Author: Zingblog 2

Life in a Northern Town

We just got back from a fun road trip, another mini-vacation. This time we went north instead of south, to the town of Saranac Lake, to visit our friends Mark and Kelly. Although we’ve been up to the Adirondacks plenty of times, we haven’t been up since before the pandemic, so it was great to see our friends and catch up. This trip was also a first in that Michelle stayed home cuz she had to work.

We drove up Friday night after work. It was a pretty easy and mellow drive, although the number of blatantly reckless drivers, as well as obnoxiously blaring extra-bright headlights, has definitely increased over the last few years. Still, that all tapered off as we got away from New York City. Once we arrived, we all stayed up late into the night talking.

Saturday we went hiking. In the morning we went up Mt. Baker, and in the afternoon some mellow walking around some ponds and lakes. Later got some local soft-serve ice cream, went out to dinner, then back to Mark’s place to build a fire and more hanging out. It’s interesting to see how the town has changed since last time we were up there. Some places have gone out of business, and some new ones have opened up.

Sunday we went for an epic canoe ride. Jeannie and I rented a canoe from a place right on the waterfront, a really nice kevlar boat, very light and fast. Mark has his own one-man canoe. The trip was about six hours, through a series of lakes and channels, and even a lock. It was a perfect day, warm and sunny, but not too hot, with very little wind. The journey was very scenic, with some shores dotted with cottages, others full of woods or swamps, all with the mountains in the background. We saw a couple of loons close up – surprisingly large birds – as well as a great blue heron, a bald eagle, and lots of other wildlife.

On the way, Jeannie accidentally capsized our canoe. We were crossing thru the wake of a motorboat, and as we rocked back and forth, she leaned too far the wrong way. When the boat rocked back the other way she was off balance and fell out, tipping the whole thing. We got wet, but it was a warm day, and our stuff was in a dry pack, so no real problem. We pushed the boat to a shallow spot near the shore, poured out the water in the bottom and were on our way. Believe or not, this is first time in 30 years of canoeing together that either one of us has tipped a boat.

Our destination was an island with a picnic area, where we had our lunch. The whole lake (and the greater area) is full of campsites and day use spots. We sunned ourselves on a rock and dried out or stuff for a while, then headed back. The way back was easier cuz it was downstream, but we were starting to get tired, and it didn’t help that a headwind came up as we were crossing a couple long expanses of deep, open water. That night we all went to bed early cuz we were tired from rowing all day.

Monday we drove home, stopping for lunch at Lake George, where they have some restaurants with patios looking over the lake, and watched the scene. Very nice. I bought some new sunglasses, since I lost my old ones when our canue capsized. When we got home, Michelle was waiting to greet us with freshly baked cupcakes.

Let’s Go to the Mall

Just got back from a mini-vacation down to Washington, D.C. At one point we were planning on going to Ohio for the Centerfold origami convention, but those plans fell thru. Last time we were out in Ohio, six years ago, we stopped by the National Air Force Museum in Dayton, which is pretty cool to see. Michelle asked if we could we go see the Air and Space Museum instead, since we haven’t been there in even longer. Seeing as she’s going off to college for aerospace engineering in a few weeks, and this kind of trip is what inspired her in the first place, we all thought it was a good idea.

Of course with the resurgence of the pandemic things aren’t quite back to normal yet. The Smithsonian is just opening back up, and large parts are under renovation, and they’re only letting in a limited number of people at at time, and of course you have to wear a mask. And yet again we struck out trying to get tickets to go up into the Washington Monument.

Our first stop was the Udvar-Hazy annex to the Air and Space Museum, out at Dulles Airport. This is fact much larger than the main Air and Space Museum and features some of the most famous aircraft and spacecraft of all time, including a Space Shuttle, a Blackbird, a Concorde, and the Enola Gay. There’s tons of other stuff too, from all eras of flight going back over 100 years, balloon craft, gliders, commercial, military and experimental aircraft, paraphernalia, engines, etc.

Since we drove out that morning, that was the only stop for the day. In the evening we met up with my friend John M., who lives nearby and had dinner. John is an origami artist, so it was a little like having our own min-convention. Our hotel was in Silver Springs, which is cute little urban dot in the middle of the suburbs, kinda like White Plains but with friendlier architecture and street life.

Next day we took the train into the Mall. It was a beautiful day for walking around, and we did plenty of it. Our first stop was the American History Museum. A good chunk of it was closed for renovation, particularly the cultural stuff, but there was a gallery of inaugural gowns from all the first ladies, and a collection of jazz musical instruments. We spent most of our time in the transportation section, which goes from sailing ships and horse-drawn wagons thru steam locomotives and of course automobiles.

The line for the Natural History Museum was around the block, so we skipped that and went on the National Art Gallery. Spent most of our time looking at sculptures, and paintings by Rembrandt, El Greco, and others. The last stop was the National Air and Space Museum in the mall. This of course has the Apollo 11 command module, a Lunar Lander, the Spirit of St. Louis, among others. The hall had just reopened, and more than half of it is under renovation, so it was a pretty quick visit. I was reminiscing about the first time I visited that museum as a kid, with my parents and brothers, only a month or so after it first opened in the summer of 1976. We all thought it was to coolest thing ever; I’d never imagined anything like it. Now space exploration seems to have largely fallen out of fashion, even as private space travel is becoming a real thing. Strange.

That evening we met up with John again, at a Mexican restaurant near or hotel with a large patio area like a beer garden. The food was great and after dinner John and I stayed talking late into the night. As always, he has alot of fascinating new origami stuff. He has some really innovative snakes with strips and some new polyhedra. John has gotten into making books styles as “symphonies”, with four movements, each a set or related models on a theme. This latest one, his Fifth Symphony, has tropical fish, tropical birds, some tetrahedron- and octahedron-based single-sheet polyhedra, and the last movement is complex sea creatures such as a crab, squid and nautilus. John is also to music and playing piano, so we had alot to catch up on.

Cruisin’ In Brooklyn

Well the fireflies and tiger lilies are pretty much done and we’re sliding into the long, languid second half of summer. Things have been going pretty well. I’ve been having an excellent run of workouts, and I’m about to go up in weight again, and I’ve been continuing to get out on my bike, and continuing to get out for some sunshine on my patio in the afternoons.

Work continues to be fun and interesting, modulo the usual ongoing fragility of the situation that comes with working for a startup. One day last week the fraction of the company in the greater New York City area, which is seven of us, or about a quarter, met for a one-day onsite at a co-lo space in Brooklyn called the New Lab, in the former Brooklyn Navy Yard, in which our company rents a couple desks. When I lived in Brooklyn 20 years ago, before it was cool, the area was pretty much disused, full of graffiti and stray dogs. So it’s nice to see it fixed up and home to a bunch of tech incubators and startups.

And it’s a really nice space too. The facility is a converted shipbuilding factory, with single giant room flowing thru the whole building, and various balconies and smaller spaces around the edges. The seating is mainly open, broken up into work spaces, lounge spaces, and meeting spaces set off by arrays of potted plants and trees. Among the other denizens we met is a group making make electronic musical instruments based on physically vibrating metal plates, kind of like taking a piezo-electric pickup and reversing it to become a speaker. Also an outfit making very cool looking (and wicked fast) electric motorcycles. I learned that being a sound designer for electric vehicles, since they don’t have engine noise, is a job nowadays. Nice work if you can get it I’d say, but hey, I’m a “Cloud Architect”.

It was good to meet my team face to face. This is the first time since I stared working there, since the company is fully remote and anyway there’s been a pandemic. So they went from being video talking heads on a zoom call to real people. So there was just alot social hanging out and everyone geeking out on music technology, telling stories of people they’ve met, vintage gear they own, and memorable gigs they’ve played or seen. I don’t know why I’m always surprised, but they were all much shorter than I expected.

The trip into Brooklyn and home again was about and hour each way, and there was parking in the Navy Yard. Fun once, but not something I’d want to do every day anymore.

And today I’m finally ready to submit a pull request for my JUCE/C++ Google Analytics reusable shared code module and accompanying one-off demo front-end app. Woo-hoo! That was a long row to hoe.

This week I took a drive the opposite way, up into Connecticut. I found a new saxophone repair guy, recommended by the alto player in my Wednesday group (unfortunately my old sax repair guy died during the pandemic). He’s about an hour’s drive in the opposite direction from Brooklyn. More on that next post.

Firecracker on the Fourth of July

Someone once told me the 4th of July is the best holiday because there are no expectations. If you want to spend it with family, you can. If you want to spend it with friends, you can. If you want go off on vacation, you can. If you want to just do your own thing you can. We often go upstate around the 4th but this year we stayed close to home, and it was a mellow family party vibe. Jeannie’s brother and his family came to town, so we when out Long Island for a party on Saturday and her sister’s house, and next day everyone came up here for a barbecue. Oh, and it was my father-in-law’s 80th birthday. Woo-hoo!

I decided to make a playlist of 80 favorite songs from the 80s for the party. The idea originated a few weeks ago with a conversation I had with Ken, the bass player in my jazz group, in which I put forth the proposition that Purple Rain was one of the all-time great albums of the 80’s, and he said he was never particularly into Prince. Josh, the piano player chimed in saying saw Prince on the Purple Rain tour, and it was one of the best shows he ever saw, and I related that I saw Prince a decade and a half later, and it was one of the best shows I ever saw. Santana even sat in.

One reason I really dug Prince’s early stuff was his approach to drum machines and synthesizers. I was really fascinated with synthesizers back then, and in the early 80’s suddenly you didn’t have to play like Keith Emerson to do something the would work in a band and sound cool.

Anyway, this led me to try and make a list of the 80 best albums of the 80s. I got off to a good start but once I got past 40 or 50 there was a long tail of maybes, and it started to feel kinda arbitrary. I went so far as google Rolling Stone magazine’s list of top 80’s, and let’s just say it’s … idiosyncratic.

To me a great album has to have more than a few great songs. It has to have two great sides that flow from one song to the next without a clunker or weak spot in the mood and story that record is telling. So for example Ghost in the Machine is clearer a better record than Synchronicity. Even though Synchronicity had some great songs, it also had a few that you kinds wanna skip on repeated listening. Whereas GITM is a great journey from start to finish. Plus it has a great album cover.

Maybe 80 songs would be easier. There were lots of great songs on the radio, and some came from great albums, some not, but it wouldn’t matter.

The songs are a mix of genres including classic rock, prog rock, heavy metal, synth pop, jazz, Canadian content, early MTV, and others. I didn’t put much planning into it, but I made a rule not to repeat the same artist, and I put the songs in chronological order. There was also a bias toward summertime party vibe. The list contains some are one-hit wonders, some huge smash hits, some deep tracks that have stuck with me over the years. Many I’ve learned to play and sing of the years, and have done in bands. All made an impression on me of kind or another at the time.

As you can see, things kinda started as a continuation of the 70’s, then seemed to to really heat up and get creative in ’81-’84, and maybe jumped the shark a little around ’85. After that the center moved over toward jazz, and when it swung back in the late 80’s the sound was pretty different. Or maybe my tastes just changed. I was only 11 years old when the 80’s began.

There’s a few songs I wanted to add there were not on spottily such as Electric Avenue by Eddy Grant, High Speed on Ice by Talas, and Got a Match? by Chick Corea Elecktric Band. Ah well. Of course there’s lots of other great songs I left out; once you start you realize 80 is not that many for a whole decade. If I were to put more time into this, I’d probably drop a few and add a few others. So if you don’t agree, go ahead and make your own list. Anyway with out further ado, here’s my playlist of …

80 Favorite Songs from the 80s

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7DQq0mGUzBfCjmPXSDcHEB?si=ac7ea145a2a9484d

1. Gaucho – Steely Dan (1980)
2. (Just Like) Starting Over – John Lennon
3. It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me – Billy Joel
4. Turn It On Again – Genesis
5. Back in Black – AC/DC
6. Battle Scar – Max Webster
7. Mr. Crowley – Ozzy Osbourne
8. The Electric Co. – U2

9. Once in a Lifetime – Talking Heads (1981)
10. Three Views of a Secret – Jaco Pastorius
11. Stone In Love – Journey
12. The Voice – The Moody Blues
13. Burnin’ for You – Blue Öyster Cult
14. Fight the Good Fight – Triumph
15. On the Loose – Saga
16. I Can’t Go for That – Hall and Oates
17. Lunatic Fringe – Red Ryder
18. Elephant Talk – King Crimson
19. Waiting on a Friend – The Rolling Stones

20. Run to The Hills – Iron Maiden (1982)
21. Rio – Duran Duran
22. Steppin’ Out – Joe Jackson
23. Take It Away – Paul McCartney
24. Dance Hall Days – Huang Chung
25. Africa – Toto
26. Rock The Casbah – The Clash
27. Somebody’s Baby – Jackson Browne
28. Sirius / Eye in the Sky – Alan Parsons Project
29. Subdivisions – Rush
30. She Blinded Me With Science – Thomas Dolby
31. Always Something There to Remind Me – Naked Eyes
32. Sole Survivor – Asia
33. Eminence Front – The Who

34. Billy Jean – Micheal Jackson (1983)
35. Photograph – Def Leppard
36. Gimme All Your Lovin’ – ZZ Top
37. Let’s Dance – David Bowie
38. Pride and Joy – Stevie Ray Vaughan
39. In a Big Country – Big Country
40. Other Arms – Robert Plant
41. One Thing Leads to Another – The Fixx
42. Synchronicity I – The Police
43. Road Games – Allan Holdsworth
44. Rockit – Herbie Hancock
45. Relax – Frankie Goes to Hollywood
46. City of Love – Yes

47. Hot for Teacher – Van Halen (1984)
48. I Want a New Drug – Huey Lewis & the News
49. New Girl Now – Honeymoon Suite
50. I Would Die 4 U – Prince
51. The Last In Line – DIO
52. Magic – The Cars
53. She Bop – Cyndi Lauper
54. One Night in Bangkok – Murray Head
55. Take On Me – A-ha
56. Perfect Strangers – Deep Purple
57. Boys of Summer – Don Henley
58. Just a Gigolo / I Ain’t Got Nobody – David Lee Roth

59. We Are the World (1985)
60. Walk of Life – Dire Straits
61. Guerilla Soldier – Gowen
62. Something About You – Level 42
63. Dream of the Blue Turtles – Sting
64. Freeway of Love – Aretha Franklin
65. Miami Vice – Jan Hammer
66. Human Nature – Miles Davis

67. Big Time – Peter Gabriel (1986)
68. Song X – Ornette Coleman
69. Trains – Steps Ahead
70. Billy’s Saloon – Gamalon
71. Master of Puppets – Metallica

72. Never Gonna Give You Up – Rick Astley (1987)
73. My Heart Declares a Holiday – Bill Bruford’s Earthworks
74. Minuano (Six Eight) – Pat Metheny

75. When We Was Fab – George Harrison (1988)
76. In the New Age – King’s X
77. Bonin’ in the Boneyard – Fishbone

78. Fight the Power – Public Enemy (1989)
79. Subway to Venus – Red Hot Chili Peppers
80. Wicked Game – Chris Isaak

81. Epic – Faith No More (1990, bonus track)

Freeze This Moment a Little Bit Longer

A week ago was Michelle’s high school graduation. Of course we’re very proud parents, but at the same time it’s the end of an era for raising kids.

The ceremony was outdoors, and it was a very hot day. Lizzy came into town for the weekend to help celebrate, even though we only had two tickets to the event so she stayed home. We all went out to dinner afterwards, at a fancy place in Hastings on the river. While we were waiting for our table, we enjoyed drinks at the adjacent waterfront park, and sat for a spell on the Michael Brecker memorial bench. I had to explain to Lizzy who Michael Brecker was. The food was very yummy, plus some fancy drinks, and then game night once we were back home. Michelle started her new job the very next day. Ah, gainful employment.

She got a new laptop computer as a graduation present from her grandfather to use in college. It’s a Windows PC. She wanted that for gamins, and because she’s going to engineering school. Jeannie is staunchly a Macintosh person, and I haven’t used Windows as my main OS in years, so she’s kind on her own.

Last Sunday Lizzy and went to the beach in Long Island. It worked well cuz Jeannie and Michelle aren’t big beach people. We talked pretty much the whole time. I haven’t really had big one on on conversation with her in a couple years, and her life has changed alot, so it’s interesting to hear her perspective on things.

We’ve lived in our house for almost twenty years, and it’s gotten to the point where all our closets and storage spaces are full of old stuff, alot of it obsolete or no longer of any use to us, and we literally have run out of space to put new things away. So this summer we’ve started a project to get rid of our old useless stuff. We’ve done this periodically, but not since before the pandemic. It’s sort of a big undertaking, cuz everything must be evaluated as to whether it’s worth keeping or not, and then if it’s trash or something we can donate. Once you start opening doors, drawers and bookshelves, there’s alot of places to look. Lizzy helped out by going thru her old room, which has become Jeannie’s office, and getting rid of some clothes, books, cosmetics and other things. She discovered all kinds of artifacts from her childhood along the way.

This last weekend we finally got the Mustang out on the road again, and did alot of yardwork, pretty so we’re pretty much caught up for the time being. The last few weekends there was alot of trimming, weeding and edging, but it was also hard to find the time because we’ve been traveling and having graduations, and then the weather has been either rainy or super hot alot of the time. At last a temperate weekend.

Saturday night we made a fire in our backyard fire pit and listened to music from a playlist Jeannie made. Very enjoyable.

Signed Sealed Delivered

Things have calmed down and gotten back to normal around here. The weather has been beautiful, and I’ve been watering the new grass every day. Then the weekend turned unusually hot and we had to put in our air conditioners several weeks earlier than usual. Today it got cold again. Go figure.

In all the excitement of the last week I forgot to mention that I’ve been busy doing origami stuff. First off, the Pacific Coast Origami Convention (PCOC) is in San Francisco this year, coming up in the fall. Jeannie and I are planning on going. It’ll be the first in-person origami convention, and the first time we’ve travelled outside of New York State in almost two years. They put out a call for models with a California theme for the convention book, and the deadline was last week. I contributed a California Sea Lion, after the famous denizens of Pier 39. It was a new original model, using the base for my Walrus and Elephant Seal. I finished the diagrams last Monday, the day we got back home. Now I’m thinking of doing a seal with a ball on its nose. I also had some ideas for California Seabirds, the Canvasback, Greater Scaup, and Bufflehead. All have a similar duck-like shape but with interesting and different color-change patterns. I ran out of time to draw up diagrams, but hopefully I’ll be able to exhibit them at the convention.

Meanwhile the OUSA Annual convention is coming up in just about a month. This is an online convention, and I’ve been on the convention committee by virtue of my handling the class schedule. I finally got to use the scheduling software I wrote last winter. I’m happy to say it worked flawlessly, although going through the process for real made me think of a few enhancements I’d like to add to make the workflow faster and smoother. The schedule is complicated compared to other years because each class is a zoom session and requires OUSA people to manage the tech and play host, in addition to the teacher. Also they’re having an empty session after every class to allow for the possibility that it runs over time. So about 100 people signed up to teach about 160 classes. I originally thought I could schedule 125 to 140 or so, so we ranked the classes, giving preference to original, unpublished models, plus some rarer categories like simple, supercomplex and presentation/lectures, as well as aiming to have every teacher teach one model. Then I got the news that a few tech and moderator volunteers dropped out, so there will be fewer classrooms that originally anticipated, and we’ll be lucky to get 120 classes in. Unfortunately, most teachers who signed up to teach multiple models won’t be able to. So I presented a first pass of the schedule to the committee, and explained the constraints. Now everyone has an opinion, and they want to schedule more meetings to discuss it. Ah, committees.

Ev’ry New Beginning Comes From Some Other Beginning’s End

I feel like things have been coming back to life, slowly but inevitably increasing. Things are new and hopeful on many levels. A few weeks ago I got my second shot of vaccine, and have slow been starting to go out and do things. We went out to dinner one night to celebrate Michelle’s birthday. Jeannie’s parents dropped by for a visit one afternoon.

I got a haircut, the first in over a year. Having long hair again was kinda fun, but it was time to move on. I went out and bought some clothes – a sports coat, slacks and a couple neckties. I haven’t had an occasion to get dressed up in a long time. It’s funny, a year and a half ago, even before the pandemic, when I started working from home full time, one of the first things I did was to go thru my closet and get rid of some old clothes. Now it feels like it’s come full circle. Soon it’ll be time to tune my piano, get an eye-exam, and all the other things made difficult to impossible by the pandemic.

Michelle’s last day of high school was today, which means I’m done picking her up after school (before the pandemic she took the train). She’s got a job lined up for the summer, which should be fun and exciting. Meanwhile, my workdays will be a little easier and more flexible. And safer.

I couple weeks ago I was on my home from picking up Michelle, sitting at a traffic light, when I was hit from behind by another car. It was a pretty strong jolt, but my car was basically unharmed; the only damage was the tip of the chrome cuff around the tailpipe was dinged. His car, a Mini, was a wreck. Bumper, hood, radiator, the whole front end smashed. It looks like he was driving without a tier, just a bar wheel. Maybe the tire came loose from the wheel and that’s why he couldn’t stop. He told me he was driving with a flat because Minis have no spare tire, and was on his way to the garage to have it fixed.

I took my car to the shop for inspection, and while they were at it I asked them to look and see if there was any serious damage underneath, but all was good. Then an oil change, which they didn’t notice I needed when they did the inspection. So I brought the car back for that. While I was at it I told them to rotate the tires. Then it turned out the needed new brakes too, which somehow they also failed to notice when they did the inspection. But then it takes a few days to order the parts. So three different days the car was in the shop. Yeesh! We had a big road trip coming up, so I had to get this all done ASAP.

Lots more happening. I’ll tell you all about it in the next post.

New Song: Mo’bility

My new song Mo’bility is ready. You can listen at:

https://zingman.com/music/mp3/bziv/Mobility29.mp3


This sure changed alot since I wrote it. It was originally more of a Hank Mobley vibe. As mentioned before, now it’s sort of a hallowe’en cartoon-jazz jump stride swing thing, featuring the Hungarian minor mode and 7/8 meter. The arrangement is for soprano and tenor saxes, with some midi trumpet and vibraphone rounding out the melody instruments line. The rhythm section consists of piano, bass and drums, with bass being more-or-less double tracked fender electric bass and midi synth bass. Additionally there’s some mellotron strings in there for extra sweetness/spookiness. Finally, I wanted a gong sound but didn’t have a good sample, so I recorded hitting the cymbals of my drum kit with mallets and letting them ring. It turned out to sound great, and perfect for the part. Enjoy!

Also updated mixes of some previous songs.
https://zingman.com/music/mp3/bziv/HeavyWater37b.mp3
https://zingman.com/music/mp3/bziv/AutumnEyes32.mp3

Hippity Hoppity

Spring continues. The days are getting longer faster, and the nice weather appears more often than not. More and more people I know have gotten the vaccine and getting hopeful about life returning to normal soon.

We didn’t have much of a spring break this year, but it was enjoyable. Busy with work and stuff. Jeannie and I both took a long weekend off from work, and Lizzy came home for the weekend. Hard to believe she’s graduating college in just a month or so. We had family game night Friday night, which was lots of fun. On Sunday we went down to Queens to visit Jeannie’s parents, and Lou and my neblings came over too. It was good to see everyone in person, even if it was pretty low key.

We normally try to go to a museum or day trip this time of year. We haven’t picked a place yet, but we’re looking at next weekend. Most places are running at limited capacity and you have to get tickets in advance. Michelle has asked that we go Washington D.C, this summer to visit a few more museums. That might happen. We might even get back to Ohio for the Centerfold origami convention, and swing my the National Air Force Museum while we’re out that way.

I finished diagramming my Platypus model, called Gladys the Platypus, for the Origami USA 2021 Convention Collection. This is my first new diagram in some time, and hopefully I’ll get back into the groove with that. I hadn’t been that motivated to do much origami during the pandemic, cuz all the conventions were cancelled, and I don’t enjoy the online ones that much. But I’ve been involved in planning and setting up the 2021 OUSA, that includes a virtual gallery, and there may even be some live, in-person conventions later this year. So I’m starting to get back into folding again.

Project dirt continues. I’m up to thirty wheelbarrows of dirt, and have gotten maybe two-thirds of the way around the yard. I filled in one really big low spot on the north side of my house that took four loads by itself. It’s good to spend some time outside, and it’ll be really nice when it’s finished. I made a pretty good dent in my neighbor’s dirt pile, but he has a whole swimming pool’s worth, so there’ll be plenty left.

Smarch Smadness

We’re coming up on a year under the pandemic. Last year on February 28 was my last live gig with a band. At least the first hopeful stirrings of spring are afoot. A week ago I was a-shoveling snow, and it seemed endless. Then we had a few days of warm weather and rain, and vast quantities melted away. Now only the rump ends of the biggest snow piles remain. Only downside is we didn’t go skiing this weekend as planned. Ah well, it’s supposed to turn cold and snow tonight. In fact it’s storming out right now. Hopefully we’ll get back on the slopes one more time next weekend.

I’ve been working on my Computer Jazz record this whole winter. I’ve been mainly focused on Lift Off, but it’s taking a long time because it’s a difficult song and I’m trying to capture some subtlety in the arrangement. I got the organ part done, including the solo, and made some changes to the piano part to make them fit together better. Also been working on the drum solo and the overall form. Even laid down a first take of the sax part, which was not too bad. But it was starting to feel like hard work. So I took a break from that to focus on Mo’bility instead.

I wrote Mo’bility for my last jazz group and it always went over really well live, with it’s danceable gypsy-jump vibe. For the studio it was shaping up okay, but didn’t really have the tone and character I wanted. It needed a bit of Raymond Scott cartoon vibe. The other night at rehearsal we working on a different original of mine, and somehow the the feel shifted to 3/4 time. It was pretty interesting, and got me thinking about different ideas for the meter and groove for Mo’bility. I changed it to 7/8, and it was just the thing the song needed. The arrangement fell together pretty quickly, and is very satisfying, just a little unbalanced. I quickly got up to the point where it was time to record the live instruments, soprano and tenor sax, and bass guitar. Unfortunately it’s much harder to solo on and groove on now, so I have to practice it a bit. Still this song should be in the can pretty soon.

As I’ve mentioned, it’s been a long pandemic. We’ve been watching alot of movies on the weekends, and seem to have fallen into a zone that includes a good amount action-adventure-scifi-fantasy. In addition to a number of family all-time favorites, there are lots of great movies that Michelle has never seen and I haven’t seen in along time, and lots of great movies out there that I’ve never seen. So we’ve started making lists of movies we want to watch.

I tried to make a list of my 100 favorite movies. It ended up more like 70 or 80 all-time favorites plus an equal number that might or might not make the cut. Still there are some definite trends. The oldest movie is from 1940 (Fantasia) and the newest from 2017 (Thor Ragnorok). By decade so far there’s 8 from the 1960s, 12 from the ’70s, 30 from the ’80s, 8 from the 90’s, 21 from the ’00s and 5 from the ’10s. The most movies in any single year is 5, for 2003 (The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, Kill Bill Vol. 1, Big Fish, Underworld). Favorite directors (appearing more than twice) include Steven Spielberg, Quentin Tarantino, Peter Jackson, Terry Gilliam, Chris Nolan, James Cameron, George Lucas, Francis Ford Coppola, and Robert Zemeckis. For directors I counted multiple movies in the same franchise if I like them (e.g. all the LotR movies but none of the Hobbit ones). For actors I didn’t count them again if they reprised the same role in a sequel, even if both movies are favorites. Favorite actors (in 3 or more movies) predictably include guys like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Harrison Ford, and Samuel L. Jackson. Perhaps more surprisingly it also includes Billy Crudup (Princess Mononoke, Almost Famous, Big Fish, Watchmen), Keith David (The Thing, They Live, Princess Mononoke), Frank Oz (Star Wars, The Muppet Movie, The Blues Brothers), and Ian Holm (Alien, Brazil, Lord of the Rings).

Our newest hobby these days it to re-imagine a favorite movie as done by the Muppets, and try and and fill out the cast. Go ahead and try it. it’s lots of fun! Like I said it’s been long pandemic.