I organized my books a bit today. Since I have a zillion books this is kind of a big deal. I cleared a path in the room I call the library so that I could file books from the living room that are just laying around.

The goal was to move my reading shelf closer to my reading chair. Important stuff.
This involved moving almost all of my poetry books (not sure how many that is.. probably close to 24 feet of books on shelves. So of course I dust them as I move them.
Well, mission is now accomplished several hours later. I am kind of dirty from all the dust but now I have my books that I am trying to read within easy reach.

I also uncovered a stack of clippings from the NYT that I am in the process of going through. The NYT site allows subscribers to bookmark old articles for future reference. I have quit clipping quite so much but these articles are from a while ago.

Listening to saxophone music by Paul Creston and Amy Quate all the while I was doing this.

Also have been looking for free mp3s of Dylan Thomas and James Joyce reading their work. I have an old CD of old Napster (pre-legal) files which I can’t seem to rip. I ripped my Getrude Stein CD yesterday. The quality is not great but I love the way she reads her work.

If anyone has any links for these things for these kind of mp3s would appreciate you passing them along.

Kunming
3/7/07

On Monday, our first day here we visited a park with many steps and Doaist temples. The bus ride over was pretty brutal due to my fatigue. Jet lag is a real factor in this kind of trip. I doubt that we will be here long enough to complete adapt…

Apparently Kunming is at a higher elevation than Denver so there is a possibility of the effects of thinner air and whatever else high altitudes do to you.

I took some photos at the temple park. I was kind of interested in one statue of an old man with two attendants. He had flowing white hair. He may have been Confuscious. Still not totaly sure after looking on the Net. [Note: Jeremy later decided that this was Laotzu]

Jeremy and Elizabeth’s apartment is a seven floor walk-up. This means every time we return to the aprtment we must go up seven flights. Tuesday morning was the first time I felt the altitude at the end of the climb. I think this was because I did not pause [to rest] on the way up.

Monday evening after the meal of squirrel fish [so called because the boned chicken looks vaguely like a flying squirrel in flight…] mint beans, soft tofu in sauce, corn and other dishes, we ended up at the apartment.

At this point, I believe we had already booked our Monday evening room. Jeremy was unhappy with our choice. He thought 200 RMB [about 25.00 US dollars] was too much. Eileen and I insisted on taking it because we were all tired. If we had searched further, it would have been hard on all of us…

On Tuesday morning, Eileen called Elizabeth on the cell phone around 8 AM (actually Eileen just told me she was up but still sitting and didn’t answer at first because it was Jeremy’s phone ringing).We had an excellent breakfast from a street vendor. She would crack an egg on the grill, break the yolk, put a tortilla like thing on the grill, spread child sauce on half the tortilla as it heated, quickly heated some fresh green lettuce, put the egg on the tortilla, then the lettuce, and wrapped it. Eileen’s had some chicken [in it. MMMMM. Good.]

Natsuo Kirino is a Japanese mystery writer. I am about 2/3rds of the way through her 1997 novel, “Out” and am enjoying it immensely. The story concerns a group of four women in a lunch box factory who attempt to cover up a crime. The details of the story are gruesome but Kirino is inside the heads of all her characters making their actions logical if not astonishing.

She has just come out with a translation of a newer novel called “Grotesque,” which was reviewed in an NPR segment.

This was the first I had heard of her.

Even though I am rested, I feel like I am slipping a bit back into the old lack of perspective. Maybe this will change when I am finished with teaching this spring. Hope so.

My brother mentioned (once again) that he uses RSS feeds. I asked if he was putting this on his hand held and he said he was putting it on his google home page. I remember trying to do this and not being able to.

Anyway, I managed to do it today and put RSS feeds for my fam’s blogs. I am still on the lookout for blogs to read. I linked into a couple of readers blogs. People who are reading Proust. Very cool. Open to suggestions.

I am in the middle of grading concert reports. Actually I have only a few left to do. Interestingly I am not very satisfied with this group of reports. I think it has something to do with the quality of GVSU concerts. I am very critical of concerts that fail to keep the attention of listeners.

One concert started off with two pieces by Evan Ziporyn. Students hated these pieces. I listened to them on Napster and decided they weren’t really openers. Solo clarinet pieces. The first one on the program was very slow and thoughtful. I think it’s a naive choice. But what do I know? I actually liked the piece but could understand why students didn’t.

I had a phone message last night from the local choral group, The Holland Chorale. A mutual acquaintance had given them my name as a possibility to audition for one of their three accompanist positions. I have heard this group a few times over the years and have never been very impressed with them. At this point, I am very leary of connecting myself with any musical project that does not involve at least one other person I trust. I called and left a message declining. It is nice to be asked.

I am starting to long to go out and play on the streets again. I think that’s where I belong. Just like my random thoughts and recordings belong on the web. It is satisfying to me to know that if anyone is actually interested they can access my stuff. If not, they can just keep on surfing.

March 3, 2007

…. the Beijing airport was quite a trial.

We made it through three customs counters… one where we dropped off the health slip stating we had had no contact with farm animals, birds or people with AIDS recently (there were other questions, but that’s the gist).

We had one form which was a small slip of paper just for foreigners to put our passport and number on and check off the reason for our visit.

At the third counter we handed in a longer form with detailed customs entry questions on it.

Then we rushed and followed signs to “transfers.” The last sign said “Transfers upstairs” and pointed to an set of opaque doors marked “exit only.” We decided to chance it and that seemed to be the right decision. This brought us into an area with many people, signs and counters.

We read the flight monitors and proceeded to a desk. The woman there looked at our tickets and said we need to “reconfirm” our flight. This was something we had anticipated with a bit of trepidation. when asked where we should do this, she waved her hand vaguely in a direction. When we asked for better directions she really was no clearer.

All the signs and flight monitors were primarily in Chinese. It was obvious that we hadn’t found anyone who could speak English very well.

We proceed in the direction the counter woman had waved, stopping at counters to ask about “reconfirming.” Most people looked uncomprehendingly at us. Finally an older attendant behind a counter laughed and made it clear that we needed to go into a completely different section of the airport and turn left.

When we followed his directions, we arrived at China Air’s ticket counter offices.

We had determined that our next flight was leaving shortly and we had not yet checked in or checked our luggage. There was a line at each window so we chose one and got in line.

I remembered from talking with Elizabeth and Jeremy that the concept of waiting in line was different in China. I watched two or three people deftly step in front of the man in front of us. Everyone appeared to be Chinese but I began to suspect the man in front of us of being a dumb American like us when he seemed incapable of asserting himself. He was obviously impatient as we were but began chatting us up in English. Iwasn’t paying too close attention but Eileen later told me he been out of the country for the last six years.

In the meantime, the people ahead of us (including the ones who had stepped in front of us) seemed to be all yelling at the China Air officical, pushing up to the window, and showing him their papers. There was much arguing back and forth.

Finally we were next and manged with difficulty to explain our dilemma. The person helping us was maddeningly slow as he peered closely at our documents and asked us questions, Then he looked long and hard at his computer screen. finally he told us we were okay and that we should “hurry” That seemed a tad ironic to me after all his foot dragging.

We then rushed back to the first counter (we had been in the right place after all). there were many lines to choose from and now I was noticing the cavalier approach people were taking to queues (“when in Beijing”). We had minutes until our flight was scheduled to leave by now.

I spotted a couple of short lines we got in one of those and pretty quickly got checked in and rushed to our gate following signs.

There was a line at the gate and we quickly got in it. After a bit we realized that although it was our gate, it was not a line for our flight.

After this flight boarded, I asked the attendants at the gate desk about the Kunming flight and they indicated it was late.

A short while later a young man (who also turned out to be going to Kunming on our flight) informed us in clear English that the flight was going to be three hours late. Unsure whether to believe him or not, we found a place to sit down.

I was exhausted from getting up at 3:30 AM that morning to check in at 4:15 in Detroit. The three hour wait was very excurciating as was the hour of taxi time before we were actually in the air.

My brother was telling me about Sam Kinison’s death.

He was killed in a car crash. Someone was holding the dying man in his arms. Kinison was saying over and over, “I don’t want to die. Why now?”

Suddenly, he looked into the thin air and seemed to be listening. Then he, “Oh. Okay.” and died.

This story is retold here.

Poking around yesterday looking for other people’s blogs to read. I find that many blogs of people I know haven’t been updated for months. I am still trying to find blogs that write about the kind of stuff I am interested in (music, poetry, art, whatever). Most are too narrow, but I’m still looking.

It’s overcast in Michigan this morning. I have spent the morning working on my lecture for today. I am thinking of doing much of it at the piano. Starting with Joplin’s cakewalk, Swipsey. Then playing Debussy’s Golliwogg’s Cakewalk and pointing out his swipe at Wagner in the middle seciton. Then after talking, maybe playing Ravel’s Pavanne for a dead princess.

I will also talk about Stravinsky. I usually play the first movement of Symphony of Psalms (which I quite like) for the class. I am thinking of adding the DVD of his Rite of Spring (excerpt) that comes with the new edition of my text.

I also want to hit Schoenberg and his pupils Webern and Berg today. This may seem like a lot but this class only meets twice a week so I have to sometimes cram stuff in.

Played a lot of Mozart and Brahms yesterday on the piano. I am starting to feel a bit rested from my China trip.

Terrorized by ‘War on Terror’ How a Three Word Mantra has Underminded America by that wild eyed radical and former Naitonal Security Advisor, Zbigniew Brzezinski.

The “war on terror” has created a culture of fear in America. The Bush administration’s elevation of these three words into a national mantra since the horrific events of 9/11 has had a pernicious impact on American democracy, on America’s psyche and on U.S. standing in the world. Using this phrase has actually undermined our ability to effectively confront the real challenges we face from fanatics who may use terrorism against us.

The damage these three words have done — a classic self-inflicted wound — is infinitely greater than any wild dreams entertained by the fanatical perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks when they were plotting against us in distant Afghan caves. The phrase itself is meaningless. It defines neither a geographic context nor our presumed enemies. Terrorism is not an enemy but a technique of warfare — political intimidation through the killing of unarmed non-combatants.

Chris Ware‘s Animated piece on This American Life’s new TV show. 

Had nightmares last night about killings in Iraq. In my dream, a soldier was explaining to the children he was about to shoot why he was doing it. The radio was on all night and I think the report about gunmen deliberately killing Sunni and Shiite childre that played together in order to incite their parents to violence against each other was in my mind.

After the last notes of the last piece of the last show of the musical I have been helping with at Grand Haven High School, the interminable thank-you’s began. I wonder what happened to my old high school drama coach’s idea that you never break character. The thank-you’s started with behind the scenes people and ended with a huge hurrah for the adult director. Good Grief.

Anyway, the pit orch conductor shook my hand as did the young pianist who sat behind me all the time.

I had a long day of playing music yesterday.

Started out with a cellist playing a Haydn cello concerto with me playing the transcription of the orchestra part. This went pretty well.

I am always struck by the vulnerability of high school musicians. They are caught up in figuring out the world. A mixture of high hopes and discouragement. All felt intensely.

After this I met a young violinist who was to perform a Telemann concerto. I found the piano soloists warm-up room and managed to get us some time to read through her concerto. She had only contacted me a day or two before. Her accompanist had canceled.

I found out later that her accompanist was involved with another pit orchestra in Muskegon for the musical “Les Miz “and had to play a matinée. Ended up backing out of solo and ensemble commitments.

I found out that my Telemann violinist had only been playing for two years. She played extremely well for so little experience. The run-through went pretty well. But when she performed for the judge, she was very excited and went very fast and changed tempos on me. The judge was kind of an idiot. He increased her nervousness as we waited for a page to bring him some necessary forms. He commented on how big the young woman was for her age: “Grow ’em big up there in Muskegon, eh?” She was obviously embarrassed as was I.

Other highlights of my solo and ensemble day included

1. People being nice to me. This may strike you as odd, but by the end of the day I noticed that people were very nice to me. Strangers saying hi and smiling. I have been wearing my long hair down due a recurring head/neck ache I have had since my trip to China (fatigue? alcohol withdrawal? terminal cancer?). The lady in the cafeteria at the school where the festival was held undercharged me for my salad (“They charge so much because the kids pile it high. You just have a 2.00 salad there”).

2. The flute player I have been accompanying nailed her solo. She was playing as difficult a work as I heard (in person) on Saturday: Poulenc’s Flute Sonata, mov 1. It’s a lovely work and actually a piece of the flute repertoire. This player tends to play buy diazepam in turkey well in rehearsal and then get very nervous at festival. But she played musically and confidently. I was disappointed in my own playing on this one because I made new mistakes probably due to my own fatigue. Bah.

3. The other last minute player I accompanied played a big concerto movement that we didn’t manage to get through for the judge. (they stop you if it’s too long) This was the other kid whose accompanist canceled on him. Both of my last minute people were ninth graders who played pretty well. This kid’s performance time was a bit later in the day so I had a couple of hours to kill. I corrected my quizzes from college and then listened to my podcasts of On the Media and some of This American Life.

4. I ran into several people from my past lives including Mr. Riekow my daughter Sarah’s old orchestra teacher (Hi Sarah. Mr. Riekow says hi and that he still has the Elvis Costello CD you gave him. I guess he really remembered you. Last time I saw him he just kept walking. I think this was because I was working with the Holland High School Musical which was sort of a renegade project that didn’t involve teachers from the school like Mr. Riekow. I still haven’t gotten paid for this).

Also saw a young saxophonist I know who had put together a jazz ensemble with students from two schools. He described for me how they had done all their homework about authorization for such a thing. But the judges still insisted on reconfirming their legitimacy. Good grief.

I met this saxophonist playing in the pit orchestra for Holland High School for the show I never got paid for. I guess some good came of that experience. His ensemble played a medley (it sounded like he arranged it) of tunes including some Ellington and other standards. I admire this.

Last night the director of the pit orchestra showed me the amount of the check I will get for playing for Grand Haven High School’s musical. It’s around 1 K and is just about half of what I owe Uncle Same for taxes this year.

I have mixed feelings about taxes. I think people should kick in for services for government. I also almost feel like a sap because I declare all my extra income. It is this extra income that causes me to have to pay extra each year. I guess it’s really a small price to pay for my feeble attempts at personal integrity.

Recently one of the people being nice to me asked me what I do. I came up “I guess I’m just a free lance musician like so many of them.” Hm. That’s good. Maybe I’ll stick with that for a while to answer that question.

I pulled down last week’s This American Life episode and On the Media broadcast and put them on my MP3 player. It occurs to me that this is a good way to avoid the “pledge drive” but that’s not why I did it.

Today I am spending most of the day at Hudsonville High School and thought it might be nice to have a couple podcasts with me for distraction. I have not met two fo the five students I will be acompanying at this point…. but am planning to try and find a room with a piano where we can go over their solos…. other wise I guess we will be playing them for the first time together in front of a judge.

I also have three sets of papers I could grade from college.

One performance of Bye Birdie down and two to go. Last night went fine. Tonight, Eileen will attend and I will get her perceptions on how this show is going. From where I sit in the pit I can’t see anything on stage unless the actors are very far down stage. As of night before last, I can hear them. The monitor is turned up very loud and the actors are wearing mics into which they shout their lines. This makes sitting in the pit uncomfortable. But the dang sound people don’t seem to be able to turn it up and down successfully so the director asked them to just leave it up. My ears are ringing this morning. Great. More hearing loss for the old rock and roller.

I listened to a few Randy Newman tunes yesterday that are in his anthology that I don’t recognize. Unfortunately, these tunes didn’t hit me as hard as some of his other works. I begin to suspect that he suffers from the typical writing too much syndrome. Maybe it’s just me, but I prefer writers to produce less and better work. Probably Newman feels compelled to produce a bunch of stuff for one reason or another. Anyway, I wasn’t impressed with “Baltimore,” “Bleeding all over the place,” and “Burn On.” (note that I am working my way through his printed anthology alphabetically and am still on the Bs….. Napster doesn’t have everything I want (sooprise sooprise). And I am impressed with songs like “Louisiana,” “Marie” and others. I think I basically like his “Good Old Boys” CD. This may say more about me than him.

I do think he is a good writer.

The first violinist at Grand haven is also playing at solo and ensemble tomorrow. He is doing a violin solo and a sax solo. I asked him what sax solo he is doing. He replied, the second movement of the Paul Creston. I don’t know this piece but I have heard of Creston. He told me the piano accompaniment is “insane.”  He is very interesting. I would like to get know him a bit but haven’t found much of an opportunity. I worry too much about being the old guy. When I was younger I would pump him for stuff like what he listens to and if he’s writing music. Now I know that I’m a bit scary to young people. And can’t imagine how a young talented man like this perceives my interest (is this old guy gay or what? is he having one of those adult vicarious moments? eeeeyew…. )

My own point of view is so eccentric. I figure I probably have something in common with young high school musicians. But at the same time I question so much about institutionalized approaches to music that are ahead of them (college, whatever). Not sure my input is all that helpful beyond some musical stuff.

Over analyzing again. I need more coffee.

Rehearsal’s for Grand Haven High School’s production of Bye Bye Birdie are now over. Our first performance is this evening. Performances are a bit less wear and tear on me. Last night’s run through went pretty well and was somewhat like a performance. The alarm went off this morning and I had to get up to prepare for my class today.

There were two phone messages from last minute people looking for an accompanist for Saturday. I returned these calls. Yesterday my violist decided it was too much for him to try and do his solo on Saturday and canceled. So now I have four confirmed solos for Saturday and one on which I am waiting for confirmation.

I did call the people from Holland High School who still haven’t paid me for a pit orchestra job back in December 2006. Although the man who hired me (not a school employee) assured me he would continue to try to get me a check (He even took my social security number again), I am beginning to feel like I have been taken advantage of. My relationship with this school has never been a good one. I was the classic disastisfied parent with much of what this school did with my three kids. Oh well. At least this way I won’t feel guilty saying no if they ever call on me again (fat chance).

I ordered music for Randy Newman songs recently and they came in the mail yesterday. I like how the piano parts are very close to what he plays when he accompanies himself. I am thinking of Napstering some of the tunes I don’t recognize. He is a strong craftsman as a song writer. And I tend to like a lot of what he writes about.

Well I have to get back to prepping for  today’s class…… Today I have to give a quiz, then lecture on Modernism, Debussy, Satie and Ravel. As I move into the 20th century I feel more and more at home discussing the music without too much prep. But still I have to do some…..

Snow Storm

Tumult, weeping, many new ghosts.
Heartbroken, aging, alone, I sing
To myself. Ragged mist settles
In the spreading dusk. Snow skurries
In the coiling wind. The wineglass
Is spilled. The bottle is empty.
The fire has gone out in the stove.
Everywhere men speak in whispers.
I brood on the uselessness of letters.

Tu Fu, translated by Kenneth Rexroth from his anthology, “One Hundred Poems from the Chinese” Online text of this anthology is here, but you have to give them your email address.

Incidentally, the other article I read in February’s Harpers in China was “On the rights of Molotov Man: Appropriation and the Art of Context” by Joy Garnett and Susan Meiselas. While Harpers hilarioiusly did not put this one online (if you read the article you’ll possibly understand why I think this is kind of funny), I did find this link to a pdf file of the article provided by a teacher for her students. God bless the Internet.

This is a very interesting discussion of appropriation of images and ideas. Recommended as well as the Lethem article in my previous post.

When I was in China, I read Jeremy’s copy of February’s Harpers (His mom brought him some back issues). The article by Johnathan Lethem (I think he was the writer) entitled “The Ecstacy of Influence” changed my thinking.

[Spoiler follows about article]

This article is a very clever one by Lethen. In it, he lays out very clearly the idea that no one is ever original and that in order to create one needs to use other human’s stuff.

At the end of the article, he informs the reader that the entire article has been cribbed and proceeds to give all the references. Very cool.

After reading this, I decided to leave my song “So Many People” the way I wrote it even though I (unconsciously) used the same (very very simple) chord progressions that Gillian Welch uses in “Look at Miss Ohio” on her Soul Journey Cd (highly recommended).