January 30, 2009
January 28, 2009
25 Things
Here's yet another one of those dang "25 things about me" notes that you see posted on Facebook all the time.
1. As a teenager I was literally knocked off my feet when I first heard/felt John Coltrane's music
2. I love to ride my bicycles and train hard, but never really wanted to race
3. I have played guitar professionally for over 35 years, mainly jazz
4. The first time I played with Peter Noone (Herman's Hermits) at the Atlanta Stadium I was shocked and startled when 15,000 fans cheered loudly for the intro chords to "Mrs. Brown, You've Got a Lovely Daughter"
5. I enjoy painting and drawing
6. I survived nearly 25 years of tobacco and other substance abuse... but never liked to drink
7. Our dogs are named Django and Miles
8. Listening to Thelonius Monk's music makes me laugh with delight
9. I used to SysOp a BBS for phreakers in the early 80's
10. I have laid in the sarcophagus of the King's Chamber in the Great Pyramid of Giza
11. I played "The Star Spangled Banner" for the multinational forces in the Sinai desert
12. Mrs. Riddle was my kindergarten teacher
13. I enjoy building and flying kites
14. Some mornings I like to workout with fitness shows on TV
15. I was kidnapped by drug dealers in May 1972 but was released about a week later
16. My best friend from childhood is now a spiritual and psychedelic artist, Alex Grey (Velzy)
17. A secret military base in the Black Forest, Germany is where I first met a guy who coincidentally was our next door neighbor back home in Georgia
18. I miss my babies, they grow up so fast
19. My mother taught me how to drive with a stick shift
20. Coffee is my current vice
21. Colors are frequencies, just like musical notes... I don't have any favorites
22. I enjoy hiking and camping
23. I have kept a training and food diary every day for nearly 20 years
24. In 1973 I was called to report for induction into the military, I passed the physical and written exams but just before my orders came through the draft was ended
25. I have played "Auld Lang Syne" at midnight for at least 35 New Years Eve events
January 26, 2009
Discovering Jazz in 1971
When my family moved to Chamblee GA about '69 or '70 I was 16 years old and in the 11th grade in high school. This was around this time I was really feeling compelled to learn to play guitar and even beginning to get interested in jazz.
West Chester PA 1969. At a jam session playing a bass.
Chamblee GA 1973 "Unit Structure" Dan, Keith Runfola and Chuck Harvey
Here is a collection of interesting photos from a person who was working for the local underground newspaper in those days, called the "Great Speckled Bird" a.k.a. 'the Bird'. It's mostly the Atlanta hippie scene in those days ncluding some images of the Strip (10th & Peachtree streets) but also has many band photos from Peidmont Park, the Pop Festival, The Sports Arena, Lake Spivey (Check out the young ZZ-Top opening for Ike and Tina Turner photo) and local Atlanta bands Radar, Hydra, Hampton Grease Band and Chakra. There is even a photo of Joe Roman at the 12th Gate.
Twelfth gate owner, Robin, and manager, Joe, changed my life when they brought top NY jazz artists there in '71. It was there that I had close encounters with Elvin Jones, McCoy Tyner, Bill Evans, Pharaoh Sanders, Gary Bartz, Weather Report (Wayne Shorter, Zawinul, Miroslav, Airto and Alphonse Mouzon) and Oregon w/Ralph Towner. Other notable jazz performances from the early 70's included Chick Corea (RTF w/Bill Conners), Larry Coryell (w/Randy Brecker), Roland Kirk, Pat Martino, Modern Jazz Quartet, Joe Pass, Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, Ray Brown, Oscar Peterson and more.
January 21, 2009
Replacing W with O
It came as a surprise because I did not think that this country was grown-up enough for the majority to elect a minority. It is a sore subject with many of my friends that are older than me while it seems the younger ones are mostly ecstatic.
Who knows what the future will bring, but for now I am glad to be able to understand our president when he speaks, happy to see the "good old boy" network take a back seat, no longer hear about "neu-cu-lar" power and be rid of the insufferable and embarrassing Texan and his oil buds from the White House.
January 20, 2009
Violinist in the Metro
I had heard about this story but only recently found the article with video clips and complete audio.
The Washington Post won a Pulitzer Prize for staging/writing this event in January, 2007. They had hidden cameras and a team of reporters to chase down and interview the people who stopped to listen. The full audio and time-lapse video is also embedded in the article Pearls Before Breakfast. They thought they would have crowd-control problems once he was found out – as he was playing his most challenging, energetic repertoire. For someone accustomed to multiple standing ovations – after finishing each piece, he was met with thunderous silence and indifference.
I have experienced this very phenomenon several times. A couple of years ago my friend, Sam Skelton, joined me at Violette Restaurant to play some tunes. Sam is easily the finest woodwind player I have ever known and is a professor at several colleges, a musical director of several esteemed bands, first-call session player, featured soloist for all the top shows/groups and has even recorded at Abbey Road Studios as a featured soloist for the London Philharmonic Orchestra. As we performed some very appropriate Gershwin, Ellington and Cole Porter tunes I was surprised that no one in the restaurant applauded or even recognized the quality of musicianship they were hearing. Then to my absolute horror, a guy came up to me and asked if the saxophone would stop playing because they were sitting too close and having difficulty having their conversation.
On several other occasions my friend, Russell Malone, has made surprise appearances at the same location and proceeded to perform for an hour or more without anyone even noticing. Personally, I find it shocking.
January 19, 2009
The Need to Serve
Our little Australian Shepherd/Cattle dog mix, Miles, is seriously compelled to serve and really needs a job. I'm sure that he would be much happier on a farm or ranch working non-stop but he satisfies himself with chasing all the critters that wander into our yard and sometimes herds the two older dogs around.
Miles looks forward to retrieving the local newspaper from the end of the driveway every morning but there is no paper on Mondays. This morning I forgot about that and we went out the front door to do our routine. The neighbors across the street have been away for a few days so when Miles realized there was no paper in our driveway he quickly retrieved one of the papers from the neighbor's yard. Whatever it takes, mission accomplished, job done!
January 15, 2009
MTB @ Yargo
It was freezing and windy so we opted out of the road ride this morning. Matt and I blew the dust off the old mountain bikes and rode the trails at Fort Yargo Park. Two full outer loops counter-clockwise, one flat tire and 2+ hours of good exercise.
Got a few pics and a video clip.
January 12, 2009
Culture in Society
Musician/record producer Quincy Jones suggested that the US should have a Secretary Of The Arts. Jones pointed out that countries in Europe and elsewhere have ministers of culture.
There is even an online petition supporting Q's idea.
There should be no need to explain the importance of the arts and culture in our lives, and if you don't get it, I probably can't help.
If the government cuts arts funding, as has happened this year with promises of even greater funding cuts next year, we will in fact harm our society and help to raise a generation of TV and online addicts lacking the creativity to compete on an international level.
Which reminds me of a recent article I read titled iPhones Have Consequences. It is not really about iPhones, but about digital "culture," or lack thereof. Read it all the way through, or else you will be proving the very point of the article.
January 11, 2009
Laptop Impressions
The Dell Studio 15 laptop arrived about 5 days ago and was a snap to get it up and running. Unfortunately, Dell had it loaded with lots of useless bloat-ware, but after a little uninstalling it was cleaned up, looking lean and running fast. I did keep the "Dell Dock" which was created by Stardock and adds a little Mac OS X feel to the desktop. Also kept the "Dell Video Chat" by SightSpeed and proceeded to have a fun video chat with Rachel who is in Baton Rouge, LA with her new Dell Studio 15 laptop.
The built-in speakers are kind of weak sounding but the ear-buds sound cool. I didn't expect much from the fingerprint reader but ironically it has become one of my favorite features on this box. Logging into my profile and even my web-based email and other ID/password protected accounts is just a swipe of the finger - hope I don't eventually forget the passwords, though.
So far my impression of Vista is mostly good, at least it works well on this machine, but we did discover that sync-ing a Palm device is difficult to impossible because Palm is lagging behind with updates for 64-bit PC's. I suspect there are probably more issues ahead, especially running older apps on this OS.
January 01, 2009
Counting
I'm not sure when it started for me however I have noticed that all cyclists like to count things; pounds, kilograms, seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, miles, watts, heart rate, intervals, placings, laps, RPM's and on and on. I started writing some of it down in daily logs about 19 years ago and continue to this day. It might seem like a waste of time but in fact it keeps me from wasting time by organizing, planning, documenting, reviewing and being accountable for every day. I have also written down several years of how much time was spent with the guitar each day, but discontinued that about 8 years ago.
As the years have passed the 'big picture' has become a little clearer. I remember when 20 years sounded like a long time to me, that's about 7,304 days. If you had one dollar for every day you lived you might have enough to buy a decent used car.
You may think 50 years sounds like a lot but it is only about 18,262 days. If you sleep eight hours a day by the end of just one year that is equal to 121 days gone which leaves about 12,202 days in 50 years. Then if you subtract the 18 childhood years and just count the 'waking' days in a 50-year-old adult lifetime you are looking at about 5,628 days total.
If you look at it that way it sure seems like a short time we have on this planet. Probably ought to not wish away a moment of time and try to do something worthwhile every single day.