About the Music:    I am incredibly fortunate to be able to work with Patrick Leonard’s music - for me, its one of those cosmic gifts and sheer joy to listen to Pat’s exquisite playing and compositions as I find new mediums to share my images, of which I have, to say the least, thousands.   There will be more videos coming up - I have new software so they will be a little more sophisticated - yes, the next stage - growing and expanding as an artist,  and Pat has generously shared much of his past year’s improvisations with me to play, learn, and grow with.     The Enchanted Garden’s composition is from Pat’s improvisation at the church on April 29.  The Rosslyn and Walk Through the Sierras photovideos are pieces improvised in Pat’s studio 2008.

Patrick Leonard, Solo Piano, April 29, 2009 9 p.m.

“It has been a dream of mine to improvise for an audience for as long as I can remember. For the past few months I’ve been playing piano improvisations every Wednesday night at 8 p.m. at the Emanual Lutheran Church in North Hollywood.

I’ve not recorded any of the performances due to my own eccentric reasoning. But, on Wednesday April 29th the church has a rehearsal in the sanctuary and so I was unable to play. I decided it was important for me to do my weekly hour anyway purely for the sake of discipline, and so I did it at my studio in solitude.

About the videos:

The Sacred Water:

A slow and gentle walk, a meditation, through the sacred springs of Te Waikoropupu, Golden Bay, New Zealand.

Rosslyn Chapel:  Where Is The Holy Grail!    

Mysterious Rosslyn Chapel is famous for it's myths and legends of Knights Templar, Arthur, The Holy Grail, buried treasure, and the intricate medieval carvings of whimsical creatures, biblical characters and scenes covering almost every space on the walls and ceilings.

Meditation: A Song and A Prayer for Our Forests - The Sacred Places Series

A Journey Through The Sierras

Walks through Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Park, California

Snapshots from a two day wander through Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Park, California ~ A condensed magical journey through the forest, mountains and waterways.

John Muir described the mighty Sequoia as natures masterpiece, the greatest of living things, a king tree, and the very god of the woods. There is indeed something otherworldly about sequoia groves along with their companion pines finding their own space and light beneath the shadow of the giant trees!

It is difficult to determine the exact age of the Sequoia, the majestic Grant and Sherman Trees are estimated to be around 3,000 to 3,500 years old. The Grant Tree has the largest known diameter, 28.9 feet at breast height, and about 267 feet tall. The Sherman Tree measured approximately 275 feet tall, 25.1 feet in diameter, a ground perimeter of 102.6 feet, is considered to be the largest living Sequoia, about 10 percent larger volume wise than the Washington Tree, followed by the Grant Tree. Many of the giants are 1,500 to 2,000 years old. The Sequoias natural habitat is only in a relatively small area of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, a collective total of around 36,000 to 38,000 acres.

The Photography

Snapshots... documenting a moment for the sheer joy and sake of it - one camera, one lens for the most part and taking each moment for what it is, no matter the time of day, light, the situation perfect or imperfect. Remembering magical moments as I appreciate the world I live in, and appreciate our wise ancestors who have left us these legacies of ancient, sacred, mysterious and beautiful places. May future generations also experience the benefit and beauty of our unique, magnificent, and much needed forests.

Sacred Places

To me sacred place can be any space that elevates ones being or awareness to a level beyond that of everyday life. Sacred places can be rendered from forests and waterways, desert rock formations, intentional architectural forms such as the legacies of ancient Egypt constructed by masters of harmony and form, or something more personal that holds significance to the individual.

Giving Thanks!     The Enchanted Garden: The Garden of Eatden

A slide show and improvised solo piano ~ Looking at the sky above, a resident hawk soars by, taking my eyes to a towering sunflower standing twelve feet tall and my attention to feeling there is more here than meets the eye... In no time at all a different world emerges. Enchanted, I am happy to be in this place and there began the building of this garden of eatden, a quiet celebration of May Day, a festival to bring forth good harvest for the coming year, and ordinarily, an unlikely place to harbor such an array of life and growth of delicious heavenly food and, yes, we have a serpent or two who have not said a word to us (its got to be the apples - we dont have any), lizards, owls, seasonal birds, beautiful bugs (we need them all) , deer, raccoon, possums, squirrels, coyote, who all frequent the sanctuary set aside for them above the garden and our beloved cats who believe they are the rulers of the universe, Smudge, Spunky and Lunita.

Ive experienced some strange things in this seemingly magical garden - I sometimes see the plants in a different state of growth for example; for moments out of time I see them further along than they actually are, and they wiggle when you sit quietly next to them and admire and appreciate them, sometimes I feel they are telling me what they need as I sit and observe in silence, although their fruits, when all things are in good balance, are not large, but certainly the tastiest food we have ever eaten. Although please note here that I have not eaten any of the fungi that frequently appear all year round - not one!

Giving thanks...

At this writing, it is November and we still have generous offerings of strawberries, tomatoes, orange bell pepper, basil, parsley, arugula, chard, lettuce, cress, carrots, sage, marjoram, lemons, lavender, calendula., parsley. Im about to collect the last of the blue lake beans and one last butternut squash. Just planted the garlic for next year, and for winter we will have broccoli, broccoli raab, cilantro, arugula, lettuces, cress, chards, kales, and baby carrots... The garden of eatden is beautiful, abundant, and we give thanks!

I’ve been curious about what’s happened to my playing in these months and so I broke my self-imposed rule of not recording and recorded. In order to preserve the idea of a live performance no alterations or corrections were made. (Im now curious as to what having heard the recordings will do to my improvising. Is a bit of a pain really).

Then, as is my tendency, I had a thought. On the weeks the church isn’t available I’ll record, print up a few copies and give them to those who would have come but consequently missed my random interruptions to the silence of an empty church.”

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