Part of the privilege of working with our artists is the opportunity to broker relationships with venues that help them establish a regular and reliable source of income. For Ironing Board Sam, that means pretty regular gigs at The Crunkleton in Chapel Hill, NC and The Depot in Hillsborough, NC. Since I’ve been a part of Music Maker, Sam has had these gigs as solid bedrocks that are there even when he’s not traveling to Australia or all over the US. They allow him to keep playing his music and to keep making a living doing it.

The next piece from our collaboration with the Duke University Center for Documentary Studies is another cut from the team of students that worked with Ironing Board Sam. The video features a lot of footage of Sam performing at one of his gigs at The Depot – if you’re in the area, you should definitely come check him out sometime! He actually plays tonight, 6/14, at 8:00 pm.

Message from the student who created the piece, Amy Huang:

As a second year pre-med student majoring in Biology, I have relatively little experience with multimedia documentary. Last semester was my first time taking a documentary studies class, Documenting Obesity, a decision made on almost a complete whim. However, because of the positive experience I had, I decided to take another documentary studies class. I chose to take Multimedia Documentary in particular because of its musical component. As a trained classical pianist, I had very little exposure to blues music. However, after reading about the origins of blues working with Ironing Board Sam, I have come to appreciate the genre much more. I find that the service-learning component of this class, developing a piece that promotes both the artist and the Music Maker Relief Foundation, removes students from the confines of a college campus and encourages them to interact with people they would not otherwise encounter.