Teo! I was listening to an old concert recorded in Berkeley last night, so at least I feel a little appropriate getting back to you, from there in California.
But I can't get into the notation with you. I was bad on guitar, and just got worse. I stopped playing trumpet and reading and writing, just being leading on guitar, even if I've enjoyed looking at many examples of notation in studios to art galleries, swirling staffs of music, birch bark compositions, stencils on nuclear drums, you name it. I even saw some scratching on polar ice a tribal elder drew of the wording for others, with a little fish slapping going on between notes.
Ah yes, singing while you're working, one of my favorites. Today, a local restaurant owner taking over a new business had me working on an illuminated sign inside the building, and I was dancing around a little and singing to "Shawty's got a fire going on the dance floor", just to put everyone else's head through, especially the owner after I started a plastic plumbing fire. It got us all some free pizza and pop, and another gig offer for me. Do you know about plastic fires, not that you should?
Seeing what you're doing is the first time I've gotten into it with computers and modern keys, so I'm glad I left it behind at the start. Just the traditional and the creative was overwhelming. Thinking about composing when you can sample and play any part and sound like anything isn't where I'm at at all, and is so far beyond me now I'll never get into it.
What I'd like is to hear some of your music to see how you're working it.
That would open my ears more than reading here opens my eyes.
And you're right about those sweet gospel sounds. Most people don't think of Scottish Presbyterian choirs as "gospel", but that's how I started singing, in the choir in a church where my parents were founding members. I'm tempted to upload a picture of my mother, who sang lead soprano in the adult choir. She's the one who had a wild beauty with her voice. I'll never feel that love again.
I hope your music maintains your traditions, a touchstone for all our lives.
as always, John Watt
P.S. If you ever see Timothy Leary, give him a smackdown for me. I bought his album because he said on t.v. that Jimi Hendrix came in for a while and played guitar in the background, so I bought it but never heard Jimi. If I wasn't visiting a friend who had a small canyon below his back deck, I never would have frisbied that album out into far space, the only record I've ever thrown away.
I hope you don't mind all this off-topic, as notational as I can be.
