A Dearth of Heroics

its been quite sometime since a dailyDose.  and i’ve been abysmal about really trying to keep it together in my head.  there are so many things i intended to put up here.  but at last, as my mind comes together after a lot of summery spacing out, i have the wherewithal to get my act together.  so here, dear reader, unabashed music.  not the usual one man operation that i have tended to make the dailyDoses, but not much more.  here is highlights of kyle’s and my brunch sets at Saje last sunday afternoon.  complete with blurbs i used on themimetiks.com blog.

i hope you enjoy.  i have some really interesting stuff coming up.  not to mention some “compositions” that might be of interest.  and if i can afford it, i intend to get a harddrive sometime this week.  which will make storage a non-issue (at last!)
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sundaykindoflove
this one was just so necessary. i don’t see how we could have not played this tune. i found the leadsheet giving us the somewhat confusing bridge and we launched into it. one of the best compliments you can receive for such a gambit is that it “looked” like we were reading it, but people weren’t sure… because it sounded like something we’d played before. well, we have and we haven’t. so i hope this serves as a hint to the kind vibe that afternoon.

lately
i recently learned this one for a gig at the Monticello casino in Liberty, NY. its one of Stevie’s greatest ballads. why i haven’t just sat down and learned the entire Wonder catalogue… well i don’t know. listen for the super-ECM-like-piano-solo… very period. like played by a white guy in a dashiki and in the 70s. (don’t think i don’t work on odd shit like that)

valentinesday medley
its just a favorite. we’ve been doing this one since the last october, when we figured out the arrangement during a weeklong journey to maine and back again. (see entry the shipMimetik)

bodyandsoul
Osamu is the sunday morning chef at Saje. and a solid jazz guitarist in his own right. during the first set break he said noticed we were going for the jazzier side of things. he asked if we did Body and Soul. to be honest, i don’t think i’ve ever sung the song. but i have accompanied people on it dozens of times, and i love to call it at jam sessions. i happened to have the lyrics handy… so we did it.
… and the food was excellent.

listenatall
during the course of the afternoon we did generate some new original material. to keep things on the up and up, we figured it might be nice to have originals in the mix. don’t want to just become a lounge band. or a soul cover duo. so listenatall. remember this one, anyone? bittergarden? bembe? ah well, whatever.

losing intelligence

i would say i’m almost complete fucked at this point.  between music, night time, and lovesongs… its like i’m up on a triangular cross.  we’ve come to a sort of stop-gap where i am trying to figure out just how Fall is going to shape up.  hard to say, honestly.  will i make good on my oath and do the disgusting work of throwing off the upstate gigs?  will i find some sort of “gig” in the city so that i can eat everyday without anxiousness?  will i practice everyday so that i can play through a score on sight?  i’ve finally made a 1 year plan… not a one year plan, but one thing that would go into my 1 year plan.  300 songs by 8/14/2008.  that is 300 songs that i can simply launch into without a leadsheet or notationpaper in front of me.  three hundred songs that i can call part of the akie bermiss songbook.  music AND lyrics.  some originals and shit load of covers.

discounting last night its been fracking ages since my last post and what has gone down could fill several books — let alone livejournal entries.  i will try to accomplish some that here. in part nine of… [indeterminate].

today, i listened to a live motherming cd from 2001.  its the only live CD i have anymore, i’ve realized.  i hadn’t listened to that music in a long while and it makes me want to throw out a group email to the former band…

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[next day.  5:19pm.  Coast restaurant.  Tivoli, NY]

in about 45 minutes i’ll be headed out of here for a gig in Athens, NY with Pamela Pentony.  the rest of the band is Barnaby (AKA the barn-stormer) and Mark Wixom (formerly of SUNY New Paltz… who i played with last summer in a pick up band put together by wicked saxophonist, Ben Newsome.)  it should be a breeze.  but just in case… i am coffeeing up… and i’ve had a cigar to day.

dinner’s over.  i’m off!

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interlude:

what can i tell you?  were this a two-way conversation i might ask you what you’d like to know.  people like to say, “tell me everything.”  but that’s just a way of saying “what happened?”  if i were to tell you everything, actually, then you would probably have a really good concept of just what is going on… but nothing would have happened since.  it takes longer to tell the everything of a thing than for the the thing to actually happen in the first place.  things is silly like that.  so i will tell you some of what’s gone down.  some little bit of what’s cracking.  and i will try to be informative, but not exhaustive.  things have gone down my fine, friends.  and going down, they are coming down… they’ve not finished descending.  not here.

i recently finished reading the newest Einstein biography.  very comprehensive.  this is the kind of writing i ask myself why no one does for jazz nonfiction.  the jazz history books always seems to be cosmetic.  they deal with an issue on the surface of the issue.  they have great pictures and memorable quotes.  but other than that?  i’ve read two jazz biographies that were actually good.  informative.  and seemed like they were written to read by adults (and not school children).  Lush Life (which is about Billy Strayhorn) and How My Heart Sings (which is about Bill Evans).  other than that, maybe Miles Davis’ Autobiography is worth checking out.  the rest are negligible.  often written poorly with more descriptive whachamacallit than actual substance.  a shame.  a flaming shame.  any way the einstein was great.  and now i’m really interested in returning to my passion for physics.  but is there enough time?

nope.  not here.

let’s see — what else has gone down?  I did that gig with Reddi at 169 Bar.  it wasn’t a packed house.  but then it was like 7:30 on a sunday evening/afternoon in august.  you know?  the music was pretty good.  if only it were a regular thing and we knew the tunes inside out and didn’t have to worry about remember the minutae of the arrangements.  i had a damned good time.  playing pop-rock-soul.  the band was pretty killing to.  in fact, if anything, i have been getting in to it with some really great musicians of late

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[2:16am.  Brooklyn.  home.]

i sat down on my bed.  and it collapsed.  there is no way to fix it now.  just to go to sleep unevenly.  i will then.  and probably be incredibly pissed in the morning.  shit.  if you think Brooklyn was burning before…

the death of max roach

is a modern day tragedy. inevitable. but sad. had i wine, i would drink to him tonight. i will, instead, remember his greatness and be awed, moved, and chastened.

[article on Max Roach]

for those of you that don’t know: friendship sometimes means that you are going spend a night on a couch in Brooklyn for no good reason.  that you are going “pretend” you don’t have a bed, in a room, in an apartment… because you said you would.  and it means you will find yourself borrowing your homeboy’s apartment at 3:25 am… after spending 30 minutes looking for parking… and discovering there is no internet.

it means that, though it was a good evening, the nighttime will be brief and unforgiving.  and when you get to the morning tell him to sod off, for me.

bugger.

(but at least you bought some very expensive limeade in the slope… and you’re drinking that down like its going to put you to sleep.)