QTN in Texas and spring newsletter!

QTN at 1803 House Concert 8 May 2011  Photo by Raina Rose

Folkville Reunion coming!

Upcoming Texas gigs! Spring newsletter follows!

Dates for live music in Texas. Bring yr friends and kids and neighbours. Print it for your refrigerator art if you want too. Request QTN music from KOOP, KDRP, KUT and KFAN.



                ***BRIAN CUTEAN TEXAS WITHDRAW'L SPRING CONCERTS***


• SUN MAY 8.......... HOUSE CONCERT • Austin • Bruce Chandler's Birthday concert. Email me for address at www.QTNRG.org. Come at 6 pm, music at 7.

• SAT MAY 14........ HOUSE CONCERT • San Marcos • Tracy and Joanna's Potluck dinner/BYOB. Music at 6:30. Seating is limited. Don't wait to RSVP to 512.392.6636 or email trweinberg@yahoo.com. Directions with RSVP.

• SUN. MAY 15........FOLKVILLE REUNION • Austin • Thrice Café/Café Caffeine, 909 W. Mary  4 pm - ??? featuring all Folkville performer alumni:Therapy Sisters, Ky Hote, Bill Oliver, Frank Hill, Gail Lewis, Brenda Ladd, Norm Ballinger, El Monte Slim and many many more. These folks have all been playing and writing great songs for more than 30 years! There'll be a tribute to Weldon Brewer too and possibly memorabilia! NOTE: Cafe Caffeine has now become Thrice Cafe. www.thricecafe.com

• WEDS. MAY 18....ARTZ RIB HOUSE, 2330 South Lamar Blvd. with Nancy Scott and Ky Hote – Nancy Scott hosts, kicking off the evening at 7:30 or so. Musical fun and mayhem with half hour sets for each. "We''re all here because we're not all there."

• THURS.MAY 25 - SUN. JUNE 12 ...THE 40TH KERRVILLE FOLK FESTIVAL! Join the special anniversary year festivities. I've been to more than 30 of em and will be out there the whole time again, most nights up 'til early singing and pickin at the Crow's Nest. I host the Ballad Tree, Sunday June 12 at 3 pm on Chapel Hill so come share a tune. There's a new CD of campfire recordings this year: Songharvest 2011 available too at Staff Rekerrds and Mainstage merch area.

• THURS. JUNE 17...FLIPNOTICS • 8 pm • Austin • 1601 Barton Springs Rd. Sharing the evening with the luminous music of world traveler Amy Annelle and the beatnik jazz of Ike Eichenberg. Three sets and Ike will sit in with me some too.

• SUN. JUNE 19.......JOVITA'S • 7:30 pm • Austin • 1619 S. First St. Our annual Father's Day concert (perhaps the 10th or 11th year) with the one and only Robert Vignaud on bass and special guests in the mix. Last time we played here was a blast. A fine sound system, plenty of room, all ages welcome, Tex-Mex food and libations!


                           ****QTN SINGING THE BOING OF SPRING!****

Here I am again, on the corner again, back where I belong, where I've always been... and all the green green green of this swiftly tilting blooming season I wish you (even if it's not quite happening where you live yet). Everything previously preposterous is clearly postposterous now and is there any time to be ponderous (perhaps preponderous)? Is there really any time? Emit DNA and time.

Many miles and moons since the last word dance from here and I thank you for reminders to compile and send. It has been a busy time since Solstice, not quite the winter I was reaching for, but many amazing things take place and who was it that said it's too late to stop now...

Obviously many systems are going full tilt these days and each day is an adventure. Staying in touch is good and music is still a fine place to go where no one can find you for awhile and a blissed respite (good thing it's not illegal...). Gardens are important to make if you like to eat, so dig out those old Mother Earth News and Foxfire mags and dig.

There's a couple of sections here:

A. Heading south - going through Texas withdrawl
B. New QTN videos coming to pocket tubes everywhere
C. Summer plans: Oregon Country Fair news/Colorado
D. Guitarred and Feathered, Bite-sized Mantras and CDs
E. Regarding Facebook


A. Heading south Getting it all tucked in, ready to scoot from the Northwet to the heartland where Texas is already on fire and rain is sorely needed. Doing my best to send boxes of rain and need an assist in doing the great rain dance for that hugest of huge states.

Yes, heading for the 40th anninversary Kerrville Folk Festival, one of my favourite times of the year. Imagine 18 days camping with many many others, beneath a huge sky, far from city cars and electrical wire fields, sitting up late singing and stargazing, sharing tales and silence and all that's coming up very soon. Staying true to my ancient migration pattern, I am and will soon be around the Hill Country playing up a musical storm in many places before and after the Fest. If you are on the Texas area list, those details are coming. If you live in other places and are heading that way, let me know and I'll add your address for the sending too.

B. New vids  In January, I played a concert at the gorgeous new Alberta Rose Theatre in Portland with Billy Oskay and Jason Montgomery. Thanks to John Schroeder and his five camera crew, the evening was filmed gloriously and is being edited now for a future DVD. Get in your webcar and drive on over to the new Hibidiville channel and enjoy three QTN tunes now here.

C. Summer plans I've been performing on stages at the Oregon Country Fair for the last 22 years and I've just been asked to open this year's 2011 OCF on their mainstage at 11:30 am, Friday July 8. The Fair is held in Veneta, Oregon and is a huge weekend Festival with eye-popping bright moments of colour, imagination and consciousness.

In August, I am planning dates in Colorado and New Mexico for the first time in many years. Not sure what all this energy is about but I like the idea of seeing those folks again. More on this in a later update.

D. Guitarred and Feathered has been getting airplay on nearly 100 stations across the nation and across the seas as well. It is, like my other discs, instantly available to order, download or listen to through www.QTNRG.org or CDbaby. See the CDbaby QTN page here.

Bite-sized Mantra Cards inventories are replenished and available again too here and there are still a few copies of LOLOLOLOLOLO, the colouring book available too.

E. Regarding Facebook Yes there is a FB music page for Brian QTN here but it has no email capability or the ability to collect "friends". I do sometimes leave posts there and can respond to comments, but am mostly email-oriented in terms of messaging and that works best if you have personal communication.

Thanks for caring about these things and for emailing and asking why there's been so much time between newsletters. Thanks for coming to concerts, for buying CDs and other projects and for keeping me moving to the communities I care about. Many thanks too for the couches and meals, hilarity and fellowship. I could not do this without all of you. The adventure is way different than before but still a good way to present these gifts that come through. My favourite quote since I headed out on the road the first time is from Pharoah Sanders who I finally got to meet and thank last year:

The music never goes away even if the people who make it do. that's the whole point of creating something above and beyond yourself, whether it's music or anything else. What I do is to attempt to bring forth the master spirit within us all and exalt that spirit through my music. To me, music is a giving process on the part of the musicians involved, nothing more and certainly nothing less. All the other aspects of the performance or of the music itself are secondary to the presentation of the gift.            Pharoah Sanders


In all this chaos and confusion of recent natural disasters, massive suffering and human ineptitude, foxes continue to pillage the hen house and not just for the eggs. There are many social distractions redirecting collective sorrow and anger from constant streams of yet another great train robbery in the old "watch this hand, not that one" routine. Now more than ever before, it has become a crime to have your savings plundered and be out on the street, in the world.

It's amazing how states screaming the loudest about having to slash budgets for social services, seniors and collective bargaining are also budgeting the commensurate amount toward tax breaks for businesses already taking over cities, discarding city councils and civil servants (read about Michigan's daily advenutres if you thought news from Wisconsin was bad) and this is not science fiction or a conspiracy theory. If you haven't been paying attention, there are many states currently (with others lining up) unashamedly undoing every last shred of what democracy was supposed to look like all the while turning up the volume on stupidity and arrogance to unheard of levels.

This is the time we knew was coming in these lives and vigilance is not obsolete and neither is feeding and caring for our closest community. It is a good time to pay attention, grow food and become involved in whatever way you can.

As a wise guy once said "The only thing there is to atmosphere is sphere itself!"

Bright moments amidst it all to you all.

Your cornforest spondent
bq