I am in from the coast for a few hours doing work at my terrestrial office.

So, while sitting here listening to music for a few minutes before getting down to the business at hand, I thought I would write a few quick words, without anything in particular to say.

Oh?  How is that any different from usual? you say.

To which I respond that you are a #%$^$&@^# and maybe should just stop having the benefit of my huge storehouse of wisdom accumulated during numerous ages.

Now, that would serve you right, wouldn't it?

Not to worry, you say?

Hmmmmmmm ---

Maybe, WORRY! would be the more realistic course.

But, then again, what does this all have to do with music?

Nothing?

That's why I said I am talking while having nothing to say.

Now that you have heard what that sounds like, maybe we can continue and have something more intelligent to say.  OR not?

And you know while I am at it, Why do my neighbors always complain that the **$&%^&%*#$ music is too loud, anyway?

I don't even have the wall of 24" speakers up yet, and they are already complaining?

I just don't understand what this world is coming to?

When I was young, you simply couldn't get loud enough.

What happend to that, anyway?

Those damn treehuggers, yet again?

But, lest you should worry that I have lost that utmost seriousness for which I am so worldly famous, let us continue with my narrative from the last post.

Have been working on setting up a very high quality field recording system in the field.

I have been working on numerous different configurations over the years, but have never had low enough voltage and amperage specifications in the equipment required to be able to do what I am doing without lighting all of the wiring on fire (literally, and for real! and FAST!!)

So, not so long ago this was an idea which you just would not seriously entertain (unless, of course ---- can you hear that wicked laugh in the background of your mind?  is that me?  or you?)

This is very exciting for those who write words or music, because it is so inspiring to sit out on beautiful locations and then to begin to practice your craft in the actual surroundings themselves, instead of while imagining them in your mind while playing in some dark, dank studio full of lights and wires and equipment, etc., etc.

No reminders of past failings out here.

A whole new world.

Just like when you were a newborn baby (surely you can remember that, can't you?)

Everything suddenly again becomes an object of the greatest wonder.

When this happens within the context of creative drive, it is a very good thing.

It is especially good when fellow humans have mercilessly and arrogantly trashed your very deepest and most heartfelt feelings.

You suddenly realize that you don't really need them at all.

That they are, if anything, --- in the way.

Now that is a transformation.

It can only be brought about by God's wondrous creation and the realization of just exactly what it is that you are looking at and walking about in.

Suddenly, when the human shackles are removed and the wings are allowed to spread out and fly, everything and everybody in this world becomes as heavy weights designed only to bring us down and to do little more.

F**k them, who needs them, anyway.

Now, that is freedom.

It is when you can live every moment like this, not caring, for all the right reasons, just what your fellows and supposed friends and relatives think about you or say about you that you have attained a new level of liberty which is very will worth cultivating for all it's worth;  at least in my humble opinion.

Now REMEMBER ---

LIFE IS ALL ABOUT MUSIC
AND MUSIC IS ALL ABOUT LIFE

It is a virtuous circle and a cycle that plays over and over again, each time kaleidescopically different from the ones before.

So, if one would be good at this craft of making music or composing music, then one must learn to live life to the fullest.

It is only by soaring in your own personal life that you can bring soaring to paper, or to sound.

It is only by knowing the deepest depths of the darkest despair that one can bring such things into one's music.

And once heard, nobody ever wants to hear another song without that deep and very emotional pathos which causes us to weep uncontrollably, without even knowing why.

We just know.

And what we know is so sad as to paralyze one permanently in the very spot where they are sitting and listening from.

Now, that is music!

Once heard, and once felt, all one can think is "I want/need more of that".

It is like a really good long and very loving hug from someone worthy of such things (very few and far between I should hazard to guess - meaning, do not try this at home, kids! it is for illustrative purposes only, not for any demonstrative purposes, whatsoever;
And, "WHO WILL TELL THE CHILDREN?"  Oh my.)

So, it didn't take long to figure out that the SH-01 was simply not going to be up to the job.

As neither would a 61 key board.

No, this requires 88 keys, indeed (= full piano board).

So, I added an 88 key controller into the loop.

Only problem is, that it is too long to fit on the dashboard close enough to be able to play it comfortably = fatal flaw!

So, out comes the wood and cardboard as I immediately attempt to fashion some kind of a stand to hold everything in place.

Well, anyone who has been around me for long knows that when I begin to "wing it", a disaster cannot be far behind.

Just how much I am "winging it" will determine how large the disaster.

That is to say, they are indirectly proportional to one another, but poportional, nonetheless.

And we all know what that means.

RUN, RUN, RUN for your very lives, because HE is at it again.

As I smile ever so grimly and reach for that switch which I just know will make the earth spin off of it's very axis in the next few seconds as I laugh, not realizing, AT ALL, what I have just done.

Now, that really is brilliant --- wouldn't you say?

Oh, me oh my, I can hear all of you naysayers from one hundred miles away.

Not brilliant, you say ---

Hmmmmmm --- what to do with all of these traitors.

Well, I will get around to that later, once I have fully consolidated power.

Yes, as you can see, the lunar madness has, indeed, struck, just as I had feared, but even far worse than anything I could have even begun to imagine.

I am thinking that I am just so screwed.

But, oh no, don't close your eyes just yet, for the best is still yet to come.

So, now I am trying to decide just how to use the SH-01 in all of this.

It is so tempting to join it to the JUNO-STAGE synth, and let the two of them combine together into some truly awesome layers of sound.

But, it also does very well with the Pro Tools soft synths = choices, choices.

So, here I sit, completely stuck, and not able to figure out which direction to go in.

In the meantime, I am figuring out more wiring, and cabling, and daisy chaining MIDI, and more audio setups, etc., etc.

I say all of that to say this.

This morning (and last night) I got to play some of the Gregorian chants in a manuscript which I brought back from Zurich last month.

WOW!

Need I say more.

You must ask yourself, what is this stuff all about?

And what's with all of this inane techno-babble?

I often ask myself the same questions.

Many times a day, as a matter of fact.

Well, here is the answer.

Gregorian chant with strings, female choir, and male choir.

That was this morning.

I was completely blown away.

And continue to be.

Last night was Mascagni's Intermezzo with string orchestra.

That's what it's all about.

It is like having children.

You often wonder to yourself whether you must have lost your mind numerous times between conception and birth and then raising them into little devils and she-devils, and then wondering all the more just what this could possibly be all about.

But, hopefully, some day, you reach satisfaction in all of the work which you have so selflessly done on behalf of others.

Then, all of a sudden, all of the pain and suffering which it took to get there just dissolves as if it never even existed.

Just as that sounds really crazy when it comes to child rearing, all the more so when it comes to music.

But, that is just how it is.

I really must go now, as there is a ton of work piling up on my desk.

All of my desk cleaning faeiries are on strike, surely not because of what I just did to them, awhile ago.

So, it is only I who am left to see to it that these tasks are completed in a timely manner.

Hence, I must take leave for now.

vw

1:54 p.m. pst

5-7-12
Monday

Ventura, California, USA