Terracotta half-life

Terracotta half-life Supports the Zaagkii Project

Obadiah — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 14:47:59 +0000

For the third year in a row, Terracotta half-life entertained for the Cedar Tree Institute’s Mid Summer Celebration. During the last two years, we had perfect weather for the event.

This year, the sky was gray. Light rain came down most of the day, but it didn’t wither the spirit of celebration. Instead of lamenting their misfortune, the good people of the Cedar Tree Institute and the Zaagkii Project gave thanks for the rain and kept smiling.

The Zaagkii Project is a native plant and pollinator protection initiative that began in 2008. It’s goal is to help bring about the recognition that pollination is an essential, critical ecological function for our survival.

Brought to you by the Cedar Tree Institute in collaboration with the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community and the United States Forest Service, this initiative makes an intentional connection between the restoration and healing of the earth with the renewal of the human spirit.

Once again, the food was delicious. After eating, the Zaagkii Project youth volunteers shared their experiences with us before demonstrated a Tai Chi form they recently learned. We did a special song to accompany them, and after hearing from several speakers, played the rest of our set.

Check out the photos

Visit http://wingsandseeds.org

Visit http://cedartreeinstitute.org

Terracotta Travels

Obadiah — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 14:20:50 +0000

Terracotta half-life played for the Menominee Summer Concert Series on Tuesday, although it actually took place on Stephenson Island, which is a beautiful park just over the bridge in Marinette, Wisconsin. We showed up early and decided to get some food first. Lucky for us Mickey-Lu-Bar-B-Q was only a couple miles up the road.

After dinner, we quickly set up the sound system and took a few photos of the river and the geese. For an opening act, there was a local drum group called Doonbali. As they played, people began streaming in with their chairs. By the end of their set, there was a stunning sunset in the distance and the park was buzzing with people.

Doonbali will be performing at The 3rd Annual People’s Festival at Picnic Rocks in Marquette Michigan at 1:00 on Saturday, July 31st and 2:00 on Sunday, August 1st 2010. The People’s Festival is set up to showcase Earth friendly, holistic, organic & natural practices.

We played as the sun drifted lazily into the horizon across the river. We were well received by the friendly people of Menominee/Marinette and would like to thank them again for being there with us.

Check out the photos

Visit http://www.myspace.com/doonbali

Mining Journal features Terracotta half-life

Obadiah — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 17:06:32 +0000

The Mining Journal, Marquette’s daily newspaper, featured Terracotta half-life in an article last Saturday (April 3, 2010). It was written by Renee Prusi after she interviewed us and took some pictures of us on stage at the Upfront on March 24th.

As usual, Renee did a great job with the story.

Thanks to everybody for coming out to the Upfront and dancing, and thanks to Renee for the photos and great write-up in the Mining Journal.

Check out the photos from 03-24-2010 at the Upfront.

Read the Article at http://www.miningjournal.net

Organic sounds

Obadiah — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 06:39:19 +0000

Terracotta half-life provided the organic sound track to an evening of organic food and organic thought with the owners of the Marquette Food Co-op. The annual meeting took place on Friday, March 12th. This was the second year in a row that we’ve played for this event, and once again the food was excellent and the folk were friendly.

Thanks to everybody for the wonderful meal, the donations, and also for hanging out afterward and dancing to our music. Our good friend Christy was kind enough to take some photos for us.

Check out the photos

Visit http://www.marquettefood.coop

Audio Highlights from 2-26-2010

Obadiah — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 02:30:27 +0000

The following clips are highlights from a live performance by Terracotta half-life on Feb 26, 2010 at Harley’s Lounge. The recording was done by Obadiah Metivier with a Sony DAT Walkman portable DAT (Digital Audio Tape) recorder and a small stereo microphone. The mix is far from perfect, but it’s listenable.

Palm Wine Sound (guitar solo)

by Fela Kuti

Improv (Alto Saxophone solo)

by Terracotta half-life

Missleading Lady (partial)

by Terracotta half-life

Something’s Wrong With This Picture (partial)

by Galactic

Onawhim (part 1)

by Terracotta half-life

This recording features the following line-up:
Aaron Kippola – Alto Saxophone
Jerry Kippola – Guitar
Steve Leuthold – Tenor and Baritone Saxophones, Flute
Obadiah Metivier – Bass, Vocals
Jennie Peano – Vocals
Dan Schaefer – Drums

If you liked these, then you might just want to…
Check out more of the Music

Call From Above

Obadiah — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 22:35:48 +0000

Video from the annual nonprofit Cedar Tree Institute/Zaagkii Project Midsummer Festival was recently posted online. Terracotta half-life provided the music for the event in support of the Zaagkii Project which took place July, 14 2009 on the shores of Lake Superior.

Call From Above

Featured in this video is a song written by Emmanuel Kawedi and Terracotta half-life. Emmanuel is an International graduate student from Tanzania at Northern Michigan University in Marquette, Michigan and is featured here on vocals and congas.

What is The Zaagkii Project?

Working alongside members of several Ojibwa tribes, at-risk teens with the U.S. Forest Service-sponsored Zaagkii Wings and Seeds Project in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula will continue protecting pollinators during 2010 by helping to build the first-ever native species plants greenhouse on an American Indian reservation and hope to trace the Mexico Monarch migration.

During the summers 2008-2009, some 23 at-risk teens from Marquette, MI planted/distributed over 26,000 native plants seeds, helped transplant hundreds of native plant seedlings, hiked through remote forests with Zaagkii Project Native American college interns to learn importance and uses for native species plants, and have built and painted 36 mason bee houses and 18 butterfly houses with one of each placed by the USFS in The Peoples Garden at U.S. Department of Agriculture Headquarters, National Mall, Washington, DC.

For more information about the Zaagkii Project, visit ZaagkiiTV

Also, Kevin Baker accompanied Susan Payant, a.k.a. “The Butterfly Lady”, as she read a short story/poem about Monarchs by author/illustrator Lois Ehlert entitled Waiting for Wings. Skip about six minutes into this video for a taste of the interactive improvisational experience.

The Butterfly Lady

Big thanks to Jon Magnuson as well as everybody else at the Cedar Tree Institute for all their efforts.

Also, thanks to Greg Peterson for the videos and photos and all the great media work he does.

Check out the Photos

Photo Archive Updated

Obadiah — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 01:59:11 +0000

I just wanted to let everybody know that our photo archive has recently been updated with a bunch of long overdue photos from the last year or so. Thanks to everybody who took photos of Terracotta half-life over the years. We couldn’t have built a photo gallery without you.

Included in the update were photos from the 2009 Culinary Journey which took place at the U.P. Children’s Museum as well as photos from the 2009 Cedar Tree Institute Midsummer Celebration which took place at the Presque Isle Pavilion and much more.

photos of the 2009 Culinary Journey

photos of the 2009 Cedar Tree Institute Midsummer Celebration

photos of the 2009 Halloween Party at Harley’s Lounge

photos of the Wild Rover on January, 8th 2010

There are still photos which are currently missing in action, but we’ll do our best to let you know whenever more are added to our gallery.

Terracotta Returns

Obadiah — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 03:49:37 +0000

Last Wednesday, Terracotta half-life was involved in an event that was eagerly awaited and highly anticipated by many of our fans. The return to the Upfront. Well, it’s been about two years since last time we played the Upfront & Company in Marquette, Michigan. Since then, we’ve had many requests to perform there again due to the ample dancing space.

Our line up ~~is slightly different~~ has almost completely changed since last time we played the Upfront. Most recently the addition of Jerry Kippola on guitar has helped us evolve to the next step in the pyramid of musical enlightenment. One thing that hasn’t changed is the age-old power of music to make people want to move their bodies.

Thanks to everybody who came out and got funky with us and thanks to Dani for taking photos. It was great to see our friends out on the dance floor getting crazy. Shuffling their feet to the rhythm, jumping and twisting like sharks in a feeding frenzy… and of course the “ultimate humanoid limbo challenge” was a lot of fun.

So, I hope we satisfied all those who wanted to see us at the Upfront. If not, don’t worry. We’ll be back again on Wednesday March, 24th 2010.

THIS TIME IN 3D!

That’s right, three dimensions. No special glasses needed. So, mark it down. Don’t forget. Tell a friend. Bring a date. Come early. Stay late. Dance hard. You’ve got about a month to practice your moves before showing us all how ~~drunk you can get~~ talented you are.

Check out the photos

New Website Design for 2010

Obadiah — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 19:49:35 +0000

Greetings humans and humanoids.

Terracotta half-life has gone through many changes over the last year, and so I figured our website should reflect them by getting a complete overhaul. Although the site has been completely redesigned, my goal was to maintain a similar feel.

The site is now more user friendly with a horizontal navigation bar just under the logo as well as at the bottom of every page. Also, the blog has been moved to the main page instead of being separated into different categories and buried in the site somewhere. This should make things a little bit more interesting around here. Look for more changes/additions coming soon.

Thanks,

Obadiah

Dancing to the Sound of the Future

Obadiah — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 00:07:27 +0000

Friday the 15th of January… two weeks into the new year and the new decade, but time was already running out. According to the prophets of old, the END was near, or maybe it wasn’t.

Either way, Terracotta half-life wasted no time getting into some serious grooves. Soon enough, a surly mob of amateur photographers swarmed the “dance floor” and unleashed a flurry of camera flashes and twitching limbs.

Maybe the prophets were wrong.

Maybe the paparazzi were dancing to the sound of the future.

Check out the photos