The Bis Key Chronicles

Enjoy a Microsoft Orchestra Summer concert at the Ballard Locks on a Sunny Seattle day. I had so many friends in this group which in the last six years has gone from a scary-small 25 to an impressive 82 musicians. And I forgot a pivotal piece of the camera tripod so I had the camera tied by it’s strap to the tripod.

This montage includes cuts from the music of Jurassic Park, Copeland's Rodeo, and the 1812 Overture. The canon booms are from a digital device. The director is Jim Truher. Those of you on Facebook have already seen this.

I’m working on a follow-up of a friend’s performance of Grondahl’s Trombone Concerto too. So keep your eyes peeled.  :o)

The Pacific Cascade Big Band plays at Seattle's Ballard Locks as part of the Summer Concert series. Soloists in this montage include Charlie Wickham and Sharon (Shaz) Adams. Songs include Take Five, Do Nothing till you hear from Me, Summertime, and Makin' Whoopie. Our director is Cam Davison.

We play this Thursday, 2 July at 7 PM at Cottage Lake.

I've been sucked in by the borg in Germany called the Quintessence Saxophone Quintet. Jeff, you arrange this, I'll find the players.

Or this one, as many of you know my fav:

I’m off to the the Ballard Locks for some sax goodness with the Pacific Cascade Big Band. I doing solos on Misty (alto), Queen Bee (tenor) and Summertime (tenor). Looks to be a beautiful day.

Many of you may have heard about the awesome pricing for Windows 7 that Microsoft is offering to customers for the next 10 days. The offer will be available from online retailers and directly from Microsoft through the Microsoft Store. Most of my family and friends are all over this so I thought I’d put it out there for my Windows Spaces family.

Windows 7: Be first. Save half.

Pre-order Windows 7 today at the Microsoft Store. You'll get it for at least half off and be one of the first to get it. Hurry, quantities are limited.*

It's pretty simple

Windows 7 is coming on October 22, 2009. Here's an easy way to get it fast and save a bundle: Pre-order a Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade for $49 or a Windows 7 Professional Upgrade for $99 at the Microsoft Store.   That's about half off the estimated retail prices.

Want more info? 

Go to the Windows team blog and find out all the details. 

* The offer begins on June 26, 2009 and will continue while supplies last, or until July 11, 2009, whichever comes first.

Firstly, I stole this title from Zep because it just made me laugh. Zep is a fellow with which English is a second language for him. Me, I have no excuses for my use of the English language.

So one of those girls would be KimP who sent me a bunch of sax quartet audio recordings to listen to. It was fun, but I’m spoiled. I prefer videos because I can tell so much more from a good video. In a video you can often see a players reaction to a mistake or how they internalize rhythm. In that vein I share one of my quartet videos.

This is  a session with the Professor Gadget Sax Quartet, a fledgling group that meets once a month every once in a while. It is a rare piece where I actually agree to play the soprano, not my best instrument to say the least.

Putting something like this out there is like baring one’s soul or going on a slide with a dress on. Many hobbyists refuse to record themselves but I find it both a very humbling experience and a good learning tool.

Be well my friends.

I was thinking the other day about successful organizations, blogs, and the like. Successful organizations or publications are not created in isolation but thrive with constant interactions, review, and comparisons to like activities. Negotiations happen all the time and often there are more than one point of view that could work. Success happens when you move to implement a great solution.

But some of us shut down such input because of harder to define reasons. We have to ask ourselves, what are we not willing to consider and why?

So in the case of a band, even a band that caters to swing dance clubs on occasions, I won’t consider doing polkas. I’ve played in Big Bands that do polkas and even waltzes, but that’s not where I want to be. But you know what, in those other bands, when you play a polka, every man, child, and grandma gets up and dances. It’s amazing how popular that stuff is.

When I’m blogging, I consider:

• religion
• politics
• sex

‘off the table’. But does that make sense—am I just taking the easy way out? Do big breakthroughs come from doing something that everyone else says is off the table? Maybe my audience would grow if I strayed from my formula just a bit.

I’d like to have some success in blogging and combos, my passions du jour. As it is today, my blog helps me to keep track of things that interest me and/or ideas I might want to delve into later. My bands, yes plural, are opportunities for me to play music with people more talented than me but still play the music I like. I really don’t dwell upon what the audience or my blog posse would enjoy. What is ‘off the table’ for you?

We were only in port for about 8 hours today and got on a bus almost immediately. All the bus drivers were women which was different from everywhere else that we have been this trip. The highlight of the day was Gustav Vigelands's stone, iron and bronze statues in a park that was quite long. Like most of the cathedral architects and such, Gustav did not live to see the park finished.

Debby, Suzy and I commented that this kind of public display would never happen in the US and that it was sad. The presentation was celebrating live from young to old and captured moments from most of our lives. And there was a story for each statue, some of which I suspect would not be allowed by Windows Live Spaces to be posted on this blog.

We ended the tour at the Viking Museum with three actual ships, sleds, and other artifacts. It was hard to hear our tour guide because the place was so packed. As was the park, these places had many tourist and people from Norway too.

We are now enroute to our final destination from whence we started, Copenhagen. I've down loaded over a thousand photos to Debby's thumb drive for her to take home. Hey, I wonder if I can get Suzy to pack my bags?  ;o)

Poland brought us to the medieval castle of Malbork located near the city of Gdansk. I must have taken over 300 pictures of the castle before we even got to Gdansk to view the Church of Mary.

We spent much of our time on the bus in between locations because our bus drive kept taking the wrong turns. After about the fourth wrong turn which where the correct location was well marked we started getting nervous. Finally the tour guide took to watch the  bus driver and giving his spiel. It was amazing and had me wondering who this fellow knew to get a premium job like this is Poland.

We had lunch at the castle with a three piece string trio, local beers and food. I looked at the music of the musicians, I'd been doing this all along and rather than the hand written songs I had been seeing, I saw a standard three staff trio piece that looked like it had been copied from a Rubanks or some such lesson book. I will be posting videos of the medieval music on my YouTube account once I get back to my ultra-fast FiOS connection at home.

Once in Gdansk we had a whirlwind tour of the Church of Mary and the Market and Long Streets.

I've received some comments about the pictures I am planning on posting on my Flickr account. The Internet is so slow here, I am going to have to wait to post until we get back to the States.