I See the Light - Oscar Songs

Following my mom's advice to remain quiet unless I have something nice to say, I will refrain from writing about "I See the Light".  Some things I just don't like.

Ok, maybe I'll say one thing:
The "here/crystal clear" rhyme thing has been done before.  It has been done on a melody of ti-la-sol, with ti ("CRY"-stal) on the downbeat.  Not, ahem, a whole new world of songwriting.  Definitely not a brave one.  Then again, brave, exploratory art rarely wins awards from established institutions.  That is the world we live in.

That is all. 

What I love about learning a song a day: I am forced to prioritize, look at the big picture.  What are the most important things about this song?  What do I need to remember?  Harmony, form, melody, feel.  When the day is over, move on to the next thing, and just see how much I can recall later. 

What I love about taking more time: Getting more in the details.  What is the keyboard player doing?  Why can't I play that one riff?  Coming back with a fresh perspective - oh, that chord has an extension I didn't hear the first time through. 

I played a game of schedule tetris yesterday.  Actually, it was more like music chairs, because with tetris, everything fits somewhere if you can get to it fast enough.  With musical time slots, there are always little tasks left running around with no hour to sit on. 

My Weekly Wishes aren't falling neatly into the weeks.  I'll learn my last Oscar song, "If I Rise", on Sunday.  I will make the medley another week.  Tonight and tomorrow, I need to practice "Black Coffee", which I'm supposed to record with my friend tomorrow.  Or I'll work on the Gershwin transcription, if she has to reschedule (I just texted to confirm).  Wrapping up this week's Wish is being pushed aside so I can finish up Wishes from other weeks.

Some Wishes, like learning to play accordion, aren't meant to fit into a week.  (Sorry, neighbors.  Sorry, kitty.) It's only a framework to see how much time I can find within a week to practice just for fun, because I still suck at time-management. To let it go and move on to something else, because I will need to practice letting go and moving on until the day I die.

EQ2EBG5HR59C

Coming Home - Oscar-nominated song

Ok, if you read this blog last year, you remember about me and sentimental ballads, right? And how much they make me want to hurl? How did I forget that Oscar-nominated songs are almost always sentimental ballads?!

Oh well. I'm still having fun this week. Yesterday's song was "Coming Home", and tonight I've gotten started with "I See the Light".

In the category of unusual modulations, we have "Coming Home" (start about 2:45 on the video to check this out): it goes up a whole step after the second chorus, plays through the first two phrases of the chorus minus the patter lyrics, then it goes back DOWN to the original key of C major.  Who does that!?!? The song was written by Bob DiPiero, Tom Douglas, Troy Verges and Hillary Lindsey, so apparently they do. Or maybe some arrangers who aren't credited as songwriters were involved here.

"After the second chorus" is usually the bridge. I like bridges. I mean, I have to, if I ever want to get out of Manhattan (there are piles of dirty snow everywhere, and more freezing rain on the way - right now I'm thinking cross a bridge into Queens and get the next flight to Puerto Rico). Song bridges are great because they are your chance to get out, musically speaking, of the 'hood for a while. Then come back to Manhattan for the end, because you know you love it here. On the bridge, get a change of scenery: change the chord progression, the melody, the rhythm or rhyme scheme of the lyrics.

...Or maybe just the key. I can't say for sure, because I haven't seen Country Strong or how the song is used in it, but I'm guessing there isn't a profound cinematic reason for that key change up a step and back down. I'm guessing it's some songwriters/arrangers who found a cheap trick to "write" a bridge. Hm. I will steal that cheap trick and put it in my own bag for later use.

Maybe Gwyneth Paltrow's character has to cross a bridge to get back home. A bridge that's a step up. And then back down.

Weekly Wish: Oscar-Nominated Songs

Why I am not learning a song a day this year, even though I miss it:
because I'm writing about learning a song a day, a book which is turning out to contain barely any material from last year's blog posts. 

Because I'm learning audition material and working and looking for more work and doing stuff that is higher priority than learning a song every day just for the heck of it. 

And!

Because I'm wishing.

If wishes were horses, beggars would ride: so goes the proverb.  I have a beggar, and she is saying, "Please please please let me go back to learning a song every day, just for a little while."  So this week, she will ride on a horse that says, "I wish I could still learn a song a day.  I wish I paid more attention to the movies.  I wish I knew this year's Oscar-nominated songs."

So, I'm going to learn the four songs that are nominated for Best Original Song:
"Coming Home" from Country Strong
"I See the Light" from Tangled
"If I Rise" from 127 Hours
"We Belong Together" from Toy Story 3
 and I am going to make a little medley for solo piano. 

Target date for starting to post videos: on or before Valentine's Day.  Hold me to it, readers!

When You Wish Upon a Song:

Ok, I confess: I miss learning my song a day.

I could keep doing it.  I have half-ass learned a song about once a week this year ("I Say a Little Prayer", "Janie's Got a Gun", "Money, Money, Money", "But Not For Me").  But it's time to move on to new things.

And it's time to tell my gentle readers what those new things are, so I feel guilt-tripped into making them happen:

I don't have a clever name for this year's project, so I'm just calling it the Wish Project.  At the beginning of each week I complete the sentence "I wish I could..." with something specific that I'd like to be able to do musically, for instance, "I wish I could play the accordion so I can record a xote tune with my friends who play Brazilian music" (which was my first wish, much to my neighbors' chagrin!).  Then I spend whatever time I am able that week working toward that goal. 

With the weekly project, I have time to get in deeper, leave something overnight and come back to it, approach things a little differently.

The rules (always with the rules!) are:
1. I have to want to do what I choose to do (no fake wishes! no "shoulds"!).

2. I can come back to the same wish later, but not the following week - I have to let it go and move onto something else for at least a week. 

3. I will post videos of the wishes when they are ready to present to the public.  Gonna aim for about once a month, give or take a little since most of my projects are going to involve collaboration. 

Here are my wishes so far this year:
Jan 9: I wish I could play accordion so I can record a xote song with my friends who play Brazilian music. 

Jan 16: I wish I could play a Gershwin solo transcription (I chose "Swanee" because that was one of the songs in the book and on the Gershwin plays Gershwin piano rolls album, even though they're not the same version.

Jan 23: I wish I could play the piano for a singer the way Paul Smith played for Ella Fitzgerald (working on "Black Coffee" from the Intimate Ella album). 

Stay tuned, and feel free to suggest wishes!

The List

Ok folks, here's the final list.  Any weirdness (like the fact that there are actually 367 songs on the list, and I'm pretty sure I didn't learn two extra) can be attributed to the fact that I suck at keeping records, as my mom can attest.

Thank you for reading and commenting both here and through other channels, and watch this space - there may be evidence of my continued existence sometime in the next few weeks.

(I Just) Died In Your Arms
21 Questions
A Case of You
A Change is gonna Come
A Child is Born
A Foggy Day
A Thousand Miles
ABC
Across the Universe
Addicted
Adelaide's Lament
Against All Odds
Ain't No Sunshine
All I Wanna Do
All I Want For Christmas
All You Need Is Love
Alone
Amanda
And I am telling You...
And So It Goes
Any Way You Want It
Anyway
As Time Goes By
At Last
Autumn Leaves
Baby, it's cold outside
Bad Day
Bad influence
Bad Romance
Beat It
Beautiful
Beauty and the Beast
Because
Because of You
Bennie and the Jets
Bette Davis Eyes
Bewitched
Big in Japan
Billie Jean
Billionaire
Black Velvet
Bleeding Love
Blowin' in the Wind
Born in the USA
Born to Be Wild
Brick
Bridge Over Troubled Water
Build Me Up, Buttercup
California Gurls
Can't Help Falling in Love
Candle in the Wind
Careless Whisper
Carolina In My Mind
Carry that Weight
Castle on a Cloud
Centerfold
Change the World
Chasing Cars
Cherry Bomb
Cigarette
Clocks
Come Together
Crazy (Patsy Cline/Willie Nelson)
Crazy (Aerosmith)
Crazy (Gnarls Barkley)
Crazy For You
Crazy On You
Creep
Crocodile Rock
Crystal Ball
Desperado
Do Ya Think I'm Sexy
Don't Know Why
Don't Let the Sun Go Down On Me
Don't Stop Believin'
Don't Worry, Be Happy
Downtown
Dream a Little Dream of Me
Ease on Down the Road
Easy to Be Hard
Ebony and Ivory
Edelweiss
Eleanor Rigby
Embraceable You
Empire State of Mind
End of the Road
Endless Love
Ev'ry Time We Say Good-Bye
Every Breath You Take
Everyday is a Winding Road
Evil Ways
Exhale (Shoop Shoop)
Faithfully
Falling Slowly
Far From the Home I Love
Feel
Fever
Fire and Rain
Flashdance - What a Feeling
Foolish
For now
Free Fallin'
Friends In Low Places
F*** Her Gently
Funhouse
Georgia on my Mind
Glitter In the Air
Go Your Own Way
God Bless the Child
Golden Slumbers
Good Riddance
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
Gravity (John Mayer)
Gravity (Sara Bareilles)
Great Balls of Fire
Hallelujah
Halo
Hand In My Pocket
Hard Day's Night
Hard Times
Have a Heart
Have a Little Faith
Have You EVer Really Loved a Woman?
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
Heaven
heaven help my heart
Help!
Here Comes the Sun
Here for the Party
Here I Go Again
Hey Jude
Higher Ground
Holding Back the Years
Home
Honesty
Honky Cat
Hotel California
How to Save a Life
Human Nature
Hurt
I Ain't Got Nobody
I Am What I Am
I can't Get no Satisfaction
I Can't Make You Love Me
I Don't Believe You
I Don't Care Much
I Dreamed a Dream
I Got You (I Feel Good)
I Got You Babe
I Guess That's Why They Call It The Blues
I heard it through the Grapevine
I Hope You Dance
I know the Truth
I Love Rock & Roll
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
I Swear
I Wanna Dance With Somebody
I Want to Hold Your Hand
I Want You Back
I Was Made For You
I Will Always Love You
I Will Follow You Into the Dark
I Will Survive
I Wish
I'd Like to Hate Myself in the Morning
I'll Be Home for Christmas
I'll Be Seeing You
I'll Be There
I'll Cover You
i'm not that girl
If I Ain't Got You
If I Could Turn Back time
If I Loved You
If It's MAgic
If You Don't KNow Me By Now
Imagine
Impossible
Isn't She Lovely
It Don't Mean a Thing
It Must've Been Love
It Takes Two
it won't be long now
Jack & Diane
Joanna
Just the Way You Are
Kate
King of Anything
King of the World
Lady Madonna
Lady Marmalade
Last Night on Earth
Lean on Me
Learnin' the Blues
Leaving on a Jet PLane
Let It Be
Let it Snow
Let's Stay Together
Letterbomb
Life of the Party
Like a Rolling Stone
Listen
Look Away
Love is a Many-Splendored Thing
Love Song
Love You i do
Lovefool
Low Rider
Lullabye
Lullabye
Mack the Knife
Magic
Man in the Mirror
Many the Miles
Maria Maria
Maybe This Time
Memory
Monster Mash
Moondance
My Favorite Things
My Girl
My Guy
My Heart Will Go On
My Way (Los Lonely Boys)
My Way (Sinatra and everyone else)
New York State of Mind
New York, New York
Nick of Time
No Woman, No Cry
Not Ready to Make Nice
Nothing Compares 2 u
oh Darling
On My Own
One (Singular Sensation)
One Night ONly
One Song Glory
Open Arms
Orange-Colored Sky
Ordinary People
Out Tonight
Paparazzi
Part-Time Lover
Piano Man
Pick Yourself Up
Piece of My Heart
Please Don't Leave Me
Poker Face
Popular
Possession
Proud Mary
Put Your Records On
Rainy Days and Mondays
Raise Your Glass
Respect
Ribbon in the Sky
River
Rocket Man
Rush, Rush
Sacrifice
Seasons of Love
September Song
Shadowboxer
Shadowman
She Came in Through the Bathroom Window
She's Always A Woman
She's Got A Way
Should've Been a Cowboy
Signed, sealed Delivered
Sir Duke
Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay
Sleigh Ride
Smells Like Teen Spirit
Smooth Criminal
So In Love
So What
Sober
Someone To Watch Over Me
Somethin' to Talk About
Something
Somewhere
Somewhere Over the Rainbow
Song for the Dumped
Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word
Stand By Me
Strawberry Fields Forever
Strong Enough
Summer, Highland Falls
Sunny Came Home
Superstar
Superwoman
Surfin' USA
Sweet Dreams (are made of this)
Sweet Home Alabama
Take It To The Limit
Take Me Home, Country Roads
Take Me or Leave Me
Take the A train
Takin' Care of Business
Taking Chances
Tears in Heaven
Tempted
Thank You For the Music
That's All
That's the Way Love Goes
The Best Is Yet To Come
The Best of My Love
The Boy Is Mine
The Christmas Song
The Closest Thing To Crazy
The Crossroads
The End of the Innocence
The Lady is a Tramp
The Long and Winding Road
The Lucky One
The Man That Got Away
The Search Is Over
The Show Must Go On
The Story
The Stranger
the wizard and I
Theme from Rocky (Gonna Fly Now)
there are worse things i could do
There's a Fine, Fine Line
These Dreams
They Can't Take That Away From Me
Thriller
ticket to ride
TIme after Time
Tiny Dancer
To Make You Feel My Love
Together Forever
Total Eclipse of the Heart
Trouble
Try Again
Try Sleeping With a Broken Heart
Un-Break My Heart
Undone (the Sweater song)
Vanilla Ice Cream
Vegas
Vienna
Virtual Insanity
Wake Me Up When September Ends
We Belong Together
We Will Rock you
What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?
What's Going On?
What's Up
When I Fall In Love
When I'm Sixty-Four
When You Say Nothing At All
When You're Good to Mama
When You're Home
White Christmas
Why Do You Let Me Stay Here?
Will You Love Me Tomorrow?
Winter Wonderland
With a Little Help From my Friends
Wonderful Tonight
Yesterday
You
You Are the Sunshine of My Life
you can't stop the beat
You Go To My Head
You Make Me Feel Like a Natural Woman
You May Be Right
You've Got a Friend
You've Got Possibilities
Your Song

For Now

"For Now" from the musical Avenue Q contains not one, not two, but three key changes up a half-step - the obligatory musical theater modulation taken to extremes.  It's the finale of the show, though, so they deserve to milk it for all it's worth. 

So here we are at the finale of my own little project.  My sister and brother-in-law took the boys to an indoor play area so I could have some much-appreciated quality time with the keyboard.  I almost succeeded in holding in a meltdown last night after my sister suggested, in a subtle way that belies her non-Japaneseness, that the rhythmic thumping of the keys when I practice with headphones might potentially be loud enough to elicit a complaint from the neighbors downstairs.  I was ok until she came to apologize because she felt bad we hadn't made enough time during Normal Waking Hours for me to practice.  I wasn't upset with her, I was just frustrated, and I hadn't had my US RDA of alone time for a while, and -

Well, frankly, it has nothing to do with her or Japan or anything like that - I'm just a little frightened for next year.  I thrive on simplicity, like 12-bar blues, or learn-a-song-a-day - but now it's time to rebalance life, priorities, how I budget my time.  Which is a complicated, ever-changing equation.  I need to subtract song-a-day in order to add important things like write-a-book and find-better-paying-work, but I don't want to lose the traction I've gained this year.  I have a project planned for next year that's more abstract than the simple but time-consuming directive to memorize a song every day, and I'm worried that my little monkey mind won't be able to stick with it. 

Sigh.  Speaking of monkey mind, it's customary to do a sort of year-in-review at this time, is it not?  Let's swing over to that branch now. 

In honor of High Fidelity, I'll start with some Top 5 lists:
SONGS THAT I WAS SURPRISED TO LIKE AND WHY:
5. The Best is Yet to Come - great, interesting form.
4. Friends in Low Places - Vocal. Range. Well done, Garth.
3. Theme from Rocky - nice development of musical ideas.  Dig the combo of fanfare and electric guitar solo in the same song.
2. All I Want for Christmas is You - Discovered to my surprise that I like Mariah.  Won't spoil it by trying to explain.  I just do.
1. Smells Like Teen Spirit - awesome melody.  No wonder this is so coverable.

SONGS THAT I LIKED LESS AFTER LEARNING THEM AND WHY
5. The Story - Brandi Carlile - would like to hear it sung by a man, suspect the melodic range would sit better than in a female voice.  And Brandi Carlile has no business singing about lines on her face, even if she sounds like she's giving herself nodes on her vocal cords by doing so.
4. If It's Magic - Stevie Wonder - don't know.  Maybe I'm jealous of the harp for taking over any of Stevie's repertoire.
3. Foolish - Ashanti - that piano riff really gets on my nerves after a while.
2. What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life - Bergman/LeGrand, various recordings - I prefer my schmaltzy lyrics and slow tempi not to occur in the same song.
1. Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman: - Bryan Adams - Worst. Lyrics. Ever.

BADASS PIANO SONGS I WANT TO GO BACK AND SPEND MORE TIME ON (in no particular order):
5. Summer, Highland Falls (and a lot of other Billy Joel stuff)
4. Honky Cat (and a lot of other Elton John stuff)
3. Lullabye (Ben Folds - for the piano solo in particular)
2. Great Balls of Fire
1. Ribbon in the Sky (and other Stevie Wonder stuff)
0. honorable mentions... too many to mention! Ray Charles, Alicia Keys, Paul Smith (Ella's accompanist)...

As you may have inferred from that last list, doing a song a day had its pros and cons.  One pro - I am familiar with a lot of songs.  One obvious con: I didn't have time to absorb much more than the form and chord progression, and maybe a riff here and there. 

So did I succeed or fail?

Well ok, if you asked me to sit down and play (and sing! that was part of the objective! ack!) from memory down the list of 365 songs, we'd come up with a colossal fail. 

But I would remember some of them.  Maybe even a lot of them.  And I suck less than I did, which, you may recall, was the other objective.

I still wish I could beam myself to where I want to be, literally and musically.  But a journey doesn't just begin with a single step, it continues with further steps, little by little, sometimes assisted by wheeled or jet-fueled vehicles.  Songs: 365 sticks of dynamite (well, maybe a few M60s snuck in there) to blast Perfectionazis out of the way, bridges to connect people who may have nothing else in common, gemstones to decorate my life, companions when my kitten doesn't suffice and real humans are frustrating or unavailable. Three hundred sixty-five stepping stones to help me go, little by little, toward the seemingly-inaccessible town of Less Suckness.  Musical Omniscience is a mirage, like water ahead on the freeway, always out of reach, but Less Suckness is actually as accessible and common as Springfields -it's everywhere along the way! 

Process vs. Product.  We live in a product-oriented culture.  Humbug.  In the end, aren't our lives made up of a consecutive series of Nows, not products-that-we're-buried-with?  I still haven't found what I'm looking for, no.  I'd like to learn actual notes, not just form and harmony that I fake my way through with varying degrees of competence.  I'd like to review what I've learned, so I can retain it.  I'd like to suck less than I do today.  If everything in life is only for now, I'd like to spend most of my Nows playing with words and music (with breaks for family and friends, travel, and shoe-shopping).  Which is what I did this year.  So I'm calling it a success. 

Happy New Year!

New Year's in Japan!

My sister has lived a total of about fifteen years in Japan, between study abroad, work and marriage.  The work program she took part in after college determines where they send people based partially on language ability - people with less Japanese skill will be better off in cities where there is a relative abundance of English.  My sister, being the badass that she is, got sent to the booniest of boonies: a small farming village in Kyushu where she was the first foreign resident, like... ever. I should mention, my sister is 5'10", blond and blue-eyed, about as non-Japanese as a humanoid can get. 

My sister's best Japanese friend, Chieko, is the only child of the sake brewers of that village.  My favorite New Year's ever - and it will be hard to top - was spent at her family's house in Kyushu nine years ago.  New Year's is the big holiday in Japan. Sort of the reverse of the U.S. - Christmas is the date holiday, and New Year's is the go-home-and-get-fat-with-your-family holiday.  Stores close, business associates exchange gifts.  My sister's friend's family had mountains of mikan, and platters and platters of traditional New Year's food from their business associates.  We basically sat around the kotatsu and ate for a couple days.  Everything was closed. Granted, it was a small town, but you could've heard a pin drop anywhere in the village.

On New Year's Eve, my sister and I went to the local Zen temple.  They have a giant bell there that is rung with what is much like a suspended railroad tie with a cord to move it.  The bell is rung 108 times on New Year's (see here for the significance of 108).  Since it's such a small town, I got to smash the railroad tie into the bell a couple times.  Some little kids were keeping count of the rings.  Then my sister and I hung out, drinking green tea and eating cakes with the priest and his wife, who remembered her from her time working in the town.  At midnight, the priest went to the altar (?) and chanted.  We returned to her friend's house, where it was a few degrees warmer inside (no joke, we could see our breath when we were brushing our teeth - I'll have to talk about Japanese houses another time).  We slept on futons under super-warm futon comforters, then got up and had sake for breakfast.  Er, with breakfast.  I'm pretty sure there were few cessations of eating that week. 

Japanese kids usually receive gifts of money at New Year's. I was very surprised to receive such a gift from Mr. Yano, one of the townspeople who had come to New Mexico in a tour group organized by my sister.  My sister's local government job was basically cultural exchange, so why not get to take a trip home by bringing her Japanese country mice to check out Southwest America and its country mice?  Fun was had by all, even Mr. Yano, who put up with an abcess tooth with typical Japanese don't-want-to-trouble-anybody stoicism until it became unbearable and had to be removed in my hometown - imagine having emergency dental work done in a language you don't understand!  Anyway, Mr. Yano gave me a generous New Year's give of 10,000 yen (almost $100) instructed me to get something for myself and for my parents, whom he'd met on the New Mexico trip.

A note on Mr. Yano: had WWII lasted any longer, had we not dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I would never have gotten to meet this kind, humble man.  He was training as a kamikaze pilot when the war ended.  He got to see the yards of the Pima Air Museum near Tucson, AZ, and he said something to the effect of, "What were we thinking?  These were your leftovers," about the giant machines.  The Japanese were prepared to fight until every last one of their young men had gone down in a paper airplane.  So, while I think that the museum in Hiroshima should be required viewing for every single 8-year-old child on the planet, so that we impress upon them before puberty how very stupid and fucked-up war is, I also think that there are at least two sides to every story.  Before Mr. Yano said it, I never thought there could have been any upside, at all, ever, for any individual anywhere, to dropping an atomic bomb.  And even with that slightly conflicted view of that particular sad event in history, I couldn't smile for several hours after leaving the museum in Hiroshima when I visited with my then-boyfriend last time I was in Japan.  Ugh.  Imagine all the people, people, please.

Meanwhile, back in the Kansai area where my sister now lives, my sister and nephews and I went to visit Chieko.  Chieko married a sake brewer from this area, so my sister very conveniently has a friend nearby.  We had okonomiyaki lunch with Chieko and her kids, sent her son to cram school with a packed dinner (6+ hours of cram school on vacation, ugh!), and went to her house via the sake brewery.  I got to have a quick little tour of the brewery, proof that even when I am almost-studiously avoiding tourism, I still get to do cool stuff.  Tamara and Chieko and I drank tea and ate little yummy things like good grown-ups while the kids ran around and played their noisy rambunctious bilingual play.  Chieko's daughter can definitely keep up with my two nephews.  I'm pretty sure she's a superhero. 

I wasn't sure where I was going with this when I started writing.  I probably wanted to talk about food.  That's usually where I'm going when I start - food or music theory.  But my natural gravitas strikes again, and I can't help but notice something non-food-related:

My grandpa, who earned a Purple Heart fighting in Europe in WWII, often referred to "Japs", at least until my sister moved to their country and seemed to be happy.  Mr. Yano got his tooth extracted while visiting America, a tooth he wouldn't have had in a lifespan he wouldn't have had if WWII had lasted only a few more days.   My sister was doing a summer internship in Florida between years of grad school when one of her assignments was to interpret for a Universal Studios Japan team that had come to study the park in Orlando prior to building the park in Osaka.  One of the few young, single Japanese men who is taller than my sister happened to be on that team, and he is now my brother-in-law.  They have two little halflings, who live in Japan but speak English much of the time, and who live in appropriately-neutral Switzerland for several weeks every summer while my sister works in-house for her main client in Geneva.  Chieko's daughter picked up more English yesterday while playing with my nephews - (kids learn so fast - I heard her correct her pronunciation of "sneck king" to "snake king" after hearing it a couple times from my nephews... goodness knows what a perennially-useful phrase "snake king" is, but it had something to do with whatever game they were making up). 

When the bomb fell on Hiroshima in August 1945, it killed everything for miles around - tens of thousands of people, and all the vegetation.  No one knew when spring might come again, or if it would come, in a stark wasteland peopled with grievously-injured survivors.  In the museum, there's a photograph of one brave little flower coming up out of the barren ground the following spring.

Every culture seems to have a winter solstice observation of hope and light before the darkest and coldest time of year sets in.  This has been my Blog Post of Hope and Light.  Thank you. 

Anyway, Centerfold

Today's songs:
"Centerfold" by the J. Geils Band, and "Anyway" by Martina McBride.

"Centerfold" now belongs in an ever-growing medley I call "Songs in the Key of G".  The medley includes but is not limited to "Blackbird", "Wake me Up When September Ends", and "Chasing Cars" (which is in A, but playing "Wake Me..." makes me want to play it).  I managed to peel myself away from ebay long enough to listen to a few of the surprisingly numerous covers of this song.  I guess I shouldn't be surprised, because that opening riff is really catchy. 

"Anyway" - to be learned after dinner (do-it-yourself sushi here at my sister's place).  This song belongs to a small set of seasonal Songs that Pertain to Important and Meaningful (if Often Tedious and Annoying) Life Lessons Learned This Year, or SPIM(OTA)LLLTY for... short?  Hm.  Well, anyway - unintentional pun - I'll list those songs with short explanations:

1. "Crystal Ball" -
a. Pink's songs are formulaic (my exploration of Funhouse album in early spring was how verse-chorus-bridge form really sunk in - went from knowing-it-in-my-head to ah-ok-so-that's-what-that-is), but I like them anyway.
b. I-IVsus2 = instant pop song
c. There are a lot of lyrics in this song that resonate with me after this year.  I don't think I can sum it up into one pithy sentence, so just go listen to the song.  That's why they exist, after all.

I'm sure I will have geeky musical thoughts about these songs too, but I haven't worked on them yet, so no conscious observations...

2. "Anyway"
I don't know if my career is ever going to take off to the point where I'm being paid to be creative, or if I will remain a respected-in-my-circle but unknown accompanist/music director.  I intend to cobble these posts together with other journaling and writing I've been doing this year into a book, and I intend to record an album that includes some of the songs I've worked on this year, but who knows if it will reach beyond those who already know about it.  I put so much time into things that may never pay off.  But what am I gonna do, not try?
Again, the song says it better.

3. "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For"
There are so many more songs in the world!  I still need to suck less every day!  Ack ack ack ack ack!
I will study music my whole life.  Hopefully I will have the good fortune to make my living at it too, since that's just a more efficient use of my time - on-the-job training.

4. "Only For Now"
Avenue Q is one of my favorite musicals.  It is so expertly crafted, in addition to being funny and irreverent, which entertainment should be if it possibly can.
The bitch about live performance is that you have to get it right time after time, not just once so you can hand it over to the editing team (TV/film actors = sometimes a questionable casting choice for the Broadway stage, just sayin').  As my technique improves, I am beginning to sense that consistency in my playing might actually be in the realm of possibility.  That's exciting.  But I still have to pay attention to what I'm doing.  Because music is only for now.  Or something (go listen to the song).

And then I learn songs like "Centerfold" to crack myself up...

Playing Catch-Up

I seem to have two speed settings: GOGOGOGOGOGO!!! and crasssssshhhhhhh.  Clearly I'm in crash mode at the moment, because all I want to do is rot my brain with tv and internet, and I have no inclination whatsoever to practice.  Ah, vacation.  That time when your brain refuses to work, and it's kind of ok.  

Need to catch up on two things - song-learning and shoe-shopping.  One GO-related and one crash-related.  Song-learning: I discovered a grave Supergeeky Spreadsheet Error yesterday - I do, in fact, have five extra songs to learn before 2011 arrives, because try as I might, I couldn't squeeze in the rest of the make-up songs before I left New York, and I lost most of a day coming here that I won't get back until I return after New Year's.  So I need to double up these last few days.  Oh well.  At least I have plenty of time.  I'm beginning to suspect that Time and Motivation are the same person, since I never see them at the same time. 

The Song Plan:
Today (the 27th) - "Go Your Own Way" and "I'll Be Home For Christmas" (as soon as Mary Poppins is over)

The Rest of the Year (I can't believe we're nearly at the end of it!!):
Crystal Ball (Pink)
Anyway (Martina McBride)
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For (U2)
Only For now (from Avenue Q)
Centerfold (J. Geils Band)
Sleigh Ride
It's My Party and I'll Cry if I Want To
Blue Suede Shoes

I had grand plans of planning a clever curriculum for myself at the end of the year, to highlight my growth over the course of the year blah blah blah, but 1) I'm allergic to waxing toooooo philosophical (sometimes, like when I'd rather be shoe-shopping) and 2) I just didn't have time (I had motivation, though - see what I mean?).

The past few weeks, I've had the same feeling I get whenever I reach the end of a trip - excitement/panic and a sense of "Oh no!  I haven't done this and this and that!  I have to come back!" - only I rarely do go back to these places unless I have family there.  I've decided to handle this existential panic by trying not to do too many things I don't want to do (hence the state of cleanliness or lack thereof of my apartment), trying to make sure the things I bother with are things I want (hence the prevalence of cookies in my diet), and not worrying too much about the rest.  So I try to avoid stupid songs that I hate, and pick songs I think I'll like, and not worry too much about the ones I haven't had time for.  And I keep reminding myself I can continue to learn songs after this year... though I seriously need time for, like, a boyfriend, and occasional shoe-shopping...

Speaking of which... auctions await (shoes, not boyfriends).

Theme from Rocky

I have just learned my song of the day, and I will take one further brief moment away from gorging myself, looking at clearance shoes online, and watching my nephews play in order to post this brief log. 

Theme from Rocky (or, How to Impress Your Nephews)
So far, in Japan, I have played legos, watched Star Wars, and eaten the tamales and cookies that are a holiday tradition in my family (props to my sister for making the tamales - I picked up corn husks, the one ingredient that's impossible to find in Japan, and the proprietors of the Mexican grocery near my apartment asked if I was making tamales.  My response was along the lines of, "hell no, but my sister is!"). 

Wow...
it's really loud in here right now - my nephews are playing with my brother-in-law and their new toys.  They are as brainy as they are loud...
I don't really feel like spending any more time writing this when I have family to hang out with and cookies to eat and shoes to find, so I'll just take notes:

WHY Rocky: it was playing in the car, and my nephews like this song, and I realized I'd never really learned a mostly-instrumental well-known song.  Also, it appeals to my oft-ascendant inner tomboy. 

HOW: ipod, keyboard, 2 sets of headphones (one to cancel out external sounds like excited nephews), one headphone/jack adapter we finally found yesterday at the third electronics store we tried.  Repetition.  Handwritten chart. 

THOUGHTS: would be fun to take more time to transcribe more specific horn/string lines and make a more detailed piano arrangement.  But my younger nephew looked suitably impressed when I took the headphones out of the keyboard and played it for general consumption. There are few parts that repeat exactly in this song - it's more through-composed than most pop songs with lyrics.  Usually it's only a small change - it sounds more repetitive than it is, because the fanfare thing keeps going and unifies it. 

Ok.  Back to family, food, and shoe-shopping, the Kat-on-Vacation Trifecta of Happiness.

The Christmas Song

My computer has caught on that I'm in Japan, because all the links on the browser are in Japanese, which makes for interesting surfing.  I learned The Christmas Song (you know, the one about the chestnuts) this morning on the keyboard here at my sister's house in a suburb of Osaka.  I listened to Sammy Davis, Jr. and Diana Krall, and played the song in a few different keys.  Then we all went, my sister, brother-in-law, two nephews and me, and did some shopping and ate some amazing conveyor belt sushi for lunch.  A little more shopping, and now it's about 1 a.m. in New York, and siesta time here, so I'm about to crash for an hour or two.  My sister has been combing through her CDs of 80s music and making song suggestions for the last few days of the year, but has asked to receive neither blame nor credit for my choices.  Yay vacation and family time!


Recent songs: 
"Feel" (Robbie Williams)
"Ev'ry Time We Say Good-Bye"
"Tempted" (Squeeze)
"Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas"
"Oh Darling"
"A Child is Born"

I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm

I just want this effing gig that provides less than 5% of my income and has taken waaaaaaaay more than 5% of my practice time to be freaking over already.  Jeez.  (You know I'm cranky when I go full circle from fake swearing through real swearing to fake swearing again.)  One more day.  21 hours from now, I will be pouring red wine down my gullet to decompress a little, because all the gigs requiring major prep will be over. 

Anyway...New York English: "happy holidays" is what we say to wish someone a pleasant December/January celebration.  It's politically incorrect to wish someone a merry Christmas here, because, well, what if they're Jewish or something?  So cocktail and background gigs this time of year can be awkward, knowing some people want to hear holiday music, some people are offended that their minority religion is underrepresented by holiday music, and some people are sick to death of the same damn songs being forced up their eardrums by our capitalist pig consumer economy boombox since mid-October. 

And that's where songs about cold weather come in.  Today's song - written by a Jew, like many good cold weather songs and in fact many popular Christmas songs (money moeny money...side note: these songwriters are savvier than I - see 1st paragraph regarding 5%) - ahem, today's song is a lovely AABA tune... with a twist.  For all my worshipful praise of 32-bar AABA form, none of the standards I've picked recently have been that clear cut.  "Embraceable You", "A Foggy Day" and "Moon River" are all ABAC: question-answer, question-different answer.  "Moon River"'s C is fourteen bars long (the rest of the sections are a more normal eight).  "I've Got My Love..." definitely has a discernible bridge, new key and everything ("off with my overcoat) - but while the bridge is Ye Olde Normal Eight, all the A sections are sixteen bars long - two eight-bar phrases each, a question and an answer.  Best of both worlds.  So, if you were really, really nerdy like me, you could, if you had nothing better to do, analyze it as (AB)(AB)C(AB). 

Or you could just sit down and play it like a normal human.  I've played this one from the sheet music many times.  It's one of those handy holiday season songs where, if I'm doing a little improvising over the form to stretch it out and it's gone on rather long enough but then I see a couple guys in suits and yarmulkes walk by, I'll take another chorus.  And now I know that the long A sections have collectively given me an extra twenty-four bars to stall with. 

Fun with standards: tonight I listened to the Ella and Billie versions I already own, then looked on youtube and playlist to investigate other versions.  Listened to Dean Martin's, part of Frank Sinatra's (could only find a snippet), and a dance remix of Kay Starr singing it.  New discovery, Kay Starr.  That track, which I ended up downloading, will be handy for days when I decide to prance around my living room for my cat's entertainment because I can't get it together to go to the gym.

Embraceable You

It occurs to me as the year draws to a close that, in doing a song a day, I might have been better served by really sticking to the traditional definition of a standard song -  one that has become standard repertoire of many musicians and has been covered a zillion times. 

Standards are about structure - what does a given arranger or performer hang on that same structure?  Strings?  A clever intro or tag?  A face-melting guitar solo?  (Yes, please, if only because then I can say "face-melting guitar solo").  Structure is the first thing I take note of when I learn a song, at least if I'm trying to memorize it.  Specific notes of a piano part, not so much.  There are a few iconic piano riffs that stick - some of the Billy Joel and Elton John stuff, some 80s piano-based power ballad stuff - but the main thing that sticks is the harmony and the form.  Guess specifics will have to wait til another year (more on this anon).  All I can really hang onto, since I'm not just learning to play but also memorizing, is the form and chord progression of a given song - the bare minimum that I need as a pianist to fake along with a singer.  I guess it's good to learn how to do the bare minimum, since my natural instinct is to do everything the hardest, most complicated way possible! 

Tonight I'm doing a standard - finally getting around to "Embraceable You".  Can you imagine how much darker and drearier the world would be without the Gershwins?  I've listened to a few different versions: Art Tatum solo piano, Ella's Nelson Riddle arrangement, Judy Garland, Etta James, Rod Stewart.  My M.O. for learning songs for much of the year has been to put the most famous recording of said song on my ipod, but on my headphones, and learn it by ear.  I think maybe I'll experiment with twinkling along with a couple different recordings, and then figuring out my own little arrangement of this standard.  We'll see how it goes. 

Build Me Up Buttecup

VR: C'mon, Kat - all you have left to do tonight is learn your song.  Hop to it.

KG: What's that you say?  All I have to do tonight is get really, really hammered?

VR: No... even though that's what you want to do... just focus and work hard for five more days and it'll calm down a bit.

KG: Arrrghhhhhhhhhhh...

Ok, I'm glad that the voice of reason won out tonight, and I stopped at my customary two-beverage maximum while out with my old roommate who's in town - I have five more days of plowing through, and no time for a hangover.  More to the point, my song tonight was really fun.  I chose it because one of the contestants at my Stonewall gig sang it to a track a couple weeks ago, and I thought it'd be a good one to learn.  It has a I-III7 chord progression, one of my favorites.  It has other secondary dominants as well.  Secondary dominants... I have already paid my theory nerd dues today, teaching a pack of actors some klunky vocal arrangements (I got them to identify plagal cadences by ear, yay, can I get an amen?); suffice to say, secondary dominants are like briefly passing through another key on the way back to tonic. 

mmm... tonic...
I kinda miss having a social life, you know?  Stupid New York with its high cost of living and fierce professional competition and atmosphere of driven-ness.  I've been thinking a bit about what to do next year.  I want to keep growing as a musician, but I need to have a life.  And maybe a buttercup (not to be confused with a peanut butter cup). 

To be contemplated more later.  Now gonna catch some zzz's before I wake up and pull a beginning piano workshop out of thin air.

River

Recent songs:
River - Joni Mitchell
All I Want for Christmas is You - Mariah Carey
My Guy - Mary Wells
Baby, It's Cold Outside (used the Ella/Louis Jordan and the Rod Stewart/Dolly Parton versions)
Taking Chances - Celine Dion

I have had geeky thoughts about all of these songs, of course, but no time to record them in a way that is intelligible to other life forms, so you'll just have to wait until my book for recent geekery.  Been busy learning 35 mm by Ryan Scott Oliver for a pair of performances next Monday - love his work, love working on new shows, and it's great to play with a band.  Also hacking through as much of the Christmas section Handel's Messiah as I can before a singalong next Wednesday that will be, um, an adventure (in the sense that not getting to rehearse with conductor or soloists before the gig is an adventure).  'Tis the season.  Looking forward to a few hours to go Christmas shopping and maybe bake some Christmas cookies before I leave for Japan! 

My Favorite Things

FAIL.  Every couple weeks I have a day where I am just too tired for ANYTHING.  In the morning, I taught three new classes at Circle in the Square - well, old classes, but new to me as I was subbing for my friend-the-usual-music-theory-teacher.  Then in the afternoon, in increments of an hour each: travel/break, rehearsal, travel/break, coaching with a new client.  Taught a lesson to a new student in the early evening.  Afterward, returned home and attempted to be productive with very, very limited success.  New classes/clients/students take extra mental energy, and I was a little fried.  The four-hour practice session was simply not to be. 

Went to bed early on the condition that I get up early to read through a musical score I have to learn over the weekend.  "Learned" "My Favorite Things" and "Edelweiss".  Quote marks around "learned", because I just sounded them out by ear, played through each a couple times, and called it a night.  I have heard these songs since I was little.  Downloaded them this morning (I did manage to roll out of bed before 6:30, which is not terrible since an "early" bedtime for me is 11:45 p.m.), will print the lyrics and analyze and listen to the arrangement.  Probably will only count one of them - I mean, how half-ass can I get?  Then again, I guess being able to sound out a song I know by ear but have never played from memory is an important skill too.  Rationalize much?

Today: Born to be Wild

I Hope You Dance

I am very excited right now, because I had a double cappuccino to counteract my sleep deprivation, and because my first column for the website Big Vision Empty Wallet just went up - check it out: http://www.bigvisionemptywallet.com/features/2010/12/2/art-and-life.html

Recent songs:
MON: Toby Keith, "Should've Been a Cowboy".  Love this song.  It reminds me of seventh grade.  It also makes for a really good androgynous facebook status update: "Kat Sherrell should've been a cowboy."  Not quite as good as "Kat Sherrell knew it complete when she wore a younger man's clothes", but not bad either.  China is definitely going to take over the world, because all the movers and shakers in the "free" world are sitting on their asses of an afternoon, thinking of clever status updates.  Anyway...

TUE: I earned back my political karma by learning "Not Ready to Make Nice" by the Dixie Chicks.  Listen to the bridge.  Go.  Go now and listen (in fact, if you download it from here, I earn 10c ... I just found out I've earned a single dime from one download!  ...But amazon won't pay in increments less than ten bucks.  It made me laugh to find this out when they emailed me saying I should finish filling out my contact info so they could pay me.  Gotta love automated emails.  The bridge to "Not Ready to Make Nice" (it could also potentially be analyzed as verse-two-on-feminism-and-steroids - the chord progression stays the same, and the bridgey-melody part interrupts at the midway point on the verse): ladies and gentleman, this is the proper way to respond to a death threat. 

WED: John Hiatt, "Have a Little Faith"
TODAY: Lee Ann Womack, "I Hope You Dance"

Outta time for writing!  Please check/share out my column (or this or any of my posts, if you feel so inclined and have more than three facebook friends ;)!

Friends in Low Places

A high school friend chastised me on facebook about neglecting my country roots, and I can't have myself being chastised on facebook, so here we go with a Garth Brooks song.  Realized that country is the popular genre in which my ears most instinctively know what to expect, and yet I've never really played it (another thing I avoided for far too long because the jazzheads thought it was uncool). 

I was gonna do some other song today, can't remember what, but realized I needed something fun, that would make me smile, and dance around my living room in a way that no one, but no one, will ever get to see.  Who cares if it's either an "up yours, ex-o'-mine" or a "yeah, I'm an alcoholic, so what" song.  This is country.  If the dog and the pick-up survive the song, you're in good shape.  So much the better if you get to stick it to an ex and then go drinking cheap beer with your ghetto buddies (gimme a break, I live in the city now - our low places are called the ghetto). 

Geekery:
Chord changes and melody, especially on the verse, are typical of old jazz standards, meaning they'd kinda work with any feel (hmm, my inner arranger starts to plot).  Two verses, no bridge, instrumental repeat of second half of the chorus before the beginning of the second verse.  Underlying rhythm on the verses syncopated; on the beat for the choruses.  Purposely rough back-up vocals on last choruses - presumably the friends in low places are singing along in the dive bar.  The thing that struck me most is that the vocal range of this song is over two octaves, from E2 to F#4.  Damn!  That's huge - most pop songs have a range of about an octave, give or take.  And it's active, which is show-people speak for "the lyrics make it possible to create a little scene that's interesting to watch", as opposed to most popular songs, in which the lyrics, even when good, don't go anywhere, and it's all about the voice and the sexiness of the singer and not the story.  Conclusion: this would be a kick-ass audition song for a guy auditioning for a countryish musical.  You're welcome, actors.

I Got You (I Feel Good)

My definition of "standards" has been pretty changeable throughout the year.  It seems like I'm just fickle and inconsistent, but the truth is, I've mostly been sticking to the styles of music I'm most likely to run into in my work life.  For most of this year, I've gravitated toward pop, rock and r&b, because my most embarrassing work moments are when I'm playing auditions for some rock or r&b based musical, and I'm not familiar with the material the singers are bringing in.  I recognize song titles, and can maybe think of a snippet of the song, but don't actually know the feel or how I should play it on the piano.  The piano arrangements are useless - the notes they write for the piano part will absolutely not sound good if played as written: they don't write in any of the accents that any good pop player will instinctively include, and the notes themselves are sometimes suspect, especially in the arrangements of R&B stuff that include the vocal line in the piano arrangement.   It's better to stick to the chords and play the "feel"... but to do that, you have to, um, know how.  Which I didn't, at the beginning of the year.  I wouldn't call myself an R&B master now, but at least I can sort of play a groove if I am familiar with the song or the artist.  So now I complain less about crappy piano arrangements, and more about snot-nosed classical snobs who don't know what they don't know (formerly known as: me).

This is all to say, that's why I've been doing a lot of pop and R&B for most of the year, as opposed to 32-bar jazz standards and show tune favorites.   I think I subconsciously expected to gravitate more toward those songs when I began this project.  But the subconscious urge to be mortified at work less often trumped the traditional definition of the word "standard", and I think my personal definition has evolved to something like:

standard, n.: a song I'm likely to run into in the course of my work, which would be slightly embarrassing not to be able to play by heart, and absolutely humiliating to not at least know of and be able to sort-of-fake

Now I'm working more with some traditional musical theater auditions and the late-night cabaret circuit, and it's more useful to know show tunes and jazz standards, which is why I've been going back to that territory more often.  ...But I don't want to lose my groove, because we all know how hard it is to get that thang back.  So I'm learning a little James Brown this weekend - "I Got You (I Feel Good)" today, and planning on "Get up Offa That Thing" tomorrow.  I'm looking at these as an accompanist - not gonna try to play the melody.  How would I accompany a singer on this, say in an audition situation?  (Is it possible I'm finally learning to look for how to make the best use of my time!??)

I'm trying to do two-song days today and tomorrow, so I'll practice switching feel-gears by doing contrasting songs: "If I Loved You" tonight, and maybe "Embraceable You" tomorrow.  A little more ebb and flow in the pulse, a little more like classical music in the accents and articulations.  It's like switching back and forth between languages - it is, in fact, switching back and forth between languages. 

I finally brought my Super-Nerdy Spreadsheet up to date the other night, and I still have to make up six songs from the Dark Days.  Then there's the fact that I will be leaving for Japan just before Christmas to see my sister... I will actually lose a day going over there, but I still feel like it's kinda cheating not to learn a song for that day.  And while I'm there, I'm gonna want to hang out with my sister and her family, not slave away at the keyboard, feverishly learning my last few songs... so I want to do some of the prep here. 

Well anyway.  One thing at a time.  Recent songs (apologies for not staying up-to-date with the blog - have been doing more journaling, which requires zero editing as opposed to the minimal once-over I give these before I post): "Stand By Me", "Lean On Me", "All You Need Is Love", "Mack the Knife". 

Back to James Brown.  Groove now, worry later.  Or maybe not. 

Beauty and the Beast

Well, wouldn't you know it, today I woke up wanting to learn "Beauty and the Beast".   The other day, it was the last song in the world I wanted to listen to and play.  It's on my list more for Rule #2 than #1, though the movie was one of my favorite disney movies as a kid. My theory is that I want to hear it today because I'm sick - achy/tired, think I was running a fever last night.  "Beauty and the Beast" is nostalgic and comforting, and also pretty famliar.  I don't have the energy to start a song from scratch tonight.  I already spent a little time today on "Change the World", which was yesterday's song - I did work on it last night, but gave up and went to bed because I was feeling like crap.  I feel a little better after my 3-hour nap this afternoon but am still only about 70%, so I will learn this simple little Disney song and call it a night.