About three years ago I had the idea of hiring myself out as a lyricist. I put some feelers out and ended up getting a short piece of music from a guy in New York who was managing two twin sister singers. I took the music with me everywhere and listened to it and soaked in it. Then, one day, as I sat in a McDonalds, I felt a flash of inspiration and wrote down the entire song.
A friend of mine who runs a studio recorded it for me and I submitted it but in the end the manager decided the song was not right for the singers.
I will share it with you, my Loyal Readers:
THE FLIGHT OF THE SWAN
[Spoken]
I stood there and I wondered
As I watched your taillights fade away in the rain
All these things you've said to me
Could it all be a game?
Our love will grow if we take our time
But first I've gotta know
If you can read the signs...
[Sung]
I thought I knew you
When I saw you
But I didn't think to ask you
If you knew yourself
First you kiss me
Then you dis' me
Now I'm hearin' that you're gonna put me
On a shelf
Yeah I want to be your baby
And I know that I am crazy
Read between the lines
If you feel it
Then reveal it
Cause I know that if you're real about it
You'd see the signs
[Chorus]
You can tell the winter by the flight of the swan
You can feel the summer by the height of the sun
So when will you begin to see that I'm the right one
For you?
Well it appears
That all my tears
Are gonna saturate my years
Until you make up your mind
But I know
Our love can grow
And you can make me free although
You've got to read those signs
You can tell the winter by the flight of the swan
You can feel the summer by the height of the sun
So when will you begin to see that I'm the right one
For you?
Don't tell me I didn't do it just right
Don't destroy the candle just to put out the light
I'm waiting for you baby but I can't wait all night
It's up to you...
You can tell the winter by the flight of the swan
You can feel the summer by the height of the sun
So when will you begin to see that I'm the right one
For you?
Copyright (c) 2005 The Doug
Laying in bed this morning, the chorus flashed into my mind. By the time the computer booted, I had a verse.
Little Betty Lou was feelin kinda blue and she din't know what to do last night
She couldn't stay at home so she called me on the phone and said "Boy I gotta get out tonight"
So I said
Hey you wanna go where we go when we go where we go when we go tonight?
Hey you wanna do what we do when do what we do when we do tonight?
Hey you wanna play what we play when we play what we play when we play tonight?
And it'll be alright
And it'll be alright
Quotes of Igor Stravinsky:
"I have learned throughout my life as a composer chiefly through my mistakes and pursuits of false assumptions, not by my exposure to founts of wisdom and knowledge."
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"Just as appetite comes by eating, so work brings inspiration, if inspiration is not discernible at the beginning. "
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"The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees one's self. And the arbitrariness of the constraint serves only to obtain precision of execution."
]]>Last night I was coming home from a party. It was a quiet, foggy night with few cars on the road. I felt like I could drive to California. I looked overhead and saw a jet shining its lights forward into the night.
That moment and that mood
inspired this song.
Today I watched the demo for a fantastic piece of music software, Properllerhead's Reason 4.0.
Wow. I am in love all over again.
I have Reason 2.5 and I love it. This software looks and acts like hardware synthesizers mounted on a metal cabinet. You can even turn the components around and hook up (bouncing) cables between the elements. The graphics show fans and power cords. The interface is knobs and sliders. It's a beautiful piece of work and a creativity-inducing way to compose music.
Reason 3.0 looked like Reason 2.5, only a lot more convenient. It had ways of grouping elements and simplifying the workflow. I wouldn't have turned it down...but it would have been fine to have.
Reason 4.0 is almost a rewrite. It's absolutely gorgeous to look at. The sequencer is just amazing. And the new synthesizer called Thor...it's got some muscle, baby.
I watched all the videos today and...wow...I want this one. Only $129 for the upgrade. It's like buying a complete new system for $129.
On a side note, I caught myself having a very interesting reaction to one aspect of Reason 4.0. On many parts of the synthesizers you can right-click and a menu pops up. This is a break from the previous versions of Reason, where they really kept 100% to the feel of a piece of hardware. Anything you wanted done, you clicked on buttons, moved sliders, turned knobs, etc. Seeing a menu pop up gave me just a touch of sadness.
]]>After my weekend on the beach (in my mind...), I've had a few thoughts come to me....
1. I would like to be in more contact with my family.
It takes a lot of work to meet up with extended family. If I just "let it happen," it doesn't tend to happen. I love seeing my brothers and sisters (on both my side and my wife's side) and I just don't do it enough. I want to plan my life around that more. Plan out a year by who we're going to visit.
2. My relaxing activity: cooking
I like to cook. I'm not particularly good at it, and I don't have any aspirations of being an amazing cook. Maybe that's one reason this popped into my head this weekend: it's an activity that I can just enjoy without getting into my (typical habit of) critical thinking. It's so much fun to find some fresh ingredients and cook them up into something tasty. I haven't really cooked much over the last year. I love sampling different olive oils, types of rice, breads, spices, cheeses, chocolate...I want to learn how to cook tapas.
3. Music is my hobby
I've been putting too much pressure on my music, and that's led me to lose direction. I play and compose because I like it. I don't need any other reason. When I get too many ideas about what I'm trying to accomplish, I lose out on the artistic side, and the self-expression side. I have other parts of my life that are governed by goals, deadlines, and accomplishments; and in those areas, that's fine. Music is fun.
4. Time to launch the art festival
Quite a while back I had an idea of holding a Christian art festival at our church. The idea is this: order a hundred pizzas, set up the stage for bands to play, for open mic, and for poetry readings. Have the projector showing paintings, movies, and any other visual arts. Maybe some workshops.... And just invite everybody who loves art to come and eat pizza, mingle, and enjoy the show.
The pastor is all for it; I've talked to people at church that I think would like to be involved and they are very excited about it. I'm going to call a meeting and begin planning.
...a classic car...
I am into everything. I've got tons of projects in various states of completion: websites, music projects, music practice, fiction writing, nonfiction writing, an art festival I want to run next spring, a HAM radio project I would like to kick off, languages (living and dead) that I would love to learn, and more.
Given that I have MAYBE five hours a week to put into passions like this....something has to go.
I've talked about minimalism of possessions. What about minimalism of activities? Minimalism of targets of passion?
Even this list of ten or so projects is a reduction for me. Thinking about reducing it to three...two...one?...is painful for me. I've made a quick list of my fears of focusing on one project or hobby:
and, of course...
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please please PLEASE put out another album! Do it for The Doug...