By John Pluntze
This coming Sunday will be an extremely busy and rewarding one for longtime Wood River Valley-based singer and musician Leana Leach. Not only will she be performing once again that evening in the Duchin Lounge from 8:30 p.m.-12:30 a.m. with her blues- and jazz music-oriented trio that's comprised of guitarist John Northrop and drummer Jason Vontver (a standing weekly gig they've enjoyed there for some 4 1/2 years now), but she'll also be performing another (solo) gig at the piano in the resort's Lodge Dining Room, from 9 a.m. until 2 p.m.
But then again, Leach is nothing if not a born entertainer -- and an extremely spirited one at that (whether you're talking about her music, or how SHE often talks sooo enthusiastically about music when you interview her -- something that I was fortunate enough to do, via phone, recently).
"I've always, ALWAYS loved music, from as far back as I can remember", Leach told me. "And it's taken me on soooooo many incredible journeys, both geographically and also spiritually, that I never ever get lackadaisical about what I do for a living, it's just so intrinsically linked to WHO and WHAT I am."
Indeed, no sooner had the Colorado Springs native who grew up in Long Beach, California received a BA degree in Classical Piano For Dance from Cal State Long Beach, and then an MA degree in Music Piano For Dance from UCLA than Leach found herself in the early 1980s getting a job offer from the Sun Valley Center For the Arts, as part of an accompanying dance workshop that the SVCA was sponsoring that summer -- a job that required spontaneously improvising on the piano, and also playing the conga drums.
Not long after that summer workshop concluded, Leach found herself auditioning for (and quickly getting) a job at the (now-demolished) Elkhorn Resort, as the hotel's first atrium-lounge entertainer they hired there -- another unabashedly-enviable gig that lasted for some 17 years and one that allowed Leach to sing as well as show off her considerable instrumental talents (on the piano and the guitar).
"Not a lot of people these days know that I SING, I guess -- probably because they're most familiar now with seeing me play the piano in the Lodge Dining Room, or else in the Duchin Room. But my early days in Long Beach -- both in high school and then in college -- were often centered around my folk singing and guitar work, partly because I was so in awe of people like Joan Baez, Carole King and Joni Mitchell when I as growing up in southern California."
Other singing and/or instrumental gigs during her early days in the Wood River Valley included stints at Creekside Restaurant (in Warm Springs), the Ore House (on the Sun Valley Mall), La Provence (which later became Michel's), "The Christy"/Christinia, as well as weekly stints at the Episcopal churches in both Hailey and also in Ketchum ("I sang solo and played the guitar during the communions there for some 14 years, as well as organ accompniment to the hymns, and people there really seemed to love it").
And all that early, post-college success (both psychological and financial) for Leach back in the 1980s quickly translated into an opportunity for her to actively pursue another huge passion of hers during slack periods here in the Valley: travel.
A self-taught guitar player, Leach quickly found a way of steadily working her way around the globe as traveling musician -- everywhere from Africa, India, New Zealand, Bali, Romania, Croatia and Germany, to Samoa, Japan, Fiji, Italy, Morocco, Turkey and Hong Kong -- and even found herself in China in 1987, not long after that once-restricted country had finally been opened up to comparatively unrestricted tourism, for Westerners and others alike.
"It (going to China) was a REAL adventure back in those days, because so much of that country was still wilderness. I mean places like Shanghai -- which today are booming metropolises -- were nothing more than rather primitive, small cities back then. Seems hard to believe looking at them now, but they were," Leach said, adding: "I'm not sure if I ever went back there, I'd even RECOGNIZE most of what I saw in the 1980s ... assuming it's even still there now!"
Timing, in fact, plays a very key role for Leach whenever she's asked what is her "favorite" country of the 85 or so that she's been fortunate enough to visit so far.
"WHEN you visit a place is really central, I think, as far as what you experience there, and what you take away from that experience" Leach told me. "I mean Vietnam and Cambodia were both really incredible experiences for me when I went there (back in 2002), but I'm not sure if I went there again, they'd have that same sort of magic about them for me, because they've become so much more influenced by Western society since I was there. As everything becomes Westernized, it loses something that made it so special and unique in the first place, I think."
Most recently, Leach traveled for four weeks throughout Myanmar -- a trip that often featured 115+ degree heat, as well as merciless humidity, and also some very questionable food choices.
"I came back sick as a dog from that trip" Leach said, laughing. "FOUR weeks was definitely too long!"
A private music tutor as well (something she's been doing regularly -- since age 17, on), Leach's first love where music is concerned has always been, and always will be, performing in front of a live audience.
"I love the SPONTANEITY and ENERGY you get whenever you're performing in front of people you don't know", Leach said. "And Sun Valley (Resort) has been a really terrific employer to me these many years -- both for the brunches there in the (Lodge) Dining Room, and also in the Duchin Room. And I've always treasured working there."
Leana Leach can be seen this coming Sunday at the Sun Valley Resort -- both during the special Labor Day Weekend Sunday Brunch in the Lodge Dining Room from 9 a.m. - 2 p.m. (brunch info at: 622-2800), and also during her regular, Sunday evening trio concert, alongside (guitarist) John Northrop and (drummer) Jason Vontver, in the Duchin Room (622-2145), from 8:30 p.m. -12:30 a.m.
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Questions or comments regarding this "Harmonic Convergence" (local music scene-oriented) column can be sent to John, at: lovesbiking2001@yahoo.com. And to read any of John's previous "HC" columns -- which include raves on local faves Paul Tillotson, Bruce Innes, Molly Venter, Josiah Venter, Caitlin Canty, Gayle Chapman, Steve Eaton, Art Wallace, Toast, All-Night Diner, Cow Says Mooo, CakeFaceJane, Hat Trick, and FOX's award-winning musical-dramedy series, "Glee" -- simply type "Harmonic Convergence" and/or "John Pluntze" into the SVO search engine here.
