This is rather an educational view of the very complex world of copyrights and copyright infringements. I want to remember this and review it periodically so, of course, I place it in my blog.
I’ve three brothers and a sister. Most of them I really like. (Just kiddin’.) This picture was probably taken in Sigourney, Iowa in the mid-sixties. This was the first *new* car that my father had owned. The shadow head is from my mom who did the camera honors. I really like the framing of this picture.
I’m not sure what we were doing, but we always seemed to have fun. The youngest was being faux choked by the oldest. I’m not sure how I got involved, but I was and still am the second oldest. So there you have it, the two eldest kids plotting a fiendish plan against the youngest. Although I must say, it looks like he’s enjoying it. I now return back to your regularly scheduled program.
Here we are in 2003. We haven’t changed much have we.
I’m late for work after a luscious lunch with sweet Suzy Jo. Seems I had a screw in the tire of my ride which has been leaking for a week now. After refilling it once I found the damage. Damn. So I grabbed Suzy’s way cool ride and was on my way to work listening to her CDs. She has taken to listening to some jazz saxophonists that she might want to emulate. Truth be known, I think she we develop to be a more lyrical player than I. Like Paul Desmond, she started on the clarinet.
And there it is, Boney James doing my C2 to C1 with the octave key Bonk Bop Bonk Bop. Clear as day, there it is. And this got me to thinking. I know a lot of great musicians who can do stuff that I may never do. But I bet they could give me a couple of new effects to work on that are as easy as the Bonk Bop!
So if you’re out there and stumble across this, what is your favorite jazz effect that I might add to my vocabulary. Mind you, being easy to do is a good think in my book. I’m hep to the turn-arounds, bends, and trills. I’m not too good with with growls, reed tongue clicks, and extreme slides from one note to four or more up the stairs.
So dish, what’s your fav sax or reed effect.
This first picture is of Theo looking thoughtful. Turns out he had an abscess over his right eye and I caught it before Suzy did. That is a rarity as she is so observant and I, not so much. I noticed it immediately through the lense of the camera and not when I was playing with him. Off we were to the vet for another round of antibiotics. We suspect his sister Macy caught his eye with her claws. These fellows play tough.
He’s on Suzy’s desk and she is working with some arrangements for one of our bands. She is so good about that. I have yet to do an arrangement of a full score. I usually only try to capture my solos if I have a good line I don’t want to forget. And then I do it with pencil and paper and not on the the various computer notepads and editors that we have.
I was reading about a 50 year old who just started up on sax again. As all the folks on the forum were talking about welcome back and giving advice, I thought I take some pictures of what can happen if you give in full-heartedly to your music passion.
Yes, there are eight instruments in that picture and no two are same. (Click on the image to see full sized picture.) Actually you can hardly see the sopranino sax on the left because I cropped the picture. And there are two metronomes shown; I really need to improve my sense of internal pulse.
Now that I have published this photo on my blog, I can point to it from the forum as a warning or cautionary tale for like-minded, would be instrument collectors. :o)
I’m so ready for the weekend, except Suzy works! Ah well, it’s chores and some quality sax practice time for me. Here is a little gem that made me laugh–hey, I’m easy that way. :o)
Our quartet practice this Sunday will include these new charts:
All favs of mine. I hope the arrangement is copasetic.
I’m making my way through the Gerry Mulligan DVD, The Age of Steam. I’ve always appreciated Gerry’s sense of rhythm and song phrasing. Right now he’s playing clarinet on his ‘One Note Samba’. The DVD has him playing piano, sax, and clarinet. His music is haunting and delicious. I have a friend, JB, who’s bari stylings are very similar to Mulligan’s.
Made me pull out the clarinet and start honking on the instrument. Did I ever mention how much I love playing clarinet. I started three years ago. Although I haven’t taken lessons, I have played bass clarinet in the concert band for half a year (then two more showed up) and in the pit orchestra.
Playing bari sax is a really a labor of luv for me. Although it takes more air, the sweet dulcid and low tones make it one of my favorite instruments to play. I’ve always played Yanagisawa baritones which have superb intonation and keyworks. It is effortless to run the scale and there is very little lip work necessary to fix the common sax intonation problems.
As side one of the DVD runs to an end, it is obvious that Gerry had a love for life that pursued with gusto and sated with his love for music. An arranger, performer, and educator, Gerry Mulligan epitomizes all that is good about music. ‘O Great Spirit’ by Gerry Mulligan indeed.
Here are some more bari soloists to consider:
Enjoy!
Around the campus where I work I’ve seen these signs touting the release of my team’s newest product. I know where the marketer who came up with the slogan is coming from but it got me thinking about life in general. We make choices everyday. And these choices lead us along the path of life in a life affirming or character hammering trajectory.
For example, the great debate amongst young people entering college is does one pursue what they love (music, art, philosophy) or go for a degree that will practically guarantee them employment when they graduate (business, law, medicine)? This decision is so hard to make that over 70% (last time I checked) of students end up changing their degree azimuth at least once during their paper chase.
Then there are the day-to-day choices like; do I wear Levi’s or Target jeans; drink American coffee or a Starbuck’s latte, drive a Chevy or a Lexus? Sears used to preach to it’s staff that if they could get a customer in the front door, they could usually sell them something. So people can have money problems based on their ability (or lack thereof) to make good sound purchasing decisions. I feel that you can drive that Lexus, if you have the car gene and really desire that, by purchasing used or buying new and then driving the car for ten or more years. :o)
How do you spend your time? Does it help you become more educated, smarter, and interesting to be around. If you are playing computer games, watching TV, and leading the sedentary life, I would ask you if you are really happy with that choice. Can you add a book a year, visit a zoo or go to a concert to your TODO list and maybe have more to talk about around the water cooler?
I would have my family and friends who have consistently made bad choices know that they are not stuck. They have the choice to go back to school, change from stressful jobs to better ones, and start eating and exercising properly. It you feel like you’re in a rut, you can make the choice to figure your way out or at least to a better station in life. Almost nothing is final, except maybe death and taxes.
"In what is being described as a "perfect storm" of bad luck, unchecked growth, fundraising and management failures, the International Association for Jazz Education (IAJE) — an important link to Seattle’s successful school jazz-band scene — has collapsed." This from an article entitled, American jazz gathering, planned for Seattle, is canceled, the Seattle Times yesterday.
The IAJE Web site sez:
Dear IAJE Family, it is with a great sense of loss that I inform you that despite drastic efforts to cut expenses and raise emergency funds, the IAJE Board has voted to file for bankruptcy under Chapter 7 of the Federal Bankruptcy Law. I want to thank profusely those who responded with their generous donations and offers of assistance following my last communication. While over 250 individuals contributed just over $12,000, this, along with the many other efforts and contributions of IAJE staff, Board members, and association partners, was simply not enough to address the accumulated debt of the organization or its urgent need for cash relief.
It takes a combination of skill, passion, and drive to get an educational organization like this survive. This is a sad day for most jazzers.
The Microsoft MVP Global Summit is this week so I’ve been very busy setting things up, reacting to fire drills, and spending quality time with my peeps, the CRM MVP team. (What do you mean there’s only food for 12 of the 14 attendees?) These guys are a hoot to be around too, traveling from all over the world including Spain, Germany, and India amongst other countries. The group is more than just savvy, they are fun to be around with a great sense of humor.
So Tuesday night we had a special dinner for them, plenty o’ booze, and my band the Dissonance played for them. We got one of the MVPs to sit in with us for ‘Killer Joe’. And, Jeff Miller, the photographer did some tenor sax solos for two other charts.
I live for nights like that. Hey, and we got paid too! :o)
The New York Times article, So You Want to Be a Blogging Star, caught my eye a couple of weeks ago and I’m just now getting around to writing about it. Most of it seems intuitive to me, but might be news for those considering starting a blog. And there are couple of my fav blogs that I would make some of these recommendations to, given a chance.
“Don’t go into blogging to make a living,” Mr. Cuban warned in an e-mail message. Still, he and other top bloggers with day jobs agree most people could attract a following on the Web. And whether a person blogs to make a little money, to influence opinion or just for sheer ego gratification, amassing a large audience is the goal.
Here’s what a number of successful bloggers with successful nonblogging careers say are the ways to think about getting into the business of blogging.”
The most commonly violated recommendation is to keep a regular rhythm. I recommend posting a minimum of 3 times a week. If you hope to develop a blog posse, you have to keep feeding the beastie.
And my blog is as much for me as it is for my readers. I keep notes, archive interesting things, and track activities that I might want to remember years from now. That gives me extra incentive to blog regularly. And I’ve found that there are times when I was able to go back in time to use information that I had misplaced. Now that’s made it all worthwhile to me.
I’m listening to Manha de Carnaval by Dexter Gordon on his Gettin’ Around CD.
Quinn the Eskimo Vintage Horns
The Bis Key Chronicles 