To Kate Bush

Music Is Conversation

Music is conversation or rote.  How well and understandably we converse limits or extends the quality of conversation.   There is an ancient idea one finds in belief systems around the world parphrased as "every uttered word is registered for eternity on the invisible air."  Regard them as a prayer without regard to perfect knowledge but to perfect love and hope, the engines which power our evolution made to the intelligence that guides them.  

From the first cave painting, from the first cantus firmus, the eye sees form and the ear hears motion and from these conceives patterns and in these creates a mirror of self, knows self and becomes a higher self.   If the drum is silent, reason speaks.  The drum is ego, the craving for power, it is not power.  A lively conversation does not put the mind to sleep.   It engages it, makes it aware of itself and in it finds the next lesson.   This is emergence made of the joy of discovery. 

Scales or RGB are fundamental to be learned by disciplined repetition but are not themselves, thoughts.  They are linens, light without a reflective surface.  Harmony binds melody to color and time makes the canvas on which worlds are made but the intellect that chooses a mode or mixes a color, the chooser of choices, this is the highest art of all.   Our melodies fade like water on sands, our colors fade into the sunset of our lives, but the thoughts made and impressed into living flesh shine on illuminating self for the eye that sees above and below

Open Mic Nights: Training and The American Song Book

At an open mic night an older genteman asked me if my finger picking style was a gift or could it be learned. I told him it is the way I've played most of my life but that a year or so of classical guitar lessons clean up the left hand technique enormously. Thank you, Charlie Higgins.
 
A gift is just such, but there is much to be said for training. A gift given technique accomplishes what technique alone cannot and a gift will not. If somehow you were afforded lessons, that is a real gift. Thank you, Jimmy Carter.

Another thought looking back on the week was a joking comment from other songwriters that I use "too many chords" and it reminded me of Ronny Cox also making that same joke at me one night in the Bluebird. I know the rubric about four chord songs in pop and three chord songs in country, that a song must be commercial so dumb it down.  Yes, it is a gift to write a timeless song that is simple and direct.

I could not give a flying rats fat behind.

I was lucky enough to be born early enough to grow up listening to Jimmy Van Heusen, George Gershwin, Jacques Brel..., Burt Bacharach, all songwriters of the American songbook. They mastered jazz, blues, classical, folk, fused styles gloriously and did not shy away from a ninth, a diminished, a thirteenth, they embraced the colors and fashioned wonderful soarng melodies the likes of which cannot be sung well without some training and much practice.

Much of this is missing in writers who stop with Dylan, Cash and even the Beatles although Lennon and Mc Cartney were prodigious in their admiration of those masters. If you write with a beat box, tracks, loops you can quickly create a snappy song. Unless you learn music, unless you discover how harmony reallf functions past fundamentals and what that makes possible in melody, you have not wandered far from your front porch.

Whatever formulas you apply as songwriters never ever stop exploring the palette, the colors possible when you master more than folk songs and a beat box. Do it because in the range and colors made possible you can evoke more subtle emotions, emotions both rich and mature and timeless. Music is not meant to be simply a career and hopefully but sometimes only a sport. It is an adventure, a country meant to be discovered, seen and most importantly felt and experienced. Do not let the strummers and the chord police cheat you of that.

No Covers! No Collections!

I send an email to a local room that advertises an open mic night to ask if they still hold open mic nights.  The owner's reply:

"Hi, I'm sorry, we do not. The licensing fees were just too high. The Foyer has a wed. Open mic."

The Foyer is the room I wrote about earlier.  It has a sign on the door saying "No Covers".  They tell me they've collected enough donations to pay ASCAP but not BMI yet.  ASCAP as John Cowan noted is the agency that collects fees according to a formula where the monies go to the highest ranked artists (by their estimate) and nothing goes to the indies.

The owner goes on:

"the problem is that there is still the fee even if all originals. Our singer/songwriter series was originals only and ASCAP came down on me like the wrath of God! After (Name deleted: ASCAP Rep) threatened me with jail and a $40,000 fine for letting local people sing their own unpublished songs in a 20 seat venue, I finally gave in and paid. Only then did I offer open mic. BMI rep was much nicer, but still never gave up, so I paid them too. :(  Mr (ASCAP Rep) is personally responsible for shutting down a number of small businesses across the region. He said we have to pay because if someone ACCIDENTALLY sings a line from a published lyric, I would be responsible for the fine."

And there you go, David Lowery of The Trichordist.  Another Sasquatch sighting.

It is time for the new generation of performers and room owners to say "No Covers. No Collections!"
 
They threaten.  They destroy.  They are the locusts of the old music business destroying the ground where the new music is taking root.  As with all locusts they don't care.  They devour and move on oblivious to the destruction to art and artists, caring only that they and they alone control access to markets, that they and their members collect fees, and that artificial scarcity is enforced where none exists.

Are these threats hollow?  No.  As Copyright Law exists today, if you play covers, they legally can collect fees regardless of how unfair their distribution formulas.  BMI is "friendlier" because you can join, but just like iTunes, you will find your self paying aggregators for the privilege.   No middle man; no pay.   Even if you pay all the production costs and take all the risks; you still pay to play.

I am not a lawyer but I think they threaten because legally they cannot collect if they cannot prove songs they collect for have been performed.  And like all bullies they rely on their victims not knowing that.  They use legal means to illegal ends.

Fuck 'em.  No Covers.  No Collections.

Exclusion Contracts for Small Performance Rooms: Earn Loyalty

Imagine the reaction among the young musicians and their fans if BMI/SESAC/ASCAP (a songwriter can only join one) if these organizations announced jointly that they have set a lower tier for rooms that host music events from which they will not collect performance royalties. No monitoring required other than the room submit an application for exclusion based on real income to the room that is updated every year. Past a certain amount of income, the room agrees to pay the fees without legal recourse.

The Bigs have a terrible reputation which they deserve. The Pirates are doing terrible damage to the industry and deserve to be shut down with a vengeance. Between them is an ad industry and tech industry that doesn't give a flying frik because all they have to do is keep doing what they are doing and they pick up enough jacks to win. If this is to change for the betterment of the artists, the collection agencies have to reform their policies to allow new acts to emerge and still want to be part of those societies. Conventional wisdom in the big centers like LA, Nashville and New York is these acts have no choice if they want to be paid. They aren't being paid anyway. So they have zero to lose. Why not take another tack and give them something to gain: earn as they go. Show them genuine respect instead of dismissing them as second raters. Try inclusion instead of exclusion, big tent instead of a curated elite. Elites emerge organically. Talent doesn't have to be curated except by its audience. Curators are not gatekeepers; they are expediters and if they take that role, the us vs them diminishes. If the collection agencies stop robbing piggy banks, the antagonism (which is real and intensifying) diminshes. It is replaced by loyalty. It is replaced by good will.

And the pirate industries fear this because they know if the kids, the new generation decides to throw in with the curators and the collectors, the pirates are done because the web has always been viral and some viruses immunize. Give it some thought.

Tired Of Chasing Rainbows

From the vault, this was our first song to get decent airplay in the local stations. Made on a Fostex quarter inch eight with one good mic and a lot of chutzpah, we were having fascinating times. From Ground Level Sound, The Evolution of Cool, Tired Of Chasing Rainbows.

Open Mics: Karma Bakeria

Tonight I attended open mic night at The Karma Bakeria in Fayetteville Tennessee.   My pastor and friend, Michael Stewart used to tell me about this coffee house and said I should go play there.   Unfortunately Mike passed away before I did finally go but hey, Mike was right.   Go north from Huntsville on 231/431 across the state line, past Park City and into the metropolis of Fayetteville, just past the old courthouse on the town square half a block on the right.  Ya can't miss it.   It's a nice room, good pastries, salads, sandwiches and locally ground brew that will pick you up and slap you down.  IOW, a great stop if you're headed up to the distillery or just like to ramble around these small towns that are still genuine Southern jewels.

The open mic is hosted by Taylor Hoch and Jay.   Taylor is a professional songwriter and singer with a barrelling tenor, smooth finger acousic picking and simply excellent songs.  Jay plays electric blues, tasty slide and together they are the kind of act you really want to see anchoring an open mic because anyone who follows them better be good or at least trying real hard.  It was a privilege to follow them but I made sure someone else did first because... well, ahma chicken.

All open mic nights, even The Bluebird, that I've played over the years have about the same distribution of talent.   Some people are good; some are there.  Out of ten, three acts will be stellar, four will be journeymen and three will be getting started.   That's healthy and that's why it's free.  Remember to buy enough consumables to keep the room open and enjoy the original sounds and "obscure covers'.

I remain amazed at how much good songwriting is bursting from the local countryside like wildflowers.   I don't know if it's the times, the fact that coffee houses are back, or the music business spreading out of the old major centers like Nashville, or the web giving access.   All of the above probably, but it is happening and it is magic while it lasts.  If we can just get the BMI/SESAC/ASCAP collectors to stop mugging the small rooms like this, it will last longer.  So, if you are someone whom they listen to, give them the wordL  QUIT ROBBING PIGGY BANKS. 

As for me, playing Gentle On My Mind and Arlo Guthrie, reciting Victor Buono, finger picking nylon again, just letting myself be the guy I used to be before I had a "real career" is comfort for my troubled soul these days.   I have no idea how we're going to pay the bills now that the day gig is short on 'natch and writing me out of the script.   I'll resume worrying about that tomorrow or when I wake up in the middle of the night as I usuall do.   But tonight, it's good to be me again.  I like that guy,  He was fun.   People liked him.   He had his own sound.   He had a reason to get up and he had a craft he loved.   So, thanks to Taylor and Jay and the fine folks at Karma Bakeria.  I plan to go back.  Maybe next time I'll play some Bach too.   Over the top, but heck, if I got away with King Tut, I can get away with Johann.

Cheers!

An Open Letter to The Music Industry: Quit Robbing Piggy Banks

And of course the open letter to David Lowery was received with diplomacy and serious consideration.  Not.

In his view the world is filled with "scofflaws" who are all stealing from the artists.  He says that rooms where this is not the case are "sasquatch sightings" and that people from "Alabama" are "like that".  He feels "threatened".

Wow.

In other words the primary campaigner for fairness for artists is afraid to admit that there might be other possibilities.  Or so infatuated with the status that role has brought him he has become yet another anachronism who goes over the top and has yet to realize his credibility as a representative of recording artists is evaporating.

And that is a problem for the campaign to get artist equity in the brave new world of digital distribution.  Yes, there is a lot of ripoff going on.   Yes, copyright is being eviscerated.

Yet there is another story, a story where the same people who are appointed to collect fees are robbing piggy banks.  From the original mistakes made by the recording and publishing industry prosecuting housewives for making wedding videos to now there has been a noticeable reluctance to admit that there need to be changes, that scarcity is impossible and that the technical world will not roll backward.   Some of us have worked hard to find solutions and reconcile the need for payments for copyright material with the near impossible requests to stop piracy.   But these efforts will go on because piracy is wrong and it fuels even worse criminal activity.  In short, I do support those efforts and have even before Lowery became a champion.

But badgering small coffee house open mic nights where it is obvious to even the casual observer that they don't actually have the money to pay three collection agencies every year is bullying.   Should BMI/ASCAP/SESAC be threatening the coffee houses holding open mic nights?

There are at least two extremes and no one is asking an obvious question: what is the threshhold for payments vs money made and covers sung or is it simply 1k a year per collection agency if even one cover is sung? And if so, is that right?

There is an opportunity for the professional artists and publishers to do something smart, gracious and decent.   It is an opportunity to show the world they aren't cold hard greedy self-serving assholes determined only to preserve their own income sources at the cost of everyone else.   If they can't see this or figure out how to do it, then they deserve neither our help or our respect.   And let the pirates have them.   If they can't help the new talent, then they are of no value to music as an art, a craft or an industry.   Working "only with the best", telling others not to vote for "second raters", these are symptomatic of elitism, forgetting that once upon a time it was they who "played real good for free".

Choose.

Open Letter To David Lowery at The Trichordist

When ASCAP/BMI/SESAC stops demanding payments from the little coffee shops where kids have to sing all original all night long because 3k a year really is more than they can afford, so they have to take up donations to pay for covers, maybe there will be some semblance of sanity on both ends of the copyright wars.  I went to a brew pub where four songwriters held the stage for two hours for maybe and audience of five and only one of those not a girlfriend of a performer.  All paid up. Then I went to the college coffee shop where it was packed wall to wall with kids with guitars and one gay guy with a ukelele, hot as hell, kids sprawling down the sidewalk, puny PA, no organization but a scribbled sign up list, and they were singing their hearts out.  For free.  No covers.  They can't afford them.

As the twig is bent, David, so grows the tree.   I've spent time fighting for the Bigs because the tech industry of which I've been a part is ripping the artists off.  Yet there is so much frikkin' greed that they can't cut those kids a break.   And maybe that's karma because if those kids keep singing their own songs in one generation they will forget the Moptops, flower power, and grunge.  They will remember Jason Mraz, Isbell, maybe even some Peter Paul and Mary, but they will say to hell with the collection agencies who cannot cut them a break, who force them to beg for tips to pay the vig.  You want their support?  Talk to the Boys and tell them to set a tier for collections.  Quit robbing piggy banks.   If the music matters that much, then let the backyard gardens grow.  That  is where the new music is coming from and they don't need you, they don't need Taplin who calls them second rate and they don't need T-Bone Burnett who only "works with the best".   They are the future and if you can't help them when they need help, then to hell with you.   You don't matter.  You're done.   But if you do, then maybe there is a coming generation that will see to it the right thing happens.   Your choice

Busking

The day was cooler than normal and there was an arts event downtown producing foot traffic, so I decided to go a busking.  For those unacquainted with the term, busking is street performing.  Singers, find a spot, open the case, take out the guitar and sing for tips. 

There is an entertainment district with mapped out locations for buskers and times of the week when this is allowed. Before these districts were established busking was considered pandering and a performer could pay a fine or be arrested, To boost foot traffic for the sake of businesses such as restaurants, busking was legitimized. It is Free Entertainment for the businesses who used to pay performers. Oh boy, but ok.   Couldn't be simpler.

Not quite.

1.  Location Location Location.   Where you setup makes a difference.  There are sweet spots and of course, if you need a PA (and you do), you have to plug the electron hose in.   The best spots are near the restaurants where there is a seated crowd.  The next best are the spots away from the entrances.  The why is people entering or leaving are focused on getting somewhere and they usually do not pause.  So even though you will be seen, tips are thin.  Caveat vendor,

2, May Be Hazardous.  If it was all foot traffic, it would be ok but these are streets with cars driving along them slowly.  You are singing and inhaling a not inconsiderable amount of car emissions.  It won't take long for your throat and lungs to notice.  So just as rooms are eliminating cigarette smoke, the cars are there to put the carbon dioxide back.

3.  Trolls.  The "I Have Taste and I Matter" folk are everywhere and like web trolls, they are there to tell you about that.  Smile and nod.  Or ask them if you can come to their job and tell them how to do it.  Your choice.

4.  Crazies. They can get quite physically close and you don't have the slight advantage of a club manager or bouncer,   This is an open carry environment meaning they have had time to down a few brews and if combined with other substances, they can be very dangerous.  Ninety nine percent of the passerbyes are fine folk but there will always be at least one wasted I Just Got Out Of Prison wacko wandering in.  Stay cool, nod, don't engage,  You can be hurt and very fast.   This is the one undeniable risk.

5.  Material.  Some of us are screamers, some of us are whisperers and some are a mix.   You are outside and unless you have a PA, the traffic both auto and human will drown you out.  Choose wisely.  Some acts are not suitable for the street and no one is that interested because they can walk a half block and listen to another act,

Understand the environment and prepare and busking is great fun.  You can try out new material without wounding the business of a club owner, you can meet people, you can do what you love to do.   Unless you pick the event the money won't be that good but if you pay for gas and a meal, you've helped yourself better than practicing alone.  You can check out your brother and sister performers (aka, competitors), see what is working for them, maybe make a few contacts.   Is it begging?  Sort of but that's ok. Name a job of any kind these days that isn't.  Remember if you sell merc you are not busking.  You are a street vendor and you will need a license for that.

Entertainment opportunities change with economies.  I've seen times when singer songwriters could fill stadiums and times when they have to give it away,   These times are more like the latter but these are opportunities to play if the money isn't the main objective.  And remember this isn't just about the solo artists, it is also the problem for the B-list and former A-list bands who are having to play strip malls.  So no matter how good you think it is for others, everyone is scrambling.   It gets competitive and you have to smile, play more and get by with less.   Adapt, innovate and keep at it.

Unfollowing: The Real Power of Social Media

Daryl Hannah posted a wonderfully sad, gentle, soft and salving video to her Facebook feed.   How do I know it was herself and not Team Daryl?   I asked and she replied quite quickly:  "There is no Team Daryl Hannah. xo"  Just that.  Sweet and with a kiss.   Perfect.

 Then there is Bette Midler.  She posts to her own page instead of having Team Bette do it. Or if she does, she's fooling me well enough to keep it entertaining or makes me think, And that is why she stays in my feed. The cause posts are ok. Those are passions and shared passions are essential to conversation.  It doesn't matter that she doesn't speak directly to me.  She is an a-lister with limited time and hundreds of thousands of fans.   I get that.   It matters that her posts are her voice, her thoughts,  It matters that she respects us enough not to fool us to advance a cause or sell a t-shirt or even an album.  I don't care that she does that as long as she does that.

I've begun to unfollow the celebrities who have Team Zeds, the professional social media experts who post for them, build their brand, sell their bric a brac and otherwise try to create an illusion of involvement, of engagement, of caring.   I am fatigued by the marketing, the shallow engagements, the little dismissives, the big frauds who consume attention and offer cotton candy comforts.   Enough.

This is a conversational medium. The a-listers who get that know if they don't actually communicate, if they let Team Zed do it, then maybe they don't need fans. And that turns us into consumers. Same as TV. And that turns my feed into a street lamp covered with old band posters. The best hope for changing or healing or offering a bit of comfort in daunting times is smart people having smart conversations because choosing who chooses our choices is the ultimate surrender of our power to another, not quite love because that surrenders our selves, but certainly a choice to be made passionately.

Daryl and Bette stay on my feed.  I am grateful they are offering their unique passionate points of view.   So it's a privilege to share a sweet, sad gentle song in which a genuine person sings backup, Daryl Hannah.   She is a Seyfert: a rare kind galaxy because at it's center instead of a void, there is a glowing heart.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zoQmHxGjR1I&app=desktop 

So You're Playing Songwriter's Open Mic:

So you're playing songwriter's open mic:

1. WHO ARE YOU? Always tell us your name. No, just because you have recorded two songs locally, we may not know who you are. Tell us your name at the beginning and end of your set.
2. Tune up BEFORE you get on stage. Really.
3. Bring your own stuff. We all forget things but best to check your gear before you leave the house. Picks, capo, spare strings, oxycontin, these are things one shouldn't have to borrow. (we all have to do it but try not to).
4. If you wrote the song yesterday, it's ok to bring the lyrics. Really it is. We all make mistakes. If you blow it and have to start over, smile and do that. Long apologies aren't necessary. Audiences understand.
5. Warm up at home. Loosens up the muscles and settles the nerves. DO NOT warm up while others are performing and don't play along from the audience.
6. If there are many performers and each get three songs before the next act, DO ONLY THREE SONGs and skip the long personal introductions to them. You are chewing up other performer's time and THEY KNOW IT. Amy Kurland, who created The Bluebird, would explain the rules for the Bluebird audition thus: "Tell us your name. Tell us the name of the song. Play until I say stop." If you violated any of these rules, you failed the audition. It is a business where following instructions is very important because time is money and she was the gatekeeper. No matter how well you played, sang or how good your song was, if you violated any of the rules you didn't pass. You could come back but...
7. New strings pre-stretched if possible. OTW, old strings pre-stretched. (IOW, see rule 2.)
8. Play Sober. Drunk or stoned, it shows. We've all done it.... badly. And COFFEE IS A DRUG. If you are not first, watch out for over caffeinating. Combined with adrenalin, it will make you shake, Water is better. Then when done, have at.
9. Everyone has a CD or iTunes site. That's cool. You can say that. Sell it later.
10. Do you have a business card? If you don't that once in a lifetime chance may just pass you by. No one remembers names and phone numbers scribbled on napkins tend to disappear.

It is a privilege to be in front of an audience; not an entitlement. Be the best you can be everytime even if the only person listening is also sweeping the floor. Good luck and enjoy it.

Sarah Lee Guthrie and Johnny Irion: A Concert

While it is not always a polite turn to review the work of other musicians, I'm making an exception.  Last night it was my privilege to attend a concert by Sarah Lee Guthrie and Johnny Irion.  Short version: they were awesome.

Long version:

I first heard Sarah Lee some years ago when I chanced upon a YouTube video of her performing Pete Seeger's Sailing on The Golden River with her father, Arlo Guthrie.  She has the voice of a sparrow and the nearest comparison I have is Edith Piaf in that small frames and supple voices produce a unique soprano sound.  More about that later.   She has her mother's light figure and the intense studious expression of her father on the cover of Washington County.

Five years ago I traveled with my wife to see Arlo perform at the Guthrie Center in Great Barrington, Massachusetts in the Western Berkshires a few miles from Stockbridge.  Arlo fans know this is the Church where Alice's Restaurant was filmed and the area surrounding it is where the events that are the basis for the movie occurred, or as Sarah Lee called it, "the hippie stuff".   It was one of the best journeys I've taken meeting some of the nicest most sincere caring folks I've known.  It is a journey to an ashram of my generation and I highly recommend it, but this is not about the Restaurant or the Church or even Alice.

During that weekend, we were to attend two performances of Arlo and his family in what was a dress rehearsal for their upcoming tour.  On the first night, unfortunately, Arlo had to be treated for a fall and could not perform.  We were lined up in front of the Church and thought we would have to return to the hotel when the word went out that the rest of the family would go on with the concert.  With not much time to get ready, they did exactly that and the evening was a rousing success.  Watching them it was notable that parts of the evening were Johnny and Sarah filling in with their own act.  While Abe Guthrie held the band together, Sarah was directing, quiet but determined.  She had steel in her spine, the Guthrie sense of show and the love of music and the people who had come to see them.  Tiny but tough; again, Piaf.  

Johnny was acquitting himself as a fine singer and guitarist playing blues, folk and rock with equal parts imitation and original feel. Being on a stage with a family of performers, he was fitting in, accenting and otherwise helping Sarah and the Guthrie sisters, Cathy (Folk Uke) and Annie (a solo performer) take care of the Guthrie kids on stage with them.  Even when chaotic, it was entertaining and dearly real.

The next evening, Arlo came and it was a fine start to the family tour.  I've videos of both evenings and an excerpt of that is at my YouTube site featuring Arlo and the Family playing Gypsy Davey.  As I said to friends before leaving that night, I felt that I was watching not a passing of the torch, but a reassurance of continuity, that the legacy of Woody Guthrie passed to Arlo Guthrie would be in very capable hands when he passed that torch to his children.

I was delighted to read that Sarah and Johnny were coming to Huntsville Alabama.  No Guthrie has ever come here to my knowledge.  Aside:  Johnny told the audience he lived in Huntsville when a toddler.  Sarah responded she didn't know that and then asked if he had been here why did he get them lost on the way?  In this, watching them is like watching Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme: a married couple who know how to perform together and make their family kibitzing entertaining.

The Straight to Ale Brewpub is a largish commercial building in a commercial district of South Huntsville.  A small wooden platform stage is set up at the end of the brew room across from the tanks and in front of the barrels and decorated with the brewery emblem, a red and white devil symbol with a trident in the middle (yes, the Straight to Ale name is that).  It is a cold room as in frosty.  It was sold out to the tune of 60 more tickets than seats so a well-attended show.  This is a listening room and Stephen, the impressario, was sure to remind everyone to "listen".  Dana and I arrived early to get the reserved front row seats and thus got the best seats in the house directly center front.

This is not a songlist review.  First, Sarah amd Johnny do not play songs most of us know.  They play their own songs and occasionally a song by Pete Seeger or her grandfather, Woody Guthrie.  Even then as Sarah said, they tend to do the obscure songs from other writers.  What follows is my sense of their performance.

Their songs are extremely well-crafted.  I am a songwriter and I understand how much work goes into that.  The emotions are painted not in cheerful contrasting colors but blended thoughtfully and still spontaneously.  While Sarah Lee is the name, certainly the looks and the wistful voice, Johnny is the engine, a strong player and writer, passionate ranging vocal, moving and twisting as he physically wrenches the notes from his guitar.  He is a consummate chord master and confident.  Whereas far too many so-called new tradition folkies limit themselves to traditional progressions as if the ghosts of the Nashville Chord Police and the limited style of Woody frowns down on them, Johnny's arrangements have hints of Neil Young and America with a little Steely Dan for flavoring.  There is a Beatle-like cheerfulness even in the somber ballads.  He is a craftsman, an artist and if he continues to hone his craft will emerge as one of the best songwriters and stylists of this new generation of songwriters.  He will not be constrained by a genre.  He will surpass it and there is where his inate astute genius will be realized.

They are very aware of their sound physically and emotionally.  You can watch them position themselves to take maximum advantage of microphone proximity and how it affects their dynamic vocal blending.  Their voices are perfectly matched even.  Johnny has considerable range, embraces his falsetto and uses it to perfectly match Sarah's natural high voice.  They never overpower each other and that is a difficult trick to master.  Here is where the time on the road together shows.  They meet each other in the soaring harmonies in an exquisite twisting melodicism as if their love for each other and their audience were a children's playground of slides, tilt a whirls and swings pushing each other in cascading arcs.

They are very respecful of natural sound resisting the temptation to rely strictly on the PA.  At one point, Sarah Lee stepped to the front of the stage awsy from the microphones and sang acapella directly to the crowd.  In a room that big, that was a very brave move.  And it was exquisite.  No one in the room moved and barely breathed until she sang the last note.  Sitting just a few feet in front of her, Dana and I were enraptured.  Later both she and Johnny left the stage and stood on the floor in front of us and sang to the audience Sarah asking if the people in the back could hear.  It expressed something Arlo told us once on his arlo.net website, that a good sound sounds just like it does three feet in front of the singer.  This is where the tradition of folk singers is felt, that it is an intimate sound no matter the sixe of the crowd or the power of the singer.  And they nailed it every time.

They are both natural storytellers spicing up the air between songs with tales of living among the greats of the last generation of folk musicians, the friends of Arlo, life in the Berkshires which they love, living in a family on the mountain close but not "too close" to her legendary father.  Sarah spoke wistfully of her late mother, Jackie who passed last year and of her daughter that I had seen a few years earlier stomping on Sarah's dinner as she spoke to people in the Church foyer, that the girl spoke of seeing her "Nana" becoming an angel.

It was painful and honest and so completely Sarah.  In this she perfectly projects the love that characterizes the Guthries.  They are spirited, animated, giving and disdainful of the title of being the first family, the royalty of folk music yet completely aware of a responsibility or the gift to reach out to the audience and reflect the love projected on them.  It is the heroism of the tradition, that people matter, that love cannot be overtaken by events or even death.  Love endures.  That light shines from their eyes and they share it cheerfully and honestly.

This is much too long and the concert was much too short even as she said they were keeping us too long. Folk music may not be the power politic of her father's generation.  Still it was Arlo who stepped forward in dark times, scary times, times when people were dieing in VietNam and even on the American streets, it waa Arlo who found a humor that we could share and would get us through to the other side.  For this and other reasons Arlo Guthrie is a personal hero to me.  There is enormous joy in seeing Sarah Lee and Johnny carry that heroism forward, a heroism of caring about people, of forming and sustaining a community of like minded and even contrary individuals. 

And that is the beautiful thought I came away with last night: the spirit of the family, the legacy of Woody and the Weavers, of Pete Seeger, of all the singers and songwriters who always appear when we need them, the gifts of love and music are in such capable, gentle hands.  As she sings, she fills her Daddy's shoes and with her partner in music and life and love, Johnny, will carry on his work in their own way, for their own times with clarity, joy and affection.

Invite them back.  Bring their friends here.   We are an engineering city, a heart of darkness in a world of military contractors and harsh hard metal.  And they let a little light shine last night.   And it salves the pain.

Jamaica Farewell - len bullard with chris kidd

NSA, Privacy, Security Some Thoughts

Serious mindmelds required.

If the NSA sent me the same contract as Google and other dataHoovers use, I'd sign it. Both entities have the same problems of privacy. The NSA has security. So starting with what the web has already accepted as privacy for example in a contract with Google, work out to security. Some amateur thoughts...

Privacy. The legal solution has two parts: opt-in and penalty for failure to perform. The chasm is the assertion that citizens as groups do not legally bargain with the government over issues of opting in or out of policy and that the citizen does not have the right to seek redress (at least of winning). So penalty to perform only falls on the non-governmental entity in the transaction. Should a government as I suspect ALL will maintain a covert capability, there is no means to stop this effectively or over a lifecycle(n). For the agreement among nations to coordinate internet privacy to work, there would be enforceable agreements. And that turns the web into a profitable weapons market or full transparent inspection for less profit.

The reason is the business model is to use the data for profit and the security model is to use the data for defense. In both cases, political or economic advantagee pushes the information ecosystem toward the weapons market. In a dominantly capitalist system, profits win over social responsibility unless such responsibility is engendered by the use of the system itself. Building legal controls into digital systems is doable but is not well-understood at the international level past how we name the transactions: URn. Then it is an issue of expression: say RDF.

Security means access to a file. To fix this, you will need an uncrackable unhackable mcguffin, and at the rate of development in the information ecosystems, this is hard to maintain and be connected. However because we can represent the law as integrated policies over a multi-variate transition state space, we can give domains such as privacy and security relationships that state the legal declarations to any level of information such that the transition from private to public and any other domain can be ascertained and adjudicated.

Transactions are measured at that transition boundary. Think of it as a phase space transition. The static model isn't difficult. It's the dynamic model we'd have to trust our globe to manage.

Ne Me Quitte Pas (If You Go Away) (Brel/McKuen)

I arranged and recorded this wonderful song by Jacques Brel and Rod McKuen as a study in Brel's style as applied to small orchestra, guitar and voice. The choice of actress came out of my wife telling me it has a film noir feel, so it came down to Audrey Hepburn or Barbara Stanwyck. Audrey wins for the French taste and well... expression.

French is one of two classes I flunked in my first year at college. Apologies for my lack of skill, but I chalk it up to nothing is ever wasted and one never knows what might come in handy years later. :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVeAuKoemNo&feature=c4-overview&list=UUQvOiEo12qnnekOauzmXY_Q

Another Time Like Now (+playlist)

Web Piracy: The Worm is Turning and Getting Teeth

I follow The Trichordist blog (www.trichordist.com) to keep up with issues of web piracy.  I recommend it for those in or out of the entertainment industry because David Lowery and his crew fight the good fight.   After decades of hearing nothing can be done, it is good to see some doing something.

This fight is going better.  More a-listers are speaking out and there is (looking at an earlier post) finally a focus on transactional models that bring to the discussion what is necessary;  standards for tracking and reporting based on computer science concepts that can be implemented and reported.  Excellent.  I recently noted a blog from a colleague lamenting timbl explaining that drm standards as much as so many of the digerati hate them are necessary.   That is good news for the creative industry over all.  It is not possible to stop piracy on the internet.   There is every possibility to improve the situation such that it is a reasonable business.  

The revelations about privacy, government snooping etc. even the problems with the obamacare website are bursting the myth of the web bubble: that it is an irrresistable juggernaut of technology innovation, resistance is futile, yadda yadda.   The web isn't going away and no one believes the creative industries can be turned back in time,  But there is finally a sober conversation that technology serves human needs and not the other way around, that technologists are not the moral arbiters of social progress and in fact in too many cases have been social morons.

Until we have transactional standards for transparent auditing and models for transactional pricing we won't be there, but at long last the conversation is realistic and those who say "it can't be done" are being held in the same regard as the tea party for the same reasons:  fools for the pirates of the economy are still fools.

Que bueno.

They may want to write some articles about developments in digital fingerprinting and tracking for media files.   Laws without teeth are games for monopoly money.  This has to be real and it has to have consequences both good and bad.

How to Navigate ROL

An old friend commented on the scene on my Facebook page. It is a screen snap from a virtual reality album I created called "The River of Life". It is on the web at the address below.

You will require a plugin or browser that can render VRML97. A suggestion is the Blaxxun browser at BitManagement
(if others work, please say).

To experience the world:

1. Copy the URL into your browser address box.
2. Let the world load completely. You will hear music.
3. If you have Blaxxun, right click and choose view my avatar.
4. Put your avatar on the boat or right click and select Viewpoints/The Boat.

The Boat will take you to the entrance to the temple grounds. Go to the woman on the bridge. When she refuses yoo,
touch her heart and you are bound to her. Whatever she worships, touch. When she has taught you all
she knows of love, she will release you to roam the world freely.

http://home.hiwaay.net/~cbullard/rol/TheRiverofLife.wrl

If the project interests you, there is a tutorial about this project including code examples in the first articles of this blog:

http://3donthewebcheap.blogspot.com

Softly As I Leave You

This is a style study for me, working out the arrangement of classic jazz ballads by ear and arranging them so I can record them. Thanks Eydie. Vaya con dios.