Let’s Try This Again

Another reboot of this site and, hopefully, of my music career. While I am certainly complicit in this hiatus from music, I’m going to point a finger at the Covid pandemic for conspiring to kick the stuffing out of my aspirations and killing any momentum I thought I’d built up.

So, now, as I reach full retirement, I am rededicating my efforts to making some modest inroads into the dream of being a touring musician/performer.

Onward.

A Year? Really?

I am embarrassed to admit that it’s been damned near a year since last I posted an update. I guess that happens when you have a “real” career and are trying to pursue a career as a performing musician and singer.

Besides the usual folk festivals you may have seen me at, I did have one excellent adventure this Spring when, the end of March, Carole and I packed up the Outlander and headed for East Tennessee. After a 575 drive from Daytona Beach to Micaville, North Carolina, I unpacked the guitar and performed at the One Of A Kind Art Gallery on Thursday evening for two hours. (I must be nuts) The funny thing is that Carole says that was the best performance of the whole tour!

I’m heading back the end of September. More that, later.

After we packed up I drove us another hour North to Johnson City, Tennessee and our granddaughter’s home.

Friday, March 31st I played the Acoustic Coffeehouse in Johnson City, sharing the bill with Martin Koop, an excellent songwriter and performer from Tiffin, Ohio. Hats off the Jim Benelisha for providing such a welcoming venue for touring musicians.

Saturday evening, I played once more at the Our House restaurant on Roan Street in Johnson City. An excellent restaurant! Don’t miss it.

I’ll be playing the One Of A Kind Art Gallery in Micaville, North Carolina on Thursday, September 28th. Then we’ll dash off to Johnson City, TN to play the 10:00 PM slot at Acoustic Coffee house the very same night. I’m nuts, obviously. Thankfully, we’re driving up Wednesday and staying nearby with friends, so I only have to deal with two gigs an hour’s drive apart, not a 575 mile drive, too. 🙂

In the “Musicians Do The Damnedest Things” department, Friday, we’re getting up in the morning and driving from Johnson City, through Knoxville, and on to Chattanooga, Tennessee where I am playing at the Charles and Myrtle’s Coffeehouse at 8:00 PM.

After that, it’s Family time Saturday back in Johnson City and Sunday is home to Daytona an work on Monday morning.

If you have the chance, click on the links for venue info. I’ll be getting the shows posted into Reverbnation and they will appear here in the widget on the upper right side of the screen.

Onward!
Brett Cammack

Catching Up Once More

I just dropped in and, wow, I’ve been AWOL for a while.  Not everyone is on Facebook, and I apologize to those who depend on this site to see what I’ve been up to.

My monthly gig at the Sleeping Moon Cafe is no more.  For a couple of reasons, but primarily because the Sleeping Moon Cafe is no more.  They are looking to relocate and reopen.  I wish Mark well, but I shan’t be playing there again regardless.  The second time you drive 50 miles to a gig and arrive to find someone else already set up and playing, you can’t help but conclude that maybe it’s time for something else.

For the third year I have applied for and failed to be accepted to perform at the Lake County Folk Festival in Eustis, Florida in October.  To say I’m disappointed is insufficient.  I really thought I’d taken my performing to the necessary level, but alas, my opinion doesn’t count.  I believe I need to improve the body of work I have available for people to review.  I guess I’d better get to work on that.

I have my application in for the Barberville Fall Jamboree in November.  I’ve yet to get accepted, but I have been previously and feel pretty hopeful about that one.

I’m working on putting together a group of other talented performers to play the festivals.  All solid people and I feel confident that we can put something together that is pretty special.

There seems to be sufficient confluence of on-line services and affordable technology that will allow me to put on live, streaming mini-house concerts via my “Brett Cammack – Classic Acoustic Americana” page on Facebook.  If you like what I’m trying to accomplish here, please Like that page for me.

I’ve been caught up in a lot of non-music stuff the past six months or so, but things are looking pretty good and I think I’m going to have the time and money to really start hitting the open mics and working in media to make a body of work available.

I also must take a moment to mention some fine people that have left us in the past month or so.  Jerry Banton, Don Van Duesen, and Bea.  All lovely people that I will miss very much.

Onward!

Brett Cammack
386-843-3063

2016 – Dedicated To Building My Musical Career

January is well under way now and I had the great pleasure yesterday evening of enjoying the music of my old friend Steve Gillette and his wife, Cindy Mangsen on their annual January swing through Florida, leaving old man winter behind in Vermont.

I have two sets at Blue Spring State Park in Orange City, Florida this coming weekend, and I will be playing Saturday night at The Sleeping Moon Cafe (4951 N Semoran Blvd, Winter Park, FL 32792), too.  Check out the Upcoming Performances widget on the right for specifics.

My application is in to perform at the Barberville Pioneer Settlement in the Spring Frolic in April.  I’ll update everyone if/when I know I’ve been accepted and the set locations/times.

My intention the next couple of months it attempt to book as much activity as I can manage through the Fall.  I feel very good about the level I’m achieving now with my performances and that it is time to really start putting it out there to be heard.  I’ve got to do some recording soon so I can start reaching out to the house concert venues throughout the region.

Onward!

Brett Cammack

(386) 843-3063

More Gigs, More Opportunities

I’ve booked two more nights at The Sleeping Moon Cafe (4951 N Semoran Blvd, Winter Park, FL 32792) on the corner of Semoran and Aloma. Check the performance schedule on the right side of this page for dates and times.

Unfortunately you won’t be able to see me perform at the Lake County Folk Festival again this year, although I might turn up at the FMFI’s “Busking For Food” program while it’s on. No formal appearance, though. Write your Congressman. 🙂

A lot of thought has gone into a subtle shift in, not the musical focus, but how I label myself in this medium. While I enjoy and appreciate Folk music, performing some great standards from Dylan, Paxton, et al, I really do lean much more heavily towards the music of the seminal songwriters of what is now the Americana genre. Townes Van Zandt, Guy Clark, Rodney Crowell, Nanci Griffith and others really don’t fit well into “Folk”, but they’re not exactly “Country”, either, although they’ve all had hits there and not lately.

As a result, I am shifting my self-definition from “Folk and Acoustic” to “Classic Acoustic Americana” because it more accurately describes what I perform and manages expectations more effectively when booking gigs.

Carole and will be driving up to Johnson City, TN on July 10th and I’m working to meet up with someone at the Moe Joe Coffeehouse in Greenville, SC on that Friday afternoon (it’s a minor deflection from the usual route) to see if I might play that evening or at least play a song or two for future consideration. I hope to do the same at a couple of coffeehouses in Johnson City as well. It would be sweet to be able to book a couple gigs along the way and help pay for future trips to see the granddaughter!

Finally, I’ve applied to perform once more at the Barberville fall festival in November. Keeping my fingers crossed.

Onward!

Brett Cammack
South Daytona, FL
386-843-3063

What’s New?

Well, since my last post, I’ve attended the monthly acoustic jam at Anastasia State Park up in Saint Augustine (a gorgeous beach park that I like a lot), performed both days at the 2015 Barberville Spring Frolic at the Barberville Settlement for the Creative Arts in Barberville, Florida, and played a set yesterday at Bloomer’s Garden Center in San Mateo, FL next door to Palatka.

I asked Bill Ellison to video my set in the Church at Barberville during the Spring Frolic. He did a great job and gave me both a playable DVD and a DVD full of edited mpeg files of the individual songs that I could upload to YouTube. They’re over on The Music page here. I highly recommend Bill’s services for your photo and video work.
Ellison Photo and Video

The set list for Saturday in the Church was:

  • Easy Ride (From Good Times To The Blues)
  • To Live Is To Fly
  • Lone Star Hotel
  • Somewhere On The Road Tonight
  • Cannons In The Rain
  • My Songbird
  • July, You’re A Woman

It was a pleasant, easy-going affair in San Mateo, Florida. I was performing for pleasure and a delightful plate of pulled pork BBQ, coleslaw and sweet tea. The PA was just right for the venue and I was able to put in an hour’s worth of music with good results. I also received some positive feedback from folks that I greatly appreciate.

Memorial Day weekend, on Sunday from around 11:00AM to sunset you can find Carole and I over in Largo, Florida at John S. Taylor Park, pavilion #4 making music and enjoying a holiday get together we Charley Groth and all the other folks who aren’t heading up to the Florida Folk Festival that weekend, but want some good music and good friends around anyway. There’s no cost involved. Come on over and join us!

The following weekend, on Saturday, May 30th, I will be performing at the Sleeping Moon Cafe in Winter Park, FL starting at 8:00PM. It’s on the SE corner of Semoran (436) and Aloma. Details are in the Show Schedule widget.

More to come!

Onward!
Brett Cammack
South Daytona, FL
386-843-3064

Catching Up Once More

Once more I am afraid I’ve become complacent about posting updates here to my blog. I can only apologize and move forward.

I did have about two months out of the loop in February and most of March from some gawd-awful crud that was going around then. While I could play guitar between coughing jags, singing was simply out of the question.

Despite that, I managed to pull myself together and answer the call on short notice to play for three hours at The Cork and Bottle in New Smyrna Beach one Saturday evening during Bikeweek. The following Saturday, I played for two hours at The Sleeping Moon Cafe in Winter Park.

I was pretty wiped out after the New Smyrna gig, but thanks to the Hall’s Honey-Lemon “magic singing pills” or Cough Drops, I got through it.

The Sleeping Moon Cafe gig went better as I was recovering, finally.

The “Big Deal” was opening for Rob Lytle at Villa ConRoy on Sunday, March 29th. I was fully recovered at that point and had a great set. It was great to be back on my game. This is the gig that I missed back in August of last year when I was hospitalized for four days with digestive tract infection and I’m very grateful to the folks at Central Florida Folk for the second chance.

Now I am preparing for the upcoming 2015 Barberville Spring Frolic. I play the Church on Saturday at 4:00PM and the Schoolhouse on Sunday at 10:30AM.

I am also scheduled to play at the Sleeping Moon Cafe again on Saturday, May 30, the weekend after Memorial Day, the Florida Folk Festival, etc.

Onward!
Brett Cammack
South Daytona, FL
386-843-3063

Barberville Fall Country Jamboree 2014

It was a terrific festival the first weekend in November, despite the cold winds that kept the temps low on Saturday.  We started out simply volunteering, but as the days passed and the event drew nearer, a few performance slots opened up as acts had to cancel or otherwise alter their commitments.

By the time the weeked arrived, I had an afternoon slot on Saturday on the Sugar Cane stage and a Sunday morning on the Family stage.  This was in addition to my emcee obligations Saturday morning and Sunday afternoon on the Depot stage (the only stage with sound reinforcement).

November 1, 2014 - Saturday

Here I am, wearing “texting gloves” during that frigid Saturday set. There was a fierce wind gusting from behind me from stage left to right. I was quite hoarse after the set as I was practically shouting so people could hear me. The wind took most of the sound diagonally so that anyone seated in the first two or three rows on the right could hear me fine. Everyone else had to lean forward to do so.

At one point, the wind nearly blew my hat off my head!

November 2, 2014 - Sunday
I dressed more warmly on Sunday, and played the very first set of the morning at the Family stage in front of the Schoolhouse. While turnout was good for the festival both days, at 10:00AM on Sunday morning, the audience for most of my set was my wife, Carole. A few folks paused as they passed by and listened for a while before moving on.

Finally, during the penultimate song, a few couples sat down, there for the next act, no doubt, and seemed to enjoy my closing song, John Stewart’s “July, You’re A Woman”.

It’s was definitely worthwhile and I am grateful for the opportunity. Doing the emcee work was a hoot and I enjoyed it a lot, too. I don’t get many chances to channel my inner Don Pardo/Gary Owens/Thurl Ravenscroft and it is fun when I get to do so.

Good News!

I have received another opportunity to perform as the opening act at the Central Florida Folk monthly house concert at Villa ConRoy in the College Park neighborhood in Orlando! I will be performing there the end of March 2015.

Onward!
Brett Cammack
386 843-3063