Welcome!

Dear friends,

Welcome to The Voice and The Song. This is a blog that will chronicle my west coast tour supporting my new album of spiritual funk/rock/reggae music, "Tree of Life". It is also my intention in this blog to use correct capitalization. (for those of you who know me, you understand the depth of this commitment.)

I'm glad to have you with me now. There are too many beautiful things happening every day not to share them with you.

Like, for a large example, this whole idea of a tour. I have dreamed of being on the road, playing music, for years and years, but only now has it become a reality. I am realizing that in order for something like this to work, the voice, the reason to perform for others, must believe in itself. The musician must understand that he has something wonderful to give to people. And, he must actually HAVE something wonderful to give! This is the reason for getting up in front of others. It is about letting the voice out - but actually it's more like THE VOICE. As I sing my songs, THE VOICE has my words and my images on it, but really it is a very basic, simple thing of life. The voice of life, singing and being shared.

The more I understand this, the more I am able to feel it in the room with us, and simply know that it is THE VOICE that is singing, and not really me.

I have played 2 shows so far - Encinitas and San Juan Capistrano. Both were well attended and lovely. I have been loving ending the shows with "You Can't Take My Life Away", the whole crowd singing along with the chorus. And at the end of the song, the guitar drops out and we all sing into the heavens, "You can't take my life away, yeah... you can't take it away!" and are left with that defiant, powerful feeling celebrating in our hearts.

You can always hear this music at http://www.myspace.com/alexcookmusic

Some great news - a new friend in San Diego turns out to be an aspiring film guy and did a high quality video and audio of the whole show in Encinitas. "Soon" there will be video clips on YouTube, and there is talk of a bootleg live album. (Which, I have to admit, even before this came along, I was musing on what I would call a live album from these performances... ahem. And I think a wonderful idea would be "Tree of Live". Right?!

Today I am heading up to LA where I will be playing a couple of joint events. I will perform for a little bit and then CS lecturer Tim Myers will give a talk, and then I will perform again. It makes me feel happy to see music, especially my music, being embraced by my community, and used as a tool to help us all grow spiritually.

And that is wonderful because that is one of the greatest things that art is - a tool, to help us grow spiritually. http://www.stonebalancer.com/artfeedsthehungry.htm

for all you non-californians out there, here is a photo of the view over the back fence of my home for the last 2 days, and another from the porch of my home for the next 2 hours.


Over Summer and Laura's back fence, Encinitas












From Amy's porch, looking out on San Clemente

More to come!