Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Writing a Fugue

Its been a while since I've written anything for this blog. Partly, its because I've been so busy with work and gigs. In any event, I have a couple of posts coming up soon on Stampede gigging (i.e., the Calgary Stampede, also known as harvest time for the musician, especially if you play an upright bass) and some biographies I've been reading on jazz players. Until then though, here are a couple of videos I came across while writing a couple of fugues based on songs by the Dead Boys. The first is by Glenn Gould, the latter by Daniel Pi.






Wednesday, July 2, 2008

What I'm Not Reading (to save my knees)

I'm currently sacrificing a book to save my knees. In a previous post I wrote about how I lock my knees while I'm playing (a result of nerves and habit I think). Well, this, combined with hiking, wrestling with my son, and yoga, have resulted in my right knee being in a lot of pain. I was told that the pain was, in part, due to locking my knees as it puts greater pressure on the knee. Now that I'm in a bit of pain, I lock my knee all the more when playing and then have to hobble away in even greater pain.

A solution: In trying to break this habit, I've been carrying Three Nights in Havana Pierre Trudeau, Fidel Castro and the Cold War World by Robert Wright to gigs and rehearsals. I put the book under my right foot. This forces me not to lock my knee, but rather have a small bend in my knee. (The book is about 300 pages.) As a result I'm taking notice of my knee-locking habit and, so I'm told, keeping a small bend in my knee will strengthen the muscles around my knee.