Moving Ahead

All the aspects of my life (poetry, singing, relationships, journalism and work) are progressing wonderfully.

POETRY

Landscapes: the Journal of the International Centre for Landscape and Language published my poem “Landscape,” We Matter Media published a human rights poem of mine, New South Wales journal Studio accepted my poem Nightfall, and Voiceworks – a journal I have been trying since I was 16 to be published in – finally accepted a poem of mine. It’s called “Matisse’s Blue Nude II.” In December I finished organising guest bookings for Perth Poetry Club but I have not left Perth’s poetry reading scene. The Katharine Susannah Prichard Writers Centre has booked me as an MC for their New Australian Voices open mic festival event on Friday 12 April which will be live streamed from Darlington Hall to launch the festival.

LITERATURE

Jake’s Perth Book Club has been revived. Marcus, one of the founding members of the group who moved to Melbourne last year, suggested that I use Meet Up to recruit members and now the book club family includes some new friendly, thoughtful, and worldly members. The novels we’ve read together this year: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.’s “Slaughterhouse Five,” William Faulkner’s “As I Lay Dying,” and now Albert Camus’s “The Fall.” Faulkner’s novel is the one I love the most; it is now among my top favourite books of all time.

JOURNALISM

Express Media selected me to be one of the Buzzcuts reviewers for the 2013 Perth Fringe Festival. Of the four shows I reviewed, those by Movin’ Melvin Brown and the Darling Buds of May were the highlights for me. Buzzcuts gave me the fantastic opportunity to have my reviews published by The West Online. Drum Perth has continued to publish my live gig and CD reviews. I am currently working on another article for MeDeFacts and another Research Info Sheet for The School of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine.

EMPLOYMENT

Working as part of the New Approaches To Teaching (NATT) team has been an absolute pleasure. It has taught me so much about e-learning possibilities in tertiary education. Among the work I have produced for the team this year, I am most proud of the instructional laboratory techniques videos I filmed, edited, and narrated as well as a marketing poster I produced to promote the improvements we are hoping to make to the F.A. Hadley Museum.

ENTERTAINMENT

Entertaining has been the most exciting and active part of my life for the last few months. The Ellington Jazz Club invited me back for a performance which I will be doing with Mint Jazz Band. The show will feature jazz classics with a dash of contemporary tunes. Mint Jazz Band recorded two new demos in January, a jazz/swing/blues demo and a contemporary music demo. I have placed these on our revamped website. Our recent gig highlights include the New Year’s Eve gig at The Byrneleigh, high octane Saturday night gigs at Wolf Lane, and an outdoor show for the Town of Cambridge’s Music in the Park. I am now taking vocal lessons from another lady whose surname is King but the most inspiring lesson I have had recently came from extraordinary Perth actress and singer Rhoda Lopez who helped me sprinkle some theatre in four of the songs I will perform at The Ellington. To help promote my upcoming gig at the City of Subiaco’s Sunset@Subi local photographer and poet Karen Murphy took some photos of me which are my first ever professional promotional photos. On top of all of this, I also joined the South Perth Lion’s Big Band and performed with them at the Jazz Club of WA, the Scarborough Sportsmen’s Club, and the City of South Perth’s Angelo St. Markets.

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As you can gather from all of this, I have been a busy and industrious man. Hopefully, in another four months I will have more exciting news to share with you. I am a man who strives for the stars.

Photography by Karen Murphy: