My child's into Techno

Anyone who knows me knows that I like all kinds of music. My favorite piece is Pictures at an Exhibition by Modest Musorgsky (yes, it's classical). But my all-time favorite artist is Garth Brooks. Pretty much all of his songs (except for his newer ones) have some kind of meaning to me. Friends in Low Places always reminds me of a guy I liked in high school (and Mrs. Pitter Patter, it wasn't DWS...I'll tell you who it was if you're really curious). That song was playing at our band party and he was singing it to me and I remember being all gushy...but not too gushy because I'm a goody two shoes and my parents were somewhere just around the corner (they were really fun band parents). The River, while not totally ruined for me, always makes me think of this guy (Pitter Patter and Eyeball, I can't remember...was it Clay?) that said, "If you think about it, this song is really about a penis." I was in college and we were at the Longhorn bar and I think that was the only night of my life that I actually enjoyed a beer (I really can't stand the stuff)...it was a very, very, very cold Red Dog on tap.

Ok, back to my son.

So, his vocabulary isn't getting much bigger and lots of what he says sounds like a variation of "da da" or "da dee." Which is really cute, by the way.

I'm always trying to come up with fun little songs to sing to him because he loves to just lay on my chest with his head on my shoulder while I sing to him. The other day I started singing the "Da Da Da" song. Those are the only words I remembered though. Remember that song from the Volkswagon commercial? TC was way impressed that I remembered the song, the car company and the premise of the commercial (though I never picked up that the two guys might be gay!).

I decided that I was going to buy the song on iTunes for X-man. I ended up buying a whole CD (Candy Classics Sing Along) that has some great 60s and 70s songs (Hooked on a Feeling (Oooga Chaka Song); Sugar, Sugar; I Think I Love You; Do Wah Diddy Diddy; etc.) and the "Da Da Da" song.

After I got it all downloaded, I played the song on the computer (and I had the visualizer on for added interest) and X-man grinned from ear to ear as soon as the song started. It was all techno sounding and when they started saying "da da da" he would say it right after. It was hilarious! And the rest of the CD was just as enjoyable. There was one song that was sung by some little kids and it was kinda annoying until I noticed that X-man was dancing to it! What a ham!

So, now I've got a great CD to play in the car that I can sing along to and X-man loves just as well! Maybe he'll have a wide variety of musical interests like me!

Blast from my past

Tonight in Jazz Band rehearsal, we sightread "Gospel John."

You girlies that went to high school with me...remember when we played that in marching band? I think we even played Jesus Christ Superstar in the same show.

We had words that went with the song...

"Gospel John, Gospel John, Gospel, Gospel Joooohn!"

Yes, I'm a dork.

Leftover Cake!

Yahoo for my birthday and leftover cake!!

My parents came for the weekend and we had a great time! Even though my birthday was on Saturday, I went ahead and made a cake on Friday. That way we could eat more cake!

It wasn't a fancy one...just a box mix and some powdered sugar/butter icing. And hey, the cake is just there to hold the icing! I still have some cake in the fridge and you can bet I'll be having a piece after X-man goes to bed tonight!

Saturday was lots of shopping. I got a pair of size 0.5 jeans...ok, they came from Chico's that has wierd sizing numbers (I think the largest they go to is size 3), but that's fun to think I'm wearing a size half. We also got some sweatshirts as a Christmas gift for TC. They're nice! Mom and Dad picked up two really cute sweaters and a pair of navy pants for X-man. They've just been chomping at the bit to buy him clothes, but they're afraid to get something the wrong size. Instead they've been getting him books...which is just fine by me!

And speaking of X-man, he gave me a cute birthday present...he learned how to clap with two open hands! He'd been clapping with one open hand and a fist. But he's so cute with the clapping. TC says that it looks like a drum major clap. Once a drum major, always a drum major!

Last night after I put X-man to bed and after we'd eaten another round of cake and ice cream, TC pulled out all the Christmas decorations. Our Christmas tree is up now! I just love going through the ornaments and talking about where each one came from. And this time, I got to tell my parents about all of them! I'm sure they were just thrilled. Our tree is amusingly devoid of ornaments on the bottom, except two little cloth ornaments my parents brought for X-man. He's going to love the tree when he finally notices it!

I was especially excited to open the box of ornaments from ^starshine. Last year she made us some ornaments and they were even more beautiful than I remembered them! She made a snowman santa for TC, a cute snowman for me, a Christmas tree and even a little pebble for X-man, who was the "little pebble" at the time. Man, she's a talented lady. My mom was uber-impressed with them also. I've already ordered an ornament from her to do X-man's first Christmas ornament. Yahoo!

Now for a few pictures. I'll have plenty this month because I've decided that I really need to get scrapping, but for some reason, I can't think of a thing to do with X-man's baby pictures. So, I'm going to take a picture every day in December and do a book of December.

This was the view from my front door on Friday morning:



And after commenting to TC that I'd love to get some firewood and actually have a fire in the fireplace, he came home with some firelogs (not really a roaring fire, but it did the trick!). This was a great birthday present!



Here's the tree all decorated. I don't know if you can see them, but X-man's little cloth ornaments are hanging right on the bottom.

Concert Update

I forgot to update you on the concert!

It was rough. But this kind of thing is not for the faint of heart.

We'd be playing along just fine and the conductor would lose his place. Or the trumpets would get a beat (or maybe even a whole measure) ahead of everyone else. Or the singer would come in too early. Or the whistler would leave out a section of the song. Or the host would say that we were going to play a piece from the opera "La Travita" (that would be "La Traviata") Several times I felt very embarrassed to be in the group. That's terrible!

There were some parts of it that I did enjoy...like the maestro's performance hair. Yep. He had a nice hair piece that he wore special for the concert!

Now the tape has to be edited and they will send it off to the PBS stations to air, I would assume, on Veteren's Day. I'm thinking it will probably air locally since it was done here, but I can't see that it would be aired to many other places. I just don't think it was that good of a concert.

But I belted out the Stars and Stripes piccolo solo like I was the proudest little piccolo ever!

Diva-me nicer

Ok, today's rehearsal (from 2:00-8:30 with an hour for dinner) was much better. It's amazing how the entire string section from our Philharmonic helped everything sound better. I wonder how much they're being paid.

And there is some major camera equipment going to be used for this deal.

ASH, I'll have to ask about the drinking song. Not sure which one that is! It's not like we're doing anything, from Carmina Burana!

Oh, and since I'm playing second flute/piccolo, I'm on the end of the row. Which puts me in prime viewing area for the roaming camera. Yes, sis, I've taken off my fuschia nail polish.

Diva-Me

I met the Diva-Me last night.

My church is hosting a big deal concert tomorrow and a group of musicians (if you can call them that) from all over the US have converged on our city. Our choir and church orchestra are interspersed in this group for a big combined deal.

Let me start out by saying I am competitive. But when it comes to playing the flute/piccolo, I'm uber-competitive. I fit the typical "flutist mold" of being catty. I know I'm good (and have a few things to back it up...Texas All-State Piccolo? Yep, one of seven in the state that year!), but I don't try to act all snotty and diva-ish. But last night just caught me off guard!

After last night's rehearsal, this concert seems more like a circus! First, there's the soloist whistler. Yes, he's whistling and we are backing him up. Then there's the guy that's going to conduct a piece he arranged and he conducts backwards! For those of you that know what I'm talking about, conducting with your right arm and in 4/4 time, try conducting doing beat 2 out to your right and beat 3 in to your left. That seriously put a short circuit in my brain! But this guy is apparently Big Man On Campus and no one has the calf fries to tell him he's not doing it quite right.

Now to the flute section. There are two ladies with this group. I understand that I'm coming into their turf, so I'll play second part...I may not like it, though. Can I tell you how long it's been since I've played with another flute playing in my left ear? Um...since grad school back in 1998. My Masters Degree wasn't in music so I didn't expect to be first chair. I digress...

I can't hear the lady that's playing first. Some of that is because she's two people away from me. Some of it's because she's NOT PLAYING! And don't even get me started on the second flute player. I'm in tune until she starts playing. She is not so good.

We were expecting a really good group.

Not so much.

So, at the rehearsal last night, I play the piccolo on one piece because I'm used to playing that part. After that, they just gave me all the picc parts. No sweat off my brow...that's what I'd rather play. I mean, it's an octave higher than the flute and it's usually playing in the stratosphere! Yahoo!

We go through the rehearsal and I learn that the guy conducting the rehearsal (not Captain Backwards) is the assistant conductor. The Maestro is Boris and he's sitting in the back listening to the rehearsal. I guess he's too good to do the grunt work? What's up with that? More weirdness.

After the rehearsal, the assistant conductor comes up to the flutes and says, "We didn't go over Stars and Stripes." I kinda noticed that. Then he says, "I will want the piccolo solo memorized." This is not unusual. Lots of groups have the piccolos stand or something during that part and we wail! In high school, we used to get all the flutes on piccolos during that part and we'd stand at the front of the stage and toot our little hearts out. Yeah, I've got that part memorized.

Oh, did I mention that I had the BAND part memorized? That's a totally different key than the ORCHESTRA part! Sheesh. Poor X-man and TC had to listen to me try to memorize it this morning. It is not a quiet part!

We have rehearsal all afternoon today...2:00 to 9:00 with an hour from dinner. When I first heard it was going to be that long, I wondered what we'd do with all that time.

Now that I've heard the group, I know that we'll need all that time so we don't sound like crap tomorrow.

When they tape the show.

To play on PBS stations around the country.

Nice.