Radio promotion & Victor Wooten
2008 07/18
Hi guys, Next month my national radio promotion starts with the awesome Jazzzdog company based in NYC. Check them out at jazzzdog.com! It's really exciting to know that more people are going to hear this latest project that I am so proud of. Am preparing for some great gigs coming up in the next few months. I've been reading (Nashville based) Victor Wooten's book "The Music Lesson," which I absolutely love. Oscar got it, read it and told me I'd like it, and he was right. It's about the spiritual connection to playing music, and so much more. I highly recommend it to anyone, but especially to musicians who feel disconnected when they play and worry about finding the "right notes." Finding one's groove is vastly more important. Relaxing into the moment of playing. The healing powers of tone! That chapter really got me. Oscar ran into Victor at the recent NAMM show and told him how much he liked the book and said that we need more that kind of thing. Victor told him to write the next one. Maybe we will. Hope to see you out and about! :) Christina

itunes!
2008 06/10
My new album is available now on itunes! Let the downloading begin! :) Christina

Greetings from Sweden!
2008 04/18
Hi to you all -- hope you're having a great Spring. Oscar and I are touring Sweden right now, and we had a great time at our Swedish CD Release Party last night in Enkoping (about 1 hour from Stockholm). We sold lots of CDs and had a full house. We're touring with our Nordic Quintet, and you can see our blog of the tour at www.myspace.com/wunq. Speaking of CDs, my new one entitled "A Flower Truly Blue" is NOW AVAILABLE at www.cdbaby.com/cd/christinawatson2. I'll have it up on itunes later this year, but for now you can get your hard copy there. The US CD Release Party will be May 18th at the Nashville Jazz Workshop (www.nashvillejazz.org) from 3 to 5pm. We'll have a great time, so hope you can make it if you're in the neighborhood. Thanks very much for your support!

Nashville Jazz Workshop article
2008 01/20
Hi all! Please check out the great article The Tennessean did on the Nashville Jazz Workshop, where I have studied and am now teaching 2 vocal literature classes.

My album is going very well! Pat Coil came in the studio on Friday and added a B3 part that is really going to knock your socks off. The song is called "What Do Your VooDoo Do?" and was written by Green and myself. I also have some nice pics for the album now. It looks like I'm going to get this thing manufactured before we leave for Europe at the end of March, so you'll be able to get your copy at CD Baby or on itunes by then. Fingers crossed.

More later... Christina

Merry Christmas!
2007 12/23
Hope everyone is about to have the best Christmas yet! I just finished the vocals for my new album yesterday, and I'm really excited for you all to hear this project. Everyone at the studio has been so supportive and genuine in the praise they've given it.. that has to be a good sign! We have a few horn parts to put on (my hubby Oscar on trombone, Jeff Coffin of Bela Fleck on saxophone, and some very talented person on trumpet) in the next few weeks, and then we'll get to mixing and mastering and all that. So much work goes into this kind of thing, and it just takes time. But I'm so grateful for everyone's participation -- Pat Coil was just the ultimate on piano and arrangements, Craig Nelson's bass was beautiful, Bob Mater rocked the drums, Jeff Hall wrote some magically cool vocal parts and sang in 4-part harmony with me, and Paul Hart (my engineer at Sony) is amazing and funny and wonderful. And most of all, Green Daniel (my producer and co-writer) is one of the most creatively gifted people I've ever met, and he refuses to take less than spectacular when it really is easier to simply go with what works at the moment. I'm learning so much from him and this whole project! So you can see I'm truly proud of what is happening with this CD. That is a GREAT feeling! Now that this thing is almost wrapped up, my next goal is to get out there and GIG MORE! I'm happy to say I'm now in rotation at F.Scott's and am aiming for a good solid performance schedule for this year. I'll be in Europe for a month with Oscar and our Watson Utterstrom Nordic Quintet, and then I've been invited to do a few dates up in NYC this coming fall. Merry Christmas, and Happy 2008... think BIG everybody! Love, Christina

New Recording
2007 10/06
A new CD is being recorded in the fall of 2007! Featured performers are Pat Coil on piano, Oscar Utterstrom on trombone, Craig Nelson on bass, and Bob Mater on drums. Green Daniel is producing the project and is co-writing songs with me. We plan to have at least 3 original songs included on the CD, two of which you can listen to right now! "Free" and "All I Need Now" are the co-writes, and "A Thousand Kisses Deep" and "All Of You" are also going to appear on the as-of-yet-untitled album. Other covers will include "We Can Work It Out" (Beatles) and Paul Brady's "World Is What You Make It." Oscar and I are performed this past June in Sweden with our Nordic Quintet, including some great Swedes we met in the summer of 2006. You can check us out at www.myspace.com/wunq. WUNQ stands for Watson Utterstrom Nordic Quintet! We hope to do another European tour with this group in the Spring of 2008. Oscar and I also performed in China with the MTSU Wind Ensemble in July. I finally got a chance to dust off my classical pipes and sang some Puccini (Musetta's Waltz from La Bohème) as well as some good ole blues (Everyday I Have the Blues). We climbed on the Great Wall of China! We can check that off our list now. :) Thanks for visiting the site and for your support! Christina

Back to the studio
2007 03/18
I'm going back to Sony Studios this week to do some remixing on the five songs I recorded with the Pat Coil Trio earlier this month. They sound great, but Green (my producer/co-writer) is very thankfully a perfectionist with monster ears and wants them to be the very best they can be before we release them upon the world!

February Update
2007 02/15
First, I'd like to announce that Oscar and I are both LOVING teaching and are filling up our free spaces quickly, so if you or someone you know would like to study music (voice, piano or trombone) in a very supportive environment and at a reasonable rate, please let us know! Our cozy little home music studio is turning out to be a great blessing to us, but we are also going to students' homes for lessons. I'm also teaching a class of vocal literature at the Nashville Jazz Workshop and an ESL (English as a Second Language) class at the Tennessee Foreign Language Institute. French tutoring is always available as well! Secondly, my new website is in the works, so look for a message from me in the near future about that. There will be lots of news and information about my performances as well as about all the teaching I'm doing, links to fun people and places, new photos and clips of NEW MUSIC! Next, I'd like to update you on my recording plans. I'm going into the studio early next month to record an EP with the amazing Pat Coil trio. The songs (arranged by Pat) will include two originals (I've been enjoying weekly writing sessions with my producer/co-writer Green Daniel), a Cole Porter song, and two surprise covers. I can't wait to have these tracks available for people to hear, because if what Green and I hear in our heads is any indication of what the final product will sound like... MAN! I'm really excited about this! I'm also singing with various party bands that do corporate events, private parties and shows for the general public. I finally have a legitimate excuse to sing Aretha Franklin songs! My vocal jazz group, 3rd Coast Vocals (you can listen to us at our myspace page), directed by vocalist / arranger Jeff Hall, is also a lot of fun. I'll be updating info about my performances with these folks on my new website.

Vocal Ensemble Going to IAJE in New York
2005 10/12
The Nashville Jazz Workshop's Vocal Jazz Ensemble has been selected to perform at the International Association for Jazz Education's annual conference in New York City in January 2006! The members of the ensemble, which is led by director / arranger Jeff Hall are as follows: Christina Watson (soprano), Laina Stanford (alto), Kristine Mylls (alto), Jonathan Kasper (tenor), Sean Horenstein (baritone), Luther Ludwig (bass). We're all looking forward to it!

A Great Summer
2005 09/05
What a great summer! I can't believe it's already fading into fall, but I do prefer autumn to summer anyway. I was lucky enough to go to some fascinating places this July and August, including a trip with Oscar to his homeland of Sweden, where we stayed with his family and performed a bit. We also got to go to the Stockholm Jazz Festival and heard some wonderful jazz musicians play. The best news in July was that my album "All About Love" got a great review in Sweden's biggest (and the world's oldest) jazz magazine Orkester Journalen (Om Jazz). They even put my picture in with the article, which was technically a review of four different vocalists' CDs, including mine. I was ecstatic to know that the reviewer thought that my original song "Half Moon" was one of the best on the album!

New Orleans
2005 06/15
Oscar and I attented the International Trombone Festival in New Orleans from May 25th until the 28th, and not only was the music incredible, the city was an experience in and of itself! There is such a history in that place, and much of it has to do with jazz, so I was very pleased to be there. On our way back to Nashville, we drove through Memphis and visited a thriving Graceland. Elvis continues to be a legend. God bless him!