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Jul. 16th, 2011 08:22 pm |
| Out the door for the 3rd wedding of this summer. And the 2nd one where I waived my fee. |
29 years together - today
Feb. 27th, 2011 11:17 pm |
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1) san francisco, 2007, with israel's sister darla
2) campo colorado, 1982
J.S. Bach - Vater unser im Himmelreich (BWV 682)
I'm a little uneasy about this one.
I guess I should have worked something impressive up - but I just chose something from my YouTube site. This chorale prelude of Bach is a difficult piece, perhaps a bit austere. (It's a compositional tour de force - each hand plays two voices, one of which is the chorale tune. The chorale between the two hands is a canon at the fifth.) The other YouTube performances are from a distinguished group: Ton Koopman, Jean Guillou - the brilliant organist of St. Eustache in Paris, and Balint Karosi - a 1st prize winner in the Leipzig Bach Competition. (IMO Guillou's tempo is too fast, Koopman's - too slow.)
The organ is my adopted instrument - meaning that I came to it late, and never would have played it unless someone asked me to.
I started posting to YouTube a couple of years ago. I've found it's a little bit like posting on LJ - at least for me, but slightly more involved. At first I just used my camera for video, which was a bad idea. Then I acquired a video camera about a year and a half ago. This past Christmas my boss gave me another one. I've messed with iMovie a little - but for my purposes it really didn't add that much.
The motivation to post is also for me about like LJ - completely arbitrary. I have only posted things that I just learned. I usually do two or three takes unless the first one feels just right. Of the organ pieces, I prefer to only post pieces that aren't on YouTube at all, or that are underrepresented. The few piano things are complete throw aways. (I should actually put a few decent piano things out there.)
I'm a little uneasy about this one.
I guess I should have worked something impressive up - but I just chose something from my YouTube site. This chorale prelude of Bach is a difficult piece, perhaps a bit austere. (It's a compositional tour de force - each hand plays two voices, one of which is the chorale tune. The chorale between the two hands is a canon at the fifth.) The other YouTube performances are from a distinguished group: Ton Koopman, Jean Guillou - the brilliant organist of St. Eustache in Paris, and Balint Karosi - a 1st prize winner in the Leipzig Bach Competition. (IMO Guillou's tempo is too fast, Koopman's - too slow.)
The organ is my adopted instrument - meaning that I came to it late, and never would have played it unless someone asked me to.
I started posting to YouTube a couple of years ago. I've found it's a little bit like posting on LJ - at least for me, but slightly more involved. At first I just used my camera for video, which was a bad idea. Then I acquired a video camera about a year and a half ago. This past Christmas my boss gave me another one. I've messed with iMovie a little - but for my purposes it really didn't add that much.
The motivation to post is also for me about like LJ - completely arbitrary. I have only posted things that I just learned. I usually do two or three takes unless the first one feels just right. Of the organ pieces, I prefer to only post pieces that aren't on YouTube at all, or that are underrepresented. The few piano things are complete throw aways. (I should actually put a few decent piano things out there.)
Spring can really hang you up the most - Rickie Lee Jones
What if Kennedy actually votes to affirm Prop 8 was unconstitutional? What will that mean for people like me in states like Texas? Will I still be in Texas, or want to be?
I'm sure I will marry Israel in the not too distant future. But I hope it will not be merely a symbolic act!
The particulars of our wedding will probably emerge closer to the actual event. There are a few songs I do associate with meeting Israel 28 years ago - just part of the soundtrack of our lives. Most of them would be a curious selection at a wedding. Nina Hagen was a shared favorite at that time. And there was a dusty, old standard from the 50s that I was working on with Jo Davis - Spring can really hang you up the most. There were several versions we listened to - Chaka Khan, Keith Jarrett, a few others. Israel liked the song too. I remember dancing to it in our old house on Tyler Street. Israel and me alone together, dancing in the dark.
ilyflw-dcnhtlw
What if Kennedy actually votes to affirm Prop 8 was unconstitutional? What will that mean for people like me in states like Texas? Will I still be in Texas, or want to be?
I'm sure I will marry Israel in the not too distant future. But I hope it will not be merely a symbolic act!
The particulars of our wedding will probably emerge closer to the actual event. There are a few songs I do associate with meeting Israel 28 years ago - just part of the soundtrack of our lives. Most of them would be a curious selection at a wedding. Nina Hagen was a shared favorite at that time. And there was a dusty, old standard from the 50s that I was working on with Jo Davis - Spring can really hang you up the most. There were several versions we listened to - Chaka Khan, Keith Jarrett, a few others. Israel liked the song too. I remember dancing to it in our old house on Tyler Street. Israel and me alone together, dancing in the dark.
ilyflw-dcnhtlw
You are too beautiful - Rodgers & Hart
Tuneful and tasteful
Schmaltzy and smart
Music by Rodgers
Lyrics by Hart
I drove to Albuquerque on Friday night in my continued Great Piano Quest. The piano I went to see was OK, but I found another I liked much better. I am really considering this one...
The piano storeroom suddenly emptied for a minute and I quickly propped up my iPhone. I just played an old standard for a few seconds before someone came back in. Somehow the sensor didn't flip, and so the clip is upside down.
This song reminds me of a singer I accompanied in the 1980s, Jo Davis. She become a very good friend, and she and her daughter became a big part of our lives. She moved from Texas to New York the minute she could get away in 1950 or '51 - something like that. She had a long romantic relationship with Percy Heath, the bass player. Later she married an abstract expressionist painter, Warren Davis. They eventually moved to Santa Fe, where he died of kidney failure as a young man. Jo was left stranded, trying to raise her young daughter with only his paintings and her singing for an income. For several years they moved to Texas where I met her.
She was a wonderful singer - and still is! She knew all of the old songs. Her charts were often yellowed and crinkled with age and in total disarray. They suggested the bohemian life she had lived New York in the 50s hanging out in the jazz clubs. Although she was occasionally in need, I would never have called her poor, because she was not poor in spirit. She lived a wonderful life full of passion, adventure, and dreams. I miss her voice, and playing for her, and her laughter, and all the fun times we had.
She moved back to Santa Fe in 1989, and I try to see her a couple of times a year. Kira grew up to produce Sisterhood of the Travelings Pants 2 and several other movies. She is now a mother herself and has an amazing and rich life in Hollywood with her husband. I played at her wedding at the Santa Fe Opera House several years ago. It was exciting to see Kira surrounded by her glamourous friends all dressed to the nines. It was also quite emotional for us that knew the hardships she and Jo had endured.
Jo had a philosophy of life that if you truly follow your dreams and do the right thing, good things will come to you. It could have come straight out of an old song. At the time, I could pay lip service to this - but underneath I was still a cynic.
Now, of course, I've come 'round - I know there is something to it.
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Tuneful and tasteful
Schmaltzy and smart
Music by Rodgers
Lyrics by Hart
I drove to Albuquerque on Friday night in my continued Great Piano Quest. The piano I went to see was OK, but I found another I liked much better. I am really considering this one...
The piano storeroom suddenly emptied for a minute and I quickly propped up my iPhone. I just played an old standard for a few seconds before someone came back in. Somehow the sensor didn't flip, and so the clip is upside down.
This song reminds me of a singer I accompanied in the 1980s, Jo Davis. She become a very good friend, and she and her daughter became a big part of our lives. She moved from Texas to New York the minute she could get away in 1950 or '51 - something like that. She had a long romantic relationship with Percy Heath, the bass player. Later she married an abstract expressionist painter, Warren Davis. They eventually moved to Santa Fe, where he died of kidney failure as a young man. Jo was left stranded, trying to raise her young daughter with only his paintings and her singing for an income. For several years they moved to Texas where I met her.
She was a wonderful singer - and still is! She knew all of the old songs. Her charts were often yellowed and crinkled with age and in total disarray. They suggested the bohemian life she had lived New York in the 50s hanging out in the jazz clubs. Although she was occasionally in need, I would never have called her poor, because she was not poor in spirit. She lived a wonderful life full of passion, adventure, and dreams. I miss her voice, and playing for her, and her laughter, and all the fun times we had.
She moved back to Santa Fe in 1989, and I try to see her a couple of times a year. Kira grew up to produce Sisterhood of the Travelings Pants 2 and several other movies. She is now a mother herself and has an amazing and rich life in Hollywood with her husband. I played at her wedding at the Santa Fe Opera House several years ago. It was exciting to see Kira surrounded by her glamourous friends all dressed to the nines. It was also quite emotional for us that knew the hardships she and Jo had endured.
Jo had a philosophy of life that if you truly follow your dreams and do the right thing, good things will come to you. It could have come straight out of an old song. At the time, I could pay lip service to this - but underneath I was still a cynic.
Now, of course, I've come 'round - I know there is something to it.
NYC & Lulu
May. 20th, 2010 04:48 am
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About NYC, I guess we never get enough. Highlights? the dinner at Dovetail, chasing down J. Mehretu, and all of the long & wonderful conversations with my best friend Glenda - she was there being interviewed by the Soros Foundation - almost routine for her.
About Lulu, it was stunningly beautiful - breathtaking. At least the music. The production was from 1977 and it showed. But the music transcended that. For me, it is the most powerful & most brilliant opera written in the XXth century.
(no subject)
Jan. 7th, 2010 08:23 am
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(no subject)
Jan. 15th, 2009 11:14 pm
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office party
Dec. 19th, 2008 09:05 am
I went to the company's office party last night. I passed on also trying to go to my other job's staff party, held at the same time. Too bad, because the food is always excellent there - the food at the office party venue, Cafe Bella, being fairly awful. I wore Texas wear for the occasion. Gifts were chosen by each employee one by one, starting with the most recent hire. There were some elaborate and silly rules to obtain someone else's gift. The gift items ranged vastly in value from a flat screen television to a simple GPS tracking device. I first opened a Playstation, but Barry got such a hard-on for the thing, I just handed it over. The next thing I opened was a 'Wii Sports'. No one seemed too interested in this.
Contemplating what to do with it...maybe give it to a children's home.
