this weather is as delcious as when they 'put you under' for surgery. i literally do not want to wake up, OR get out of bed of a morning; and wouldn't if i didn't have to feed the cats, or answer the phone. today: both.
1st somoeone calling a wrong number at 8AM- grrrrrrrrr. then i checked for the cats: star baby & barbra were out all night [bad kitties] & didnt come home; only domina was a good girl & stayed in. fed her and went back to bed.
then a robocall woke me- a credit card company wanting to lower my interest rate- then "press 1 to speak to a representative" which i did; when i asked 'which credit card are you?" we got disconnected. so that was my so called 'wake up call'. but it was ok, because, it was around 11AM, so i got up, made coffee, sat & listened to my latest [read further]
then one of my surrogate sisters called wanting to come help me with yard work today- and as much as i need it- had to decline, because: i have been postponing going to buy groceries, or doing anything concerning business, home & garden, or anything else around here for weeks. well, i did go to baton rouge right after coming back from europe, which did take a lot of preparation & work beforehand. i think i might have gotten a few things at sam's when i first got home [September 15th]- and friends who looked for the houses while i was gone did get some cat food and such... BUT the kitties are out of food- which warrants a sam's run.
i had planned to go yesterday, then decided to just clean up around the house, do some chores, and then go... BUT... [why why why] i decided to use my crappy plastic Net MD and electric piano to do some improvisations and record them all, just to see how the sound was. i did 10 songs, which [to me] really sound pretty good. this kind of stuff is not for everybody, but is not so far out that it makes you go "turn that off, its driving me crazy"- it's rather laid back- no, its VERY laid back.
but the influences are many- from cage to messiaen to takemitsu, satie to debussy, sun ra to monk, w/a little Fess or Nina thrown in here and there. using the electric piano was/is of course NOT my preference; but it was here. it's my local live gig piano, which i bought because it weighs 35 pounds! BUT...it does have a good piano sound... but it is not acoustic! which is a whole different thing; but it is what it is and it worked fine for this 'session'- despite the lack of subtlety one gets with a REAL piano- the pedal, the sustain, the dynamics and touch, the sensuality of being one with it etc. i also found some strange 'sounds' on the piano, which could be interesting to work with. have even been thinking i need to scour goodwill to find kid's toy instruments to record; and check pawn shops for old synths etc- junk equipment, and take all this even further... i used to do 'sound collages' [ala musique concrete] [80s-90s] where i would record 4 different 90 minute tracks of totally different stuff on recorders - then mix them... weird stuff... love it.
MANY decades ago i recorded a program off the classical radio station in either little rock or new orleans- can't recall- of olivier messiaen- which changed my musical perspective. i still have the OLD cassette. it made me realize [as classical music had done, when i was barely a teenager- as did 'musique concrete' later] that music does not have to "make sense" in the normal sense, or "have a good beat"-[american bandstand lol]- granted most classical music i'd heard DID have 'meter'- BUT messiaen blew me out of the water. he was possibly the 1st who made me feel music was an ART form; not only a form of seriously spiritual self expression, but auditory imagery/photography/film. "and i await the ressurection of the dead" and "exotic birds" completely floored me.as did/does Vingt Regards sur l'Enfant Jésus XV
messiaen speaks about "birds" ...i LOVE this guy... the whole way he thinks about music. check him out on amazon
so i did the recordings then decided to stop and watch PROHIBITION [ken burns on PBS- about the drinking prohibition, not the current smoking one]- but didn't. instead, i recorded it and went and began editing what i had just done.
the NetMD [minidisc] is supposed to make it EASY for you to transfer the files from the apparatus to your computer and vice versa. BUT... because the software is several years old, i tried getting updates online, which took hours and all to no avail. so, as with my better AIWA [european= 220] i just plugged the cable from the line out on the MD into my laptop's line in- opened Sound Forge & recorded it, while i watched Prohibition. when i came back it was done, and so was i- BUT... i decided to edit it- make individual tracks etc. add some reverb and normalize. when i was almost finished, i looked at the clock on my computer- finally- and saw that it was 5AM... and i still had 2 songs left to edit... so i did. c'est la vie, c'est ma vie
i've decided to avoid the middle man [NetMD] and just take my OLD laptop and play the piano directly into Sound Forge. it takes up more space & is probably more of a hassle, but wtf? even though i already have done more solo improvisational work than i can edit, or afford to put online all at once, i continue experimenting, improvising, recording everything, every chance i get.
but now back to life... back to reality... back to sam's, to wally world and dollar tree... mon Dieu
[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY
