After 4 hours of score and part study on the plane — with my eyes starting to cross and my brain showing signs of overheating — I decided it was time for a change, so once again my handy iPhone comes out to blog. It is still amazing to me that I will be able to write and post this from my phone while traveling — write in the air, post when I land. It wasn’t so long ago that connecting a phone cord to a bulky home computer was the only way to even access the internet. Now, I have a much faster connection virtually everywhere I go with a device that fits in my palm. I’m glad I didn’t have to carry-on my old tan desktop! Very difficult to fit underneath the seat in front of me.

Since my 150 or so traveling companions are not likely fans of trumpet fundamentals, I have decided that some good old-fashioned score study would be a good way to get in some necessary work. While pouring over the music for the Cabrillo Festival, I am once again struck by how difficult it is to prepare for this festival. Most pieces you play are totally unkown and unrecorded (no buying the recording to see what a piece sounds like for this festival). Not only that, much of the music is by composers whose music is unfamiliar, so you don’t have the instant knowledge of tendencies and style that you would have with a Stravinsky, Mahler, Brahms, etc. Oh yeah, and the music is just flippin’ hard too; that definitely plays a role.

So as the plane lands and I fight my way through the airport, I will likely be fingering thoughtlessly through a tricky passage, or singing some off the wall rhythm, or wondering how, as is indicated in one piece, it is going to work to have me play into the bell of a tuba with my Harmon mute on, while the tuba player wiggles the valves creating a “watery effect”. It might be cool. It might not. Either way, it will certainly be different.

Tray table is up. Time to update my blog.

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I was listening to the radio this morning –

The radio?
Yes.
Not your iPod or computer?
No, the radio. An actual radio. With a knob
In the car?
No, at home.
They make them for the home?
Yes.
Do you have to pay for it?
No, it’s free.
What’s it like?
It’s like an iPod where someone else picks the music.
Weird.
No, it’s actually pretty cool, because they pick things that I wouldn’t pick on my own.
Don’t they sometimes pick stuff you hate?
Sure, but they also pick things I love, and most importantly, they pick things that I love, but that I would never have picked on my own.
Like what?
Well, that’s what I was trying to write about when you interrupted me.
Oh. Sorry.

Anyway, I turned the radio on this morning and the local classical station was playing Aaron Copland’s Red Pony. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to hear the entire piece, but I really enjoyed what I did catch. It has been a while since I listened to any Copland, but I found myself wondering why, as I listened on the radio this morning. He has such a distinctive style: extraordinary use of color and texture in his orchestration, simple and clear themes… His is a defining voice of American classical music, if not the defining voice. What is perhaps the most extraordinary about his music, though, is how instantly recognizable it is. Whether you are listening to one of his more popular pieces (Appalachian Spring, Rodeo, Billy the Kid) or one of his more obscure (Inscape, Orchestral Variations) you can always tell it is him. This is a trait of a great artist: a voice so clear and strong that it transcends whatever form or technique is used and emerges as a profound and distinctly unique voice amongst a chorus of voices.

That is what I was thinking over coffee this morning. But it’s not all I was thinking: I thought also of Steinbeck, whose novella was the origin of the movie and the inspiration of the music; of my time in the San Francisco Symphony and our recording of the Copland the Populist CD (one of my favorites of all the orchestral recordings I have done); of playing principal trumpet on that recording of Appalachian Spring with (Andrew McCandless playing an incredible second trumpet); of the fire and energy that Michael Tilson Thomas created in the orchestra, especially for that recording. All of this was on my mind because I just happened to turn the radio on and listen while having a cup of coffee. This is not music I would have ever chosen to put on myself this morning, not on any device. But there it was. On the radio. And the fact that it was there is what got me thinking, the fact that it existed without my having chosen it, that it was there for all to hear. I was a musical tourist, bumping shoulders with other musical tourists listening from their homes and cars all around South florida, reflecting on what was being broadcast, each of our thoughts and feelings overlapping here, contrasting there…

As much as I love my iPod, these thoughts and memories would have never flowed from it. Perhaps the radio is not as outdated as some might believe. I’m glad I turned it on.

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I’m working on a new post this morning from the beach at Key Biscayne. think I could get used to this somewhat unorthodox writing studio.

Technology has it’s advantages.

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When I first launched this website in 2005, it was born from heaps of coffee, bleary eyes, and the late nights that created them. I don’t think I slept more than four hours in a single night for 2 months during the early stages. Now, as I redesign and reinvent the website — in hopes that more of my time can be spent actually writing than getting mired in a mass of pasted text, HTML, and PHP — I have found that the late nights have returned.

If you have followed LivMusic for a while, then you know that I have been dormant for some time. The truth is, maintenance of the site became too difficult to continue in my busy life (a life which grew to a previously unimagined level of busy during the last year). Now, however, I am able to return my focus to the site. But before I could resume writing I knew the site needed a makeover, so it was time to get to work planning and redesigning. Now, after applying a lot of virtual elbow grease, there is a shiny new design for the blog (complete with a new logo/banner by yours truly) running on the newly updated WordPress 2.8.2, with more changes in the hopper. I will keep you informed about changes as they happen, but that is not the purpose of this post. No, the purpose of this post is simply to write, to take those first steps out of the chute and get down the track. It is 2am right now, and I have been working on the website for much of the night. But before I call it a day, before night makes that subtle transition into morning, I thought I’d let you know that I’m still here, that I’m working on the site, and that most importantly, I’m writing again.

The late nights have returned. Coffee donations accepted.

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Mornings on Key Biscayne, where I regularly ride my beloved Italian bicycle, are stunning. The sun rises over the ocean, casting long westwardly-grasping shadows across the ground and hues of orange and purple across the sky. There is generally a refreshing light breeze, and in summertime there is often a cloudburst or two (or many) drifting over the open waters beyond. It is a special thing to be out cruising on two wheels — almost soundless on the pavement — taking in these glorious surroundings.

But that is not what I did today.

No, today I went in the afternoon. I couldn’t go in the morning, so I missed all of that pleasant pretty stuff. Instead I rode like a pig on a spit across baking hot pavement into a blistering headwind with cars and trucks roaring by, spewing fumes and grime. There were no clouds; the relentless wind had blown them all away. The only shadow I could see was my own drifting across the pavement beneath me. I could swear it was sweating. As I was riding across this less-than-pleasant surrounding, I kept thinking about the Key in the morning. Specifically, I kept thinking about what it must have been like this very morning. I’m sure it must have been glorious. There is little doubt that would have been a better time to go for a ride. But I couldn’t go, so there is no need lamenting it. In fact, lamenting it should be the very last thing I do, because it is much more difficult to make yourself do things when they are difficult or less-than-pleasant than when everything is perfect and pristine. Today I reaped all of the important health benefits of riding a bike. I got the exercise, the bit of solitude, the indescribable joy of a self-powered mini-journey on two wheels. I earned these rewards on a day that I could have easily stayed at home. After all, it was hot and windy, and I have a long list of important things that must be dealt with (just ask the people that want me to do them!). I could have just skipped the ride and gone tomorrow morning, but in so doing, I would have missed the ride today and all of its inherent benefits. And if you want to get better at something, or simply benefit from it in whatever way, it will take your daily attention, even if it doesn’t fit easily into your schedule, or even if it isn’t as pleasant as it would have been otherwise. Get it done today, maybe tomorrow can be more perfect, more pristine. But today? Get it done. Whatever the conditions. We can’t really count on tomorrow, not until it turns into today. That is what I was thinking today as I clawed my way up the baking causeway. Now if I could somehow manage to do the same thing with every aspect of my life…

But if you happen to be in this neck of the woods with a bicycle, and if you find that you can be up and out in the early dawn cruising across the Rickenbacker Causeway to Virginia Key and beyond to Key Biscayne, then you will see: it really is beautiful in the morning. I go as often as I can.