Inspiration is everywhere. Sometimes all you have to do is look outside your window.

Photographer Paulo Pinto snapped a pic of birds on a wire. The photo ran in a newspaper. Seeing the stark contrast of the black birds against the sky, composer Jarbas Agnelli envisioned the birds as musical notes and his curiosity made him play the tune. Here’s what he saw and heard.

The Daily Mail from the UK has more info on Agnelli.

I have it on the best authority that not only does the technology exist, but it’s being produced and sold. This is no demo.

Don’t let the silly European techno culture distract you from this incredibly glitzy and brilliant piece of computer engineering. It is an intuitive leap forward for the way we view music and music creation (or it will be, anyway, if the price drops). They even have a newer model that’s supposedly more durable and easier to use, for installation in public institutions such as children’s science centers and music/arts learning centers.

Since our 27 year old Volvo has been in the shop a bit longer than anticipated, we did not go up to be with Tomás’s family yesterday.  In fact, the day before, I realized we had precious little food in the house, and all of our neighbors were out.  I decided to walk to the nearest Giant Eagle Market, which is 2 and a half miles away.  I made it a personal goal, and you know the old story Grandpa would tell you when you were complaining about something, that he had to walk five miles to school uphill every day?  In the snow? (even if he was a southern California Native….)

Then as you grew up you made the joke “uphill both ways, right Grandpa?” (Or Dad, or whomever is trying to use this particular way of telling you to quit whining).

Well, I just found out that in Pittsburgh, it really is uphill both ways, lol.  I LOVE this city!!

Anyway, I purchased a few basics to make a dinner that would last a few days, and Tomas and I worked the rest of the day.  We woke up on Thanksgiving, and after a relaxing cup of coffee and fresh juice drink for breakfast, we went to work, and worked all day – it was blissfully quiet, and once we got over not having any fresh pumpkin pie, and wishing we could have enjoyed a legitimate day off, we made some good headway into rebuilding a few music emulator banks for Reel 2, plus I got some work done on my novel.

If anyone is a “Dexter” fan, the real Thanksgiving for us was Sunday’s episode – Dexter’s Thanksgiving – “Hungry Man”.  It just does not get any better than that.

Happy Black Friday, Everyone.  We are in, watching the first sleet turn to snow, and yes, still working.

I possess a small amount of musical talent.  I can carry a tune if I get a big enough bucket.  Taking music lessons early in life only left me with a distaste for practicing.  And that folks is at the crux of the problem.   Talk about a major case of the coulda-woulda-shoulda’s.

If I had kept up with the music and actually dedicated myself to it, I could be well, above average by now.  But I left it, went to school and did other things.  Sure getting a degree is important, but the other recreational time, filled mostly with video games, seems like such a waste now.

It is only now that I see how much time and effort is required to get good at playing piano and singing.  (I’m partaking in both and am fully cognoscente of the amount of diligence, willpower and effort required to effectively play the piano and sing with confidence.

I have been blessed with the opportunity to learn with tremendously gifted piano instructor.  It is at her piano I am exposed to exactly how much more still have to learn.  It isa daunting, depressing, exhilarating challenging experience that it seems I cannot get enough of right now.

I mentioned earlier of my involvement in a Choir.  My vocal chops are raw and undisciplined, but with the excellent vocal coaching our choir director I have made significant progress on the Choral side of things.  Another steep hill, but the learning is so challenging and rewarding.

So, neophyte pianist, neophyte tenor; where does composing fit into all of this?  Rather poorly, in my initial appraisal,  as composing takes all the aspects of musicianship and wads them up so it lands like a cinder-block on your head as you’re trying to write down that elusive melody that is infesting your mind.

Composing is an art unto itself, and I am yet again having another Titanic moment as I’ve seen only the tip if the musical iceberg as I have recently tackled the notion that I should be able to write a traditional round for my choir to sing.

Well, I have a finished product of sorts, but no way of accurately judging the quality or internal musical structure inherent to all good music pieces.   Fortunately my piano instructor teaches composition as well and is helping me with turning a raw product into something that is not only singable, but beautiful.

The moral of the story:  Hate the piano lessons, but take the idea that often if it requires hard work  it is often ultimately worth it in the end.

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Last week, Tomás sent off three versions of an important cue  for “Ravana’s Game” to director David Eblan. He likes all three, and has narrowed it down to two.   The reason this cue is being called ‘important’ is simply because it is one of the main characters themes, and every time throughout the film, when we see this character, there will be a version of this theme around or under him. It may be featured, it maybe underscore, but  it will be there. Consequently, it is important that both the  Director and the Composer are happy with the cue.

This is the fifth ‘important’ cue insofar as establishing main characters themes.  All of these have been in Reel One.  There are new characters we meet in subsequent reels who will have their own personalized themes written. These themes make up the whole of the score.

Before Tomás can go on to Reel Two, and while David makes his final pick, Tomás has to go through every character’s theme, and start the dreaded “organizing”, a combination of Music Editing,  assisting, and Composer assisting.  The Composer is assisting…..himself.  It almost has an “X” rated feel to it.

No such luck.  It is lots of paperwork, cue organization via melody, harmony, instrumentation and elements.  It requires a completely different head space than writing, and is often much more exhausting without the creative reward.

In a nutshell, Tomás would much rather be writing than doing this, however, this is absolutely necessary for the score to start flowing at a nice clip, with no need to suddenly be interrupted because something is ‘missing’, and the piles and piles of  paperwork, and hundreds and hundreds of banks of sounds do not need to be searched through.  Everything is in it’s place, and this is essential for optimal creativity and productivity.

Still, it is the drudge work, and the little I can do to speed things along, I do, but ultimately, it is his style of organizing, his office, his space, and his computer.  As much as I wish I could wave the magic wand and have it be finished, it is his composers studio, and only he knows how he wants it organized.

I spent enough years assisting composer John Williams and his editor Ken Wannberg to know there came a point where there was nothing I could do to help them through the ’slosh pile’.  I could only turn my attention to my own.

With Tomás, I am doing the same – dealing with my own piles of desperately needed organization, and remembering that I make a mean cup of coffee, a mean sandwich, and a mean scowl when I hold out a handful of vitamins to get him through the day.

Upward and Onward!

When I’m listening to music at home, it’s almost always on the dedicated computer that’s connected to a proper hi-fi amp and speakers. It’s getting a bit long in the tooth now, and quite low-powered, but it’s fine for playing music with XMMS, software which is also somewhat ancient and primitive, but it does exactly what I need. And nothing else.

I’ve tried several of the popular alternatives which are supposed to be a “new generation”  compared to XMMS, but they all are fat and ugly, in a software sense. Actually, ugly in a visual sense too. And they all do things like “managing” your “library” of music, and I don’t know what that’s supposed to be for. I have music on my computer and I want to hear it – OK?

XMMS may be old, but it does have a plugin that connects to last.fm and uploads the detais of every track I play. (You can see the results at http://www.last.fm/user/RecycledAlien, if you didn’t know that already.) Since creating the account there (I did have an earlier one) on 29th January 2008, I’ve logged 39,525 plays. That’s almost exacty sixty a day. If you guessed that an average track time was a pop-tastic three minutes and twenty seconds (averaging between a frantic 45 seconds from Melt Banana and 20 minutes of Tortoise), it means I listen to about three and a half hours of music a day. And that doesn’t count, say, another half hour a day in the car that last.fm doesn’t know about.

And you know, actually, it’s too much. I’m not saying that listening to music is bad, of course not, it’s practically the whole point of my life. But I do know for sure that when I’m listening to other people’s music, I’m not writing my own, and I’m not practising guitar or bass. (Well, the latter is not totally true, since I do try to play along on occasion. Putting an acoustic bass guitar in the living room was a great idea.)

With any addiction, you can either go cold turkey or try to cut down. As it happens, I chanced to hear part of an item on Radio 3, which I guess may have been to do with the infamous Mr. Drummond’s No Music Day where the presenter had asked listeners to get in touch about relevant experiences, and one e-mailed to say that he had spent nine months listening to no other music while working on his own. Too drastic for me, but how about, maybe, one day a week?

Well, I did it on Wednesday. Almost successfully — the only slip was when I jumped in the car to go up to the Post Office (I should have walked or cycled; it’s only two miles) and the car player was two minutes into Breakdown by Colourbox before I realised. You could verify the gap in my last.fm stats, but it’s too easy to fake to be good evidence. I could just disconnect the computer from the network for a day, for example.

In fact, that’s exactly what happened the following day, when high winds damaged the little wire that connects me to the rest of the world. I couldn’t even make phone calls on it, never mind Internet. But the very wonderful BT (whom I used to work for) seem to have got it fixed. Not that a day without Internet was a totally bad thing. I should do it, maybe once a week. Break the addiction.

So that’s No Music on Wednesdays, No Internet on Thursdays, and, oh, I don’t know, No Unhealthy Food on Tuesdays. What do you think?

I was privileged to teach a class at a recent music conference. The class was called, “You Can Give the Industry What It Wants and Still Be Creative”. It was taught by a team of 4 people: Suz Doyle talked about finding inspiration when you are blocked; Chuck Schlacter talked about how he researches opportunities and client requests, and illustrated how he sketches out the plan for a piece of music on a daily basis; John Mazzei talked about what it’s like to work with film directors as a composer, and the challenge of supporting the creative vision of the director while remaining true to one’s own muse.

I choose to talk about creatively managing creative time.

I was on a coaching call a while ago with Debra Russell and Nancy Moran, and Nancy talked about delegating tasks. Not just bookkeeping or web management… but the personal things you need to do around the house, or the errands you run. Her logic was, if you are self-employed, then everything you do is part of running your business. What a sense of relief I got when she said that! I’d been struggling with the house, shopping, laundry, and felt guilty about not being able to keep up with it all. It was huge weight off my shoulders to realize it was ‘ok’ to delegate some of that out. So here’s what I came up with.

1-Make a list of daily, weekly and monthly tasks. That’s everything you need to do. Pay bills, shop for groceries, go to the gym, etc.

2-Set up a calendar. I have mine set up as a table in Word. Preferably you want something where you can see the month at a glance.

3-Now schedule your tasks. Try to be efficient. For example, if you are downtown on Friday afternoons, then you schedule all your downtown errands on Friday afternoon, that’s when you get your photocopies, pick up toner from the office supply store, mail your packages, do your banking. If you set aside time on Saturday morning to clean house, maybe that’s also a good time to do laundry. You can throw a load in and then go clean the kitchen. If, like me, doing laundry means a trip to the Laundromat… well, I have enough towels and clothes to go one month before I need to do laundry. And when I do laundry, I put everything in the washer and then go to the grocery store and/or drug store, do any banking. Sometimes I’ll even call my mom from my cell while I’m sitting in the Laundromat. I can cross ‘call Mom’ off my list

I mentioned in the class that I order my groceries on-line. There is a local company (Spud.ca) that deliver organics. I order those supplies on Mondays and they are delivered Thursdays. I then go to the store once a week (usually Wednesday morning) and get anything I need that they don’t deliver. I order on-line for the convenience, but also because I know that if I get swamped or overwhelmed, the first thing that goes is shopping. That is not good for my health. So ordering on-line is not only time management, it’s health management, to get a box of beautiful fresh veggies and fruit every week, encouraging me to eat sensibly.

Because I work at home, I’m able to manage cooking by preparing veggies for the steamer, and plugging it in before my last session starts, or using the crock pot. I tend to eat pretty much the same things most of the time. I make a meal plan for the week – this is not only good for time management but it’s a good budget measure as well. I always try to cook enough for two meals so I only have to warm things up.

Included in your schedule of ‘tasks’ should also be some daily personal time, just to be… to walk, to dream, to meditate, to be still. And also include, on a weekly basis, time to go over your schedule for the following week, plan your budget, balance your chequebook, make your grocery list & plan your meals. I allow 2 hours for this on Saturday morning.

4-The next step is to make a list of projects you want to work on. This could be musical collaborations, writing for opportunities, working on your album, etc. I have separate project sheets for library composing, co-writing, my album, and listings I plan to submit to. I have a project binder and in each section I put notes & emails for the different projects I’m working on.

5-Now look at your schedule, and plan when you will be in your ‘studio’. On weekends I plan 4-6 hours per day, during the week I plan 3 to 5 hours per day depending on what I have on. Allow time for social events…. Dinner and a movie – one night a week. Overall I schedule about 20 hours studio time as a minimum. Because I work for myself I’m in charge of my schedule. If you work full-time and you have a family, then your obligations are going to be different, and your available time for writing is going to be reduced. That’s life. We make choices and we need to see them through.

When you walk into your studio at the scheduled time, then you look at your list of projects and ask, ‘what is the best use of my time right now’, or ‘what is the most urgent thing to work on,’ or ‘what would I like to play with today’. Guard this time, don’t let other things eat into it. Use your weekly planning time to assess how well you are figuring out how to deal with your needs, and adjust accordingly.

It only makes sense to me that we should set reasonable goals, figure out what we need to get or to know, and then set out to save for that software, or set aside time to learn/practice, and use available resources (like songwriting forums) to get feedback on what we are doing, or even to share our process and ask for advice. We assess progress by looking back and asking… did I move forward over the past few months? Am I writing better, more consistently, did I finish what I set out to do?

I recommend these books:
“Getting Things Done” by David Allen
“The Artist’s Way” by Julia Cameron

The handout I distributed at the class is available here:
http://www.islandnet.com/~vflawith/Creative_Time_Handout

——————-
Just as an example, then… my overall schedule might look like this:

Sunday-
1 hr – clean hse/organize
(walk)
4-6 hrs – studio

Monday-
3 hrs – work
(lunch, walk)
4 hrs – work
(dinner)
2 hrs – studio
order on-line groc

Tuesday-
3 hrs – work morning
1 hr – rehearse with trio
(lunch, walk)
4 hrs work
(dinner)
2 hrs studio

Wednesday-
2 hrs – studio
shopping/banking/laundry/walk
(lunch)
4 hrs – work
(dinner)
2 hrs – studio

Thursday-
3 hrs – work morning
1 hr – studio
(lunch, walk, groc delivered)
4 hrs work
(dinner)
2 hrs studio

Friday-
3 hrs – work morning
1 hr – rehearse with trio
weekly appt
run errands
dinner/movie

Saturday-
2 hrs – scheduling/planning
(lunch, walk)
4-6 hrs – studio
——————-

385491     การแต่งเพลง     Composing

การแต่งเพลงไทยและการแต่งเติมเพลงไทย

(Composing and Recomposing Thai music.)

(385491 มหาวิทยาลัยเกษตรศาสตร์)

Folkzzz,

long time no hear no see.  Hope you are well . I am still working a lot with the new Ableton 8 diving a bit deeper into its features day by day. Today I started to work on some very old ideas which have rot on my desk several months, some even several years already. It’s not my intention to build ready-to-go tracks but more track-like soundscapes which one (maybe you and I) could work on and perform later. This one is called “From Now On I Am A Rock”.  Have fun and take care!

A creative artist works on his next composition because he is not satisfied with his previous one. When he loses a critical attitude towards his own work, he ceases to be an artist.

We hide ourselves in our music to reveal ourselves.

Jim Morrison

A poet always has too many words in his vocabulary, a painter too many colors on his palette, a musician too many notes on his keyboard.

Jean Coctau

It is the duty of the composer to serve his fellow man, to beautify human life and point the way to a radiant future. Such is the immutable code of the artist as I see it.

Sergei Prokofiev

To write great music, the musician must make his life a great song.

“We live in an era when the borders between human action and human made technical machines action are being vanished.” Zofia Lissa

In last blog we discussed transformation of cognitive process at moment of creating art work (i.e. composition). Accepting a computer as an active participant (as a “composer”) in a process of composing has shaken settled opinion about inspiration or artistic fantasy.

If there is a situation in which the energy no longer goes only in one direction – form man to machine – but the opposite – from machine to man, then we can speak about the effect of reversible coupling (cybernetic system).

What is even more interesting is a fact that computers work only by scientific principles unlike so called “artistic inspiration”. This is the fact that bothers many aesthetes and musical theorists.

From this point of view, computers break the myth about non-coupling connection between imagination (fantasy, creation) and strict scientific logic. As we already claimed in some of previous blogs, it is very certain that nowadays computers can compose music in the same way as human.

Now, we have another question that needs to be answered: do science and inspiration both have the same inner logic?

Two days ago Tomas was working on a cue that is quite ominous – it is the beginning of the setup for one main character’s theme, and it gets more eerie as the film progresses.

This happens to me every time – I am not consciously aware of the music playing throughout the house all day, but it is subconsciously making me very skittish.  A gust of wind, a creak upstairs – I start noticing these things.  They seemed particularly loud last night, and it does not help to remind myself that we live in a very old forest, in a 110 year old house – for some reason those very facts make me even more jumpy.

I reassure myself that it is a good cue when it has me this rattled, and go to sleep.  I woke up this morning and looked in the mirror.

And no, I do not know what the silver button is on my shoulder. That is the least of my worries.

Worse than the silver button and the yellow eyes? I am smiling in this picture.

Tomas is writing the main theme tonight for another character, which is mainly a minor-y mournful electric guitar cue.  We will take another photo tomorrow and see if I am no longer possessed by Ravana or one of his minions.

Bah! I love my job!! About three weeks ago, my boss called me to ask if I could conduct a phone interview in French. I said yes, to which she replied, “Wonderful! I just gave Yann Tiersen your cell phone number. He’ll be calling you at 7pm.”

Me – In my head: WHAT?!? Yann Tiersen?? The Yann Tiersen?? Who composed the music for Amelie and Goodbye Lenin?? The Yann Tiersen who’s music I used to listen to to keep my mood up when I was studying for exams in university? The Yann Tiersen who’s music I play whenever I move into a new apartment, because it fills up every corner with this warm, wonderful feeling?? The Yann Tiersen who I’m obviously sort of obsessed with???

Me – Out loud: Oh, wow! Great! I’ll write up some questions while I’m waiting for his call and email you a transcript of the interview tomorrow.

Me – In my head after hanging up the phone: EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

I rushed home, typed up some interview questions and sat nervously on my bed (which doubles as my desk) waiting for the phone to ring. He called at 7:22pm and I swear, those were 22 of the longest minutes…

And then, my ringtone started to play, my stomach did a somersault and I started sweating profusely.

“Allo? C’est Yann Tiersen.”

And then I said something along the lines of “Gobbedly gobbeldy goo..” feigned a bad connection and somehow got my brain working again.

In the end, it turned out that Yann Tiersen is actually a really nice, down to earth guy, and the rest of the interview ended up going really well. He was patient with me, friendly and gave thorough answers to my questions. I felt like a real journalist for the first time – such a rush!! Success!!

So here you go! The un-cut version of my first feature article in Time Out Beirut!

YANN TIERSEN

“Music and life are the same…I’m always thinking about music.” Words spoken by a man who has clearly found his calling in life, French musician and composer, Yann Tiersen, who will be performing at the Forum de Beirut on November 12.  Tiersen was jettisoned into the international spotlight after the success of the film, Le Fabuleux Destin d’Amélie Poulain, for which he composed the award winning score. But as any devoted Tiersen fan will tell you, the 39-year old musician’s work extends long before and far beyond Amélie.

Born in the city of Brest and raised in the nearby city of Rennes in Brittany, France, Tiersen began to study piano and violin at the age of 12, discovering his passion for music early in life. During our interview he revealed, “I always knew I wanted to be a composer – since I was a young child. I love music!”  Tiersen would go on to receive formal music training, but a free spirit who could not be contained by the restrictions of classical protocol, he made the sharp turn from classic to rock.  Jamming with several different rock bands in the 1980s, he began to develop a style of music all his own.

In 1995, at the age of 25, he released his first album, La Valse de Monstres (The Monsters’ Waltz), a compilation of music he had composed for two French plays, Le Tambourin de Soie (The Silk Tambourine) and Freaks. The minimalist, instrumental music showcased influences of classical compositions, the old French crooners of the 1950s, and Tiersen’s beloved rock.

In addition, true to the composer’s now trademark style, the album featured the beautifully bizarre combination of such varied instruments as the violin, piano, accordion, toy piano, melodica, and xylophone.  Tiersen explains, “I really love working with sound…looking for things to use and instruments that aren’t really traditional.” Obviously not one to be limited by the conventional, the ever-curious Tiersen has continuously experimented with different melodic tools, utilizing the noises produced by things as abstract as typewriters and bicycle wheels in his compositions.

Domestic fame came in 1998, with the release of his third album, Le Phare, and then this eccentric, suddenly in-demand musician was graced with the international praise he had long deserved when his compositions for Amélie (2001) and the German film Goodbye Lenin! (2003) surprised and impressed the world.

Composing a score for a film tends to be different than composing for an album, but not for Tiersen. Whereas many composers take their inspirational cues from the visual rhythm of the film and the style of editing, or try to synchronize their music with actions and dialogue, Tiersen takes a different approach: “I don’t work with the images. I don’t look at them while I compose.” And while this may be an unconventional modus operandi, you can’t argue with success. He was given the French national film award, the César, in 2002 for Best Music Written for a Film, for his score in Amélie.

While he enjoys composing for films, and cannot deny the international success it has brought him, Tiersen prefers composing independently, professing, “There’s more freedom. When you’re working on the score for a film there are limitations and obligations.  You have to have a certain result by a certain time…it’s a bit stressful. I prefer to compose on my own time, when inspiration comes.”

When it comes to composing his music, to finding that inspiration, Tiersen likes to be alone – “I have a house on a small island west of Brittany and I have less pressure there. I can just work.” He adds laughing, “And if I don’t find any ideas there, I go into town to the bar for awhile.”  This gifted composer seems to live and breathe the music he writes, issuing the impassioned statement, “When you are a musician you can enjoy life and life can be material for your inspiration. I’m always thinking about music. It’s always with you.  When I compose, I think about life, and when I’m not working, I’m thinking about music.”

And now, Yann Tiersen will be gracing the stage in our beloved Beirut, performing songs from his yet to be released album, Dust Lane as well as compositions from his last studio album, Les Retrouvailles (2005). Dust Lane, an album that his fans are anticipating with baited breath, is the combined effort of French indie/pop-rock musician Syd Matters, British dark-folk artist Matt Elliott and Orka, a musical group hailing from the Faroe Islands. Tiersen is enjoying his current tour and is looking forward to his visit here, stating, “I’m happy to being going back to Beirut – it’s a beautiful city.” Well, Mr. Tiersen, we’re thrilled to have you!

Das Bremer Unternehmen Cardio Consult, mit seinem Geschäftsbereich PRAEKARDIO spezialisiert auf die Früherkennung von Gesundheitsrisiken am Herzen, setzt seine Imagekampagne fort. eskalade entwickelte ein weiteres Motiv für die Kampagne, die mit dem verstörenden Kontrast zwischen Bildern aus dem Bereich Sport und Freizeit einerseits, sowie Elementen aus dem Themenumfeld Rettungswesen arbeitet.

Im zweiten Motiv ist nun die Szenerie ein Tennisplatz, auf dem ein Ball liegt. Im Hintergrund ist unscharf ein Rettungswagen zu sehen. Die Motive weisen auf die Tatsache hin, dass Herzinfarkte und Schlaganfälle zum hohen Anteil aus scheinbar völliger Gesundheit heraus auftreten, und empfiehlt die Vorsorgeuntersuchung zur Früherkennung.

There is nothing worse than having a cold and trying to write.

I suggest you listen to some Mozart.

It will refresh your brain, stimulate your intellectual brain cells and help you think clearer.

There is something about the music that affects the parts of your brain you don’t normally use.

Listen to it for a few hours and you will either be exhausted or energetic.

Depending on your systematical constitution.

That’s a word my dad made up.

It means how your brain is affected by the sounds of music.

How is your brain today?

Have you taken some time to refresh and pamper it?

Or are you too busy worrying about all those bills you have to pay, the gifts you need to buy, the party you need to plan?

As a writer, you dedicate hours of your time to mastering your craft.

You must take time to relax and refresh.

It will give you renewed energy and allow you to write and compose some wonderful pieces of work.

If your under the weather (like I am this week) then it helps you to feel better and happy inside.

We get those rainy day blues, and we need a quick pick me up.

Try some Mozart Brain Waves – It will help you with your writing!

It’s group week in my studio this week, which meant it was a perfect week to work on some Halloween-themed activities.   I always use group lessons as an opportunity for students to perform for each other, then spend extensive time on rhythm, listening and theory for the rest of the hour.  Here’s what we’re doing this week:

I found some fantastic re-written lyrics to the 12 Days of Christmas – now the 12 Days of Halloween, and made a rhythm card to go with each “day”.  I then hung the cards all around my studio.   I would chant a line to students and they had to go look for the rhythm that matched.   Once we had a match, we sticky-tacked the lyrics onto the rhythm card and hung it on the clothesline. 

In elementary-level groups, we sang through the song several times:  First, we simply clapped the rhythm and chanted the words.  Next, we assigned a different action for each value of notes (i.e. clap quarters, slap thighs for eighths, stomp for half notes), and finally picked out rhythm instruments to perform a clanging, banging version of the song as I added harmony on the piano. 

Download the Rhythm Cards (including lyrics cards) here. 

Intermediate level students used the rhythms to complete a composing challenge worksheet.  Working with a partner, they composed and notated new melodies for each “day” of Halloween, and added a simple I, IV or V7 chord harmony in the  key of F Major. 

Download the Composing Challenge worksheet here. 

We are back from our wild 12 hours in New York, where “American Dumpling” was warmly received at the Chashama Film Festival, despite it being a small venue, a ten a.m. screening, and a rather damp, drizzly day.

Never mind that as we crossed from New Jersey into New York, over the Verrazano Bridge, and off at 38th St, we heard a really bad dragging sound.  I was hoping it was the rather mangled road we were on, but no such luck.  It was still dark, and behind us, the bridge was still glowing blue in the 6 a.m. pre-dawn sky.

We made a left onto 4th Ave,. pulled over, and Tomas got down on his hands and knees in rain pooled gutter, only to see that the ‘engine splash guard’ had come partially off, and was not about to budge, either back into position or just do us a favor and break clean off.  We only had to go down to  17th Street, where director Aminta Goyal and her husband Michael lived, so after a bus went by and splashed all over Tomas, who was already dressed in his good clothes, we decided to park the car on 17th and deal with it after the festival. Buses splashing water on a person who dressed up is something you laugh at in a movie, right? It is a sight gag. Do not try this at home.

We staggered down the street to Aminta’s, where we were greeted with great joy, hugs and kisses.  Her husband Michael was wonderful, totally easygoing and welcoming, considering we were  two strangers who were so tired our eyes were rolling in our heads. Seriously, how many people let anyone in their house at the ungodly hour of 6:45 a.m., and be nice to them?

They made us coffee, and we all sat in the living room and talked excitedly until Michael realized it was time to go.  I had changed into something decent, and did my best with eyeliner and mascara, which can work miracles, well, sometimes.

Subway from Brooklyn into Manhattan - we fit right in.

Onto the  Subway, into the city, where we made our way to the venue, below.

Aminta finds the festival, we wandered right by it and were weaving up the street

When we went inside, we immediately collapsed onto the chairs, offing jackets, scarves and purses, when I realized I needed to see if our Dumpling cards were placed with the other films cards. Sadly, Eileen, the director, had not had the time to make up new cards and get them out, so below is a very tired me peering down at the stage, wondering where the cards are.  A very tired Tomas took the picture, and I think it is perfect, as the out-of-focus shot is physically how I felt.

As I was wondering where the cards were, I heard my name being called behind me, and to my great surprise, an on-line friend I had invited showed up with his wife – what a treat to finally meet someone you have only known through cyberspace. John and his wife Eve were delightful and John took the time to write a review of the film on his blog, which you can read here. They also gave a DVD copy  of the film to some entertainment reporters they knew, in the hopes that they would write up a review in an actual newspaper. We were overwhelmed.

After the film played, Tomás and I did the Q&A, which was being filmed, and to be perfectly honest, I have no idea what we said.  Aminta reasured us that we did fine, but we were blithering idiots at that point.

We met a lovely woman, Louise Chu, who works publicity, marketing, and promotions for film, theater, and special events.  She had some excellent suggestions for “Dumpling”, and gave us her card.  I passed this information along to Eileen, and we shall see what comes of that.

Tomás and I extend our thanks to Ariel Vered and Rick Kariolic for their  support and enthusiastic reception of “Dumpling”.  You guys were great, and we hope to see you next year.

Afterwards, the six of us went to Chinatown, where we indulged ourselves in Vietnamese food and drink, and had so much fun we could have stayed until closing time.  Eve expertly herded us through the city into the subway, not an easy task, let me tell you.  She noticed I was weaving a bit at the corner, and I wrapped my arm in the crook of hers, and together we made all made it to Chinatown.  Somehow she multitasked propping me up, while making sure not to lose either of our husbands or Aminta and Michael.

Tomas manages to get a shot of Chinatown and not get swallowed by the crowd

Regretfully, was time to go, as we had a long drive ahead.  John and Eve headed towards their subway entrance, and we headed back to Aminta and Michael’s, where we had to deal with the car, and then wound up recapping the day, along with about a thousand other topics.  We left their flat at around 6 p.m.

The drive back was a challenge, we got lost on the New Jersey Turnpike, just as the skies opened up with ferocious intent. Once we crossed from New Jersey back into Pennsylvania, we felt like we were home!  Well….not quite.  There was still the whole state to go through, more storms, a deer in the middle of the freeway which was a near miss, luckily, no one, man or beast got hurt.

All in all, we were up for forty hours straight, and although we made it, it has taken a few days to get back to a semi-normal sleep pattern.  As you can see, my eyes refuse to open, but I am still smiling!

How far have we driven? Who are you? Where am I?

Tomas took some spectacular pictures of Brooklyn, Manhattan, and people, but we will sprinkle those throughout other posts.  For now, we are back, and back to work.  As I wrap this up, Tomas is mixing cue 1m5 for “Ravana’s Game”, to send off to director David Eblen tonight.  David was very understanding concerning this trip, and we appreciate it, as he knows that if he needed us to do something like this for “Ravana’s Game” long after the score was written, we would do it in a heartbeat.

All in all, it was a wonderful time, and we want to thank John, Eve, Aminta and Michael for adding an extraordinary human touch to what would have been a nice, but ultimately grueling experience.

Oh, and I forgot, as Aminta and I were standing on the corner down the street a bit from the festival, waiting to go in, a young woman with a smart blond ponytail and a brisk step, walked by me, and her yoga mat smacked me firmly in my lower back, nearly causing me to fall flat on my face.

Aminta gaped, then laughed and said, “Wow, I’ll bet you felt like you were back in L.A., huh?”

Actually I didn’t.  The Los Angeles twenty-something blond perky yoga matties walk the 9 steps from the yoga studio to their  gigantic SUV’s where they throw all of their ‘portable yoga gear’ in the gaping maw of the back of the SUV, right next to the bags of groceries from Whole Foods, bottles of wine from Trader Joes’s, and assorted items ordered from “Mommy and Me”.

I have been hit with a lot of things in my time, but never a yoga mat.  To add insult to injury, it was pink.  Bashed by a pink yoga mat.  Another new experience to cross off my list.  Tomas got a shot of the corner, but he missed the attack of the pink yoga mat.  Ah well, at least we have the footage of where the scene of the spiritual crime occurred.

Hello Friends!

This week’s essay is posted:

Perseverance. Without It, Passion Is Never Enough.

An excerpt:
*******************
by Chiron O’Keefe

“You cannot always control what goes on outside. But you can always control what
goes on inside.”  –Dr. Wayne Dyer.

Perseverance is a word that stumbles on the tongue. It’s not at all like the  word Passion. Passion sounds juicy and gorgeous and bursting with flavor.

Passion. Yum. *smile* Writers imagine the process of composing is simply a matter of the right amount of passion. As if each story dangles like ripe fruit just yonder out of reach. Snap it off the branch and there you go!

The desire to carve a story out of thin air is certainly our greatest motivation. Passion moves us to reach beyond the known and imbues us with the courage to venture into the dark landscape of our imagination. However it’s the less attractive relative—the one with the heavy backpack and sturdy walking shoes—who is more likely to successfully traverse that rocky path.

Perseverance.

Without it, passion is never enough…

**************************

Ready for some motivation?

Jump to The Write Soul: <a href=”http://www.chironokeefe.blogspot.com“>www.chironokeefe.blogspot.com</a>
for the complete essay. Sorry I was unable to send out messages the last two weeks!

Keep writing, everyone!

–Chiron O’Keefe

Tomas and I are going to New York, to the Chashama Film Festival, where “American Dumpling” has been accepted and is playing on Saturday Morning at 10 a.m.  You can find it in the categories “under $10,000″ and “Society”.

We have been turning ourselves inside out to try and figure out the quickest and least expensive way to get there – Plane and cab fare – a little pricey.  Train and cab fare, a little pricey and too many days to leave two cats and a crow alone in the house.

And trust me, a house sitter is out of the question.  When there is an uncaged crow as part of the deal, recession or no recession, no one wants that job.

So, we decided on renting a car, leaving the night before at around 11 p.m. (that is tonight, in five hours.  We have to get a nap in there somewhere, and a shower) – it is raining, and by 11p.m. it is going to be pouring, thunder and lightening predicted.  Totally exciting.

We are driving all night, into Brooklyn, where we are going to tumble into a brownstone belonging to Aminta Goyal,director of  “The Morning Fog”, and her husband Michael, where we will be slapped awake and hooked up to an I.V. of coffee, while we all catch up!  Then, we jump into our presentable clothes, and the four of  us hop the subway from Brooklyn to Mid Town Manhattan, where we watch the film, Tomas and I do the Q&A, we mill around for a bit, pass out a few cards to anyone who is interested, then hop back on the subway to Brooklyn, jump in the car, and drive home.

According to the weather, it is going to be raining the whole time.  We purchased a new nikon camera in order to take some decent pictures of the gorgeous Pennsylvania fall, so we are hoping that the drive back will produce a little bit of sun to capture the Fall leaves turning. If all goes according to plan, we will be back in the house tomorrow by no later than 9 p.m.

This is going to require some serious time travel back when we were in our twenties and could pull off a 24 hour shift with no sleep.

I promise, we will not wind up in a ditch somewhere, and this will not be the last post.  After all, there is a cooking contest going on over at “Dumpling” – we have judging to do!

Everyone is invited to the cooking contest:  Just go to American Dumpling, enjoy the entries, and read about how to enter at the bottom of the page.

Okay, gotta get a nap!

Hey guys,

We’re working on composing the songs for our first album, Travel by Day, Travel By Road. We have 16 songs written, though not all of them may be in this album. The current line-up is displayed below.

1. Undone
2. Shattered
3. Undead
4. Aversion
5. Truth
6. Stained
7. Shoot
8. Suffocation
9. Scourge
10. Endurance
11. Lost
12. Redemption
13. Yours
14. Temperate Desert

There are two more songs, but they so far were only tests (but we may add them if they turn out better). Keep coming back and we’ll have some audio up for all of you to listen to!

-Rosland Hall Band