nothing is happening.

Sure, that will always be a massive overstatement if you apply it literally.

Slow day at work today. In fact, you could say that it's so slow that it's not moving at all.

I use to wonder, jokingly, if traffic could be so bad that cars actually start going backwards.

But other than work, there have been a couple of interesting things that have transpired, most namely:

the recording from the April 14th concert.

So, let's play a little number game:

The concert was on April 14. This CD has 14 tracks on it, and the duration is 40:14.

So, 4-14 : 40:14. Interesting, isn't it?

Anyway, Chelsea VandeDrink, assisted by Asher Mandel [both audio students from Webster], did a wonderful job on the recording. They put a couple of mics on the piano, but the unusual thing that they did was put up some really nice microphones out in the audience. This helped to create such a huge sound for the recording, b/c the sound of me playing on a full-scale piano in a large church is huge as it is, but to have it captured so well is really exciting.

All in all, I'm quite pleased with my performance. The energy on this recording is really something!! It seems to draw you in, and you want to hear what happens next. It's a fun listen, and I don't know how many of those there are in the realm of solo piano.

It sounds like an ocean liner or something. It's so huge-sounding!

So, anyway, I've been listening to that and trying to sort out what to do with it. I've definitely got some ideas...

dreams

I had a bunch of strange dreams last night.

One involved me trying to escape from a mental institution.

Funny? Yes, and I really did have a dream like this.

At one point, I saw Jay Herskowitz there. Jay Herskowitz is someone I went to junior high and high school with. I was never particularly good friends with him, but he was in a class or two. Why was he in this dream? I don't know...maybe I wondered about him at some point.

Elton John popped up at some point, too. I'm not a huge fan, but I was thinking about one of his songs the other day for some reason.

I also had a dream that someone called me and was trying to reach my mother. He was a realtor and he wanted to know when she was going to sell her house. Well, she currently doesn't OWN a house. So, he thanked me, and wanted me to stay on the line so that he and his whole realty office could wish me a Merry Christmas.

It wasn't Christmas.

A lot of music, too. I dream up a TON of music that I never use [at least in a consciously aware way]. I'll be dreaming that I'm listening to something, or that someone's playing something, or SOMEthing. I'll never realize in the dream that this is stuff I'm making up IN my dream. I'm pretty sure a good chunk of the music I've dreamed up has been pretty good.

I did dream once that I was running around in the music building at Webster, late at night with all of the lights off.

At first, as I was running around, I was saying "Hello! Hello! Hello!"

Then, I was saying "Holland! Holland! Holland!"

Then, at some point, I ran out of the building through the fire escape, as the sun was starting to come up. The perspective shifted from mine to that of a camera view of the fire escape door as I ran down.

Then, in the background, came the sound of Chinese or Japanese singers singing English words but with their native accent:

"Hel-lo, Hollannnd....on Radio Station Number Five."

With, of course with their accent, sounded like this:

"Her-ro, Hollannnd...an Radio Station Numba Fye."

They sang it a few times, I believe, and then I woke up.

Somehow, in my waking moments, I pieced together what it meant:

An American aspires to live an artistic life. He graduates from college and expects to land a nice broadcasting gig with PBS or NPR.

Instead, he finds himself in Japan where he has been hired to create, produce, and host a radio show about the art music of Holland.

So, the music I was hearing was various personnel at the Japanese radio station, singing the theme song that he had created.

I derived from all of this that I was to write a piece, or a story, or SOMEthing, called "Hello Holland", involving the theme of artists making the most out of what they can accomplish, even if it is hardly in line with what they expected.

I guess that applies to everyone.

I'll let you know if I write it.

Opera and music...?

An interesting and rather unexpected last couple of weeks. I was GOING to be working on sound at Opera Theatre of St. Louis this year, but someone on prop carpentry crew was injured, and they had to move around a few people. Now, I'm on swing crew, which is basically the crew that helps out when other people need extra help. Not really a crew, so much, as two people.

There have been some other changes associated with this, such as how my partner, who has been around for a few years now and has much more experience and knowledge of Opera Theatre and how they do things, is not going to my partner after today. This gives me a little bit of trepidation, b/c there will probably be occaisions when I'll have to do something and it'll take more time than it would normally, or I'll have to go to the warehouse and get stuff and not know how to do it yet. It should be fine, though.

The biggest deal for me, really, is that it appears that I'll be on a straight 9 to 5 schedule. THIS IS THE FIRST TIME IN MY ENTIRE LIFE I WILL HAVE HAD THAT SCHEDULE!!! It's kind of funny, b/c that's the standard thing, and I've never done it!

It worries me slightly, b/c I'm such a night person that I'm guessing that 90 to 95% of the time, I'll really have to drag myself out of bed. Kind of like school from ages 6 to 17.

But if I shower the night before and have the alarm go off at 7:50, that will give me enough time to really drag around for a while before I leave. I'm finding that I really don't like to rush. I think maybe I used to, but not so much anymore, ESPECIALLY b/c this is stuff I'm being paid for, and not just some silly class.

Also, Leigh Anne Huckaby is my boss, and I really like her. She's been to both of the Xavier concerts and was gracious enough to apparently tell virtually everyone at Opera Theatre about how much she enjoyed them. I think it's good for me to work for someone who really knows about me in a real way, as opposed to working for and with people who don't and only see me fumble around and etc.

You see, I find that my life has been leading [occupationally] solely in the direction of the music. I feel ill-equipped to do anything else. Obviously, I will, but not without some hiccups and some great discomfort along the way. On the other hand, the good news is that there's always things I enjoy about the jobs I've had. This is my third year at Opera Theatre, and it's located right on the Webster campus, which is my second home. To get to work at 'home' is really nice, and to be involved with something creative is, too. I was one of the spotlight operators last December for "Edwin Drood" at the Rep, and it was really great fun!

On the music front, I seem to have decided to really look more in the direction of making a great, dynamic, fun CD. It's not that there aren't a number of great piano albums out there, but I sure can't think of a SINGLE ONE that has a strong element of listenability and fun to them. It's also not to say that I'm going to make something EXTREMELY accessible, but hopefully moreso than many. It's a good thing most of my music has a really strong rhythmic component to it, or else this would be a much more difficult task.

That's about it for now. More later!

I've been thinking about which pieces would work best on a CD, and I've also been thinking about keeping the length down to around 30 minutes or so. Why? Number one: my pieces are all basically song-length [anywhere from 2 min 15 sec to 4 min], and number two: just because you CAN put a lot of information of a CD doesn't mean you SHOULD.

So, I'd like to start this process, one that will probably take many months, because the biggest deal for me is finding the right person[s] to record this with, production-wise. Then, it's a question of finding a really great method of recording the stuff [mics, pianos, rooms, etc.], and, then, it's a matter of executing it. All of this will most likely take some time, but, who knows? Maybe I'll meet someone soon who will really connect with the music and we'll really take off with it.

I'd like to think of this more as an 'album' project and less of a 'demo' project. I don't even particularly like the idea of 'demos'. It seems to me that if I'm going to make any audio recordings, I should do everything in my power to make it as good as possible on every level, and approach it that way, rather than in a 'demo' kind of way.