Nurture is Nature and The Big Bang
Just finished writing two more tunes in my cherished shed, like virtually everything I’ve written the last 10 plus years, in a beat-up three ring binder, all with pencil or pen and paper at the piano (sometimes, in the case of the pop stuff, guitar). I tried writing on a sequencer, but for me, there is something very pure and timeless about using the same method as the composers have been doing since the time of Palestrina and before…Anyway, it turns out that, even with many additions of manuscript paper, I had come to the end of the book, so, appropriately enough, the tune is called “last page in the book – nurture is nature is…” so look for it on your mega-store endcaps soon. It has occurred to me that for all of us, the first and last sentence of our book is the same: he was born. he died. It’s how we fill it in that is interesting. The title partially refers to that.
The other song I wrote tonight is called night watchman, a nod to the fact of my late night jazzer tendencies from an early age. I remember hiding the radio under the covers when I was a teenager, so I could hear the faint and static tones of Kasey Kasem counting down America’s top 40 between midnight and 1 am, as the rest of my family soundly slept. So being a jazzer was predestined. I’ve always been vaguely suspicious of folks who loved to rise early and go to bed early, and a true upgrade in quality of life in my hood is the opening of two high-end late night restaurants around here, Fonda and T Rex, not to mention authentic Chinese at Daimo. Still, I miss being able to go to any number of great late night spots around here the way I could in NYC. Oh well, got to stop looking for Indian food in a Japanese restaurant, ya know? At any rate, as my wife and son hit it for another early night of sleep, I am in love with the stillness of the night.
Cool weekend coming up, will see Frederica Von Stade Friday, Jarrett Sunday and of course my gig at Anna’s with Susan Muscarella on Monday. Rumor has it John Stowell may stop by, and Carla has also threatened to come sing a tune. Both sound fun.
As for the world…sigh…Feingold is a mensch, the weak-kneed Dems who are running from his censure motion are in need of a balls transplant. (BTW, having balls is not gender-specific. Arianna Huffington and Susan Sarandon have them. Alan Colmes and the caving Dem men don’t. You can substitute the more elegant courage of his/her convictions if you like.) The Dems have become such a bunch of equivocating, poll-sniffing cowards it is disgusting. The Goppers have a sorry litany of excrement from McCarthy to Nixon to Gingrich to Reagan to Bushco to Frist to Lott to Delay to, well, you get the idea. Folks filled with hate, twisting us and appealing to whatever divide and conquer fear tactics they can, but from Goldwater on, they have the courage of their kooky konviktions! Where have you gone Bobby Kennedy (the good Bobby.) W and his gang have lied about WMD, gone to an optional war which has caused about 100,000 needless deaths (more than all terrorist acts, period) sanctioned torture, created a powder keg and civil war in the making, shredded our civil liberties, shit on the constitution, eviscerated environmental safeguards, appointed justices who question the idea of one man one vote and turned the largest surplus in history in to the largest deficit in history, all while lining the pockets of their ultra-rich base. Meanwhile, the Dems wring their hands and worry about alienating the swing voter. Anyway, heartening to see the occasional bit of bravery from Senator Feingold.
On a positive and awe-inspiring final note, did you see the story that scientists have now confirmed that the universe turned from something the size of a marble to astronomical size in a trillionth of a trillionth (aka a sextillionth) of a second?
As the CBC reports, 'NASA's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe or WMAP spacecraft is looking at the afterglow of energy from the Big Bang, believed to have occurred about 13.7 billion years ago, to help researchers understand how the universe formed.
"We report today the most precise measurements of our infant universe," said Charles Bennett, principal investigator for the NASA mission.
"We have new evidence that the universe suddenly grew from sub-microscopic to astronomical size in less than the blink of an eye," Bennett told a telephone news conference.
The event happened in less than a trillionth of a second, according to the researchers, who analyzed variations in the brightness of microwave radiation, or cosmic microwave background, to find the evidence.'
And the vast majority of our tiny little planet in a obscure byway of a not very important galaxy subscribe to the all-encompassing we are the apple of the intelligent designers' eye explanations developed by our distant and primitive forbears who didn’t even know the earth revolved around the sun and you should wash your hands before you eat!!!
Well,this is one camper who ain't buying what they are selling, boys and girls. The only answer worth embracing to me is the question. So I leave you with what that fellow Bill Shakespeare said all these moons ago. “There is more in heaven and earth than is dreamt of in your philosophy.” AND Diogu got 21 points in 24 minutes tonight.
The other song I wrote tonight is called night watchman, a nod to the fact of my late night jazzer tendencies from an early age. I remember hiding the radio under the covers when I was a teenager, so I could hear the faint and static tones of Kasey Kasem counting down America’s top 40 between midnight and 1 am, as the rest of my family soundly slept. So being a jazzer was predestined. I’ve always been vaguely suspicious of folks who loved to rise early and go to bed early, and a true upgrade in quality of life in my hood is the opening of two high-end late night restaurants around here, Fonda and T Rex, not to mention authentic Chinese at Daimo. Still, I miss being able to go to any number of great late night spots around here the way I could in NYC. Oh well, got to stop looking for Indian food in a Japanese restaurant, ya know? At any rate, as my wife and son hit it for another early night of sleep, I am in love with the stillness of the night.
Cool weekend coming up, will see Frederica Von Stade Friday, Jarrett Sunday and of course my gig at Anna’s with Susan Muscarella on Monday. Rumor has it John Stowell may stop by, and Carla has also threatened to come sing a tune. Both sound fun.
As for the world…sigh…Feingold is a mensch, the weak-kneed Dems who are running from his censure motion are in need of a balls transplant. (BTW, having balls is not gender-specific. Arianna Huffington and Susan Sarandon have them. Alan Colmes and the caving Dem men don’t. You can substitute the more elegant courage of his/her convictions if you like.) The Dems have become such a bunch of equivocating, poll-sniffing cowards it is disgusting. The Goppers have a sorry litany of excrement from McCarthy to Nixon to Gingrich to Reagan to Bushco to Frist to Lott to Delay to, well, you get the idea. Folks filled with hate, twisting us and appealing to whatever divide and conquer fear tactics they can, but from Goldwater on, they have the courage of their kooky konviktions! Where have you gone Bobby Kennedy (the good Bobby.) W and his gang have lied about WMD, gone to an optional war which has caused about 100,000 needless deaths (more than all terrorist acts, period) sanctioned torture, created a powder keg and civil war in the making, shredded our civil liberties, shit on the constitution, eviscerated environmental safeguards, appointed justices who question the idea of one man one vote and turned the largest surplus in history in to the largest deficit in history, all while lining the pockets of their ultra-rich base. Meanwhile, the Dems wring their hands and worry about alienating the swing voter. Anyway, heartening to see the occasional bit of bravery from Senator Feingold.
On a positive and awe-inspiring final note, did you see the story that scientists have now confirmed that the universe turned from something the size of a marble to astronomical size in a trillionth of a trillionth (aka a sextillionth) of a second?
As the CBC reports, 'NASA's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe or WMAP spacecraft is looking at the afterglow of energy from the Big Bang, believed to have occurred about 13.7 billion years ago, to help researchers understand how the universe formed.
"We report today the most precise measurements of our infant universe," said Charles Bennett, principal investigator for the NASA mission.
"We have new evidence that the universe suddenly grew from sub-microscopic to astronomical size in less than the blink of an eye," Bennett told a telephone news conference.
The event happened in less than a trillionth of a second, according to the researchers, who analyzed variations in the brightness of microwave radiation, or cosmic microwave background, to find the evidence.'
And the vast majority of our tiny little planet in a obscure byway of a not very important galaxy subscribe to the all-encompassing we are the apple of the intelligent designers' eye explanations developed by our distant and primitive forbears who didn’t even know the earth revolved around the sun and you should wash your hands before you eat!!!
Well,this is one camper who ain't buying what they are selling, boys and girls. The only answer worth embracing to me is the question. So I leave you with what that fellow Bill Shakespeare said all these moons ago. “There is more in heaven and earth than is dreamt of in your philosophy.” AND Diogu got 21 points in 24 minutes tonight.
posted by Michael Zilber at 12:39 AM
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