When a filmmaker finds a "passion" project, you come to that place where you have to be "all in". Or you should just forget about it. And sometimes "all in" literally means moving. The desire to make the film about Thomas Chapin turned into a passion around the end of December 2011.  

My sister Terri, a New Yorker and Thomas' widow and keeper of his musical legacy, visited Kaua'i and our family for Christmas, and I said to her, "I think it's time to make a film about Thomas, before he is forgotten and before all those who knew him and can speak about him forget the details and stories about his short but remarkable life."  He died on Feb. 13, 1998, and it was now nearly 15 years later.  It was time, I felt, to do the film I had imagined for many years, and I believed I was the one to do it.

It would be my 10th film, in a filmmaking career that had spanned nearly 25 years, one EMMY Award, and numerous other awards, plus several PBS broadcasts of my work.  Clearly, though, I was not looking for another film to make when I spoke those words to Terri. I was satisfied with my track record of 9 successful films, some of them made with film partners, but all of them major involvements for me. But I could be compelled to venture in again if a film idea evoked worthiness and certainty that an excellent story needed to be told.  And this I felt about the Thomas Chapin Story.  

As a long-time filmmaker, and former journalist, I know a good story when I hear one.  All of my films have been compelling documentaries (What are they? Go to www.olenamedia.com), watchable and of interest to audiences curious about something they probably knew nothing or little about.  In J-school and as a working journalist for a local newspaper, I learned how to sniff out good stories and recognize them; in filmmaking, it's the same but you have to think of millions of viewers and whether your film can appeal to that kind of reach. 

By March of this year, I felt compelled enough to build this website about the Thomas Chapin film. By May, I travelled to NYC to begin my research and to interview the primary storytellers, witnesses to Thomas' life and career.  By June, the flood of doubts came; you really have to be sure you want to climb this mountain!!  Three to four years of committed attention; the slippery money slope to find the funding to make the film; and the confidence to surmount every obstacle and barrier (mental, emotional and physical) that would come against you finishing your film. By July, I had found my way back to courage and commitment, and began making plans to forge ahead.  

In August-September, I finished up my paying gig and proudly premiered Grace and Beauty, a documentary made for the celebration of 150 years of the Episcopal Church in Hawaii.  And deposited my final paycheck from the project.

In September, I found an editor in New York City who was willing to defer payment to cut the needed fundraising trailer, my next necessary step in launching the film project. I bought my plane ticket with plans to land in NYC on Oct. 20 to start work with editor Laura Corwin, a professional and seasoned filmmaker herself who could see the worthiness and excellence in telling the Thomas Chapin story.  

Oh. And I decided ten days before leaving for NYC to give up my beautiful cottage on Kaua'i, to put all stuff in storage, and to let go and Let God, as is the vernacular in the journey of Faith. 

I am now settled in with my sister Terri in Jackson Hts., Queens, not too far from Manhattan where the Thomas Chapin story played out. Terri and I decided to take a "chill" day the day after I arrived and headed for Woodstock to see the brilliance of the leaves and to spend some sisterly time together. On our way back to NYC, we listened to a preview copy of Thomas' new 3-CD release, NEVER LET ME GO. It is as BRILLIANT as the leaves of God we encountered that day. I can't wait to share it with you!

More settling in at Terri's. I have bought a work table and a computer chair, and my Metro pass.  Laura, the editor, is just two Metro stops away from me, and we had our first person-to-person meeting yesterday. Unfortunately, or fortunately if we want to stay confident and in Faith, already she has been called away from me to a paying gig that got pushed up. With the excellent work she has already done to begin the trailer and organizing the workflow of its editing, the hand off to me was smooth. I will finish the editing myself, with her looking over my shoulder from afar. She plans to stay involve with the project, and will resume her involvement next year sometime when her paying gig is up. By then, I hope to see the money mounting up for us to speed ahead into the actual making of the film.  

The path before me is clear. Finish the trailer, launch the fundraising. It's the day to day work that keeps me stepping forward into the life of making a film. And it's being made in Thomas' city, the Big Apple, where he took a huge bite for his short-lived life. 

I attended a film fundraising workshop the other night at the offices of Women Make Movies in Soho. I brought my grant writer Marti Fischer with me to give her an orientation about raising money for films.  It's something I've been doing for years, and have raised almost $2 million over the course of my nine films.  For Marti, it's all new, but she is a fast learner and has already identified possible funding sources and partners.

Two questions were asked at the workshop:  Why is the film you want to make important? Why is it URGENT to make this film now (an element the presenter felt must be considered).  Part 2 of this blog is coming, and I shall articulate the answers. 

 Thanks for staying with me.  It's going to get exciting!!

 

Thomas Chapin died on February 13, 1998. It's now 2012, that makes it almost 15 years since his sad passing. 

That we are celebrating a new release of his music due out on Dec. 11. That a 7-minute trailer for my documentary film about him will be ready also on that date. These are powerful coincidences that will meaningfully converge. And this synergy will resurrect Thomas with synchronicity.

Carl Jung, the great Swiss psychologist who in the 1920's studied and reflected on synchronicity, was the first to use this term. He defined it in his writings (paraphrasing here) as the experience of two or more events that are apparently unrelated in their cause or unlikely to occur together by chance, yet are experienced as occurring together in a meaningful manner. 

I think I would add that it is "we" who create that meaning.  As I am expressing it now.  

It's meaningful to me because the CD release draws attention to the fact that Thomas' music continues, and that my making a documentary film about him is relevant to an important jazz legacy -- important and worthy. The man is still creating! Even in this resurrection of music never heard from 1995, 1996.  And even as my film will unfold through his music and words the remarkable story that surrounds him.

Like all important convergences, it's worthy to take note. The CD and the film are going to launch Thomas Chapin into "beyond the jazz history books" and take his fame far beyond what he never fully achieved because of his very early passing. (He died from leukemia just as his career was shifting into high gear.)

The CD and the film trailer will be a simultaneous "released" on Dec. 9 in Manhattan at a celebration party. Wish you all could be there!!!

Read for yourself the press release about the 3-CD recordings: 

On December 11th, Playscape Recordings will release Never Let Me Go: Quartets ’95 & ’96 (PSR#111095), a new three-disc set featuring two late-career performances by saxophonist/composer Thomas Chapin, including his final New York concert before succumbing to leukemia in 1998 at age 40.

Mixed and mastered from original tapes discovered in the private family collection, this special historical release was produced in partnership with Akasha, Inc., the non-profit organization founded in 1999 by Chapin’s widow, Terri Castillo-Chapin, to preserve and advance his musical legacy. In addition to the music, the set features liner notes from veteran jazz journalist and broadcaster Brian Morton, exclusive archival photos and remembrances from the musicians who joined him for these shows.

Discs one and two capture Chapin’s working quartet of the time, featuring pianist Peter Madsen, bassist Kiyoto Fujiwara and drummer Reggie Nicholson, performing at Flushing Town Hall in Queens on November 10th, 1995. The group played two selections fromYou Don’t Know Me (Arabesque Records), as well as a wide variety of other material, including Artie Shaw’s “Moonray”, Thelonious Monk’s “Ugly Beauty” and “Red Cross” and Jimmy Webb’s “Wichita Lineman”.

Chapin founded this ensemble in the early 90′s to explore new harmonic possibilities in his music after years of performing and recording with his highly regarded trio. Prior to this date, they performed regularly around New York, including week-long engagements at Iridium Jazz Club and The Village Gate.

In contrast, the third disc captures the first and only concert ever played by a later quartet featuring Madsen, bassist Scott Colley and drummer Matt Wilson at The Knitting Factory on December 19th, 1996. For what turned out to be his final performance in New York, this ensemble presented extended readings of three new pieces written specifically for its all-star lineup, a version of his well-known composition “Sky Piece” and an arrangement of Roland Kirk’s “Lovellevellilloqui”.

“They can do just about anything,” wrote Peter Watrous in his review of this show for theNew York Times, “and Mr. Chapin had the group move from freetime sections to swinging parts that moved with complex harmonies. Mr. Wilson doubled and halved the tempos; the music sounded wonderfully unstable. One piece, a ballad, invoked the Blue Note Label in 1964; Mr. Chapin tore through a composition by Rahsaan Roland Kirk, using a hard, rough tone. He likes heat and velocity, and the music flew by, jammed with notes.”

In summing up Chapin’s place in jazz history for the eight-disc retrospective Alive (Knitting Factory Works) in 1999, GRAMMY® winning jazz critic and author Bob Blumenthal wrote, “An honest appraisal of the universe of improvised music created in the decade of his activity as a bandleader should persuade all but the most doctrinaire that Thomas Chapin was one of the definitive artists of the 1990s. Not the most heavily exposed or fashionable, perhaps; but a musician who got at the emotional and spiritual nub of what jazz is supposed to be about as successfully and consistently as anyone working during the period.”

New York, New York -- I'm comin' back with a to-do list for my Thomas Chapin film project and with the courage that a few weeks ago was at a low ebb.

Why the change in my momentum?  That's what MIRACLES do!!  They propel you, they move the mountain that seemed insurmountable, they are a gift, and a blessing indeed! They are an answer to prayers, that I trust, moved the Hand of God. 

I have my plane ticket, and will leave on Oct. 20 to join editor Laura Corwin who is going to cut my fundraising trailer for the film. Fundraising trailers are a necessity if one is to communicate an idea before there is a film to see. It's how we raise money for our films, it's the preview, it's the showcase to raise support and cash and grant funds.

Laura came referred to me by Thomas' business manager who said I should talk with her after I told him my sense of how to do this film project was to work with an editor as my collaborator, someone who could conceive and help me see the story before I went out with a camera crew and shot all the necessary parts, before I took my footage into the editing room. I've never done a film this way before, and I don't believe it's the traditional way; but for this film it really make sense, or so I was thinking.  

My wish was an editor, who could cut a music documentary and make sense of a very colorful and complex story, who worked and lived in New York City, who would be excited about telling a New York story, whose mind and heart could dance with mine. 

Laura seems the perfect answer.  She's a New Yorker, has cut music videos for years, and has done weighty documentaries as well as a music documentary (on the Rolling Stones). We had arranged to talk once we both got off of production deadlines. The day finally arrived, after 3 months of emails and clearing away our schedules.

We finally met, on Skype. I had sent her this website and my own personal website so she could get up to speed on me and on Thomas. I watched clips of her work that she sent beforehand. Her clips told me I was definitely on the right track. I felt very excited about the possibility!

I had thought about trying her out, about gaging her as a collaborator by letting her cut the fundraising trailer, but I didn't know what she might charge for this. I know what I would charge if a stranger approached me to do this kind of work, and so I was ready to find and pay the $7,000+plus that I figured it would take to hire someone to do a 7-minute trailer.

Our introductions went quickly. And when I posed the possibility that she could cut the fundraising trailer, and before I could say, how much would you charge, she says , "I'll just do it."  Imagine my head spinning, my eyes brightening and large with smile, and my heart jumping with joyful and excited "thank you God"s. 

She explained that she, like other New York editors and filmmakers, take commercial jobs that pay them well, that pay their bills; then they can help other filmmakers who are doing "passion" projects and help them pro bono, or recoup payment later when distribution and sales deals come in.  She and her partner Hugh, a cinematographer, have worked with several filmmakers this way -- A Tibetan filmmaker who is doing a film about Tibetan folk music that young Tibetans are in danger of losing.  A Boston filmmaker whose brother was abused by a priest, who wanted to make a film that boldly told the family's story way before anyone would speak up in the then-surfacing Catholic Church scandal.

Then she offered to start right away, before her next commercial job -- shooting and editing a cooking TV show -- begins in November.  So I am off to New York soon. She has already begun reviewing my interviews shot in New York in May. See my blog http://www.thomaschapinfilm.com/2/post/2012/06/yes-ive-been-interviewing-who.html

So do you believe in Miracles? As a filmmaker, I have received many. We are not usually flush with money, but if we are good, that is good at what we do, and good to others in mercy and helpfulness, miracles come big and small that allow us to make our films. It's part of the collateral we operate with to do our Good work. It's nothing to take for granted, but there is Goodness and God and Great Work.  That, we as artists, blessed with gifts and talents as storytellers, must trust will happen for us as we follow our dreams, passions and hearts. Without money, you can do little except by the Grace of God and the Goodwill of Good people like Laura Corwin. 

It's not every day that the FACEBOOK Genie pops out of its bottle.  Today he/she was quite generous, and fed me spoonfuls of anti-courage constipation medicine.  

Reading between the lines of jokes, invitations, Obama/Romney quips, sarcasm, criticism, damnations and all sorts of What's On Your Mind? brain matter in my Newsfeed today, there were some jewels that shone bright. Brighter than the dismal days I have recently been suffering through. 

Take this post from BEN-HUR (my favorite movie of all time).  I love this scene when Ben-Hur is told He Is Needed! and only HE can do the job.  Ever feel like it won't matter if you do or you don't do what you could probably do better than someone else?  I've been having some of those feelings.  

OK, stop. Time for the "courage constipation" explanation.  Two weeks ago, my heart dropped into a place it's been hard to climb out of.  It wasn't so much that I was denied a $20,000 grant that would have allowed me more resources to finish my film's research and to make the fundraising trailer needed for the next step of moving the project forward.  But it was the feeling of hope gone dark, of the boost gone bad, of the mountain of madness still to climb if the Thomas Chapin film would get made.  Yes, there were other options to surmount, other strategies chomping at the bit, and other choices that clamored "Save Thyself!!"  It's been a dark two weeks as my soul waded through the murky waters of What To Do.  

I wrote to some close friends, asking for their prayers, their spiritual, emotional support. A dear friend wrote back: Your prayer might be: Lord, give me insight and courage to follow this through, and to be at peace whatever the outcome. 


Another one wrote:  Relax in the faith that God is saying "I got this.


Some of my friends didn't write anything back.  But I knew they were holding me in their thoughts and prayers.  That kind of friendship is just known, not spoken. 

In the days that followed, I did actually feel encouraged in this kinda supernatural way. I began to feel my heart being craned out of the murk, my head growing clearer with hope, and courage beginning to sprout again.  The BOLDNESS to move and act still hadn't kicked in, but then again I was still being still and quiet in my spirit.

Then today came!  With Facebook postings that I swallowed like EXLAX.  Let me share a few:

From Darrin, my niece's hubby. Imagining "launching into something great" when difficulties come."

 And above it, a post from Blue Water Mission about taking "bold solo action." True courage takes this, it said. SOLO! Someone's got to do it Ben-Hur!!

Friend Caitlin from West Virginia posted this cliche gone good.  Yes, in MBA school we were encouraged to think outside our boxes; but in life, sometimes we have to live like there are no boxes, just dreams and possibilities.

Elena from Phoenix reminded me with this quote that some of us are very blessed, very lucky, very fortunate to teach the world through our art.  

I KNOW the story of Thomas Chapin's life and music can inspire and teach! It's a worthy story, and the storyteller who can tell the story will bless world.

Claire from Baltimore, who often posts beautiful thoughts from everywhere, quoted inspirational speaker Wayne Dyer.  Miracles come in moments. Be ready and willing.  Easier said then done, I thought to myself. But how would we know its truth unless we looked at the moments in are lives with that kind of expectancy and possibility. How challenging.  

And the last one for this blog comes from a post from Meleanna Meyer, native Hawaiian filmmaker, artist extraordinaire, and loving friend. Here she posts an interview with writer Alice Walker who gives some brilliant answers to some everyday questions (read the whole article if you have time, you will be inspired! http://www.newint.org/features/web-exclusive/2012/08/22/alice-walker-interview/

Alice names Hawaiian Queen Liliu'okalani as one she admires.  Meleanna is making a film, has been making a film since 2004, that tells the story of this beloved queen and her love of the land (land being a symbol of place, identity and spiritual purpose).  

Why did Mele's post grab me, move me to tears?  Because in it, Alice Walker gets us!  She gets us artists, us film artists, who desire so deeply, who try so hard to bring important and worthy stories to life, who give and sacrifice what they can to birth a fllm idea that they know can change the world, can move hearts and minds, who die a little every day to the selfish pouts and doubt to quit. Mele, we believe!! Keep going!!

Let me end my blog with Alice Walker's words that brought the tears today.  

"The creation of art is such a sacred function it is appalling that it is often so hard for artists to have the support and funding they need. If Meleanna Meyer’s film finds the necessary funding it will help the healing of the world. It can help us restore our senses. It can help us reconnect with ancestors whose base acts depress, distress and embarrass us. We should all be jumping up and down around our artists asking them what we can do to help them help us!" 

Perhaps you will be inspired to stay with me and to even help (Early Birds, Donate now page) as I trog the trouble in my mind, as I seek the boldness of heart to find True Courage, as I strategize and find my next steps to birthing this Thomas Chapin film.  Oh, and yes, as I take my anti-courage constipation medicine.

This red shower tree is partly the answer. I am showering my film project with a lot of thought, love and activity short of making the actual film.

Truth be told, today is my 7th month of working on another film, one that has been paying my bills!  It's a work for hire, and something I am kinda doing for love, although I get paid to do it.  It takes up most of my days but I always spend a little time on the Thomas Chapin film project to keep the fires (ie. red blossoms) burning.  It's actually more like fanning embers as I spend most of my time working on the paying project. I have been joining jazz forums on LinkedIn, becoming a follower of jazz groups on Twittter, maintaining my film's fan page on Facebook, joining jazz groups on their websites, i.e. learning about jazz and building the fan base for my  jazz film. Some pretty special jazz connections have been made, but I will save that for another blog. Main thing these days is finishing the editing on the work for hire documentary.

But that's what filmmakers do.  They have to find ways to support themselves while they make their dream projects.  The reality of independent filmmaking, ie, where no one pays you to be a filmmaker, is you have to find ways to survive so that your dream can survive.  So I am very thankful that I have this paying work to support me and my Thomas Chapin film dream.  That work for hire project will be completed by and shown on Sept. 22, and then I move on.  To what?  Ah, that is the question.  Stay tuned for what work will show up to take me further and help pay my bills.

I have been making films since 1988.  My first film, a co-production with PBS Hawaii, took me 5 years to make at a cost of $500,000 -- all of which I had to raise.  And which I did in 4 years.  Record time, believe it or not.  That was what I was told by other filmmakers; they say documentaries normally take 8 to 10 years to fund and make.  I remember thinking naively that I could make my film in a year.  What did I know back then?  I quit my newspaper job to make my film; I had $10,000 in the bank to help support myself. PBS Hawaii was helping, giving me a part-time salary to work on the film, and I had the will, a very strong will, to get this done.  I put in full-time hours to raise the money --  writing letters and making phone calls every day for four years. In the end, the final monies came in, a large grant from the state of Hawaii, and I was on my way to making my film.  SIMPLE COURAGE, my first-ever attempted film, aired on PBS stations across the country and won a prestigious EMMY Award. 

In those four years, when my $10,000 savings was exhausted, the help of friends and other backers and grantors came in to help me survive. Without that help, it would have taken me more than five years.  I could focus, because of this help. And focus, plus perserverance, are the keys to finishing, and finishing in record time. 

So I'm giving a shout out to this paying work I have!  It's sustained me for going on 8 months now, and as I worked to launch the Thomas Chapin film project in March. And it has allowed me to create something very special in the process.  Those that gave me the work had no idea I would be doing both, not cheating either.  They will be very happy to receive and present on Sept. 22 the finished film, GRACE AND BEAUTY: 150 YEARS OF THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH IN HAWAII.  It is a beautiful history, and I am so proud to tell this story for my church.  So happy to have received this help to keep going. 

Say AMEN with me! 

Someone asked me if Thomas was a prodigy.  I don't know. He's never been formally called that. Although words like brilliant, virtuoso, and even genius and iconoclast have been used to describe him, his music and his playing.

Childhood friend Arthur Kell, who I recently interviewed, recalls Thomas playing flute proficiently at age 9. While other kids were swinging on the jungle gym, Thomas was swinging on his flute. He discover the sax in high school and went on to college to outplay everyone and to ascend to a professional career at age 24 when he began playing and traveling with the Lionel Hampton Orchestra. And by age 30, he had formed his own trio, which immediately started playing on the big stages of jazz festivals in the U.S. and abroad.  (For a complete timeline of Thomas' music career, go to http://thomaschapin.com/bio-music-timeline)

The word "unique" is also often used to describe Thomas. (A word I feel is inadequate in all ways and in reference to everything and everyone. Just not specific enough). So let's let music writer Bob Blumenthal of the Boston Globe tell us in his words about Thomas' "uniqueness":
Affirmation, honesty, passion, risk, the coherence of successful collective enterprise; all of the things we expect from the strongest and most lasting jazz permeated the music of Thomas Chapin. In every note he played – and most certainly between September 1989 (when the Thomas Chapin trio featured in this collection played its first engagement) until the leukemia that took Chapin’s life on February 13, 1998 interrupted his ascendance – Chapin was a study in the testing and exceeding of limits. In every live set and on every recording, he plunged headlong into the musical abyss and responsed with a driven yet upbeat concept that held humor, cataclysm and contemplation in rare equilibrium. The sound tapestries that resulted – solidly rooted in a tradition Chapin knew intimately, yet straining that tradition’s boundaries at every turn – were both lucid and combustible. They remain just as inspiring now that Chapin is gone.

Thomas was Hampton's lead alto sax-flautist and also Hamp's musical director for 6 years, right out of college, right out of Rutgers University's jazz program.  In another blog, I will let Jerry Weldon, college roommate of Thomas and band mate in the Hampton band, tell you about Thomas' days with Hamp.

With Hamp, Thomas toured Europe, Japan, Mexico, South America and U.S.
Festivals, including Kool Jazz (USA), Newport Jazz Festival (RI), Nice Jazz Festival (France), North Sea Jazz Festival (The Hague, Holland), Aurex Jazz Festival (Japan), etc.,

It's only a sample of Thomas' playing, but here is a video recording of a Hamp concert in Brazil.  This YouTube video captures Thomas doing a 30 second solo.  To watch his solo, go to 1:47 sec.

On June 14 in Scottsdale, Arizona, in a sacred space called The Boulder House, an event hosted by Diamond Visions Events allowed me for the first time to expose an audience to Thomas Chapin's music.

There were some jazz lovers among the 50-plus who attended, but my guess is that most were among the "uninitiated". That is they were far from being jazz fans or afficiandos. 

They had been sitting for a while as I shared stories and clips of my 25 years of filmmaking; some got restless, I must confess, as I was going on a bit too long.

But when it was finally time to share about my new film project, the room stopped moving, and all ears and eyes were on the clip I played for them as an introduction to Thomas Chapin.

I had a feeling they would enjoy this clip, a 6-minute video of the Thomas Chapin Trio playing on the big stage before 10,000 people at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1995. 

What I didn't anticipate was the silence and stillness in the room as the music romped and the Chapin riffs and chops filled the space.  This powerful performance seemed to drench the air with energy and excitement.  It's that "Thomas Chapin thing" I thought. Folks who had seen him play live would talk about this phenomena. Captivating energy, mesmerizing, stimulating jazz.

That night, I became very sure that the film I was making would prove to be one that could hold any audience. Because Thomas could, his music could, did and still does. 

Can't wait to mesmerize and Thomasize everyone with this film!!

When you start a film project, there are so many things to "launch".  A website. A social media plan. A way to formally announce the project. The fundraising.  I'll come back to these to explain my strategies and thinking on their launching.

Let's talk Research. 

Research is what you do day and night while you do everything else.  On an average day since I created this project, I have been researching the subjects of Thomas Chapin and his life, the world of jazz, the people I should talk to, and the business side of launching this film. I probably have spent almost 8  hours a day!  Some in the morning, some in the afternoon, and a lot of it at night. Some of it in "dream" time.

Research, ie education, is a steep, vertical learning curve these days.

On Tuesday, May 15, I begin my first Research Trip.  First?  Yes, this is only one of many times I will have to leave my quiet, country-living in a cottage on the island of Kauai and head into the Big Cities where this story takes place.  Mainly New York City. Where I will be meeting with some of the primary storytellers for the Thomas Chapin film.  His brother Ted.  His trio members, Mike and Mario. A high school class mate of Thomas, Arthur. John, a jazz festival promoter who brought Thomas to the big performing stages of jazz at Newport, RI and in Europe.  Jerry, who played with Thomas in Lionel Hampton's band in the 1980's. Terri, Thomas' wife and partner for 10 years before he passed; she's my sister, a central storyteller for my film, and my host in NYC. And there are a few others important storytellers who I am still setting up appointments with. 

This trip will also take me to Tuscon, Arizona, where I will meet and interview two other storytellers. Marty, who met Thomas toward the end, but saw enough to know how special a musician and person Thomas was. He advised Thomas in jazz business matters and holds, I think, a very important perspective on the timing of Thomas' passing.  Interesting!! I will also meet up with young, next generation player, Nadar Nihal, who is an American studying spirituality and music in India. He knew Thomas only by listening to his music but was inspired to play his horn at Thomas' memorial on the 10th anniversary of Thomas' passing.

Also while in AZ, my dear friend Carmella will be hosting a fundraiser in hopes of adding to my Early Birds list of donors.  (Have you thought about becoming an Early Bird?  click here.)

Won't you follow my blog, and take this trip with me.  I will be posting as I go.  I will let you in on some of my Research findings and will be posting photos.