| Pages:
1
..
50
51
52
53
54
..
348 |
polydigm
King Kong Status
Posts: 2173
Registered: 1-4-2006
Location: Horse Tray Ya
Member Is Offline
Mood: Inspired
|
|
Just passing and saying hi. Things are going well with me. Best wishes to everyone.
Bonny, that's a very familiar shopping tale to me. 
|
|
|
BBP
Super Administrator
Posts: 8064
Registered: 3-10-2005
Location: Eindhoven, Netherlands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Cheerful yet relaxed
|
|
You buy bras? 
|
|
|
polydigm
King Kong Status
Posts: 2173
Registered: 1-4-2006
Location: Horse Tray Ya
Member Is Offline
Mood: Inspired
|
|
I thought that joke would turn up. I meant that I've been shopping for others before and ended up buying stuff for myself instead.
|
|
|
punknaynowned
Frank Zappa Status
Posts: 1283
Registered: 29-8-2006
Member Is Offline
Mood: No Mood
|
|
hahahhahha
today I went to our local 'microbrewery' where I met up with an old friend to give them a dozen zappa cd's. I had burned a bunch of things to give
him a sense of the zappa world in the last ten years. And talked about zappateers.
I ran into a bunch of people I used to know and one of them gave me a pair of tickets to see a jazz combo Sunday at the place where zpz played last
week. He said he could have used my help running stage crew for that show!!!
So I missed out on that entirely 
but get to see a free show next week. 
Some people would say I need to get out more often,
but most of the time, I'd say I show up just in time.
[Edited on 16-6-10 by punknaynowned]
|
|
|
BBP
Super Administrator
Posts: 8064
Registered: 3-10-2005
Location: Eindhoven, Netherlands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Cheerful yet relaxed
|
|
Well,if you know the joke's coming, Poly...
Oh man, it wouldve been awesome to work on ZPZ! Hey, maybe I could do that! I still need a ticket to Melkweg btw.
|
|
|
polydigm
King Kong Status
Posts: 2173
Registered: 1-4-2006
Location: Horse Tray Ya
Member Is Offline
Mood: Inspired
|
|
Don't worry Bonny, it was obvious you were only joking. I wanted to say I related to your tale, I just forgot to specify which part.
Moving on, it's just after breakfast time here in OZ, another day after a patchy sleep which is none the less getting much easier now. I got through
yesterday without so much as a single paracetamol and I had a major epiphany about my piano playing early on before breakfast while practicing. To
attempt to progress with it, I've used a fairly classical method with all the attendant pre 20th C pieces thrown in and always gave up after getting
bored with the process. I don't know what made me think it was a good way to go about it. I don't want to push that stuff into my head any more.
On the guitar, I've always been self taught and have only rarely ever played any pre 20th century stuff and mostly my own work as I've developed as a
composer. In fact my progress on the guitar has been integral with my progress as a composer. All this has been knitted together from a fairly
extensive personal library of books about music theory ranging from the rudiments through increasingly complex levels of diatonic composition and then
serial music and beyond into the rest of the 20th century. I eventually reached a point where the books became only reference material, as carving out
my own sonic domain became my main mode of operation. There's still quite a variety of musical discipline going on in there as well.
Anyway, it occurred to me yesterday, why am I not playing the piano using exactly the same methods in principle as I use on the guitar? That's what I
started doing fairly soon after I started the saxophone earlier this year. On the sax I only play my own stuff and a couple of Zappa tunes. The upshot
with the piano? All the classical books are now permanently shelved and my progress is taking my breath away. I'm already playing things on the piano
I wouldn't have considered possible previously and coming up with some new arrangements of my pieces. Right now I'm well into working on an
arrangement of, and playing, the Fillmore East version of Little House I Used To Live In. It's great fun and I'm now highly motivated because the
piano will do much more for me in the arrangement department than the guitar.
The only thing I don't do is sight read my instruments, but I can read music and pick up parts for them very quickly. I've also developed my music
writing ability to quite a high level, somewhat untidy with a pencil, but I love physically writing it. I do most of my work with scoring software,
but it's not always convenient to use and I've always got score paper, pencil and eraser about the place.
Well, that was a bit of a long one but I couldn't wait to tell people about it. Hope this finds everyone well.
|
|
|
BBP
Super Administrator
Posts: 8064
Registered: 3-10-2005
Location: Eindhoven, Netherlands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Cheerful yet relaxed
|
|
That's great news! I love the piano for all the same reasons,although with a guitar it's much easier to play in a different key. I primarily play
classical music on it though. But I love classical music so it's not a bad idea. Among the pieces I'm currently working on, is one of my favourites:
Chopin's waltz no 7 in C sharp minor.
(besides that, there's Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor, the Ave Maria prelude, the infamous menuet, Mozarts Rondo Alla Turca, Beethoven's 14th
piano sonata op 27/2 first movement, Greensleeves, and maybe a few pop songs I play every once in a while. I'm pretty upset now that I let my playing
slip so badly. I've had to start over again, re-study songs I never had any trouble with.)
|
|
|
polydigm
King Kong Status
Posts: 2173
Registered: 1-4-2006
Location: Horse Tray Ya
Member Is Offline
Mood: Inspired
|
|
| Quote: | | Originally posted by BBP: That's great news! I love the piano for all the same reasons,although with a guitar it's much easier to play in a
different key. |
I disagree, because even though the guitar presents you with symmetric key changes, they
still sit differently within similar pitch ranges, give you a wide variety of different possibilities for pull offs to open strings, etc and you still
need to know them very well individually ti get the most out of them. I know certain keys really well like E, F, F# G, A, Bb, B, C and D in many of
their major, minor, modal, chromatic scale variations and chord progressions but when I go to other keys I lose track. I'm talking about improvisation
there, with fixed compositions that I learn it's no problem, I can do that equally well in any key, which is where I would agree with you.
On the piano, there's a logic with the pattern of black and white keys, which, even though the keys are very unsymmetrical makes them easy to pick
out. Okay, having a black key as a root note is more difficult than having a white one, but there are techniques you can develop to minimise that.
| Quote: | | Originally posted by BBP: I'm pretty upset now that I let my playing slip so badly. I've had to start over again, re-study songs I never had
any trouble with.) |
I know exactly what you mean, that's my main reason for changing the way I go about it
from the bottom up, because I don't intend ever to give it up again. I started playing about 17 years ago in order to help my daughter who was 8 at
the time and having piano lessons and then after she gave up I continued only to fall into a pattern of giving it up out of boredom. My current level
of playing certainly does not indicate even a third of that time in experience.
|
|
|
polydigm
King Kong Status
Posts: 2173
Registered: 1-4-2006
Location: Horse Tray Ya
Member Is Offline
Mood: Inspired
|
|
Anyway, yesterday's noteworthy was me driving our van around the the block, exciting hey? I won't be driving on main roads yet for some time. Today is
just unfolding, I'll probably go for another walk at some point and do some guitar and piano practice in the mean time. At some point I have to start
getting my head back around what I teach at school and do some preparation in advance to help ease my way back in.
|
|
|
polydigm
King Kong Status
Posts: 2173
Registered: 1-4-2006
Location: Horse Tray Ya
Member Is Offline
Mood: Inspired
|
|
Now for the momentous post. This one's noteworthy right now.
Ta!! Da!! Geoff reaches 500 posts on the
Goose!!
|
|
|
BBP
Super Administrator
Posts: 8064
Registered: 3-10-2005
Location: Eindhoven, Netherlands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Cheerful yet relaxed
|
|
Wow Geoff! (APPLAUSE)
In the mean time therapy is going well, although my ankle gave me some trouble last week. And I'm trying to get a game to run, with help from a
programming friend off the Sierra forum. He's great!
|
|
|
polydigm
King Kong Status
Posts: 2173
Registered: 1-4-2006
Location: Horse Tray Ya
Member Is Offline
Mood: Inspired
|
|
So, Bonny, how much time do you think from today until total recovery? And, please remind me of the date of your operation. I hope it's going well.
|
|
|
BBP
Super Administrator
Posts: 8064
Registered: 3-10-2005
Location: Eindhoven, Netherlands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Cheerful yet relaxed
|
|
The tumble and the operation were on February 3rd. Prognosis is it won't be as flexible as it used to be, but we're already diminishing the physical
therapy. Maybe a month but I really can't be sure.
|
|
|
BBP
Super Administrator
Posts: 8064
Registered: 3-10-2005
Location: Eindhoven, Netherlands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Cheerful yet relaxed
|
|
Yesterday I uploaded the zip file of the game I'm trying to get to run, so my scripting friend can help out. Isn't that nice? Okay, so uploading the
first disc took two hours.
|
|
|
punknaynowned
Frank Zappa Status
Posts: 1283
Registered: 29-8-2006
Member Is Offline
Mood: No Mood
|
|
That IS nice. I would volunteer but, of course I have no idea how to do that.
Spent 152 minutes on the phone with the IRS -- our tax collection service here.I talked to 5 people and was on hold for nearly 60 minutes. 152
minutes equals about $30 worth of minutes on the phone. And now I have to wait two more weeks to get more paper work, fill that out and then they will
bill me. It may be $1200 or more. First time that's ever happened. I guess I must live and learn.
|
|
|
BBP
Super Administrator
Posts: 8064
Registered: 3-10-2005
Location: Eindhoven, Netherlands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Cheerful yet relaxed
|
|
Dad and I went to visit an architecture day in Eindhoven. Five normally closed buildings would be open. Besides the old textile building (OK, the tour
sucked, he knew next to nothing and let us all try to find the exit ourselves, although it was a total maze) and the old art museum, it was rather
disappointing. We went to get icecream afterwards.
And I just narrowly avoided a disaster. I slipped down the stairs. But I escaped with just a few scratches.
|
|
|
BBP
Super Administrator
Posts: 8064
Registered: 3-10-2005
Location: Eindhoven, Netherlands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Cheerful yet relaxed
|
|
Dad'll be gone for the next three days... hum.
|
|
|
aquagoat
King Kong Status
Posts: 2170
Registered: 15-3-2006
Location: France
Member Is Offline
|
|
Party tiiiiiiiiiiiiiime !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 
|
|
|
BBP
Super Administrator
Posts: 8064
Registered: 3-10-2005
Location: Eindhoven, Netherlands
Member Is Offline
Mood: Cheerful yet relaxed
|
|
Oh you bet! (makes a jump to the left...) Cooked myself a nice meal today. And I had therapy again, chatted with ma therapist about football. And he
gave me advice on how to improve my running, as I can't run while using my regular foot movement yet. That hurts like hell.
So he adviced me to run slowly, touching the ground with the front of my feet only. Unfortunately it means running gets rather "springy", and I don't
have any underwear that can... ahem... soften the blow, so it'll be an indoors activity. Ho hum.
And I cleared the piano. Man it's off-key! Beethoven's op 27/2 sounds much better on piano, though. Even if it's off-key.
|
|
|
polydigm
King Kong Status
Posts: 2173
Registered: 1-4-2006
Location: Horse Tray Ya
Member Is Offline
Mood: Inspired
|
|
Hey Bonny, I can relate to the stair fall, I fell off a step ladder a week back and bruised my wrist and ankle and luckily managed not to damage any
of my surgery. An overconfident momentary lapse of reason. That snapped me out of it I can tell you. What was I doing up a step ladder only two weeks
after surgery, well .... ?!
Anyway, had my first checkup at the hospital yesterday and as I've been driving to local shops for a couple of days now and dropped my sons off at
their Saturday sport games, I drove into the hospital. When I got there, I found what should have been a perfect park but some dick head had parked
right across the line into the space and there were motor scooters parked right up against the other side. I was driving our Volkswagen Transporter
Van and just squeezed in so the dick head would have to get in through his passenger door, a minor inconvenience after what he'd done.
When I came back, having realised earlier I'd forgotten to pay and display, I saw something blowing in the wind under the windscreen wiper and thought
I'd been fined. But, when got to it, I found a scrap of paper with a note scrawled on it, "Are you a dick head, mate?". Hilarious.
Anyway, they were very happy with my progress at the hospital and happy for me to be driving again, with a warning to avoid activities like gardening
and any heavy lifting until at least 6 weeks after surgery and even then I'll have to wear this special elastic waste band when playing tennis and so
on, which is cool by me, 19 days to go and counting.
On the music front, my guitar speed is back and I'm now playing the fast parts of Echidna's Arf fairly accurately on the electric. The acoustic is
still a bit hard on my fingers, but getting better. The piano's coming along in leaps and bounds and I've started working on a book of Cool Jazz
tunes. Still no saxophone, it's killing me.
And, I've started learning French again, with a vengeance this time, but not using text books, just reading books, starting with a fairly advanced
young person's book about Monsieur et Madame Curie along with a comprehensive pronunciation guide using sound samples and a comprehensive Grammar
guide, both downloaded from the internet and a French - English dictionary which also has pronunciation and grammar guides to cross check with.
Similar principle to how I'm approaching the piano now. I did do four years of French at high school so the foundation is in there already and I'm
having a lot of fun with it. It's a damn complicated language, though. I want to able to speak to my Mum in French and also email my French relatives.
|
|
|
| Pages:
1
..
50
51
52
53
54
..
348 |
![[*]](images/davis/default_icon.gif){kind=icon}
