Showing posts with label something to think about. Show all posts
Showing posts with label something to think about. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

The Music Never Left You: a repost from Kirk Hamilton's Murfins and Burglars

Reposted from SF musician and friend Kirk Hamilton's blog Murfins and Burglars. I know you're out there fellow musical friends and former classmates.

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Things kind of suck right now, don’t they? It has become difficult, especially over these past few weeks, to shake the feeling that we are lying in the basin of some vast, vague ditch of malaise, frustration and crappiness – nationally, globally, but also individually. Everyone seems depressed, and not just because it’s January.

We’ll see if Mr. Obama can get up there tonight for his first State of the Union and make us feel better about things. I imagine that at the very least he’ll make those of us who support him feel a bit better about him, which should in turn make us feel a bit better about “things.” I doubt, however, that it’ll be the spiritual salve that I, at least, am craving.

But I think I know something that could be. I was browsing the Facebook statuses of my friends and fellow musicians when I saw a post by a San Francisco saxophonist I know, Bari Sax-man extraordinaire Doug Rowan, who shared the following:
Everyone that ever played a musical instrument and quit playing for some reason or another should pick it back up again and see what happens.
To which I say: YES. Doug, I love this. “Pick it back up again and see what happens.” Yes. Yes.

Right after seeing that (but unrelated to it), a singer friend of mine shared on my wall that she’d picked up her alto sax again after several years of not playing, and was loving it. And I realized: that’s it! We should go for it, we should turn that thought into some sort of unofficial national initiative.

People of the world!

Ex-band geeks, garage rockers! Dorm room strummers and lapsed fifth-grade recorder virtuosos!

Hear me, and heed the call! It is time to pick up your instruments once more!

Seriously, I am talking to YOU. Perhaps you played an instrument in your high school band, or banged on the bass in a garage punk group in college? Maybe you sang in the madrigals or were a marching band nerd? Did you rent-to-own a euphonium, or spend days learning scales on the xylophone? Is there an accordion moldering in a closet somewhere in your house?

If so, go dig that accordion up, dust of those drum cases, re-string that bass, have your folks ship out your old Squire. Find your old instrument and see if it still works, because I’ll bet it does. And more to the point, I’ll bet that you can still work it. Just place your hands on it and see what they remember. You just might surprise yourself.

And sure, you might be utter rubbish, you might give your cat a nervous breakdown. Playing again may remind you why the lip pain, sore fingers, and frustrating metronome bleeps made you stop in the first place. But maybe, just maybe, you’ll realize how much you loved music, how much you miss it, and you might start to play again. Find a teacher. Learn some new songs you like. Join a band.

I know this won’t solve anything tangible. It won’t get back any bailout money, or fix the California state budget, or re-hire all the amazing teachers who are going to be let go this year, to say nothing of what it won’t do for the suffering multitudes of the world.

But what it will do is something less quantifiable, perhaps smaller but no less grand – it might allow you to rediscover a part of yourself that you’d forgotten was even there.

You don’t have to sound “good.”

You don’t have to sound like anything at all.

Just give it a try. See what happens.

Monday, January 4, 2010

Movie review: Aamir Khan stars in "3 Idiots": a Indian film about making your passion your work

3 Idiots ad in the lobby of the the Naz8 in Fremont, California

"Chase excellence and success will follow." That is the lesson of the new Indian film 3 idiots.

You know when Aamir Khan takes on a project, it's going to have some sort of social lesson. He has tackled British rule over Colonial India in the Oscar nominated Lagaan: Once upon a time in India and primary education of children with learning disabilities in Taare Zameen Par (Every Child Is Special) in which he starred and directed. Now Khan takes on higher education in India, a factory that churns out engineers, doctors and student suicide.

If you have never seen a Bollywood movie before, but enjoyed Slumdog Millionaire (which was largely a British film), this is an excellent first Indian film for viewers used to Hollywood's style. 3 idiots is huge already and I'm sure you're going to start hearing about it. It will be the first ever officially released film on youtube (12 weeks after opening, so around the middle of March) and it is Bollywood's biggest blockbuster with the biggest opening of all time

On the way home last night, my friend, who was born and educated in India expressed to me how much this movie hit home for him. To get ahead of the herd in India, students are pressured by their families to study to be engineers and doctors so that they can make a lot of money, marry and live in a big house. What if you aren't even good at engineering? What if you want to be a photographer?

Sound familiar? Yeah, I thought so. Americans can learn from this message as well.

READ MORE OF MY REVIEW HERE

Sunday, April 19, 2009

Why the women of planet earth need more Susan Boyles



Please read my new article on examiner.com about why the phenomenon of Susan Boyle is so important to me and to millions of people around the globe.

I've been thinking about this whole concept for awhile, and then Susan came along.  It took me all day to write this article, I'm really proud of it!

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Stop and Hear the Music: Violinist Joshua Bell Plays the D.C. Metro

I received this email forward today from a friend. It happens to be over a year-and-a-half-old, but I thought it was really thought provoking...

A man sat at a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousand of people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.

Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried up to meet his schedule.

A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping continued to walk.

A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work.

The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.

In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the best musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars.

Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the seats average $100.

Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of an social experiment about perception, taste and priorities of people. The outlines were: in a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour: Do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context?

One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be:

If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?
Read an article at washingtonpost.com