Verity's Blog

Three days into recording...

Three days into recording and we have all the drums and bass done! Tony and Helder have been absolute stars in the studio and it has been amazing to watch the songs start to take shape with their playing breathing life into the demos that we have been working on for the last few weeks. Paris Studios has the most spectacular views of FalseBay and inbetween takes we have witnessed whales frolicking in the bay below us and had to pinch ourselves that we finally making this album.

The pace has been flat out with everyone giving 110% and it is showing in the recording! Tomorrow we start on piano with Nelson till Sunday and will also have a string trio coming in to work on the string parts for a few songs. Watch this space...

Afraid to be angels?

I seem to have an affinity for one word titles - “Shine”, “Miracle”, “Perfect”, “Raise” and “Careless” are all on the album, as well as my two newest songs “Angel” and “Afraid”. I wrote 'Angel' and 'Afraid' six weeks apart from each other this year just before voting started for the album.

They are in essence complete opposites of each other lyrically – 'Angel' celebrating being able to let the best part of yourself out into the world, and 'Afraid' questioning all the things that hold us back from letting go and just living. But if you think about it, letting go of fears is how we start to access our light and so I am really glad to have them on the album together. They mark my journey of being so terrified to even sing in front of my friends to now fearlessly following my passion and saying its ok for me to want to shine.

Thought for the week...

Take life in your hands and make the most of it.  Learn to make a plan, and never forget. To keep people close, take one day at a time. Love so it shows, know the magic of your mind.

Guide where you once fell - share lessons you have learnt. Have stories to tell, leave no stone unturned. Live life with nature's tools, speak other people's tongues. Don't stick to stupid rules - do as you would have done.

                Verity

Rediscovering the piano...

Right through my childhood, piano lessons were the bain of my life. I spent each week trying to distract my lovely teacher Hennie DeBruin from making me play the classical pieces I hadn't practiced. I refused to learn music theory and avoided any live performances like the plague. On the rare occasion that I had to play at a school concert, I would go into a state of terror and try to play it as fast as I could to get off stage. (Hard to believe I perform for a living these days...)

Two years ago exactly I found myself back in Miami unpacking all my belongings that I had left there eighteen months earlier. Plugging in my old keyboard, the song I wrote that day was “Box of Photographs” and it became a firm favourite at my live shows in Nashville for the next six months. Now it has been voted in as one of the songs for the album and we have decided that I will play it myself – yikes!

This a big fear for me to face as I always let better pianists than me play my songs, but I am up for the challenge. On Thursday 28^th September I am booked into the SABC Beach Road Studios to play Box of Photographs on a 7ft Bosendorfer grand piano. I am completely daunted but also excited to know that my album will have one song on it the way I write all of my songs – just me and a piano.

Rediscovering my songs...

I am adjusting to working 12 hours a day on all my songs for the album and learning to keep perspective on what they will actually sound once we have started recording in the studio. It is definitely pushing me to think outside everything I know about my music and consider new and better ways for each song to sound. Paul McIver is a dream to work with – he allows me all the space I need to get my head around changes as we go along.

While I was shooting Ella Blue in Arniston I took my keyboard up with me and for the first time since I was 17 I revisted my old classical pieces and spent hours practicing them for fun. Amazingly I am seeing the huge payoff of that as I am playing the keyboard in studio with massively increased confidence and have come up with some beautiful new piano parts for some of my songs have lots of new song ideas popping into my mind daily. Can't wait to record a second album!

Memories from a film shoot...

I have just finished five of the most incredible weeks of my life shooting a six part mini series for MNET called Ella Blue that will flight next year in March. It was such a gift to live out in Arniston in the original fishing village and work with an outstanding cast and crew - not to mention Oscar nominated director Darrell Roodt - and feel part of a very special project. Every time I drove out to set amongst fields of yellow canola flowers I had to pinch myself to think that this is the work I get to do! As sad as it was to finish shooting last week, after all our teary goodbyes I found myself winging my way to Joburg to record my album, so I really can only say thank you for a fantastic year so far!

Here is an album that captures some of the mood of the film and to give you a taste of what to expect next year. Enjoy!

And the songs for the album are....

Votes have been cast and the album is finally in production! Here are the songs that are definitely going to be on it in no particular order...

1. Miracle
2. Shine
3. Wherever Love Goes
4. Angel
5. Perfect
6. Love Is
7. Afraid
8. Forever in Me
9. Raise
10. Take me Back
11. Careless
12. Don't Look Back

And.... Box of Photographs

Thought for the week...

What if you played this day differently,

Who would you be - if you weren't so afraid?

Thought from Future Owner #92

Miracle is the best song since Raise and Going Your Way! The harmonics, the chorus, the vocals mesh so well! Love it.

P.S. I chose the following songs from the list: (in no specific order)
Raise
Perfect
Wherever Love Goes
Angel
Afraid
Don't Look Back
Love Is
Miracle
Going Your Way
Fix It
Good For Me
Will I Still Be the One

Nice. hehe

Choose vs Decide

Some wise words from my good friend Bruce Muzik that I want to share...

We all have dreams, but until we CHOOSE to follow them, nothing ever changes. However, once we choose, there is no turning back and our choice begins to shape our future and ultimately, our destiny.
Most of us go through life making DECISIONS and very rarely making CHOICES. So, what's the difference?

The word 'decide' comes from the same Latin family of words as suicide, genocide, homicide etc... All these words include the Latin suffix 'cide', which means to cut or kill. When making a DECISION, we have to kill off the other options in order to be left with one last option, which we then decide upon. In this case, we are not making a choice, because our REASONS (why we should or should not do a thing) are choosing for us.

When making a CHOICE, we consider all the options available and we choose freely, not based on reason, rather based in free will.  So, my question to you is this. Have you CHOSEN where you want to go in your life, or are you still DECIDING? Are you creating your life based on the CHOICES you make or are your reasons DECIDING your life for you? Take a look...