Lame Fan Pages

Apparently lame fan pages are not annoying. you (yes, you – dear reader!) should create one and then join the Ellen Fullman Fan Ring. Geocities and Angelfire and other free web hosting things are perfect for this application.
Just think about all the great composers and msucians who you dig but who have no mainstream fame. Some of these folks are broke, even though they’re making your favorite music. This is a bad thing. We’ve got to do something about this. I’ve got a three step plan!

  1. Go buy the CDs of the people you like. You don’t have the lastest one? Go get it! I know, I always buy used CDs too. I hope that inspires music stores to buy new ones, since they can see that it’s selling.
  2. Ok, then call up radio stations that play music in this genre and request songs from the records. i know, this is hard for contemporary classical stuff, but some college stations do it. then your favorite composer is getting some airplay and maybe will sell more CDs as a result. It’s a great idea. No, I’ve actually never done this, but you can see how it would be a great idea if I did.
  3. Make some fan pages and set up or join a webring. it’s guerilla marketting! ok, it’s as useless as all those dot com schemes that used this same formula. if this worked, then ask jeeves would still be worth $150/share (did you know that i was offered a piece of their ipo and said no because i thought their product wouldn’t scale? arg.). But even if it’s not actually useful marketting, the subject of your webpage may google for him or herself and find your fan page and be amused or confused. which is almost as good as fame and fortune.

Improv Music

Not long ago, I comment to a friend, “I don’t like improv music.” That’s not actually true. I love Deep Listening Band and I enjoy the Circle Trio, both headed up by Pauline Oliveros. And heck, I play in an improv rock band. And I like jazz solos. I like non-competitive improv music. For a while, I thought I could make a claim about female-dominated improv, versus male dominated improv, but it doesn’t work. Pauline Oliveros may well be the best improv artist ever, but Anthony Braxton is also very good and he’s definitely not female. I think it just must be very difficult to play improv music and many bands, for whatever reason, become competitive and play thoughtlessly. Certainly competitive, thoughtless music is not limitted to improv, but I think that it’s harder to get to the next level while improving. So, I’d like to clarify my comment. “I don’t like improv music unless it’s good.”
I think I also need to make a resolution to be less negative. What I mean is, to be more positive. Yeah. I love making resolutions for the same reason I like predictability. I can keep making the same resolutions year after year after year. I just need to change the date. I resolve to be more positive, to quit picking on Christi and to play more gigs, put out a new CD and generally improve my music career. yeah. this year will be different. this year will be great. I know it’s April and not January, but it takes me a few months to get the hang of new years.

Bathtubs for tubas

So I spent yesterday trying to get my new sousaphone into working order. It’s not actually new. It’s very very used. It came in a refrigerator box filled with packing peanuts, shredded paper and trash. I emptied out the box looking for the gooseneck. Whoever oppened the box openned it from the bottom, so at the very bottom of the pile, I found a note explaining that the gooseneck was “mislaid.” But it was all worth while, because Tiffany discovered a tuba mouthpiece amid the rubble, which included dirty, used foam, house insulation, bottle caps, used matches, etc all smelling like ashtray. Very odd packing maeterial, but the shipping was hella cheap.
I took the horn outside and started hosing it out. Inside were spiderwebs and spare packing peanuts. Every solder joint leaked water, but that’s ok. If they have bad air leaks, I can either try to resolder them or just duct tape it. Eventually, the odor of the tuba went from nasty-old-tuba smell to odorless, so I left it in the sun to dry and maybe disinfect. I mean, would you want to put your mouth on something you had just hosed spider egg sacks out of, unless it spent some time in the sun first?
Of course, before hosing it out, I pulled out all of the valves. They’re piston valves and they seem to be made out of brass, which is kind of unusual. I wanted to clean them, but I don’t own any brasso, and I didn’t really want to buy any, so I hit the ecology center website looking for some earth-friendly brass cleaning alternative. it suggested katsup. I swear, if some enviro group told me to cure headaches by hitting myself on the head repeatedly, I’d try it. And then, in conversations about headache remedies, I would casually mention it and then add, anecdotally, “but it didn’t work for me.”
So I rubbed katsup on all the vales and then rinsed them several times. Then I hauled the tuba back inside and yanked all the tuning slides out. There’s a trick to this. Loop a dishtowel through the slide and use it to yank it out. You won’t hurt the horn, but if the slide isn’t frozen, it’ll come out. So I pulled the slides out, ran a trombone snake through them a bunch of times and then rubbed the shiny parts of them with katsup. I think Christi and Tiffany think that I’m insane.
The valves move pretty well and the slides will budge if you pull on them. They’re not perfect, but I don’t feel like I should invest the money to take them to a shop. the main body of the horn is still filty, since I coulsn’t submerge it, I didn’t run a snake through it. I’d need a jacuzzi tub. I always thought those were silly and useless. They take a kajillion gallons ot fill up and then they get gradually cold and you have to drain the whole thing and start over next time. I mean, why not just get a hottub? But you can’t wash a tuba in a hottub! Old tuba grease would cause all sort of problems. But you could wash it in jacauzzi tuba! You’d probably want to keep the water jets turned off while doing it. So these giant bathtubs make sense for tuba players. I’m sure that when my parents had one put in, they somehow intuitted that I would one day take up the tuba, and then, in my late twenties, long after I had left home, I would come back to my dear widowed father and ask if I could wash my sousaphone in his bathtub.
As soon as I find a gooseneck, where “find” means “buy,” I can check out how playable the horn is. Hopefully, I can do this tomorrow, since the Brass Liberation Orchestra is playing at a protest outside of Lockheed MArtin in Sunnyvale on Tuesday morning.

Movies

Christi went to see a movie yesterday called Bullet Proof Monk. i didn’t see this movie. i think that by looking at the title, anyone can imagine what i might have to say about the movie (which i haven’t seen) and so it’s not really necessary for me to say anyhting, sice it would all be very predicatable.
I like predictability. i like to play games, like Snake with algorythms, such that I could program the computer to play it for me, so I wouldn’t have to. While I worked at Netscape, I considered doing a secret project to write a program to play solitare for me, thus freeing up my time for other persuits. then they laid me off. go figure.

Holiday Madness

I was going to write a letter about this, but I’m not sure who I should write a letter to. I would like to adress a serious problem in christian traditions. That problem is that they got the holidays in the wrong order.
Let’s look at Easter. First, look at the pre-christian aspects of it. The symbols associated with it are eggs, chicks, baby bunnies, flowers, etc. This holiday is clearly about fertility and birth. Obviously. It’s spring time! The leaves are coming back on the trees! Sumer is a cumin in, loudly sing cuco! The bulls now farteth, etc. It’s time to mate your livestock and dust off your plow. But what is the christian holiday about? Death! Death and resurrection. It’s a great theme for midwinter, or even autumn, but it has no place in springtime.
Now, take a peek a Christmas. The pre-christian traditions associated with the solstice are harder to sort out, as the non-christian aspects of it continue to evolve. Santa Clause is a new figure on the Christmas scene. But some symbols, like stars and Christmas trees and wreaths and evergreen stuff is part of a very old tradition to remind us that even though much of the world is dead, life will return. The Christian holiday, instead of being about something sensible like death and resurrection is a birth holiday. How does that tie in to the winter solstice??
The autumn holiday, at least makes sence. Halloween (Sam Hain) is not a major holiday on anybody’s calendar except for Mars candy company. But the Christian feast of All Saints and All Souls (Day of the Dead) is about death, as it should be. There, at least, things are as they should be.
I know my analysis here is terribly northern-hemisphere-centric. Does a birth celebration make more sense at the summer solstice instead of the winter one? At least Easter works with the seasons there. It’s almost as if the folks scheduling the holy calendar had a hunch that the season were backwards someplace else that they might one day sail to, colonize and convert. And they thought to themselves, “some part of this thing has to make sense, or the folks with backwards seasons will never sign up.”
Now, as a legacy of some counsil held hundreds and hundreds of years ago, it seems like we’re stuck with a non-sensical system. But we can work together to change this. Write your Cardinal! We must demand that the Easter and Christamas be switched around in the norhtern hemishpere and appropriately re-ordered to match the seasons in the southern hemisphere.
Write your archbishop! Write the pope! We must lobby at all levels!

Old News, New News

Ok, well, at some point in Seattle, I think near the last day there, I went to a concert festival to see, or rather hear and see a collaboration that Ellen did with some dancers. It was very groovy. Ususally, I feel clueless about dance, but I totally “got” that one. And the sounds were cool. the next piece, I didn’t get as much. It had toys in it.
then there was an installation/performance art thing before the second part of the show. It was groos. It was supossed to be “deep.” something about economics and war, but it looked like a gross parody and mocking of homeless people.
then came the second part of everything, which I could try to give a review of, but it was several days ago and I don’t feel qualified. anyway, also at this event, Ellen’s missing teeth video was shown as a lobby installation. I have now seen pictures of many of my friends and acquaintances (and even perfect strangers) without all of their teeth. Ellen is a master of photoshop. She should work for dentistry jounrals and ads.
after all of this, we went to a piano bar, but neither Christi or Ellen (or me) could be persuaded to sing.
I left Seattle on sunday night, but not before having dinner with Ellen at an Ethiopian restuarant. fun was had by all. then Christi took me to the airport to fly overnight to Hartford Connecticut. Everytime I travel overnight, I swear that I’ll never do it again. anyway, I had to run through the airport. I was in the second to last row in the plane and didn’t want to recline my shair too much, because the row behind me couldn’t recline at all.
for some reason, despite the late hour of takeoff, they decided to show movies for hours and hours and hours. and since the folks behind me couldn’t recline to sleep, they yelled advice at the people in the movies. after a while of this, I decided that it would probably be ok for me to recline my chair back as far as it would go.
after one plane change and a long nap in Newark, I got to Hartford and rented a car. I drove one half hour to Middletown. folks tell me that it is imparative to have a car there cuz you can’t get anywhere without one. the transit situation must really suck if there’s no bus to take the half hour ride in. Of course, I’ve now seen middletown and I beleive the people who say there’s no transit.
People in Connecticut are very friendly. The airport people wanted to tell me how to get where I was going and the students wanted to tell me where I was going and it was all very nice. but where are the outdoor drinking fountains? I saw two drinking fountains in the whole state and both were indoors. also, the gas stations are not immediately visable. How do they find gas?
One of the first people I saw on campus was Judy‘s friend Anne. She very helpfully suggested that I stay in some grad student housing and the grad boys there very thoughtfully put me up in their house. It was really very kind and hospitable of them and I’m very grateful. It must be exciting living in such houses, since I was living in a stranger’s room without his knowledge or consent. In fact, he came home the last night I was there, at 2:30 AM, to find his room occupied. And so he slept on the couch. He’s a visitting artist at the university and he didn’t seem to be at all angry that I had been in his room.
So I met some teachers and walked around. The buildings are interesting and mostly underground and all connected underground, which I hope isn’t because of the weather, but I think it might be. apparently, it snowed less than a week before my arrival.
so I signed the paperwork and that’s where I’m going in the fall. And I decided to go home, rather than New York, cuz I couldn’t find a place to stay from any of my meager east coast contacts. Not that they’re individually meager, just that there aren’t many of them. So I fly from Hartforn to Columbus and from Columbus to Vegas, over Texas cuz of weather problems. the couple next to me lived in Columbus and tried to get to Vegas whenever they could. As we were getting to the airport, they started pointing out casinos to me, surprised that I didn’t know of them. “See that red and purple one, that’s the [whatever].” I didn’t have much to contribute, so I said, “did you know that Vegas uses five times as much water per capita than any other place that gets it’s water from the Colorado River?” they sat in silence for a minute and then said, “see that? that’s the replica of the Eifel Tower.”
The vegas airport is loud like a video arcade, but, of course, the games are for adults only. were the gamblers just passing through? Were they anxious to get started or wanted just one last chance before leaving? What makes people want to feed coins into a machine? I mean, I play arcade games sometimes and they eat my quarters. I think maybe it’s like trying to save the princess, but no particular skill is involved, so it’s relaxing and exciting at the same time. but what would I know?
there’s two different competing groups of men who take off their clothes. One is the chippendales. I think the attraction and fantasy of the Chippendales (this is gleamed by looking at the poster in the airport) must be that there could be men in leather pants and bowties who aren’t gay. Straight women hold out hope for men who care about their appearance, like musicals, wear leather pants and are stright. good luck. there’s also an austrailian groupd. they all have long hair like Fabio. Is Fabio straight? With his name and appearance, he should be in a pulp novel dating a guy named Rod.
By the time I got to Oakland, I was convinced that I had taken the wrong flight to the wrong airport. None of it looked familiar. Where was I? but the Christi lead me gently home. And I slept all day yesterday, except for waking up at 9:00 PM to see a movie with Jenya called Chaos. It’s French. It may be a comedy. All ends well. there were some problematic aspects to it. Clearly, French culture is having some problems dealing with immigrants. But it’s not a bad movie. The Sf international film festival apparently likes it. I went back to sleep after seeing it.
and now, my gosh the house is messy. There’s boxes full of drums and a beat up sousaphone and luggage all over the place. the end.

Don’t leave a message

BTW, can’t get messages on cell phone. Email access is very spotty. You can call, but don’t leave a message. Or if you do, don’t expect an answer right away. Thank you and goodnight. I love jetlag! *snore*
The best return flight is the shortest and also the cheapest but leaves at 6:00 AM. bleah. I think I’d collapse.
Some of you will come see me in Connecticut, right? You know, until I get all my new, cool east coast friends. just kidding.

Far Away

You all would come visit me in Connecticut, right?
I got invited to see a new Robert Ashley Opera in New York. Holy Cow! This is amazing for two reasons: 1. I love his operas & 2. New Operas get staged out here??!!
It’s 2.5 hours to New York from here, so it should all work out unless the rental car company gets upset, or I am unable to book a return flight or find a hotel or something.