Vicki Blankenship joined Indiegrrl in 2003 and embraced
the networking group wholeheartedly. She worked with Holly Figueroa the
founder of Indiegrrl to build more showcases and her company, Spotted
Kiva Productions, took over the maintenance of the Indiegrrl website and
started offering discounts to Indiegrrls on their CD duplicating and web
design services. In 2005 Vicki started approaching other businesses to
start offering the Indiegrrl Members discounts on their products
and services. When Holly needed a much needed rest she had no problems
passing the torch to Vicki to take over and to build the organization
into the non profit Holly had always envisioned the group to be. Already
the Founder/President of the Indie Music For Life non profit, Vicki met
with Holly face to face at Rockrgrl 2005 and discussed Indiegrrl becoming
a part of Indie Music For Life. Indiegrrl as well as Laughs For Life the
division working with comedians are now two new entities of the Indie
Music For Life non profit. Indiegrrl is now more than just a networking
group of women in the music industry. It is an organization that supports
women in music, comedy and spoken word and is ever growing in its sponsorship
programs and building larger events for the members. Three years ago Vicki
set her sites on Indiegrrl having its own conferences to set up workshops
and panel discussions to help it members with their music careers and
to bring much needed exposure for women in the industry to raise them
to a level playing field with male performers. That vision is closer as
Indiegrrl will hold its first annual conference in August 2008.
Vicki Blankenship the singer songwriter is that rare artist that comes
along from the shadows of nowhere and blows away everybody that hears
her perform. Her voice can hit a high pure pitch and then growl into the
depths of rock and roll and blues in the next breath. It is that great
diversity that has many people comparing her to the great Janis Joplin
or the haunting and poetic images of Stevie Nicks. But sometimes that
country girl that grew up in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia shines
through in comparison to the spunk of Mary Chapin Carpenter and the pure
vocals of Patsy Cline and Alison Krauss. She is a writer of great depth
not only in songs but poetry, short stories and blogs. She gets right
to the heart of things with an insightful mind that examines truth and
presents it in a simple, honest, touching, direct, and a most poignant
manner. Vicki's songs move people and her determination and compassion
inspires people. Meeting her in person is an energy charge. Hearing her
perform live will glue you to the edge of your seat, hanging on to every
lyric. She is a true story teller in her songs. By the end of the night
you will have reached every emotion possible from laughter to tears to
a tugging heart full of memories. Her songs will hit you dead in the heart
and stick to your mind.
Vicki the person is complex and has a deep inner drive with a mind that
hardly ever sleeps and plans months and months and even years ahead of
what is taking place in the present. She envisions large goals and chips
away at them methodically to complete things most people only dare to
dream. Thus the goals and growth of Indiegrrl and the ever growing visions
of Indie Music For Life. She is a self confessed workaholic in need of
more play time but also confesses that when you love and feel compassion
for something it is not work. It is that inner drive and compassionate
mind set that has earned her the nick name "Super Woman" by
many of the Indiegrrl members, friends, and other music industry professionals.
Many people have encouraged her to write an autobiography because of the
past jobs and life experiences she previously endured before hitting the
road as an Indie artist, but she laughs and states "I have to sleep
every now and then but one day you never know." Vicki has been a
police officer, a District Manager for both Mikasa and Toys R Us, a restaurant
and catering business owner and a Utility Engineer where she was co-owner
of a utility trenching business in Charlotte, NC.
The workaholic mode was prevalent even as a young girl when she worked
in her father's printing shop and in the tobacco fields of local farmers
where she grew up. As a teenager and young adult she worked three jobs
at once while attending college to help pay for her tuition and expenses.
She worked 3rd shift in a knitting mill, was a convenience store assistant
manager, and a security guard on weekends for the Frito Lay and AMP plants
in Greensboro, NC. She also managed to play three sports while attending
Elon University was named to the All Conference and All State NCAIAW Division
1 Softball picks and become the first female Sports Editor of the college
paper. If that wasn't enough she also was a DJ at the college radio station
WSOE and wrote news releases, along with performing live music every chance
she got around local pubs, bars, and coffeehouses. She won several Elon
University talent shows. When asked how she accomplished all of this her
reply was "I slept about 3 to 4 hours in the afternoon or sometimes
on the bus going to games."
In 1998 three months after turning 40, Vicki was hit with news that shook
up her life as she knew it. After several months of antibiotics and visits
to the doctor for a pesky bladder infection that would not go away, more
tests were run and cancer was found in her bladder. For 5 years she fought
the reoccurring cancer with chemo and radiation. She moved to the coast
of NC to write, play music which had always been the love of her life,
and to live out what she thought would be her last days next to the ocean
that she so loved. Fighting a form of cancer that only 1 out of 8 women
survive, her determination to never give up while being treated with heavy
doses of chemo and radiation helped her overcome the bladder cancer but
weakened her body tremendously. She retired from many of the sports she
so loved and turned back to her music and writing as her every day hobbies.
She began recorded her debut CD called "Don't Forget To Breathe"
in 2003 with the help of Producer/Engineer Karen Kane while still undergoing
her last cancer treatments. The CD project was completed in late September
and in January 2004, a very short haired Vicki hit the road touring as
an Independent artist at the age of 46. An age when most touring Indie
artists have retired from their music careers. At the end of 2004 she
started production on her second CD, "Horizons", and in February
2005 she hit the road touring again and passionately began to put the
Indie Music For Life non profit into gear and started bringing in awareness
for the cause. "That first year we did coffeehouse tip shows, theaters,
acoustic venues, bars, churches, anyone that would let us hold an event.
It didn't pull in a lot of money but I knew the first several years were
going to be public relations work anyway." Vicki stated. "Building
awareness is the key to greatness. I talk about Indie Music For Life everywhere
I go and also Indiegrrl and my closest friends sometimes probably feel
like they are hearing a broken record but if I stay passionate about it,
then the passion will flow into others. And when the roots spread, the
vine can grow out in every direction. I vision Indie Music For Life to
one day be a household name just like Relay For Life and I envision Indiegrrl
to be a great organization that helps a lot of women and young girls wanting
to pursue a career in music, comedy, or spoken word. I don't know if I
will live to see it but I am working hard at getting that root system
into place."
Comedian Shelly Ryan and Director of the new Laughs For Life division
has this to say about Vicki. "The emcee gig I had on November 4,
2006 forever changed my life. I'd talked to local musician, Vicki Blankenship,
who was organizing a concert event at Blackstock Winery in Dahlonega,
GA. I've always believed music and laughter are universal languages, and
bringing them together in one place would ROCK! But this wasn't an ordinary
concert. The musicians I met that night had gathered for a purpose --
to fight cancer one song at a time. I don't remember at what point in
the evening it hit me, but I KNEW I had to get involved! Vicki's enthusiasm
for this cause was contagious. The "Laughs for Life" concept
was welcomed with open arms and enormous hugs. I've found not only a great
business partnership, but I've met a friend for life."
Vicki confesses that the hardest part of Indie Music For Life is to be
at the events and have people coming up to her to share their stories
about their family members having cancer or the struggles that they themselves
have had while fighting the disease or worst of all hearing the many stories
of the loved ones that did not survive cancer. "I shed a lot of tears
at these events. I don't care if I didn't know them personally. I just
know what
each and every one of them is going through so it becomes personal. I've
made more friends with that common bond because of the events. I have
also lost a lot of those newly made friends and it is very sad."
Vicki has lost many family members and close friends to the disease but
it was after her grandfather Curtis Morgan Sr. passed away that it hit
her the hardest. He was a big musical influence in her life, and he also
loved to cook and the two shared a lot of moments together playing music
and cooking in the kitchen. He passed away with prostate cancer that quickly
spread to bone cancer. "That was a tough, tough year for me. I was
undergoing treatments for cancer myself and trying to record my first
CD and was trying to go home to Virginia as much as I could to see my
grandfather and my grandmother who was also undergoing treatments for
stomach cancer and leukemia. My grandfather didn't get to hear my finished
CD project because we were finalizing the mixes the very week he passed
away, but he did get to hear some demos that my mom and I played for him
in the hospital. I did place a copy of the finished CD project in his
casket. Along with a set of his drum sticks and a bottle of Texas Pete
that he so loved to put on everything. All of his friends called him "Pete"
because of his love for the spicy sauce. I know he is in heaven playing
that down beat to the music and spicing everything up." The following
year is when she decided to start a non profit that was music related
to raise money specifically for cancer research fundraising and she tested
the waters with three concert events in North Carolina with the help of
three other Indiegrrl members, Allison Tartalia, Danielle Miraglia, and
Patti Witten. The concept and the work for Indie Music For Life was underway.
It is the love of family that took Vicki home back to the foothills of
the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia at the end of 2006 when several family
members were struggling with health issues. That winter Vicki also had
increasing lupus attacks from a weakened body that was attacking itself
and the rheumatoid arthritis was affecting her hands and other joints
with extreme swelling, and also her lungs were becoming weakened with
continuing attacks of pleurisy. The "workaholic" had days where
she couldn't even crawl out of bed and she felt extremely tired all the
time. More blood work and testing took place and in February she was hit
with another hard blow. The diagnosis of leukemia. All of her plans and
work for the non profit were put on hold as she began treatments once
again for cancer and the advancing lupus stages but her dreams and visions
stayed in place. "It has been an extremely hard year as each trip
to the doctor my meds have been increased and this is also the longest
duration of treatments I have had to take" states Vicki. "Most
everything I wanted to do this year got put on hold, including putting
together music for a third CD, the Indiegrrl song writing contest and
conference plans, most of the events for Indie Music For Life, and no
touring either. But I have learned the value of true friends that come
to your side when you need them most, and I have learned how to sit quietly
just to rest and take notice of life around me outside of music. But the
wheels never stop spinning in my head with plans." she grins. It
is quite possibly those wheels turning and the plans, dreams, and determination
that keeps Vicki just beyond the grasp of a disease that claims so many
where she can spread her enthusiasm for music, cancer research, and Dalmatians
and she can touch countless lives.
Interview
1. How old were you when you started writing songs, playing instruments
and how many years have you been performing?
I was 5 years old when I started playing guitar and drums with a little
encouragement from my great grandfather who was a banjo player who lived
to be 104 and I was lucky enough to know until I was 16, and also my grandfather
who was a drummer in a jazz and big band orchestra. My mom has a beautiful
voice and always encouraged me to sing at an early age in the church choir
and other events. She also reminded me all the time to spit out my bubble
gum before starting to sing.
2. Who were your major influences with your music and what made you
decide to become a performer yourself?
My great grandfather and grandfather played a big role in getting me
started with musical instruments but I fell in love with the Beatles at
the early age of 5 and used to stand on the living room coffee table and
shake my hair and guitar and sing 'I want to hold your hand'. After that
it was many 60's and 70's rock bands that kept me captive but Carol King
became my songwriter idol and Lindsey Buckingham became my guitar idol."
3. How would you describe your music?
I write in many genres. Folk, Rock, Southern Rock, Americana, Country,
Bluegrass, Pop, Jazz. I had a tremendous diversity of music in my life
at an early age.
4. What is the best review or statement that someone has written about
you and your music and who said it?
Recently Carl Zeigler, documentary film maker and artist, stated that
my live performance at The Festival For Change was the most powerful rock/folk
set he had ever heard in a long, long time. That blew me away because
he is a music and movie aficionado.
5. How many personal CD projects have you finished and are you working
on or have any future project in the works? Also how involved are you
in the recording process and producing of these projects?
'Don't Forget To Breathe' was my debut CD release and 'Horizons' was
my second project. I have many, many unrecorded songs from both past and
present years and would like to start another project in 2008 but funding
would be the main issue with all of that. When I write a song, I not only
hear my guitar, but I hear the other instruments and arrangements in my
head and know how I would like the song to come to full life. When recording
and mixing I am very hands on and working with producer/engineer Karen
Kane I have learned a lot about the small details that can make a big
difference.
6. What special honors or awards have you received?
Every day I can play music is an honor and the best awards and rewards
are when someone buys your CD because they really like your music or you
see someone in the audience singing the words to your song when you are
performing. When I hear, "I put your CD in and listen to "That
Thought Left Me" every time I need a pick me up, that is the best
award.
7. What is your favorite venue to perform live and why?
I would have to say house concerts. It is intimate and the people attending
those shows are so attentive and want the story behind the song. So it
opens up the music more. Most larger venues I sing with my eyes closed.
I am actually very timid about going on stage and have had to learn to
have a stage presence. I joke with all of the photographers that say they
want to shoot me during a set that if they get a shot of me performing
with my eyes open, that I will pay for that shot.
8. What music organizations are you affiliated with or plan on joining?
Besides Indiegrrl I have been affiliated with OUTmusic and Folk Alliance
but because of the lack of touring or doing anything music related this
year, I have not been active with those two organizations but do have
plans when time allows to get back involved with them more. Both organizations
are going through restructuring.
9. Do you find as an Indie artist it is easier to express yourself
and view points in music instead of following main stream marketing in
songs?
Most defiantly. The majority of my music does not fit the mold of the
current music industry especially what the industry promotes for women.
Not many short, chunky, almost 50 year olds out there shaking their booty
on stage and becoming idols.
10. What does "Indie" mean to you?
Control of your own career. I choose how many shows I want to book,
where I book them, how I get promoted, what target audience I want to
reach out to, and how I want to write my songs and record them.
11. Do you own your own record label or publishing company or one day
hope to?
I am actually working on that. It is one of my many plans to turn Spotted
Kiva Productions into a label and artist representation company along
with the CD duplicating and web design business that we already do.
12. What advice can you give to someone who is just starting to market
themselves in the Indie music market?
Don't expect instant gratification on your work and don't expect people
to come knocking on your doors to give you opportunities. You have to
create those opportunities and you have to work very, very hard to reap
the rewards, no matter how talented you are.
13. Do you have other work, projects, or hobbies besides your music
and if so tell us a little bit about it?
I love to cook and have still done some side catering jobs over the
years since owning my restaurant and catering business up until this year
because of the health issues. I also love to golf but again have not done
that at all this year because of health issues. In the past I have worked
for Dalmatian rescues and also helping other animals in need. If I could
afford it I would probably have a large zoo of sorts.
14. How many instruments do you play and what are they?
I play guitar, percussion, and drums and have been messing around with
the harmonica. It is good exercise for my lungs that get weak because
of the chemo. I also want to learn how to play the piano.
15. What are your main goals for 2008 to boost your music career as
a whole?
Personally I want to start getting my music into Television and Movie
markets. I am working hard putting together an Indiegrrl Conference for
August 21, 22, 23, 24 of 2008 and for Indie Music For Life my biggest
plan is to work with some grant writers to pull in funds to take this
organization to the next level.
16. What long term goals have you set?
To me long term is a month to month working process now to get accomplished
what I have already set into motion.
17. What does Indiegrrl mean to you?
Indiegrrl is more than just networking with friends, songwriters, and
musicians and other industry professionals. It can be a great organization
that does a lot of things to help its members by opening up doors of opportunity
for shows, help with music projects, mentoring younger girls, discounts
on services and products that we all need in our careers. At least that
is the vision that I see this organization becoming but it takes a committed
involvement of members. In 2008 with the help of grants, I hope to have
set into place, job descriptions that we need to be filled both voluntary
and paid that can take Indiegrrl to that stage of growth.
18. Is there anyone you would like to thank that has helped you along
in your career or in the music industry as a whole?
I want to thank my grandfathers and parents for letting me beat on drums
and wail on guitars at an early age and for turning their ears when it
wasn't so pretty but never stopped me from playing. I want to thank my
sister who put up with a lot of practical jokes when we were growing up
and who has grown closer to me with age and kept my spirits up through
my battles with cancer. I want to thank all of the musicians and songwriters
that have been a part of my creative processes through out my life. I
want to thank Holly Figueroa O'Reilly for having the vision to start Indiegrrl
and for the hundreds of emails over the years and for having the faith
in me for taking Indiegrrl to the next level. I love ya Holly. I want
to thank all the radio programs and personnel that plug my songs on air.
I want to thank Karen Kane for helping me produce my CD projects and for
also being a friend. I want to thank the friends that have constantly
emailed me or talked to me on the phone giving their support, encouragement,
and assistance to get through very tough times. And last but not least,
I want to thank Lee Ann Tarducci for all the countless hours of volunteer
time she does for both Indiegrrl and Indie Music For Life. We live in
different states so we have to work together by phone and emails which
makes it a little harder. She is my right arm techie guru, confidante,
and best friend and without her support and friendship my life would be
incomplete and much harder. I also want to thank my fans for coming out
to see me at shows, for supporting me and for buying my cd’s.
products
and services. When Holly needed a much needed rest she had no problems
passing the torch to Vicki to take over and to build the organization
into the non profit Holly had always envisioned the group to be. Already
the Founder/President of the Indie Music For Life non profit, Vicki met
with Holly face to face at Rockrgrl 2005 and discussed Indiegrrl becoming
a part of Indie Music For Life. Indiegrrl as well as Laughs For Life the
division working with comedians are now two new entities of the Indie
Music For Life non profit. Indiegrrl is now more than just a networking
group of women in the music industry. It is an organization that supports
women in music, comedy and spoken word and is ever growing in its sponsorship
programs and building larger events for the members. Three years ago Vicki
set her sites on Indiegrrl having its own conferences to set up workshops
and panel discussions to help it members with their music careers and
to bring much needed exposure for women in the industry to raise them
to a level playing field with male performers. That vision is closer as
Indiegrrl will hold its first annual conference in August 2008.