Camp - Inception and Fruition

In the fall of 2018 Featherburn recorded our first EP, One Precious Life.  Days after I scheduled the digital release and booked us an intimate venue to invite our friends and families to celebrate the music at, our drummer Tim let the band know that he had been diagnosed with a brain tumor and would soon be undergoing intensive, long-term treatment.  Our tremendous friend died in August the next year and, although the CD was cut and One Precious Life streams today, the release party never happened. Tim’s courage through the last year of his life was humbling and inspiring.  On visits, we would talk about a musical future - about the songs we would record and the shows we would play when he was healthy again.  When I asked him what we would call our next album, he paused briefly for intuition and replied simply, “I don’t know, Camp?”

That was the inception.  The idea stuck with me for years.  Camp.  It grew into a collection of songs and stories that spent time on the surface of my mind, but also sank deep into my subconscious.  And although a later configuration of Featherburn recorded some material for it in 2020, we weren’t able to bring the work to fruition before the great global shutdown.  The pandemic taught us, among other things that we may not have fully processed yet, patience, perseverance, and appreciation.  Both we and Camp have been through a long process of growth, and this latest round of work, Featherburn is collaborating with Lancaster-local theater company Three Sheets, led by award-winning theater devisor and Franklin & Marshall department chair, Rachel Anderson-Rabern.  A match rivaling the power of s’mores.  This February 10th and 11th at 7:30pm, Featherburn and Three Sheets will present Camp at last, at Zoetropolis Cinema and Stillhouse in Lancaster, Pa.

We’re billing it as “an immersive love story between Earth and Sky.”  What we mean, I think, is that the performance we’re building draws from creative forces above and below.  The tactile, the intuitive, the early morning sunrise, the late night fire.  Creek walks, tent stakes and tree roots, but also smoke and embers rising to blend with the starry sky against the sound of acoustic guitar, drums and a crackling fire.  The hike of the story and the swim of the dream.

At its core is a deep sense of play.  Through the process we have been monkeying around with all things associated with camp and camping.  Camp, in the whatever-that-means-to-you sense of the word. We continue to explore and distill it in the rehearsal room, venturing far out into our memories and experiences, our associations and projections.  We’re finding ways to tell our stories and yours, our collective adventures with endings both happy and sad (but mostly happy), our associations and projections, our myths, misfortunes, transformations and translations; all packaged in a live, interactive, musical, theatrical performance.

We’re still writing some of the music right now, still adjusting the script.  It’ll probably be a living document, even after February 11th, but I believe that Tim would love what we’re bringing together, and that we’re about to join forces on a great adventure. 

Tickets are on sale now at featherburn.com/camp