Eric Cadesky and I represented Glass Orchestra for The Weird Instruments show on CBC radio’s GO. It was a lot of fun and got to meet a number of interesting people who come to music from different directions and intentions, like a visual artist, Iner Souster, who transforms found objects into musical instruments. Here’s a link to part two of the show: streaming radio. The Glass Orchestra segment occurs around 37:00 and the jam occurs at 48:00.
In front of a studio audience at the end of the jam:
I was recently checking out Why We Make Miztakes in Book City (Toronto/by the Carrot Common). I like the feel of it – the writing style, the insights, and what seems to be the idea for the book. I want to read it. But after I finish Margaret Atwood’s Payback, which I started a while ago and put down to finish Jhumpa Lahiri’s Namesake.
(I liked Mira Nair’s movie better, which is rarely the case with books turned into films, usually books are more effective. Except for The Shining where the book and movie are both strong, or Psycho – not the Van Sandt version, whose idea I loved but the execution was disappointing – where the movie is much more visceral and voyeuristic.)
But then a student lent me The 4-Hour Workweek – written by an ambitious American bulldog of an entrepreneur with the zeal of Vince Offer (the ShamWow guy) – which effectively explains how to manage your time. Speaking of which, I should get to work on my other website, 6stringMosaic.com, so I’ll conclude in saying that I’m currently reading Joseph Boyden’s Three Day Road, the tale of a one-legged Cree soldier, hooked on a dwindling supply of morphine, who struggles with the horrific memories that flood his mind.
This song grew out of a theme created by Alex North for the 1955 prison movie, Unchained. The Liberace version gives you a sense of the tune without vocals, flamboyant and melodramatic. In almost all versions of the song I’ve heard (search on youtube alone), the essence of Hy Zaret’s lyrics of loss and longing, with the promise that love will prevail and unite the separated lovers, is nearly lost with crass sentimentality in the musical accompaniment.
Though I’ve never been a huge Elvis fan I like his version of Unchained Melody the most, especially the final growl. There’s a visceral resonance in his delivery that reflects, perhaps, the distance he was feeling between himself and his beloved fans.
I recently made a chart of this soulful Willie Nelson tune, made classic by Patsy Cline. I’m preparing to open a new website called 6stringMosaic.com in mid-August, where you’ll find a number of free charts, like this one, and video guitar lessons.
My goodness gracious. What an upset for Boston. Philadelphia lost the first three games of the best of seven series but came back to take the Bruins down winning four straight. The final game reflected the series. Boston was ahead 3 – 0 but lost the game 4 – 3. In the final minutes of the third period you could almost see fate congealing over the Boston team. I was hoping for a Bruins win, so I could watch my two favorite teams battle it out for the Eastern Conference. But, alas, it was not meant to be.
I don’t have a real connection to Boston these days. Haven’t followed them since Bobby Orr left the team. So, I wasn’t disheartened by tonight’s game.
Now, Montreal plays the Flyers. I think it will be a great series.
What a series. Hockey doesn’t get any better than the seventh game of the Eastern Conference semi-finals between Montreal and Pittsburg. My god. Fantastic. So Canada has a presence in the finals, Montreal plays Boston or Philadelphia for Eastern Conference. I’m ecstatic.
Dina Jandela is a composition by Mang Koko, a master of the kacapi – a 20 string zither from Indonesia. I made a solo kacapi arrangement for an Evergreen Club recording called Sunda Songs, which was released by Naxos (2003). I also added a coda to the arrangement. It’s a little tune that I overdubbed and includes Blair Mackay on percussion.
Here is the arrangement I wrote and performed on kacapi, with Blair Mackay on percussion. It is used unedited for the promotional video of a gamelan extravaganza going on in Vancouver, put on by friends and colleagues.
Here is a beautiful gamelan version of the original tune.
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Subsequently, I wrote French lyrics to the song and have performed it many times with Evergreen Club when we do the Sunda Songs show that features Jennifer Moore, Suba Sankaaran, and Maryem Tollar. Evergreen Club is working toward a release of the Sunda Songs project in the next year.
I never finished Life of Pi. It wasn’t that I disliked it, though I didn’t connect with the protagonist. I was working on P minor blue at the time and found it distracting – but I was curious about the name Pi. Anyway, I put it away until I read an article in MacLeans magazine – the night K and I spent at the Old Mill, Martel’s new book was out. The review was confusing so I went online and bought Beatrice and Virgil as an e-book and began reading it.
I finished it over the course of a week, in between rehearsals and any free moment I could find. It’s clever and engaging. I love the fictional characters of Beatrice and Virgil and the way in which they cope with the murderous madness around them. They contrast well with the “real” characters of the story, a pair of writers both named Henry. The protagonist Henry, a successful novelist, is bland and ordinary, but intelligent and sometimes almost humorous. The antagonist Henry, a taxidermist, is gruff, laconic, and slightly more appealing than that repulsive guy I couldn’t stand in a Confederacy of Dunces.
Martel is a masterful writer. He draws you into a world of animal consciousness through the soul of a killer seeking forgiveness.
