Thanks for subscribing and welcome to my eighteenth Newsletter.
(My newsletter is published every two months – This is the Dec-Jan issue)
My Help
I am a Branch Co-ordinator (Bay Sy. George) for the Songwriters Association of Canada (SAC), former student at SongU, a past member of the Nashville Songwriters International Association (NSAI), on-going participant of SongStudio – hosted by Rik Emmit and Blair Packham, member of Music Newfoundland and Labrador (MusicNL), and a member of SOCAN. I also continually repeat Pat Pattison’s course on « Songwriting » – he is indeed the master of prosody. I can honestly say that each and every one of these organizations and individuals has helped me to continually hone the craft of songwriting and I thank them!
Songs are the main vehicle by which a songwriter communicates with listeners. I will be sharing my songs, and stories about how they were written, in my newsletter. I will also be sharing additional folk art and personal interests.
My Music
My latest YouTube video is « Snowflakes » http://youtu.be/J7n4lgxucL0 it is a eulogy to Canada’s missing 600 First Nation’s Women.
To date I have recorded 4 CD’s; A Field By The Sea, Blue Smoke, Life is Good and The Only Sin. You can sample songs from these CD’s on my CD Baby web page store. As well, some of the songs appear in the audio player on the top of each page on my website.
I have begun work on my 5th CD. « Song For Malala. » Allister Bradley will produce the project. The title song, a folk song, will be an anthem for Mala, a young Pakistani girl who was shot in the head by an Al Queda thug for speaking out about the right for girls to learn to read.
« Snowflakes » and « Song for Malala » reflect the reality that women are marginalized, in diferent ways, in almost all of the world’s cultures. It saddens me that we seem to be lacking in respect for the world’s mothers, without whom we would not exist.
My Reading
Everything Under the Sun by David Suzuki and Ian Hanington
Scietists find clever ways to tease out information about our world. And everywhere we look, we discover new challenges because our knowledge is so primitive. Accumulating pollutants in air, water, soil, and our bodies; vanishing species; loss of nutrients in topsoil; ocean degradation – all of these provide warnings that human numbers, consumption, and activity are undermining the very things that keep us alive. Climatologists have accumulated a powerful set of observations and models pointing to fossil-fuel as the cause of global warming.
These companies will poison the water table without remorse – Please share the song. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v283MunuZaE&feature=share&list=UUK637I8lHwNuxUk39J6sgIA
The Ostrich
As a species I sometimes wonder if we most resemble the ostrich. If we duck our heads, ignore the problem for long enough, it will just, maybe, hopefully, please, go away. Or perhaps our approach is more like Bill Clinton’s solution to gays in the military – don’t ask, don’t tell! After all, if nobody talks about it, it isn’t there, is it?
My brother-in-law, a house painter and his friend, who has worked in Alberta sum it up this way: « it’s been about 150 years since the Industrial Revolution and we’ve done this much damage to the environment. We might get another 100 years out of it all. »
At a church luncheon, a fellow parishioner relates to me his experience of reading about the poisoning of the St Clare River at Sarnia. « I was there the night the company put that stuff in the ground and supposedly sealed it off. » There was pain in his eyes and no doubt, in his heart and in his soul. I stated that it was amazing how many people I speak with, ordinary people, blue collar workers, who understand that we are gradually destroying the planet. He casually observed, « there will be a revolution. »
It’s hardly unlikely that for some inexplicable reason, I am the only guy who has these conversations. It is more likely that most of us see the truth for what it is. We are gradually, speeding up, speeding up, speeding up, destroying the very planet that gives us life. Suicide or madness? Take your pick, I can’t figure it out.
I wonder who our political leaders talk to? Do they have these conversations or are they shielded for their own protection? They don’t appear to be losing much sleep about it all as the oil companies drill away, as the auto manufacturers continue to turn out the gas combustion engine, as poisons are released into our rivers, lakes, oceans, landfills – anywhere the millions upon millions of barrels of poisonous waste can be hidden for awhile. Long enough, they hope, to finish making the money, packing up and leaving the deadly stuff behind. Perhaps, like Chernoble, the animals will have another paradise, free of humans, in a future that may be as inevitable as the prediction of my house painter friend – a hundred years or so.
Is it possible to change a future that is rushing towards us virtually unhindered except for sporadic demonstrations and vocal minorities who are often perceived as « radical », « inhibiting progress », « tree-huggers », « terrorists », « trouble – makers », etc? Most days are like today – I simply have no idea whether we have the rational or empathetic ability to slow down, stop and possibly reverse the race to the « end of the human race. »
My Tale of a Song
I have been a fan of folk music for as long as I have been listening to music. It was inevitable that I would eventually write folk songs. I have written a number with moral themes. The latest is « Don’t’cha Go Frackin’ ‘Round Here. » The scar that hydraulic fracturing will leave on the planet will be irreversible. It is poison. It is driven by greed. It is madness. I am proud that the province of Newfoundland and Labrador has instituted a moratorium on Hydraulic Fracturing. It is the time to gather ourselves and work for the real goal – a total ban. It is technology gone mad. It is driven by greed and our love of energy consumption with a supply driven by fossil fuels.
My Carbon Footprint
As a consumer I accept that I bear some responsibility for global warming and the destruction of the environment in the form of my own carbon footprint. I pledge to make changes in my behaviour one action at a time. Action 1: I pledge to not drink or purchase bottled water when fresh drinking water is otherwise available from a water tap or other supply. Action 2: I pledge to not place Christmas Lights on the outside of my home. Please send me your suggestions as to what I can do, personally, to reduce my carbon footprint. smokinjoewiseman@hotmail.com
This year I will reseach the economic and environmental implications of adding solar panels to my home. I will start taking action at a personal level to reduce my carbon footprint. I have reduced the temperature in my home and wear warmer clothing. The temperature in most rooms in our home for 20 hours of the day is not ablove 15-17C degrees.
My Charity
World Vision Half of the proceeds from Smokin’ Joe song purchases at this link will go to World Vision.
My Second Little Bay Islands Song
My second Little Bay Islands (ancestral home of my parents) song is « Bound for Hell. » The song was written as a tribute to two of my ancestors, Ray and Good Wiseman, along with 4 other crewmembers who perished in the wreck of the Helen C Morse. I thank my childhood friend, Fred Roberts and my cousin Craig Penney for details on the story of the wreck and lost seamen. I thanks my friend, Gerald Butler, for his great imagery during the writing of « Bound For Hell. » https://soundcloud.com/smokin-joe-wiseman/bound-for-hell
Recent developments in Little Bay Islands, an isolated Newfoundland outport foreshadow the disappearance of this beautiful island paradise as a community. Resettlement to the mainland of Newfoundland is inevitable. I hope you enjoy my tribute. There is another song with a Little Bay Islands theme « Love of a Hometown Girl » on my 3rd CD « Life is Good. »
If you are an artist, indie or otherwise and would like to build your collection of Indie music by exchanging CDs, please e-mail me at smokinjoewiseman@hotmail.com I would be pleased to exchange music with you.
I have made my 1st exchange with Brian Volke of Calgary, Alberta. I met Brian in the summer of 2012 at SongU in Toronto, ON.
My Family
My son Waylon is currently a veterinarian in Brisbane, Australia.
My son Jim is in his last year of med school in Dumaguette (the city of gentle people), Negros, Phillipines. He is currently in Canada studying for his Canadian Medical Board Exams.
My daughter in law, Kathleen Mae Lano Wiseman, has just achieved her Master’s Degree in Public Health and is applying for employment as a nurse in Newfoundland, Canada. She has received her Canadian certification.
My wife Marie has just retired (for the 3rd time) from teaching Grade One at Brochet School in Brochet, Manitoba. For her, the teaching of reading was a passion as opposed to a vocation. She loved her work, and the children, and they loved her. That’s how it should be in a Grade One classroom. Marie’s idea of a good workout is a 2.5 hour snowshoe in -25 degree weather. Not bad for someone who is finishing a 40 year career of teaching. I am truly a lucky man.
We have just purchased a winter residence in Port Charlotte, Florida. Not a condo on the beach but a condo within a short drive to the beach. We are looking forward to February and the pleasures of Charlotte County, Florida.
My band Keltic Jam, play some of my songs locally and a scratch track version of St. John’s Town, my first Newfie rocker, is available on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07v7bVnHSME Hope you enjoy!
Smokin Joe radiates the soul of Johnny Cash, the sensuality of Jim Morrison and the style of Woody Guthrie wrapped up in a folk/roots package! He’s kinda like Pete Seeger, somewhere between « Ringo Starr and the Grateful Dead » His songs are “real life gritty”, not “Nashville pretty”!
Contact Info and Websites
http://www.smokinjoewiseman.com
smokinjoewiseman@hotmail.com
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Smokin-Joe-Wiseman/124634987594733?v=wall&filter=1
http://www.cdbaby.com/Artist/SmokinJoeWiseman1
http://www.songu.com/members/smokinjoe
http://www.reverbnation.com/smokinjoewiseman
http://www.youtube.com/smokinjoewiseman
http://www.myspace.com/smokinjoewiseman
http://www.musicforte.com/member/smokinjoewiseman/
http://itunes.apple.com/ca/artist/smokin-joe-wiseman/id253012691
http://www.twitter.com/tjwiseman
http://www.flickr.com/smokinjoewiseman
