Kate and I get married in a little more than a month. That’s pretty crazy, considering how few of our plans are actually nailed down. The important stuff is pretty well taken care of, but I’m sure we will be under a deluge of little things as October 14th edges ever closer.
One of the things that we need to do is assemble playlists for both the cocktail/dinner portion and the dancing portion of the reception.
At dance practice tonight we cha-cha’ed to some really cool latin hip hop. That’s latin as in Latin America, but don’t tempt me, Gregorian chant hip hop may be cool too…
Here’s the thing, I don’t know where to start looking for cool latin hip hop. Any suggestions? Any suggestions from other musical genres? Grandma will be sad if we don’t play the Hokey Pokey, so that’s under control. :-)
Approximately 10 years ago I wanted to play guitar, but a lot of my guitar playing friends really wanted a bass player around, and they were pushing me in that direction. One problem, I was very much a musician, and most of the bass parts in popular music at the time were B-O-R-I-N-G!
I talked the issue over with my dad one day, and he was a little shocked that I was worried about being bored on the bass. My dad is not a musician, but he’s very much a fan of music. He took me down into the basement where we had a turntable and his hundreds of albums. Out of the cabinet came two albums by Stanely Clarke, first a self titled album, and then School Days.
It didn’t take long. By the end of Spanish Phases for Strings and Bass I was sold. I found a video of him playing his upright on YouTube, and I thought I’d share it with any of the bass players in the audience.
That’s why my next vehicle will be large enough to tote an upright bass.
Fifteen months ago, Kate and I
started taking dance lessons at our local Arthur Murray franchise.
I had a little bit of dance experience from musicals, and we
talked on several occasions about one day taking lessons together.
Kate found a coupon for a free introductory lesson, and she
signed up for the 10 week beginner program at the end of that lesson. I knew about the free lesson, but signing up for the 10
week course was news. It went something like "hey, I signed up
for dance lessons today!" Running that through my personal
girlfriend translation engine, I deciphered the message. It said
"I hope you weren’t joking about taking dance lessons, because now
we’re going whether you like it or not."
Fortunately I was up for the challenge and actually excited to start.
A lot of couples our age sign up for dance lessons because they
are getting ready for their wedding, some with as little as 4 weeks
before the big day. That wasn’t us—Kate just wanted to dance.
Even still, dancing is a lifetime fitness activity that takes a
while to learn. Signing up for a long running activity with her had me
sighing with relief. You see, she had no idea, but at the time we
started dancing I had recently written the single largest check ever to
come out of my checkbook. Tivol gladly cashed that check while
placing a shiny diamond on a platinum band into their vault on my
behalf. Yes indeed, long term commitment was just what I was
looking for.
Our lessons happened over my lunch break at first, and because of this
I caught a little flack from some coworkers. They’d call me Fred
Astaire, or worse, Ginger Rogers. These taunts came from men
deathly afraid of emasculation. Men for whom a big night out with
their wives involved eating out and making it home just in time to
watch reality television or a cartoon rerun. They laugh, and tell
me that life will be much the same for me. I laugh too. I
know that Kate wants a house with hardwood floors for dancing, and I
know she wants the DirecTV subscription canceled when she moves in.
Fifteen months of dance lessons. Fifteen months is quite a long
time. That’s two and a half semesters of school plus breaks.
At about the one year mark, I made mention of an upcoming
jitterbug lesson to my grandma. Grandma grew up with the
jitterbug, and I was giving her fair warning that I’d be ready to take
her out on the dance floor at the wedding. An uncle cocked his
head a little and appeared genuinely curious. "What? You’re
still taking lessons? I figured you would have learned all there
is to know by now. I thought that after a year you’d be dancing
like Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers." Grrrr, those two again.
No, we are not yet dancing like Fred and Ginger. After
telling our instructor that story, he pointed out that even he still
takes lessons. This is definitely a long term commitment.
Keep in mind that we aren’t just talking about matching our feet up to
black painted and numbered outlines on the floor. There are small
matters of timing, styling, and combinations. There are larger,
more "pressing" issues. Me not pressing my toes on to hers.
Kate not pressing her elbow into my face as she walks through an
under arm turn. Her elbow, my face. She worries about that a lot, so
it warrants repetition. I have a different outlook: it is
my problem and my fault if I lead her through a move and collide with
her elbow in the process, but I appreciate her concern.
As an example of the layers of complexity involved, let’s dissect the
basic footwork required to make the Rumba look like a Rumba. If
you’ve had any waltz experience, you may look at the footwork diagram
of the Rumba and think "piece of cake, it’s just like the waltz on a
smaller scale! Forward, side, together!" At first, both
instructor and student will be thrilled when the student consistently
remembers the pattern of the dance. But music has rhythm, and a
straight "forward, side, together" doesn’t feel very latin to me.
The student is then introduced to a new mantra, "slow… quick,
quick, slow… quick, quick."
Kate and I were happy at this point. When we danced a Rumba, we
danced WITH the music, and we were even learning some nice turns and
breaks. At that point I learned why we as a nation have such a
problem with Cuba. It isn’t their government, it’s their motion.
Cuban motion is the fancy term for making your hips and legs go
in all sorts of different directions while dancing. Truthfully,
Cuban motion is an American invention, but it’s still quite
foreign to me.
Here’s a quick beginner’s explanation of Cuban motion. Keep one
leg bent, and one leg straight at all times. Take tiny steps.
Keep your toes near the floor. Lift your heels off the
floor, but drop them slowly. Land on the inside of your foot,
roll to the outside. Now, all at once. Confused? So
am I. Mastering this with any competency may require long term
commitment to rival even Castro’s dedication to communism.
Kate and I have a long way to go with our dancing before we even finish
the bronze level program in which we are currently enrolled, but we
will continue dancing at whatever level we can swing as long as our
hips, knees, and ankles continue to do their part. Long term
commitment is a joy when shared with someone so wonderful. I only
ask you to remember that there’s a big difference between an activity
looking easy and being easy. Thanks alot, Fred and Ginger.
Kate admitted last weekend that although she thinks that she has probably eaten ribs in the past, she couldn’t remember any specific time when she ate ribs. So obviously even if there were ribs in her past, they were terrible. That was a travesty, and if she was going to continue living that way I’d have to break things off.
Lucky for us she had this Thursday off. Thursday at BB’s is a wonderful time. A full slab of ribs plus two orders of their massive and massively delicious batter fries runs only $12.95, and your meal comes with entertainment by John Paul’s Flying Circus featuring Bill Dye. I think I’ve been to BB’s on every night of the week, and Thursday is consistently the best. Lindsay mentioned tonight that John Paul has been playing Thursdays at BB’s for 10 years now, and I think I first saw him there 9 years ago.
If you’re in the area you should make a point to stop by some time. BB’s Lawnside BarB-Q is just East of 85th and Troost. As they say, "to find it, turn right at 85th, then go South about 60 years."
And for the record, I wouldn’t really break things off with Kate if she didn’t like ribs. It’s easy to say that now that she enjoyed our evening eating pig like pigs.
We danced tonight. Closely. Last night we learned all about body contact in dance, and we were practicing our dance positions at tonight's open practice session. What a difference such a small distance makes. After going from 8 inches of space to 2 or less between us, we're stepping on toes again. It is better now compared to when we started -- I've learned to step lightly in the last year.
After practice was over we got to talking with Darren, our instructor, about artistry. Kate's mom is a visual artist, and her dad writes, and she mentioned that she thought the creative gene must skip a generation. Darren put for the the idea that everyone has creativity locked away inside of them somewhere, if only they find out how to best express it. His personal example was his talent on the dance floor, and he also mentioned cooking. "When someone beautifully presents a dessert that you just can't get enough of, that's artistry." That example really resonated with me because I love the process from cooking to consumption, and it's even better sharing the experience with friends and family.
Artistry and creativity are not meant to sit on a pedestal for only the creative elite to participate in. Certainly, there are people who exhibit artistry and creativity in all manners of expression that are worthy of examination upon a pedestal, but we all have a right and a duty to participate in the creative process. Find your Muse and create a little bit, or a whole lot, of beauty and joy in the world. Now if you'll excuse me, I have some beautiful code to write... :-)
I finally did it. After years of procrastination I sat down tonight and pledged my support to KCUR. I’m a huge fan of NPR and community supported radio as evidenced by the fact that four of my presets point at NPR and community radio. The obsession started during my first years of college as I needed something sane to listen to while commuting, and things grew from there. All Things Considered, The World, Marketplace, Morning Edition, and lighter things like This American Life, Cartalk, Whad’ya Know? So many great programs, and that isn’t even touching on the music. I really started listening because of the blues and jazz selection, and since then I’ve even started listening to bluegrass.
What are the other three public and community supported radio stations on my dial? KKFI, KANU, and KTBG. All great stations, and they’ll all get some of my money sooner or later.
This post isn’t really about me pledging. It’s about you listening. Embrace your inner nerd and listen to radio that goes beyond the greatest hits of yesterday and today.
Do you have an Apple? Do you have .ogg files? Go download the Xiph QuickTime Components now. I’ll wait. That is monumental. It has been out for a few months, and I am disappointed that I was late to the party. There was a QuickTime component for playing ogg files that worked with QuickTime 6, but a few things changed in QuickTime 7 that left ogg users out in the cold. That really hurt since I was a new Apple convert with over 5000 songs legitimately ripped from my CD collection in ogg format. There were workarounds, but I really wanted iTunes to work with my audio files. I was starting to contemplate re-ripping all of my albums to MP3 just to have all of my audio always available again, but that’s a whole lot of time that I wasn’t looking forward to spending.
You may be asking yourself why I chose to rip my discs to ogg format in the first place. It is a completely open and free format that produces better sounding audio than MP3. I most often listen to music with high quality headphones or speakers, so the artifacts audible in poorly encoded MP3 files stuck out and made me look for a better, more free, way of encoding my music. Basically because I’m an audiophile open source computer nerd. :-) For more information you can check out the Ogg Vorbis FAQ.
I was loaned a copy of Nickel Creek's "Why Should the Fire Die?" album by someone at work. We got to talking about music because he noticed my Sennheiser headphones, and it ends up that he has a pair at home that he uses for recording his own music. While talking about what we like to listen to and play I mentioned that one day I'll have an upright bass to tote around leaving all those who don't have an upright bass feeling lucky that they don't have to tote an instrument that is equal to themselves in size.
I am glad to be on the receiving end of this loaner copy, so I figured the least I should do is write a quick review. In short this CD is great.* I have read that it is a little darker than their previous work, but I really enjoy it. Songs like When in Rome played over responsive speakers refresh in me the desire to play both upright bass and mandolin. Other stand out tracks include Scotch & Chocolate, Eveline, and Doubting Thomas. Fans of bluegrass, acoustic instruments, and vocal harmonies should at least consider picking up a copy.
*So... you may have noticed that I give every album that I review a pretty glowing review. Well, yes, you're right, but I have my reasons. I figure that if I'm going to review an album on my blog I should make it an album worthy of review. I go through a lot of music that will never be reviewed here.
A couple of weeks ago I picked up Four Tet’s Rounds album. Why did I wait so long to pick up some Four Tet? I remember listening to samples on Amazon around 2002 or so, but I thought the group sounded pretty lame. Then while we were in Virginia Kate picked up a Kings of Convenience remix album. I just loved "The Weight of My Words" from that disc, and I found out that it was Four Tet. Upon digging into my own music collection when we returned home I found that one of my all time favorite remixes (Channel 1 Suite on Xen Cuts) was also by Four Tet. All of the sudden I was feeling a little dumb for not snapping up some original Four Tet when it was first offered.
Normal everyday acoustic instruments just feel a little more lush after they are given a sprinkling of Four Tet’s musical magic. Stand out tracks include "She Moves She" for it’s wonderful use of space and alternative instruments, "Unspoken" for its grand rise and fall, and "As Serious As Your Life" for its infectious groove and melody.
In case you missed it I actually handed out three different recommendations during this one post. A little three for one deal never hurt anyone. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I heartily recommend the Xen Cuts three disc set. In terms of quality and quantity it is just an amazing deal. A great mix of ambient, acid jazz, electronica, and hip hop spanning three discs for less than $25, it has probably seen more playlist time since I purchased it in 2000 than any other discs that grace my collection. If you’re looking for a slightly more mellow wade into electronica you can start out with Rounds and THEN get Xen Cuts.
