. Estela can sing, but she has no patience. She is a slave to her fluctuating emotions. I’ve set obstacles before each of them, to see who will come closest to their respective ideas of success.

What effect did the writing of these books have on you? Were you transformed in some way?

It’s been exactly ten years since I first began to think about writing these books. That’s a long time, but you have to remember that I was freelancing for clients throughout, and weeks went by when I could not write a single word on behalf of any of my own projects. But even when I was not able to be working on the trilogy, I was thinking about it; I was reading books that touched on the subjects I wanted to explore and making notes. I was completely immersed. In The Art Spirit, Henri says, “The object of all art is intense living, fulfilment and great happiness in creation.” I have experienced all that and more.

I understand the books stand alone on their own. This is quite an achievement when writing a series. What was the most important thing to keep in mind in order to accomplish this?

Book two was the most difficult to write in such a way that it would function as both a book in a series and as a standalone novel. Of the two main characters, one, Jack, knows exactly what happened in the rainforest in book one, because he lived it, but he has reasons not to want to share that information. On the other hand, Nora, the woman he loves, feels that their relationship will remain in jeopardy if she doesn’t learn what Jack knows and is keeping from her. My job was to migrate the right amount of information from book one to book two while keeping the plot of Jack and Nora’s story moving along. I had to make sure it wouldn’t feel redundant to anyone who had read book one—or confusing to anyone who hadn’t. It was challenging. I wrote a lot of drafts before I was happy with it. I also asked fellow writers to read drafts and advise me. The third book, River Aria, relies much less on the information from either book one or book two. It was easy, relatively speaking, to bring the essentials in organically.

What’s on the horizon for you?  

River Aria is the last of three books in a historical novel trilogy. I have been utterly immersed in this series for a number of years. Because some parts of the trilogy take place in the South American rainforest, I have made two trips there. I’ve read lots of books as part of my research. This project has been intense and very enjoyable, and I think it will be hard for me to turn around and start on another novel right away. I’m thinking of taking a nonfiction break in the meantime. I hope to write something about my sister, who died a few years ago.

Thank you, Joan! And best of luck with River Aria!