Daisy the rabbit, First solo performance

Posted on January 24, 2012 by geneperry

Daisy the bunny
On Thursday of last week, Deanne decided to get a rabbit.

A rabbit?!

I heard this on the way home from LA to Temecula. At first, I was a little bit miffed because I was not involved in the decision, but this was just my ego that was bruised. I was really more concerned for Deanne as having another pet is going to be very challenging given that we already have a cat, a dog a turtle and that she is doing quite a lot of horseback riding with Brandi up at her folks house.

The rabbit’s name is Daisy and it is a love! She is very gentle and as it turns out, very easy going with people, cats and dogs. The first night, we put her in the bathroom so she could just get used to being with us. The second night, we set up her habitat which was provided for us by her previous owners. Elie was tolerant of her, but for the most part, not very interested. Marley was very curious about the new addition and I think she was really wanting to play with the bunny.

In any case, from what I have read, rabbits are quite easy to own, you just have to give them space and attention, like you would any animal. Joelle and Corinne are prepared to assist with the day to day task of feeding the animals and tending to them, so Deanne will not be alone in the task. I am a bunny believer!

Stick at Un-urban
So on a whim last Thursday, I decided to swing by McCabe’s guitar shop to see if they had any music for Chapman Stick – a fantasy, I know, nonetheless, I went. Turns out there was none and I was not surprised. I did manage to strike up a conversation with what turned out to be one of the owners. I mentioned that I played the Chapman Stick and was curious to know if they would consider some sort of class at McCabe’s for beginning Stick players, perhaps even getting Emmett to come down if possible.

He liked this idea! He directed me to speak with one of their employees who is there on Sundays and Tuesday, so I am hoping to check in with them at that time.

I then walked down the street to un-urban, a coffee house just off of the 10 on Pico, east of Centinela. I inquired as to who the manager was, turns out her name is Pam. At about 9am tonight, I decided, after about a good hour of practicing, why don’t I give Pam a call and see if they want someone to come out and play Chapman Stick. When I called, Pam picked up the phone – I asked her if I could come down and play music, and she was very receptive.

I made it down to the cafe at 10pm, she was not there yet, so I set up. I got a cup of coffee from a nice guy named Matt. He served me my coffee in a beer stein, it was good and strong. I played unaccompanied for about 20 minutes; In a sentimental mood, Alive in Wonderland, Someday my Prince will come and segued into Somewhere over the Rainbow. This yielded the most applause, from what appeared to be about 7 people. People had questions about the Stick, so I took a moment to speak to them. There was no mic, just me and the Stick. I was using a Behringer K900fx and an Ernie Ball Volume pedal, running both sides of the Stick into the pedal and the amp.

Pam was very pleased with the music, and as I was breaking down, the man at the back of the coffee house asked if I could play some more. Needless to say, I was delighted to do so! I played Naima, an original called Forever in Love, some improvisational numbers (E and F are my favorite keys) and Equinox.  I am hoping to add an original called Gingerly to the set as well as Duke Ellington’s Come Sunday and Eric Clapton’s You look wonderful Tonight. The gentleman that served me my coffee was very gracious about clapping after every song, and I was grateful for him being so considerate.

At the end of the evening as I breaking down a second time, Pam asked if I would like to come back and play again. This was such great news – I agreed. I mentioned that I had a friend that was quite good at Saxophone and that he might be interested in coming out and playing. Unfortunately, Marc was sick, as I had called him the moment that Pam said I could come down to play. I confirmed next Tuesday at un-urban with Pam and later when I got home with Marc via text.

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Wednesday night practice

Posted on January 19, 2012 by geneperry

Marc had a suggestion early in the afternoon prior to our Wednesday night rehearsal, basically stating that we should try to cover less material in the course of an evening. I hadn’t really stopped to think about it until after I had reviewed all the material we had been stacking up over the past few weeks. He was right, we ( I in particular) need to get focused on learning fewer songs and playing them well.

Our rehearsal went very smoothly, we covered All Blues, which we had not yet played together and Sentimental Mood (which I have been playing incorrectly!). We spent the better portion of the second half of the practice reworking a tune that we had played the first time we got together. Thankfully, Marc has been able to record using is iPhone. So we picked this one up after letting it lay dormant for almost 2 months. Its starting to sound much better. We had reviewed an original which I have been doing a lot of work on called crackers and jam, the title of which will inevitable change, although most of this was arranging as much of that track is already written.

 

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Pony club of Southern California

Posted on January 14, 2012 by geneperry

The family is heading down to Fallbrook this morning to watch Corinne and Joelle participate in the Pony club of Southern California. There will be lots of kids, I think girls mostly, that will be riding horses and ponies of sizes.

This week at work was a little rough as we have had some outages and tickets that have been bounced between groups. Thankfully, our team is pretty sharp and we have had good luck in getting the ticket to the right team.

I am still stoked on the meeting of Paul and Marc! I feel like we are off to a good start and I am looking forward to collaborating with them and hopefully getting an opportunity to play out and do some recording.

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Jams are go!

Posted on January 12, 2012 by geneperry

Tonight was an amazing night for music. To start, I finally reconnected with childhood friend Paul Grundman. He is such an amazing talent and a fine person, it’s been no less than 10 years since I saw him last. It was such a privilege to play with Paul AND with Marc, who is also phenomenally talented. Marc and I have developed a great bond over the past 2 months – it was great grabbing a beer with him afterward and getting his thoughts on what we had played. Very positive and very fun!

We went through some jams to warm up with and then pressed on through Stolen Moments, In a sentimental mood, (mostly serious) Girl from Ipanema and Equinox. We rehashed Crackers and Jam and a ballad which was previously untitled which is now officially called  Forever in Love. What else? We spent some time writing and arranging what could be called a samba called Subway Sabor.

I have a lot of work to do on my sound. My current 1×15 cabinet is seriously lacking tone. I also need to consider replacing the SVT-III amp as it is just too heavy for what we are trying to do. I’d like to replace 1X15 with a 2×10 and possibly an Ampeg pf-500 for the head. We’ll have to wait and see as I think my days of playing both sides of the Stick through my paltry Behringer 90 watt keyboard amp are coming to a close.

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Still looking for a trade, Churay for Chanukah!

Posted on December 20, 2011 by geneperry

Despite having posted my 12 string Grand Stick on the Stickist for 10 days now, I have still not found any takers on a swap for a 10 string. I have had some people that were looking to trade out Sticks of lesser quality, but I know the value of my instrument.

Chanukah starts tomorrow, which is really exciting. Kind of bummed that I will be up in LA for it as I am working on Wednesday. On Thursday, I will head over to the Perry’s house for a luncheon for my beloved Aunt Mary. I am looking forward to getting some time with her.

Had great fun last night with Sam and Jeff from work last night at Killer Shrimp. I don’t know that Sam had ever been and I know that Jefferson had not been there before. So much fun! We talked about our upcoming DC2 project a bit towards the end of the conversation, it is really amazing to see how intelligent both Sam and Jeff are – I am very fortunate to be working with them and have much to learn from them about IT infrastructure.

I have had some success in setting up the SP10 Dev environment at work. I was able to get search working yesterday and today, I am really hoping that I can get the Quest Migration tool up and running.

Also – I have been working with Marc on Wednesdays which, every other one for now. The last session was extremely productive. Marc pieced together a more up tempo groove in D, I had come to him with a groove that I had in F, more of a simple two part Jimmy Smith groove and together we came up with a tune in Eb that was reminiscent of a 50′s doo wop ballad. Wild. That pieced together with our first untitled track and a piece that I putting together called Gingerly totals 5 originals. Still hoping to knock out Knives out by Radiohead, Blue Juice by Jimmy Cliff, Sneaking in the back by Tom Scott and possibly Stolen Moments by Oliver Nelson and we have a set!

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Andrea Marucci

Posted on December 13, 2011 by geneperry

Friended a really fine Stick player out in Italy this morning named Andrea Atreio Marucci. He is a fantastic Stick player based out of Montepulciano, Italy. He plays in a traditional jazz style, walking lines in the left hand and phrasing melodies and chords in the left.

Went to the Cedars Holiday party last night out at Maggiano’s, it was really fun. There was a group version of Jeopardy, and even though our team (Occupy EIS) finished in a commanding last place, it was lots of fun.

I am on the fence about trading out my 12-string for a 10-string. I have a couple of people that are interested, but nothing that I am really interested in just yet. We’ll see.

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Sleepless, thinking about gear…

Posted on December 9, 2011 by geneperry

Up late again. I did manage to sleep from about 10pm till about 2, so I won’t be totally useless in the AM. I am contemplating selling my beloved 1966 Fender Bassman, but I can’t seem to pull the trigger on posting it. I have taken all the pics and done the research, seems I could get at least $1600 for the condition that it is in. I might end waiting, but I am chomping at the bit to get some new gear, and most of it is a little pricey.

I am especially interested in the DB Instruments M440SE volume pedal. The pedal works as a traditional volume pedal, moving up and down to control volume, but also moves from side to side, allowing for an additional parameter to be controlled by foot. The pedals supports both volume panning in this regards in addition to the option to use it as an expression pedal. Lots of opportunities. Having one of these pedals for both the melody and bass side of the Stick would be out of this world.

I am also debating what to do with my old bass rig. My 15″ cab is pretty heavy, and coupled with an Ampeg SVT-III, just does not seem practical. I am hoping to replace the entire thing with a Behringer k3000fx amp at some point, this could be in conjunction with my K900fx or by itself. It would be nice to have that option and the price for these amps is very agreeable. I have had good luck with reviving my old Boss SE-50. That coupled with my DBX compressor sound pretty solid through the K900 for now.

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Contact, finally

Posted on October 21, 2011 by geneperry

Yesterday I finally got in touch with Andrew Rode, the cellist I have been looking to perform with for almost 3 months. He is a little young, but he’s very enthusiastic and I need that. He’s also not griping about money, which is all pretty tight these days. I have spoken with Marc about it and it looks like he is game to hear him out.

Speaking of Marc, Marc Bagasao that is! We had a great rehearsal last Tuesday. We went over In a Sentimental Mood, Stolen Moments, Equinox and he tried to get me through Killer joe. I had some trouble at first with the change, so I need to get learned up on the original. Marc and I then embarked on a journey I do not expect to make – writing original music! Marc is wanting to play reggae, so I was trying to catch a rhythm he could jive with. I think we got something to paper at least, but no melody yet, just chords. We then managed to put together a really nice ballad, no title yet, but complete rhythm and melody. Very exciting.

I put out an email to drummer royale Paul Grundman who mentioned he was down to jam, so it looks like we have a quartet for Tuesday. I can hardly wait. Marc mentioned that he knew a guy that plays cello and is half decent at it, so I have let Andrew know that we are taking this slow to start as I promised him first shot at it. Either way, Tuesday is looking like fun for music!

Deanne and the girls are coming up today, so I am very excited to get to see them. We are looking forward to going to Niki’s sushi night tomorrow! We’re going to let the girls stay up late and play wii over there, we’ll sleep in on Sunday – maybe head to Patrick’s for pancakes and eggs!

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Cal Poly date in the works!

Posted on October 14, 2011 by geneperry

Recently, Emmett had asked if I had any connections with schools in the immediate area where he could showcase the Chapman Stick. I called on our friend Faye Wachs who is a professor over at Cal Poly in Pomona to see if she knew anyone in their Music department that might be interested in having Emmett perform. That was three months ago.

Well, out of the blue Dave Kopplin, a Music professor at Cal Poly returned my message and to my surprise, he is ready to set a date in early January for Emmett to come out and perform. I mentioned this to Emmett just yesterday and he confirmed the tentative date, so it’s game on! Emmett also agreed to let me perform as opening act for him at this date, which is doubly exciting! I expect I will play a variation on Bill Evans’ Alice in Wonderland, but I am leaving open for now.

On other notes in the Stick world, I have ratcheted up my matched reciprocal tuned Grand to a full Baritone tuning. I really like this tuning best and am going to be hard pressed to veer from it. I have tuned the high D down to an F#, giving some nice melodic variations relative to the 10-string tuning. I am revisiting Eric Clapton’s You look wonderful tonight and am almost ready to go with this in it’s entirety.

Lastly, I spoke with Marc Bagasou, a fantastic Tenor player in west LA. He and I used to gig pretty frequently with Custom back in the day. Turns out, he is up for getting together and it looks like we are on for next Tuesday. Looking forward to getting his take on my style and if it is worthy of setting up a gig. Also, still trying to figure out if Andrew Rode is going to fit in to what I am doing. He’s charging $30 / hour for rehearsal, so I am going to have to see if something can be worked as that rate is a little rich for my blood.

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I’m in the training room, sleeping

Posted on October 10, 2011 by geneperry

Wouldn’t you know it, I am spending my last night in the training room – literally. Because I waited too long to book my flight, I was not able to get a flight home on Sunday night. Normally, no problem, just book a flight early on Monday, BUT, there is a huge convention here in LV, and there are few if any rooms available. On top of which, our family is tight on money.

Well, the good news is this. The training room is available 24/7! So, I am curling up here in the training room at Netcom until my shuttle arrives at the hotel at 5:45. I can’t complain, there’s a bathroom, plenty of leftover snacks from earlier in the day (chips, nuts, apples) and soda. Although, I don’t really drink soda. Something to mix with would be nice, but I’m not complaining. It’s interesting how life comes at you this way and you just have to make the best of it.

I have been taking practice SharePoint certification tests throughout the afternoon and my scores have been getting better. There is a lot to know about SharePoint, but I am starting to see now that it has more to do with the needs of the business more so than new SharePoint 2010 functionality. Either way, the class was an excellent investment and I am feeling much more confident in approaching the SP 2010 upgrade at Cedars.

I was just about to lay down when I figured I would quickly make a note of this, hehe. Funny how my blog has done me a solid. A security guard just walked into the training room – my cover is blown I thought! Turns out he was checking in. He asked how long I was going to be in here. What was I supposed to say? I answered, I will be working all night. I guess he figures I can go back to my room at any time. Funny part is, I don’t have a room – I have the training room! Oh it is to laugh. I can’t wait to get back to work and then back home for some rest!

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