Shara sings with Clogs

Please join Clogs on March 24th as we celebrate the release of their fifth album, The Creatures in the Garden of Lady Walton, with a special concert at The Bell House in Brooklyn. After giving a sneak preview of the record this past month in Minneapolis at The Southern Theater, Shara will be joining Clogs again in Brooklyn for a rare performance of these songs by Padma Newsome.  Shara is the featured vocalist on three songs, and also duets with Padma and Sufjan Stevens on a few others.

4 Shark EP Remixes released today!

Friday January 22nd Bowery Ballroom

Happy New Year lovely people!

After a year long absence from the New York stage, My Brightest Diamond will be headlining a show at Bowery Ballroom on January 22nd. Shara had so much fun on the short European tour this last December that she, together with drummer Brian Wolfe and bassist Nathan Lithgow, decided to keep the glow alive by playing in New York and adding Butoh dancing and clowns for fun.

We hope you will join us to celebrate the limited physical release of the Shark Remixes collection. The hand numbered and signed Shark Remixes will be available at the show on the 22nd, or online on January 26th.  *If you are afraid of balloons, this is a warning that there will LOTS of balloons at this show.

Bowery Ballroom
6 Delancey Street (between Chrystie and Bowery)
New York, NY 10002-2804
(212) 533-2111

tickets are $15 in advance, or $17 at the door

For those of you in the Minneapolis area, Shara will be collaborating with with Clogs on February 19th and 20th at The Southern Theater.

Clare and The Reasons and my family

Hello folks! The new Clare and The Reasons album entitled “Arrow” is out now and it is so beautiful and I hope you get it and enjoy it. I sang a little bit on the song, “This is the Story“.

This video for their song “All the wine”, directed by Ryan Foregger is rad!

Here is my uncle Donald Ryan and my cousin Barron performing at Barron’s senior recital. Wow, I should have kept taking lessons from my uncle for a lot longer.

Shark Demos as a present for you!

I’m getting out my advent calendar and counting the chocolate squares. Where are those candles for the window? As a holiday present to you, I would like to give you the Shark Demos in case you missed them in the A Thousand Shark’s Teeth pre-order.

The 6 demo recordings will be available for download on December 12th at Asthmatic Kitty. Happy Christmas!

We Were Sparkling; or surprises from a stranger

Hello dear!  I write to you today from my San Fransisco hotel room.   On my plane ride earlier today I was reading Proust’s Swann’s Way, famous for its tale of how the tasting of one tea soaked, petite madeleine brought a flood of childhood memories to mind in clear detail.  Well, with so much talk of memory and childhood, I began to reflect upon my own past, of how we erase certain things in our mind, and what causes us to remember again.    This first video was my own sort of “petite madeleine”, an experience that sneaks up on you when you least expect it; a bruise touched that you forgot you had, a stranger who seems at once familiar, a jack-in-the-box of grief.   I see that this video was made by a certain StrawberryBang and I have never spoken with this person, but when I first saw this video I began to remember.  I think it was a good thing to be surprised into feeling again.  Thank you StrawberryBang.

Here are some other voluntary videos which I recently discovered and I want to give a shout out of thanks to Federico Forlani & Alisonista for these beautiful videos!

Extra curricular activities- The Long Count, solo show & The Decemberists

It might appear that things are quiet in the world of My Brightest Diamond. Nay! There is lots of noise being made.  Shara is singing several songs in The Long Count, has a solo show at The Pygmalion Music Festival and is performing select shows with The Decemberists (see below for details).

The Long Count

In an inspired collision of creative worlds, three inexhaustibly original artists—brothers Bryce Dessner and Aaron Dessner of indie rock band The National and omnivorous visual art phenomenon Matthew Ritchie—combine talents to create a song-filled myth about the beginning of time. A feast of images, instrumentals, and songs thick with primordial mystery, The Long Count pairs Ritchie’s protean forms with a twelve-piece orchestra and the Dessners’ gothic mix of electric and orchestral sounds. Shara sings the roles of the Heart of the Sea, the Seven Macaw & the Mother of Light with performances on September 11th at the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts in Champaign, Illinois & then later at BAM in Brooklyn, NY on Oct 28, 30 & 31. Other guest vocalists include Kim and Kelley Deal (The Breeders), and Matt Berninger (The National) to round out the line-up in this visionary collaboration between music and art.

Shara will sing some of her old MBD jams, accompanied by her pile of instruments, at 8:45pm on September 17th at the Krannert Center in Champaign, Illinois as part of the Pygmalion Music Festival.

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Shara will be performing in her role of The Queen with The Decemberists this fall.  This is it!  The final lap!  The final spell and blast of furious “repaaaaids!!” that will be heard throughout the Americas! As Becky Stark (Lavender Diamond) and Shara say, this has been a delightful experience of magic, friendship & bliss. In our hearts we will be D’s fo-evuh.

September 20, 2009	Flynn Theatre	Burlington, VT	Buy Tickets Map
September 21, 2009	Wellmont Theatre	Montclair, NJ	Buy Tickets Map
September 23, 2009	Norva	Norfolk, VA	Buy Tickets Map
September 24, 2009	Charlottesville Pavilion	Charlottesville, VA	Buy Tickets Map
September 25, 2009	Thomas Wolfe Auditorium	Asheville, NC	Buy Tickets Map
September 26, 2009	The Classic Center	Athens, GA	Buy Tickets Map
September 27, 2009	Ryman Auditorium	Nashville, TN	Buy Tickets Map
September 29, 2009	St. Augustine Amphitheatre	St. Augustine, FL	Buy Tickets Map
September 30, 2009	Hard Rock Live	Orlando, FL	Buy Tickets Map
October 2, 2009	House of Blues Houston	Houston, TX	Buy Tickets Map
October 3, 2009	Austin City Limits Festival	Austin, TX	Buy Tickets Map
October 4, 2009	Cain’s Ballroom	Tulsa, OK	Buy Tickets Map
October 6, 2009	Singletary Center for the Arts	Lexington, KY	Buy Tickets Map
October 7, 2009	Ninth Street Fallfest	Columbia, MO	Buy Tickets Map
October 8, 2009	Riviera Theatre	Chicago, IL	Buy Tickets Map
October 9, 2009	State Theatre	Minneapolis, MN	Buy Tickets Map
October 18, 2009	Treasure Island Festival	San Francisco, CA	Buy Tickets Map
November 18, 2009	The Forum	London, (United Kingdom)	Buy Tickets Map
November 19, 2009	The Coronet	London, (United Kingdom)	Buy Tickets Map
November 21, 2009	Crossing Border Festival	The Hague, (Netherlands)	Buy Tickets Map

Ukrainian Sand Painter

Relevant Magazine MBD Article

Word. If you are inside on one of these hot August days and are sniffing for links whilst in front of your air conditioning unit, here is something for your perusal: Relevant Magazine

Detroit returns to Wildlife

Detroit Wildlife from florent tillon on Vimeo.

MTV Iggy Music Performances

Interviews with Shara

While floating along this spring as The Queen with Decemberists, Indie Handbook’s Eric Robertson caught Shara for an interview on subjects concerning music as science, opera, her studies with Padma Newsome and the process of creating A Thousand Shark’s Teeth.  You may read it HERE

The Indie Handbook: You studied voice at the University of North Texas. What was that experience like?

Shara Worden: In school the only role, the only kind of complete role that I had was in L’enfant et les sortilèges, so playing the child was a turning point for me. Where I was able to find pleasure in singing again…so because I got to play a kid …I was able to be playful and explore so I think that piece in particular has had a really special place for me because it’s a fairy tale in its own way.

TIH: So, is that why you did “Black and Costaud”, your own personal connection to the song?

SW:  I think that I, for many years was trying to reconcile myself with the idea that I had chosen songwriting because, in classical music, you dedicate an enormous amount of time to doing one very, very specific thing, which [is] to sing this really difficult music, well, and beautifully, and with feelings, and connection. [And] to compare that with writing songs, which is very internally motivated – If you hear someone like Itzhak Perlman play or Yo Yo Ma or really amazing classical players – Renée Fleming or Barbara Bonney – and you just think Wow, you’ve devoted your life to doing this one thing really beautifully…. That’s really profound to me and I feel like there is something really honorable – there is so much energy in life put toward destruction and put toward negativity and I really admire people who dedicate themselves so fully to something that is so beautiful – I’d rather explore lots of different kinds of things, and I found myself more excited about songwriting and more enthusiastic about spending hours and hours. It’s the same amount of time spent on making music, but the sort of form results in a different thing.

TIH: How would you say your classical training has influenced your songwriting?

SW: Honestly, the singing, I don’t think about it at all. But at the beginning of the writing process for Shark’s Teeth, I was listening to a lot of Boulez and so I was trying to write songs, more so trying not to be prescriptive of the songs, not dictating the form of the songs. Allowing the harmony to take it to a different place, or not having repeated choruses or kind of trying to find different ways of setting the text, so in a certain way the texts was more important, the texts and the harmonies were the priorities. You can see that with songs like “Goodbye Forever” or “If I Were Queen”.

More at Indie Handbook….

Interview with Impact 89.fm radio.

My Old Kentucky Blog Videos

My Brightest Diamond – From The Top Of The World from LaundroMatinee on Vimeo.

My Brightest Diamond – The Gentlest Gentleman from LaundroMatinee on Vimeo.

My Brightest Diamond – Inside A Boy from LaundroMatinee on Vimeo.

My Brightest Diamond – Apples from LaundroMatinee on Vimeo.

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Interview with Turtles

May 28, 2009

Shara has a new interview with Turtles Last Broadcast.  A close to home moment has occurred- the newest interview with Turtle is with Amy Kuney, whom Shara knew when she was living in Tulsa, Oklahoma and Amy was just a baby!!!  You rock on Amy, girl!!!!

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Recommended

May 12, 2009

I have two friends who have put out records recently and I love their music and I hope you will check them out.  DM Stith (whose voice you have heard on all the MBD albums as well as held his beautiful artwork in your hands) has written a beautiful record called Heavy Ghost.  He is out on tour in Europe right now with my dears- cellist Maria Jeffers and violist Marla Hansen.

Also you must listen to St. Vincent’s new record called Actor.  It makes me laugh and shake and sit still and feel inspired.  They also start tour on May 19th!  (Same day as I start The Decemberists tour.)  Hope you are enjoying this lovely May!!!  xxx shara

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