Skip to main content

Day Ninety Eight (Year Three)

Taught today.  Started working on Christmas carols with one of my students.  They have been asked (by my lovely wife) to perform for the annual youth Christmas Play, which happens this year on the 12th of December.  We're going to be learning two songs, I believe, "Jingle Bells," and "Go Tell It On The Mountain."  We're starting with "Jingle Bells."  The notes are all perfectly in her wheelhouse.  It's all things we've covered before.  And yet, there was trouble focusing today.  It happens, I know, but I know she's quick enough to pick this up faster than she seemed to today.  And I still can't get her to use more than a couple of fingers to find notes.

Anyway, enough of that for now.  I got home tonight to find that S. had added a few music books to my shelf of rock & roll awesomeness.  Two books on R.E.M., and Juliana Hatfield's biography now have a spot on that shelf, and I've got to say... I want to read them all right now.  The R.E.M. books I'll get to eventually, but the Hatfiled bio is the one that has me the most curious at present.  Somehow this surprises me.  I'll get there.  I'm reading, or trying to read, too much right now to start new stuff anyway.

Made it all the way through the new Marcy Playground record today.  Really impressed with the whole thing.  It's 19 tracks in total, and even with 3 covers, there's still enough fresh music there to make the whole thing a compelling listen.  Usually anything over 12 and an artist can start to lose focus.

There's that word again, focus.  I think I'm going to go try and dial in my own.  See if I can't get some work done on either the Grohl Challenge or the 30 hour workout. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day Three

Short one today. I've got a bunch of the DVDs that Guitar World has put out. Waded through those to see what I had, worked off of the lead guitar one. Just basic scales , but still a light place to begin. It was nice to just start loosening up my fingers again. Off from work tomorrow, so hopefully I'll get a lot of playing done. Said I'd mention the other project I'm hoping to finish this year. Back when I was living in WI, I started a hard rock band with a friend of mine. She was heavily influenced by Evanescence, and so, with her as vocalist, we started writing songs. We had written and demoed almost a full album's worth of music by the time I moved to IA, and had even purchased a P.A. in preparation for eventual gigs. We never did find a permanent drummer or bassist, so our demos sound very rough (and not nearly loud enough). I'd like to finish those songs, and make an EP of the 4 or 5 strongest, just as a way to put a cap on that project. More tom...
Post a Comment
Read more

Day Two Hundred Sixty Six (Year Six)

One of the biggest advantages of not getting all that much done this week is that it clues me in to what I need/want to take on vacation with me.  It's basically everything that went along with me when we left to go and dog sit on Monday night.  Granted, there are a few extra things I need to pack (the notebooks with the first two recording projects in them, for example), but that shouldn't be too hard to fit in. Most of the day tomorrow is full already, but there might be a bit of time in the evening (like there was today) to get into the studio.  Then, possibly a few hours on Sunday morning before we hit the road around noon. My shoulders have started to loosen up a bit from all of the insanity the last few weeks.  I'm ready to finally have an extended chance to focus on music next week.
Post a Comment
Read more

Day One Hundred Forty Two

So, I haven't been sleeping much lately, and I've been staying up late. listening to music, doing a bit of playing, and watching old episodes of Behind The Music on the internet. It's funny, you know, because I never met the rest of my "band," I've become the critic. It's all right, don't get me wrong, but for a decade now I've always hoped that I'd find a way to release something. It'll happen, I know it will, but it's continually happened slower than I expected it to. I've gotten close to getting something released, as I've documented before here before, but with the winter coming and the cold closing in, I'm facing another chance to make something musical of the winter. I'm going to start by finishing up the old things that have gotten pushed to the sides in the last few months. With the buildup of everything since the summer, it should be easier. Even if all I do is spend the winter writing lyrics, trying to g...
Post a Comment
Read more