Title: Violet Skies
Format: CD or MP3
Artist: Barb Sorensen
Musicians: Barb Kronau-Sorensen
Producer: Barb Kronau-Sorensen
Recorded at: Stockton, IL and Schaumburg, IL hotel Rooms
Publisher: Fantabulous Publishing/ASCAP

Song List: Song List Violet Skies
Instrument List: Instrument List Aria Acoustic Guitar coyotes in the wild in Stockton, IL
Recording Equipment: Recording Gear Digidesign's Mbox Sennheiser e835S microphone Mac Titanium 15" Laptop OS X.3.9 earphones

Inspired by the evening sky in Schaumburg, IL, and the coyotes and wild freedom in Stockton, IL this song came together one evening as I got off tour in 2003 to land in a hotel in Schaumburg, IL.....

I was over tired. I was strung out and exhausted and stressed. I could not get to sleep and it was like 3am already. I don't drink, so that wasn't going to work, I don't smoke or do drugs and so that wasn't going to put me to sleep, and I don't sleep around and so that was not going to put me to sleep either. Living a clean lifestyle sometimes you gotta figure something else out. hmm.. so I saw my guitar and picked it up and and just started playing around with these two chords. The way the guitar resonated against my body was soothing and before I knew it I was almost asleep sitting there playing my guitar. I had started to sing "oohs" on top of the chords because it felt good - as if I was letting out excess energy and calming and getting centered again in the process. and so I kept singing it and then - being as tired as I was - visions of that evening's purple and orange sky kept coming back to mind and I felt like I was hearing the wild coyotes in Stockton IL again and then the lyrics just suddenly flowed out of me into this song. I wrote this in 2003. But I did not have the entire story and experience yet. There was still something missing, something it needed and I did not fully understand it until...... I went on tour through Europe in the summer of 2005. It was a very stressful tour. I was doing all the work of setting up the concerts, and publicity and website updates, etc.. myself. I didn't want to do it this way, it just happened this way.. now, one of the things I like to do for myself is to take some time each week just to play and go do something that is not necessarily music related. something fun just for me.... so I planned my tour to work with a few things I wanted to do in Europe..i.e. I wanted to see Berlin and the Wall and experience what it was like for people there, I wanted to see the new and the old Berlin, I wanted to see the Bremen Town musicians statue, and I wanted to experience the North Sea. I wanted to also go to Switzerland and experience the incredible clear water there and to go to Corsica and learn polyphony singing. I saved Corsica as a birthday present to myself that year. But I couldn't give myself that gift till after my Birthday because of the way the concerts fell in line for my tour. It was the final place I would land before heading back to the states.. sort of like a mini vacation to heal and re-center..

When I got to Corsica I was blown away by it's amazing-nes!... Yes It's beautiful and yes it has incredibly clear water and warm breezes and people that are real and friendly but not overly friendly and will let you just "be". and when I got there I was blessed with alot of concerts. Even though I had not planned them. I was thrilled and felt extremely blessed. Then one night I got the chance to play at Chez tao - a word renowned restaurant with live music after hours. A most incredible experience with incredible neat people! and afterwards was invited to sit in with a bunch of other world travelling musicians and we took turns singing songs for each other and sharing our gifts at the table of music, road stories, experiences, good feelings and fun. It was a spiritual type evening but we didn't see it at the time. I got back to my rented apartment by 5:30 in the morning and thre sun was just beginning to come up over the mountains and the sea, when suddenly, across the entire Island, a chorus of coyotes began to howl in unison as if on cue to the rising of the sun, and it spread like wildfire from one side of the island to the other as the sun seemed to come out from behind the purple and orange morning clouds very slowly and gently and lovingly blessing the earth with a gentle wakeup. I have never heard that many coyotes in one place and had no idea Corsica had coyotes even! Then when the coyotes were done, as if on cue...the roosters began to crow and they too, started singing one after the other all across the island - an amazing thing to hear! seemed like everyone had a rooster! Then the birds started singing and chirping away as if there was a cycle of when each species woke up according to the schedule of the height of the sun. I could do nothing but be in awe and amazement of this creation and beauty! an experience like none other I have ever seen or felt!
So today (March 20th , 2006) as I write this story up for you to show you how this song and CD came to be.. I am suddenly struck with clarity at the indisputable spiritual guidance I had received unbeknownst to me as I just was being me and doing my thing - music and enjoying life as I go to spread the music. From start of writing it to finish of the CD cover (which as I was making the cover I was just looking for a pretty picture - I thought I'd use one I had taken in Corsica.. I had not put two and two together with the coyotes yet as I chose the image...the realization of this all came as I am writing this today.never realizing that my choices of cover were being guided spiritually by just showing up to experience the Corsican Sunrise and take a picture for myself & then doing the legwork to get a nice looking CD cover together LOL!) . I had not been able to come up with a CD cover for this song up until this morning.

So this morning as I am writing this and looking at the CD Cover I am struck by the incredible power of my Higher power to bring me the ultimate BEST and most appropriate picture for this CD cover... this picture is of Corsica that very same morning as the coyotes sang - It was taken at the exact same time that the coyotes and roosters and birds were singing in unison in joy as the sun came up .. This is a picture of the morning sun as it comes up over the mediteranean in MOntecello , Corsica. A most amazing experience that you have to be willing and open to be ready for and listen silently for and experience in the quietness of the wee hours of the morning.
This song and CD has come full circle now, and I am now officially ready to release it!~ Thanks Universe for supplying me with this and guiding me to this amazing song and CD.
I hope you all enjoy it as much as I had making it This song contains my experiences, strengths and hopes as I continues to tour and release new music. I have a greater insight and deeper appreciation of what music and life and spirituality mean to me and how they work within me to create new music and sounds and experiences and hopes for others. And how I am one with the universe and each other being on this planet and I too am just a channel for an amazing spiritual realm we all live in.
I also need to put a surgeon general type warning on this CD for you:
Warnng*** DO NOT LISTEN TO THIS WHILE DRIVING OR OPERATING HEAVY MACHINERY!...... IT WILL PUT YOU TO SLEEP!

Other cool tidbits about this song:
I sang this song to a stressed out executive at Adidas Marketing over Skype - the free internet telephony- one night as he sat in Germany, and I in my hotel room in Schaumburg, IL and we were discussing my new tour and club dates. He mentioned he was too stressed from work to go to sleep, so I sang him this song over the internet. After I sang the song we hung up cause he was sooo tired he finally was able to go to sleep. so it works across cultures, around the world and it still works to put me to sleep every night when I can't sleep and need help . .

The coyotes came from a recording project I did for a Silent retreat center out in Stockton , IL in 2003. I got to sit and listen all evening until the coyotes came out and then I recorded them . was alot of fun I also recorded birds and other critter sounds.. crickets, owls, etc.. it's amazing what a laptop , mbox and good quality microphone can pick up in the woods! even the wind and a far away airplanes and cars and dogs and little mice scurrying around.. but the sound that totally freaked me out one night, was as I was listening for coyotes, I was pretty tired and a bit scared. cause I had seen enough werewolf movies to keep my imagination very active. and so I was sitting on a chair and this moth buzzed the mic suddenly and it made this giant huge distorted sound in my headphones and I flipped out of my chair instantly! LOL! I laughed at myself when I realized it was only a moth LoL !
so moral of the story is.. never dose off when you're recording in the woods. something WILL wake you up! :)

regards
Barb