Tagged with band

Summer Swing in the Park Concert Sessions in Opelika

BJ Playing the Drums at Summer Swing

Do you know what goes on in your own city? Apparently I don’t. Last night I went to shoot the Summer Swing Fest in Opelika Alabama and, who knew, it is a whole summer series of concert events that goes on each Tuesday night during the summer, wow.

Every Tuesday evening beginning May 13, 2008, the Opelika Parks and Recreation Department hosts a free outdoor concert at 7:00 p.m. at Municipal Park in Opelika Alabama. This 14-week concert series offers a wide variety of musical entertainment including Gospel, Jazz, R & B, Oldies, Country, Big Band Swing, Folk, and Community Band music.

Ok, so I found out because I was scheduled to shoot the Cornerstone Band that night, but what a great event for the city, and there were a lot of people there as well.

This particular event had two bands, the Cornerstone Band and the Sons of Asaph Band from Auburn United Methodist Church. I had a great time and although I did not know this was an event that goes on each summer, I do now. I am still in the process of editing the shoot from last night and I will post an update here with a link to the final image edit when completed.

Update: I completed the edit for this gallery and you can find the complete Summer Swing gallery upload here.

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Meet the Cornerstone Buzz Band :: Photos

Cornerstone Buzz Worship Band

Cornerstone Buzz Worship Band

Elizabeth Singing Raise Your Hands at Cornerstone

Patrick on the Electric Guitar at Cornerstone

Cornerstone Worship Band

I had the privilege last night to do another photo shoot with the Cornerstone band. Being able to do a photo shoot while listening to and participating in some great praise and worship music is pretty cool. This is part of a larger collection of images (see full photo shoot set here) that Cornerstone is trying to gather, and step everything up to the next level. I am glad I can be a part of the process. Out of about 1,000 images I shot last night I edited down to about 50, then those 50 were narrowed down to about 30, which are now loaded in the full shoot session on my gallery, and I chose 5 of those for this post here. So, come meet the band.

Now that you are down at the bottom of the post, click on the last image to see them all in a gallery in the larger size. If you start at the top my youtube video sticks on top, sorry, haven’t figure out why yet. Hope you enjoyed the images as much as did taking them. There will be more to come, for now you can see all the current images on my gallery. Leave a comment below and tell me what you thought, or some creative critique on how to improve.

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Low Light Photography with a Worship Band and Some Great Music

Worship Leader, Brian

Electric Guitar

Keven at the Keyboard

Keyboard with Worship Leader in the Background

I did a short photo shoot of the Cornerstone worship band this past Wednesday. I am still gathering and editing the images but here are a few below from the shoot. Low light photography is one of my favorites when you can get some good directional light concentrated on the subjects.  Here, it is a pretty dark room for photography, especially for hand held work, but some great subjects, and a little light from above and you can still capture some interesting shots.

I have tried so many different online gallery programs over the years and never could find one I fully liked, so I finally gave in and just started organizing my gallery. Coming soon I will upload wider variety of images from each shoot along with past photo shoots from all over the country. For now, you can see the current uploaded images on the Auburn Images music gallery. Check back there soon and I will have more organized and uploaded.

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Music, Work, Worship, Photography and a Little Fun

Brian Johnson Worship Leader

It has been an extremely busy last several days and my normal daily journal post (as in this one) has been lost the last few days. We have been very busy with the books and all other aspects of work, but I also took on a few extra projects that took a bit more time than I anticipated (not unusual). Yesterday was Deborah’s birthday, see post Happy Birthday, Deborah, and I hope she had a nice day, but it was one where we didn’t have to leave the house for work, but just tried to get things done here at our home office. That basically means carrying boxes up and down the stairs all day and getting them listed on our store.

Deborah went through more books yesterday than in a typical day, which means I carried more boxes up the stairs and down the stairs than a typical day, BUT, we are starting to be able to see the floor in our dining room. Something we haven’t seen in going on two years now (we received a shipment of about an 18-wheeler load of books some 18 months ago and are still trying to get through all of them).

Photography (With a Little Worship), Finally

It has been a while since I have done some actual photography shooting on location, but last night I had the opportunity to do some shooting at the church of the band while they practiced. Below is just one small “head shot” of the worship leader. All in all I took about 500 shots over the hour and a half so it will take some time to go through (hope Brian doesn’t mind me putting up his mug shot for everyone to see).

I am trying to get some graphical images of the worship band up on the worship leaders blog site (now over at http://th.eophil.us or http://www.worship-journey.com for the long url). It is an ongoing project and hopefully will have a great impact on those who read and follow Brian’s story.

Everything Else

I was able to get to my guitar lesson this week, although I have been so busy I haven’t had time to practice yet. I now know exactly how much I don’t know, just about everything. I did get some new music arrivals this week as well, they included another interesting mix:

  • David Benoit – Here’s To You, Charlie Brown: 50 Great Years! (mix is a little off here)
  • Dan Fogelberg – Greatest Hits
  • Phil Keaggy – Inseparable
  • Phil Keaggy – Acoustic Sketches (great guitar album)
  • Billy Joel – The Nylon Curtain

Yes, those are from all over the place but I like to collect a wide range of music. Today should be a calmer day, one that we can stay here at the house and work. Glad to finally get back to my journal blog here. I am not to happy with my newish theme so I might go back to the other one and use the head graphic I did the other day, who knows.

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Coldplay's New Viva La Vida Cover Art Released

Coldplay's Viva La Vida Cover Art

Coldplay just announced the release of their new album, Vivav La Vida or Death And All His Friends. Coldplay is doing two free concerts, one in New York and one in London for their new release in June, and are offering a free download of one of their songs on the album, Violet Hill.  I love the fact that they released a high res version of their front cover, and a free copy of a single on the album.  They seem to get working with the digital age where the music industry (like Sony) just want to fight it.

The artwork for the cover is pretty interesting, and this is said to be (by Coldplay) the album which the world will remember them by. Certainly took long enough to release it but I am sure it will be great.  From the first single release for Viva LaVida is Violet Hill and probably has a lot to do with the album art above.

The album’s artwork features the classic painting Liberty Leading the People (La Libert guidant le peuple) by French painter Eugène Delacroix commemorating the July Revolution of 1830. It is currently on display in The Louvre in Paris.

Go get the download while you can, it is the only release until June.

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Dinner at LuLu's Homeport and the Bama Breeze

bama breeze

We drove down to the coast today. We try to come down to the gulf coast as often as we can since this is where our sailboat is located (see this blog under the category coastal or tagged under sailboat). This is actually getting more of a challenge with the price of gas now close to $4.00/gallon down here, but it is still reachable, just would be nice in some gas friendly car.

Who knows, I may look back at this post in 6 months and the price may be $5.00/gallon by then. Makes our trip to Colorado in late summer a load of fun, gas wise.  Either way, we love it down here and we try to come as often as we can (which seems to never be enough).  Our favorite time to come down to the gulf coast is in the off season, you never have to wait for a table and the beaches are always clean and empty.  Of course one thing we love to do while we are down here on the coast is eat, and Orange Beach and Gulf Shores has no shortage of good places to eat.

There is Some Great Food Down Here

There are several restaurants we love eating at down here. Tonight are going to LuLu’s at Homeport, which is a localish restaurant (meaning it is half touristy and half locals) and tonight should be a great set by John Reno and The Half-Fast Creekers.

John Reno andthe half-fast creekers

The band played longer than we stuck around but they played a nice mix of their own music and the usual known pop most bands play for the tourists. I guess those here for their vacation expect to hear Cheese Burger in Paradise at some point when they come down here. Deborah and I enjoy hearing songs we know, but we do like hearing the original music each band creates, they all have their own flavor.

His music can be defined as trop rock – a mixture of rock-n-roll with an island theme. John Reno and the Half-Fast Creekers have been described as Hoagy Carmichael meets Toby Keith in Margaritaville! -LuLu’s

One reason we love to go to LuLu’s when we are down here is for the live music. It isn’t the most quiet place in the world for sure, and probably not the cheapest, but if you are in Alabama’s gulf coast, stop by and have their open faced crab melt sandwich and enjoy some local music.

Nature in View

Down here there is always something going on. When we got back from dinner we had a nice pod of dolphins that were having a feast on the fish they had pushed into the cove across from our sailboat. We watched them jump, play, and eat for about 30 minutes and then sat in the cockpit of our boat and listened to them until we went to sleep.

There is always the Pelican, Sea Gull, and all the other water birds constantly flying around but we also have a pesky Gray Heron that seems to think our slip is his domain. He squawked at me several times trying to get on the boat and then again as he reclaimed his territory. The dolphins were kicking up so many fish that he was just waiting to pounce and he several nice dinners.

Other Images

A few other images from LuLu’s last night. The Bama Breeze (from the song of the same name, but I am pretty sure this is not the original) is just off the sand mound from LuLu’s and for the previous year we had been coming to this restaurant we didn’t even know it was out there. There was also another photographer there last night, she was shooting some private party but we shot her shooting them (really cool dreds too).

Scott at LuLu's at Homeport

The wait for a table in the summer time is supposed to be very very long, but we have never had to wait for a table, not once. Of course we have been there mostly in the winter and early dinner in summer but, still, no wait at all.

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