Stencil T - S H I R T S

Stencil Cutting:

My brother Kenneth is one of the most talented people I know. One of his recent craft trends is makings stencils out of photographs.

He decided to make some stencils from my photographs that ica took! Then, I am going to buy some V-Necks and spray paint these onto them ( one on each) and sell them at the Release party! they can each me hand signed, etc. and personalized to you!

HOW AWESOME IS THAT?

the album release P A R T Y

To all of my lovelies,

This has been a long time in the works and is one of the most exciting points in my career thus far. I am releasing 1,000 limited press copies of my debut original album. It has 11 tracks, most of which several of you have heard at my shows.

1. Do You Like Me? (intro)
2. My Better Half
3. Be Your Girl
4. A little More Perfect
5. Zero To Sixty
6. Stay
7. Every Single Time
8. Sad Little Boy
9. Don't Ask Why ( The Pancake Song)
10. Just Be friends
11. Check Yes Or No ( outro)

I am releasing my album for the first time at Rugby Cafe in Washington, D.C. Georgetown. Rugby is the first place I ever performed with my guitar live, and has one of the coolest vibes in the city.

And What Better day than VALENTINES DAY! 2.14.2010. if you don't have a valentine, come find one here! and if you do, bring your date!

The Party will be from 7-11p.m. and there will be a $10 cover charge at the door.... you will receive a free copy of the album, and drink specials all night.

expect a night full of wonderful music, candles, and Chirstmas lights... it's going to be magical.

a huge thank you to everyone who helped make this album possible. Especially Ica Diongzon, Justin Huey, Douglas Sonders, Thomas Carter, Alex Johns, Tim Cossor, and MPB.


** STAY TUNED: THERE WILL BE LOTS OF OTHER FUN GOODIES AND ANNOUCEMENTS TO BE MADE IN THE WEEKS LEADING UP TO THE EVENT! **



if you have any questions e-mail: hope.makes.music@gmail.com



If you can not make it the album will be for sale on the website beginning the same week: http://hopeleigh.webs.com/



RSVP @ the facebook event here:

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=279445468597&index=1

the B E A U T I F U L ica

ica diongzon is the most lovely girl in all of the world.

she is responsible for many aspects of my career, including teaching me my first guitar chords... taking my album/promo photos and now- doing the graphic design for the CD tray and Booklet. she has the biggest heart i've ever met, and is someone i aspire to be more like everyday. she is talented, beautiful, giving, smart, and oh so charming and delightful. and sorry boys, she's taken, ( by a boy who fits her just right too!)

she is truely incredible...

I dare you to try and not fall in love with her, and her work:

FOLLOW ICA's PHOTOGRAPHY BLOG: http://icaimages.blogspot.com/

ICA's PROFESSIONAL SITE: http://icaimages.showitsite.com/

ICA's FAN PAGE ON FACEBOOK: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Ica-Images/119310402524?ref=search&sid=7412958.699890909..1

BUY ICA's CUTE STUFF!: http://www.etsy.com/shop/riniandfaith


in case you can't tell .... i l o v e h e r

for real this T I M E

So my last post said we were finishing the artwork... tonight we are ACTUALLY finishing it. I didn't drive out to VA to be with Ica so we are doing it all via telephone/ e-mail ... luckily i trust ica and everything she does turns out stunning... again, i am lucky to have the friends that i have.

This page is fun... all of the tiny words at the top are the lyrics to my songs! Then... is my thank you's ( i wish i could thank the whole world) then the initials of everyone who inspired any of the songs on the album, and then the production credits... i printed in the size font it's in on the booklet template to make sure that size 6.5 font is legible, turns out it is....


I'm not going to show you the album cover until it is done BUT.... I did decide to show you the actual CD label:

I am so ready for this all to done... at this point it is all so close, I am just waiting for all 1,000 copies to come in the mail... I simply can not wait, this is literally a lifetime dream of mine, and i am beyond myself ecstatic to share it with you all...

FEBRUARY 14th SCREAM IT FROM THE MOUNTAIN TOPS!

finishing the A R T W O R K

So this is one of the most tedious steps.... album artwork and processing .

Recording is fun. Photoshoots are fun. Putting that music and pictures into an album and ordering and organizing it all on templates... is not my favorite part to say the least. the differences between .jifs and .psds. and .pfs. and .ai 's.... haha next step please? the party....



Luckily, one of my best friends, the beautiful and talented Ica studied both photography and graphic design in college, and was able to do it all with me. Ica and me have been friends since we used to sing and lead the music in church every morning. She was there the first time I learned a guitar chord, and did one of my promo photoshoots... Ica knows the style and image I aim for both in music and marketing as well as who I am as a person, so I trust her more than anyone outside of my own brain with this ( and often even more than...)



Tonight, me and ica finished the templates for the CD Booklets , Disc Silk Screen images, Tray Cards, etc ... of course last minute ;) I had taught ballet/ guitar this morning and went straight to " All that Glitters" rehersal and have a cold.... Ica lives an hour away so i got there around 9pm and now it's 3 am and I'm just getting home after driving an hour in the rain ( and of course blogging about it!) long story short, Im exaughsted.....

I fell asleep eating a banana and working:

While Ica Kept working hard:
and while gina entertained us:

Ica's photography work is amazing : CHECK IT OUT! we are both so proud of this project...and i can't wait to put it all in your hands in 20 days!

I am so P R O U D of her

LIFE

I know this blog is about my career in and passion for the arts ... but art is life.. and so this post is about life.
You know the question : "if you were stranded on an island with one ________, what would it be?"

well, if that blank said " person" ... I wouldn't hesitate, I'd say, my gramaw.

She's hilarious:

And Adorable:

My gramaw always takes me and my friends to the Red Lobster, she even threw me my 21st birthday party. When the world becomes too much, I go to her house and just nap on her lap while she plays with my hair, she usually tempts me into sleeping over by bribing me with grilled cheese and hot chocolate for dinner. She comes to all of my shows, and even offered to donate fabric from her church to our theatre department after noticing that our costumes for Wild Party were "small". lol....

Anyways, she is the funnest most lively 81 year old i know... ( although to be honest I don't know many) she is able to laugh about her age and her life, and WHOA if you could see her watch Redskins Football!!

My Granny-O ( as i like to call her) has Neuropothy, meaning the nerves in her feet and legs aren't really working at all, so considering she can't even feel her own feet anymore, she is doing quite well- she even still drives! She is staying in Florida with my Aunt Joyce for 2 months during the winter to avoid the cold of DC ... and while down there she promised her doctor she would walk as much as she could.

She is walking 3 times a day, I was there for 2 weeks and we tracked her path, 1 mile! she is walking 1 mile 3 times a day! While at dinner with my cousins Bob, tiffany and there son Greyson, they mentioned a family race in florida the following weekend that was all ages they were going to do...and we convinced my gramaw to do it!

SHE DID IT! MY GRAMAW DID THE FIRST RACE OF HER LIFE AT 81 AND CAME IN FIRST PLACE FOR HER AGE GROUP! she did 1.3 miles in 24 minutes!!!!!

she e-mailed me ( yes she has a laptop, and a cell phone...) this picture, and it makes me feel so happy and full of life, and so proud of her. it also makes me feel like we never should make excuses....

i love you to the moon, and back gramaw

a W O N D E R F U L week

Wonderful things are happening all around...

I think 2010 is going to be my year.

Since last Friday things have been wonderful, I did a great photoshoot for Phillip Noss, he went to Duke Ellington with me for guitar and majors in songwriting and music business at Berklee now.... He's quite a stud so it was fun to shoot him. I love his image, this was his first promo shoot so we did a few locations: like em?

Photography is just my side hobby but i love the immediate results. You can check him out on Youtube, Myspace, and Facebook- his new songs have a very John Mayer feel, Ithink youll dig him. My photos are the background art on his sites, enjoy loves....

After that was AU BSA Apollo night, which if you've been reading went phenomenol! and I won! It was an incredible night! And if you missed it, here is the video again!

Starting Saturday I went back to filming with HAZE. It is a full feature indie film I've been a part of for 2 years, the bulk of the cast has had off since August, and we were back in full swing this weekend. We shot at George Mason on Saturday, a huge party scene, Sunday at University of Maryland, and Monday in Arlington, Sunday was a 17 hour shoot day so .... things got cranky, but I loved being back around all of my -faux-sorority sisters again. I had some ridiculously mean Haze-ing lines, but i love my little and she knows it. We all had a feast at La Tasca in Clarendon and it was, oh to die for. For obvious reasons we can't have a camera on set, but I can post some behind the scene cast shots ... These are our fake frat boys, who i love:


and it keeps getting better! Tuesday I filmed a music video/ promo with 8112 Studios, the guys are AMAZING, and my friend Zach is interning with them and got to be there so that was fun too!

photo via. Douglas Sonders iPhone

On Tuesday, On my way to the 8112 Studio , I found out I got cast in a show at H.Street Playhouse, here in Washington D.C. called "All that Glitters" It goes up February 17th-28th, so keep an eye out! It has a great cast, including Jabari Exum and David Lamont Wilson, both great friends of mine, and is directed by the ALWAYS fabulous Courtney Baker-Oliver. The show is part of Restoration Stage. The link to the facebook event for the show is : http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=262389712067&ref=ts



Then Tuesday Night... I finally made it to a Greg Holden show... at Jammin Java, funny enough last time i tried to see him ( when he toured with INGRID MICHAELSON) i was at jammin Java to see Emily play with FUN. and missed it. He came down with his friend Ian Axel, who I was ABSOLUTLEY BLOWN AWAY BY... I had talked to Greg Before via E-Mail, in fact i started keeping up with his music before he was in even in the United States, and we go to talk for a few hours after the show. Both guys are just so insanely talented, nice, and funny- they are living in NY but hopefully I'll be playing more up there soon. These are my favorite songs by them:



IAN AXEL: (feat. greg)



GREG HOLDEN:( feat. Ian)

and the W I N N E R is....

Tonight was a huge deal for me.

I sang at my school's 1st annual Apollo night, hosted by our BSA ( Black student Alliance) I got into it through my friend Tia who is the president of BSA this year, and a delta sister. The talent was rockin' all night. There were about 20 acts. Slam Poetry, Rap, & Singing. There was also a great house band who backed up the vocalists and rocked the night!

I was nervous for a lot of reasons, I knew literally less than 3 people in the audience, and it was packed, literally standing room only in the tavern, all the seats filled... and in true Apollo Tradition, you could be boo-ed of stage ( and yes, some people were) and the winner was left into the hands of the audience vote, which in this case, I assumed I wouldn't get much since I didn't have many friends in the crowd.

I sang one of my R&B mixes ( and updated it to pick popular songs) the band rocked out and the audience sang a lot, and i couldn't ask for more, I just didn't wanna get bood! and then...

I WON!

when the audience cheered for me at the end on their feet, I almost cried, my stomach was doing flips- and it was an amazing feeling, I've only played acoustic, so to be standing playing guitar in front of a great band and a packed house who loved it was so rewarding, and was a huge personal achievement for me. ( and i won money too!)

But a huge shout out to all of the other performers, it was so wonderful to be a part of it and if i can do this every night for the rest of my life... i think i will


Check it out: Express tied me for first! I LOVED his song: so check it out too, its hilarious:

Such a P E R E Z nerd

Free copy of my A L B U M

Follow this link for instructions on how to be a part of the h o p e . makes. m u s i c street team and receive a free signed copy of my album!

http://hopeleigh.webs.com/streetteam.htm

die hard F A N S ?

What the Elf?

I am not the best with technology - building a website took me forever, but last night I decided to start exploring my site stats! [ Remember them from my last blog post] Anyways, I found out that it tracks each unique visitor ( someone there for the first time) by their I.P. Adress . I don't know much about those so it isn't like I can then tell who you are BUT it can tell me what city they are from which I was very interested in, because I want to know what cities I have a base in to play shows...

So most were in NYC, DC, and LA... cool right? Right where I want to be.

Whilst looking at an LA supporter... I tried the zoom button on the map tracking their IP Adress...trying to just sort of see if it was a part of LA where I knew people, or what not....


THIS VISITOR IS FROM A CEMETERY! Rosedale Cemetery to be exact. ( click on the picture it will come up more clear for proof.... ) Now - I had one of two ideas about this:

1) Someone is in the cemetery and looking at my site from their iphone or something... like, they needed a little positive distraction at , oh I don't know, their dogs funeral?

2) someone is a DIE HARD fan and following me from the grave... in which case, I am very greatful for their extreme dedication and I would REALLY like to know which cell phone or interenet service works from 6 feet below because I barely get reception in my own home...

WEBSITE: up n' R U N N I N G

HOPE.COM

I have my very own website, wow.

I've actually had it for over 8 months... BUT I was terrible about getting it finished. I've been very slow at doing my own website and myspacemusic page because I was intimidated and lost at where to start BUT... I've done it.

It feels more real now because you all can see it, and share it with me!

http://hopeleigh.webs.com/

THE HOME PAGE

What is even cooler is that I am able to have Site Stats where I can see how many people are looking at it at a time, what times of day are more popular, how often I have first time viewers...how long people spend in each Tab...EVEN THE AVERAGE TIME SPENT! ( which right now is like... 10 minutes and 46 seconds) So cool, why did this take me forever to do?

MY SITE STATS

At this point, i am down for some SERIOUS feedback. I am brand new at all of this, and I am trying to keep up with a lot online on my own, and it is sort of overwhelming, but so worth it! There is also a leave love section... so please do, leave love.

I built my site using webs.com because it is free, and because my dad used it to make our annual Fantasy Baseball site with it so I was familiar with it. (and yes, I won Fantasy Baseball this year!Woop Woop!)

So what are you still doing sitting here reading my blog?
GO CHECK OUT THE SITE!
You will be able to buy the album through here NEXTMONTH....

Hello from: F L O R I D A

What a Y E A R it's been.

So I've had a lot of posts lately about progress...and I am hoping other new artists can see this as a marking point... like if you do this ____ you'll get this ______ in this amount of time _____.

After all, a big part of this blog is for other people going down this same crazy path.

STORY TIME: One year ago I was just learning how to play guitar really .... I went to a party at my friends house. All of the members of our school's comedy improv team were hanging out along with some of their friends. My friend Zach raved that I was a singer, and had a good sound. I strummed on someone's guitar a bit, but really was not too great at the time... This night was one of those one's I'll sort of always remember.

I strummed the guitar with a penny because I didn't have a pick.

Some of the more business savvy people in the room sat me down and gave me advice on all of things I should do to use the internet to boost my career in music. Music used to only be sold in stores-hard copies- and you needed to be signed, to have your music heard. With the internet as it is now, that is no longer true- you can make yourself be heard.

They went on and on. I didn't even know what Twitter was, and they raved. I was so stubborn not to go back to Myspace ( i thought it was soo middleschool....) but they assured me it was true that it is no longer the coolest social network but it is for music.

Well It's been a year, so i thought i would re count my progress based solely on my personal activeness on the internet and it's results over the past ONE YEAR.

Youtube account: made
Views: 25, 723
Subscribers: 248

Twitter account: made
Tweets:821
followers:142

Facebook Group: Made
members: 817

Blog: Made ( less than one month ago)
Posts: 25
Followers 5

Myspace Music page: made ( 4 days ago)
Fans: 129

Personal Website [ with paypal shop for CD purchase ]: done
Launch date: february 1st 09

Live Shows [2009 tally]: 29

Full Length Album: Done
All originals written and recorded in one year
release date: 2.14.2009


.Although it is exaughsting to keep up with it all it makes me proud to know that I did this in a year... and it grows exponentiolly... I wonder where I will be today next year?

Tech H E L P ?

I just got my Myspace Music page, [as most of you know] and I am waiting to post my songs until I get them back from the studio balanced and done. I wanted to already have a Myspace Page with friends and all sorts of fun gadgets... so I started a month early. ( I am not the best with technology)

I decided to fill my music page with Mp3's of covers I have recorded over the last few months just playing around in D.C. Then I rememberd I have a live Mp3 of Can't Forget- which Myspace says is too large of a file...

So for now, you can download it to your itunes from here:
http://www.zshare.net/download/7084811899e869a6/

and sometimes this website has dirty ad's... don't say i didn't warn ya ;)

So the tech help is:

for any of you with the know-how, is there a free program or site online where you can shrink the size of an Mp3?

On a totally unrelated side note I am expierimenting with my creativity while on Vacation in florida (hehe) I am quilting for the first time AND I died my little sisters hair blonde ... I've ben doodling with greysons markers while I sleep in his bunk bed and of course photography because this weather is b e a u t i f u l . Pictures to ensue.

To my S U P P O R T E R S

It has been a few months since I started my Hope Makes Music group on facebook. Oh the internet and it's wonders. When I first started it, i was TERRIFIED. I wondered if my dad and sisters would be the only ones to join, ( I would say gramaw but she hasn't quite figured out Facebook....)

And look- 817 people as of today. And there is quite a chunk of these people I have never met and thanks to the wonders of the internet, they are able to keep up too!

So this is to you. number 1...number 24....number 367....NUMBER 817! let's keep em comin! invite your friends.... spread the word.... HOPE MAKES MUSIC.


Hopefully one day I'll have a bajillion friends in this group and say remember when I was thankful for #817? and now...

Get to know me V I D E O

GET TO KNOW ME VIDEO:

This was a video that I made a few months ago for my you-tube account. The main reason that I made it was to get rid of tons of video files on my computer before it exploded, but also...as a get to know me video.
E N J O Y

United State of P O P

HAPPY NEW YEAR LOVEYS!

I tend to start new years by setting goals and wrapping up the year before... Musically thats what this post is. Maybe one day a Hope song will end up in the POP-MIX-OF-THE-YEAR ....

check out 2009's some great catchy one's in here.... l o v e
by DJ EarWorm




If you've not been in the loop about this like i havent.... be sure to check out last years