Bad Memento = Good Art?

I played on a recording session yesterday afternoon, and, during the lulls in the proceedings, a lot of us were taking pictures with our phone-cams. I guess my camera hand must have been really shaky during the one I took, because this is how it turned out:


It may not have ended up as quite the treasured memento of yesterday afternoon that I had hoped it would be, but I think it scores extra points as a work of slightly avant-garde art.

Kids Say the Darnedest Things, Week After Week

More funny kid stuff:

It's starting to be the time of the year where I help the students pick out solos for Solo and Ensemble contest in February. One particular solo--a Baroque transcription--is marked at a tempo at which nobody would ever play it; even if it were physically possible, it wouldn't be in any way musical.

When introducing this solo, I often joke that either the too-fast tempo is a misprint, or the arranger had consumed an entire case of Red Bull before sitting down to do the arrangement. When I said that this morning, the kid for whom I was demo-ing the solo came up with this gem:

"I wonder what Mozart would be like if he sat down at the piano after drinking a Red Bull."

Again, maybe you had to be there. But people on Facebook really liked the quote, so I figured I'd share it here. (And for what it's worth, I bet Mozart on Red Bull would be similar to Beethoven on the mall organ in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure; go here if you've never seen it.)

At Day's End, The Waters Dance

The Shops at Legacy (North End), this evening. (I've photographed this fountain before...)

Kids Say the Darnedest Things, Vol. LVII

More lesson levity this morning:

ME: Ok, this piece is in half-time feel, which means that the value of every note is doubled. So how much is a half note tied to a dotted quarter note usually worth?
KID: Three and a half beats.
ME: And how much is it worth in half-time?
KID: Six and a half.
ME: I'm going to enjoy teaching you during your second senior year.

(To the kid's credit, their school pretty much had yesterday off because of trimester exams, so today qualified as a sort of honorary Monday in terms of how out-of-it everyone was. I'm sure his math is a bit better than that most of the time...)

Throw the Bum('s Son) Out? Yeah, I Guess It Had to Be Done

I was away from the radio for a long time today, but I caught the news through the next-best source--the Facebook posts of my friends--that Jerry Jones had done an about-face and let Wade Phillips go as Cowboys head coach today. Despite that one-word vote of confidence that Jones gave to KRLD-FM ("The Fan") last week, it was clear that something had to be done after last night's 45-7 pasting at the hands of the Green Bay Packers. And though it made sense not to bring in a new coach from outside the program with next year's possible labor troubles looming large, it appeared that Jones may have actually been listening to the one possible idea that would circumvent all that: Promote Garrett and see what he could do with the team; could it possibly be any worse?

It was only a few short years ago that Garrett was the hottest young assistant in the NFL, turning down head-coaching offers from other teams in favor of remaining with the Cowboys as offensive coordinator/heir apparent to the top job. And now he has his wish, though this is certainly not the scenario under which he'd like to take over the position. The chatter of the past few weeks has been that it would no longer make sense to promote Garrett when a lot of the fan base considered him a part of the problem (it's not like the offense was shining before Tony Romo went down), but after the past few games, it was obvious that something--anything--had to be done.

It's too bad the Wade Phillips era had to end as it did. I grew up in Houston as an Oilers fan in the days when Wade was an assistant to his legendary father, Bum Phillips, and I hoped that the son could succeed here. I'm still not sure why the same players who went 11-5 just a year ago are suddenly mired at 1-7 at the season's halfway point, but it was obviously more than Mr. Fix-It could fix.

So Jones made a bold (for him) move, changing coaches in midseason for the first time. But will he make the bolder move--firing himself as GM and hiring a knowledgeable football person? He's been great at things such as building an amazing facility and promoting the team; why can't he stick to the things he does best and leave the football decisions to the experts? Is his ego still too big to allow himself to do that, or has this season finally humbled him?

UPDATE: Tim Cowlishaw of the Dallas Morning News also promotes the Jones-should-fire-himself angle and states even more great reasons why this should happen.

Feel free to hit the comment button and chime in if you wish.

As We Are Reunited With Daylight Wasting Time

It's not that I didn't appreciate the extra hour of sleep last night; I did. And it's not that I didn't get the bulk of my afternoon errands (post-judging, post-meeting; there was no rest for the weary this weekend) done before it got dark. And it was a lovely sunset in my rear-view mirror as I drove down the highway.

But that being said, it still bugged me that it was dark by 6 p.m. Not so much for today, mind you; the productive part of my day was done, and all I had left was to eat dinner and watch the Cowboys game (and what a bad idea that was!). But I'm thinking about the rest of the week. Because you know what? I really, really dislike Daylight Wasting Time.

And why?, you may ask. I still can't say it any better than I did in the 2003 post that inaugurated this topic:

I think the really depressing part of DWT is that it almost always gets dark before I'm done teaching now. It seems to me that if you don't finish work until after dark, you've worked too long. In a way, I know my days are too long, but at least I can hide behind a little denial if I get home while the sun is still out. DWT blows that all out of the water, and I'm forced to come to terms with my workaholic self. Bleh.

It's still like this, of course; Mondays go till 6:00, Tuesdays till eight, and Wednesdays go till 6:30. (It's pretty much always dark when I'm done on Thursdays, but I teach a night class that ends at 9:45, so that's par for the course.) That leaves me with only Fridays to still have daylight when the teaching day is done, and even then, I'm within an hour of sunset.

I'm happy that DWT has been made shorter and shorter lately by the gradual expansion of Daylight Saving Time, but it's still too much for me. But what can I do about it? Well, complain--just like now. But it's only once a year; thanks for indulging me here, and I'll counter this with a bit of rejoicing every spring.

Lesson Levity

I'm not sure how I forgot this yesterday, as I always like to post "funny kid" stories. Here's one from this week:

ME: OK, let's move on to the etudes; we're done with scales...OK, we're not really done with scales forever--just for today.
KID: No, no, I like the first idea. I'm done with scales! I'm done with scales forever!
ME: So you're breaking up with scales?
KID: It's not them; it's me.

Again, maybe you had to be there, but I thought it was funny.

Let's Wrap Up This Week With a Golden Tune

It's been a long week for me, and the weekend will be busy as well. So rather than engage in any punditry tonight, I'll offer up the one thing I like to share even more than opinions or stories: Cool music. Just like last night, here's one from the Esbjörn Svensson Trio--a version of the tune "Goldwrap" (originally recorded on the Tuesday Wonderland CD) from the live CD recording done in Hamburg, Germany in '07. No visuals as such, but sit back, listen and enjoy:



I still wish I'd known of this group during Svensson's lifetime, so I could have tried to catch them during one of their rare U.S. appearances.

Still One of the B-E.S.T. Bands I Never Got to See

I often have listening breaks during my evening combo--both to rest people's chops during a three-hour rehearsal and to turn the members of the group--who range from their teens to their 50s--onto cool music that they might not have heard before. Tonight's band of choice was the Esbjörn Svensson Trio (E.S.T. for short), a group I had heard of over the years but didn't actually hear any of their music until a few weeks after Svensson's untimely passing three summers ago. Thankfully, the group left a large recorded legacy that can be enjoyed again and again.

I hadn't watched some of my favorite E.S.T. videos in a while, and I was disappointed to discover that a couple of them are no longer available on YouTube. But there's still a wealth of stuff out there, so enjoy this one, a live performance of "Dodge the Dodo" (I'm not sure how old it is, but Svensson had hair--lots of it, actually--in this video, as compared to the shaved-head look he favored later in life):



Listen, watch and enjoy. They don't make 'em like this too often.

This Legal Action Doesn't "Wash" with Me

The other day, I mentioned a clever T-shirt that a couple of Rangers fans had come up with a T-shirt that riffed on manager Ron Washington's signature mangled phrase, "That's the way baseball go." But the website that had been flooded with orders was suddenly forced to stop selling the shirts (right before I could order one, of course), and everyone suspected that--despite the fact that the T-shirt had nothing specifically referring to the Rangers or Major League Baseball on it, just the iconic catch phrase on one side and a caricature of Wash on the other--the fledgling company had somehow run afoul of the legal high sheriffs.

Unfortunately, everyone suspected correctly; they were given cease-and-desist orders by both MLB and Rangers attorneys. This threw the guys behind the company for a loop:

"It's bizarre that they would approach us at this point," said Seth Hayhurst, a co-creator of the shirt.

Hayhurst said his attorney plans to respond to the letters this morning and try to find a resolution.

"I hope for some kind of resolution where they aren't trying to squash the little guys who are trying to make the Rangers fans happy," he said.

The Rangers didn't return a call seeking comment, and an MLB spokesman said he was unaware of the situation.

If it were just the Rangers involved, I would hope that owner Chuck Greenberg--a lawyer himself--might include this in the "fan-friendly" moves that he's been making since acquiring the team. But if the league itself is involved, I'm not overly optimistic that an agreement can be reached.

But if they do, I'll be all over that T-shirt.

Ode to a Great Season

I won't lie--I'm really bummed at how Game 5 of the World Series ended tonight. I really thought that the lineup the Rangers sent up to the plate in the top of the ninth could come through like they had all season long, but in the end, the unexpected juggernaut that is the Giants' pitching staff proved to be too much. I'd never heard of most of these guys before the Series started, but I sure won't disrespect the National League again any time soon.

It's easy right now to wallow in defeat and think of what might have been, but let's not lose sight of all the great things that happened this season: The first playoff series victory; first trip to an ALCS and winning of same; finally vanquishing the hated Yankees; first World Series, and first Rangers game in November, ever. Who would have imagined even half of that at the start of the season?

Sure, there are some problems that need to be solved. Keeping Cliff Lee for next season is of paramount importance, and finding a way to keep key players healthy for bigger chunks of the year would really help (imagine what things would have been like if Nellie, Josh and Ian hadn't missed so many games due to injury). A top-three pitching rotation of Lee, CJ Wilson and Colby Lewis would put the team in good shape, but the other two are question marks (can Tommy Hunter gain some consistency?). The first baseman of the future has arrived in the person of Mitch Moreland, and I sure hope Bengie Molina wasn't serious the other day about retiring.

And I can't wait to see the team enjoy a full year under the ownership of Chuck Greenberg and Nolan Ryan. For the first time in years, the team is on solid financial footing, with one co-owner who has the money to upgrade not only the team but the entire fan experience, and another one who's not only a local icon but has already turned the team around as club president. The future's looking bright, and I don't think it'll be another 41 years before the Rangers are in the World Series again (and if it does take that long, I'll be really freakin' old, so they'd better be selling wheelchair section tickets on StubHub.)

Congrats, Rangers, on a great season. I'm sorry it had to end this way, but I can't wait to see what next year will bring.

Let's Tell a Scary Story Again

It's easy to indulge in reruns on holidays (somewhat like they do on TV), but what could be better on Halloween than to post the one ghost story with which I'm intimately familiar?

So if you haven't seen it yet--or simply want to revisit it, much in the way that people will watch It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown on an annual basis--please direct yourself to The Legend of Smith Hall. And happy 41st birthday to KNTU, the last entity to call the haunted house its home.

Now That's the Way Baseball Go...

I wasn't able to watch any of tonight's World Series debut because of a gig, but I was discreetly checking updates on my phone once the playing portion was over, and I got to hear Eric Nadel call the final "HE STRUCK HIM OUT!" when Neftali Feliz got Jose Uribe to seal a 4-2 Rangers victory.

So what contributed most to the victory? The hitter-friendly confines of Rangers Ballpark in Arlington? The rabid home fans? The return of the DH to the game, in the form of Vlad Guerrero? My answer--from the sparse game accounts I was able to see and hear--would be "yes." But more than that, this team knew that it had to win tonight's game, or their collective backs would be so far up against the wall that it wasn't funny. Colby Lewis came through in the clutch again, and the bats started to reawaken.

Tonight's win guarantees yet another "first" in this magic season: A Rangers game in November. Who would have imagined that during spring training?

Let's do it again tomorrow night, guys!

And as for the weird saying that serves as the title of this post, it refers to a now-iconic utterance by Rangers manager Ron Washington that I evidently just missed being able to get on a T-shirt. Wash explains the phrase here.

A View from the Top...

...of my price range, if I'd actually been paying:


I was at the American Airlines Center tonight for the Mavericks' home opener. Well, OK, I was at the home opener, but I really wasn't there for that game. Rather, I was there to watch the Rangers' World Series opener on the TV in a luxury suite, from where the above picture was taken. (The basketball game--which the Mavs did win--was purely incidental.)

It all started when a friend and I decided to get together to watch the Rangers, but the locale shifted throughout the preceding days. It may have originally been set for my living room, then it seemed likely to migrate to somewhere with a lot of TVs, like Humperdink's. But said friend had a corporate hookup, so that was how we found ourselves in the lap of luxury this evening.

And how luxurious is it? The bathroom mirrors double as animated billboards, for crying out loud:


I've now been to one Mavs game and one Stars game at AAC, and, seeing as how the latter was also in the expensive seats at a reduced price, I still have yet to visit that place as a "regular Joe." I hope I can keep lucking into deals like this in the near future.

(And of course, it was a horrible night for the Rangers, so it's obviously bad luck for me to watch the game in this manner. I promise not to do it again for the duration of the World Series!)

This Idea Would Add Up For a Lot of People

Reading the op-ed page of the newspaper at lunch today, I came across a column that resonated with me. Here's a sample:

How much math do you really need in everyday life? Ask yourself that – and also the next 10 people you meet, say, your plumber, your lawyer, your grocer, your mechanic, your physician or even a math teacher.

Unlike literature, history, politics and music, math has little relevance to everyday life. That courses such as "Quantitative Reasoning" improve critical thinking is an unsubstantiated myth. All the mathematics one needs in real life can be learned in early years without much fuss. Most adults have no contact with math at work; nor do they curl up with an algebra book for relaxation.

The interesting part of all this is that the column was written by, of all people, a retired math professor. G.V. Ramanathan has also taught statistics and computer science at the University of Illinois' Chicago campus (and may still be teaching in semi-retirement, as he holds professor emeritus status with the school). He goes on:

Those who do love math and science have been doing very well. Our graduate schools are the best in the world. This "nation at risk" has produced about 140 Nobel laureates since 1983 (about as many as before 1983).

As for the rest, there is no obligation to love math any more than grammar, composition, curfew or washing up after dinner. Why create a need to make it palatable to all and spend taxpayers' money on pointless endeavors without demonstrable results or accountability?

Ramanathan makes a good point, as far as I'm concerned; there's a big debate going on as to whether high schools need to prepare their entire populations for college, or if some students should be steered towards a more vocational track. But it appears that everyone takes four years of math now, and for those who take Algebra I in eighth grade (which seems to be nearly everyone these days), that means they'll be spending part of their senior years dealing with calculus...and if we're asking if everyone needs this much math, then we really have to ask if everyone needs calculus (a class which I managed to avoid entirely in my pursuit of two-and-a-half college degrees).

Read the whole thing; it's interesting to see someone in academia who understands that his discipline may not be for everyone.

Questions of the day: How much math did you take in high school? And should everyone have to take four years of math? Please "add" your response to the comment page.

The Dog Days of October

Even though this was my first weekend off since August, I went to Austin for part of it. One reason was because I hadn't gotten to see my sister and her family in quite some time, and the nephews do grow up quickly, after all. The other reason was to be able to meet this little guy:


Say hello to my new four-legged "nephew," Fletcher. He's the newest in a series of Sheltie dogs in my sister's family, but unlike their previous ones, he's both smart and friendly. In fact, he loves people and is always eager to meet someone new. (And yes, he has a regular-sized tail; I'm just a crappy photographer at times.)

It was great to get away; before this weekend, my last trip of any kind was to a business meeting in Indiana back in July. I did all the usual bits of righteous road food that are characteristic of this trip--Fazoli's in Waco, the Czech Stop in West, and so on. I'm pretty exhausted right now, and this week (like all of them lately) will be quite busy, but it was worthwhile. The grind resumes tomorrow...

Tonight, There Is Joy in Mudville

Over an hour after the end of the game, it's still sweet to type this sentence: The Texas Rangers are going to the World Series! But believe me, it rolls sweetly off the fingers...

I've been a Rangers fan for the past 24 years, or at least that's when I attended my first game (against these Yankees; I looked it up). A few years in, I got to enjoy the thrill of the Nolan Ryan era, when people decided which games to attend by which night he was on the mound. Later on, I enjoyed the thrill of a brand-new ballpark and the first playoff years. And other times, I spent many hours watching some mediocre teams, and a few outright bad ones. Also--being one of those who enjoys baseball on TV and radio, not just in person--the team has seen me through many a night off and more than a few long drives. I may have grown up an Astros fan, but the Rangers integrated themselves into the fiber of my being as an adult.

When the final out was imminent, I turned down the TV sound and cranked KRLD on the clock radio from the next room; Eric Nadel deserved to be the one I heard make the final call. I was on my feet for that entire last at-bat, just like everyone in the ballpark, and I did my share of jumping up and down at game's end. (And how sweet was it that A-Rod struck out to end the game! As a friend of mine commented on Facebook, A-Rod finally sent the Rangers to the World Series. Nice.)

Did I tear up a bit when all this went down? You bet. But not right away; I was (literally) jumping for joy at first. What got me was the postgame interview with series MVP Josh Hamilton; of course, he started out by praising God, and right after that, he deflected all the credit to his teammates, and it hit me that Nolan Ryan had done the exact same thing after the game where he got his 5,000th strikeout (a game I had the privilege to attend). And now Nolan is co-owner and team president, and it sure seems that the team-first attitude is being taught from the top of the organization. Not only is it great to see our team win the pennant, but it's great to see this team do it; from all indications, they're a bunch of stand-up guys.

When Rangers Ballpark was being built, I was finishing up my stint at KNTU, for whom I'd occasionally go and report on a game. As I watched the structure take shape, I made a few promises to myself: 1) I would be there on opening night. 2) I would be at the All-Star game whenever it was held there. 3) I would be at the first playoff game hosted there. And in due time, all these things came true. But now, with the World Series coming to Arlington next weekend, I'll probably need a lottery win in order to get tickets (if only I'd had the $75 to spare a week ago when tickets went on sale!). But maybe this will come through as well; I have a week to get things together.

As I went on a late-night grocery run after the game, a couple of kids joyfully ran ahead of me into the store, shouting happily. One of them looked back and me and said, "Woooo, Rangers." My reply: "You got that right; I've been waiting for this since before you were born." No matter what happens next weekend, I'm going to enjoy this moment for a while.

In the End, He Couldn't Dodge This Bullet

The news itself wasn't surprising at this point, but the timing was: The UNT athletic department chose today to fire Todd Dodge as head football coach:

Dodge came to UNT before the 2007 season, fresh off winning his fourth Class 5A title in his last five seasons at Southlake Carroll High School — rolling up a 79-1 record in those five years. He was never able to replicate that success at UNT and finished with a 6-37 record with the Mean Green.

Dodge never won more than two games in a season and was 1-6 just past the halfway point of his fourth campaign.

“While coach Dodge has done some great things with our men between the lines, it rolls out to 6-37,” UNT athletic director Rick Villarreal said. “The decision is not based on the last seven games. It’s about a body of work over the last 3 1/2 years, and at this point I believe we should have been much further along.”

Offensive coordinator Mike Canales, who is in his first season at UNT after serving for three seasons as coordinator at the University of South Florida, will take over as interim head coach. The search for a new head coach will begin immediately.

This is disappointing to me, even if pretty much everyone expected it to happen at the end of the season. As I noted when Dodge was first hired back in December of '06, I think that he's a class act, and he definitely helped bring about some new enthusiasm for the program, which resulted in, among other things, the favorable vote for the new stadium that's under construction across the street from the aging white elephant that is Fouts Field. And while I don't know for sure whether all the losses this season could be attributed to Dodge's coaching, I wonder what anyone else could have done with a team that's been as decimated by injuries as this year's squad has been.

So, two quick questions to ponder:

• Todd Dodge will certainly land on his feet again, most likely at the high school level where he excelled for so many years. Which area high school do you predict will snap him up?


• Who would you like to see as the new coach of the Mean Green for next year?

The comments are open; fire away.

8-0

The good guys win again; what else can I say? Cliff Lee is still a beast (I think there's a new "Mr. October" in baseball), and the Rangers continue to vanquish old ghosts.

One of these days, my blog posts will be longer than glorified tweets, but it's hard to get a lot of work done with meaningful baseball this late in October. Still, what fun it is!

Behind the Green Red Door

The newest "renovation" of Casa de Kev, done yesterday:


(And most of it took place while I was teaching. Thanks to Mom and Dad for the help.)

My door hadn't been painted since I bought the house over nine years ago, and it just seemed like it was time for a change. And I've watched enough HGTV to know that all the cool kids paint their doors red now, and, after getting a number of color chips and plastering them up there, I found one that I liked. I think it adds a lot to the entryway, even if the door itself is somewhat secluded from the street.

I'm off to UNT Homecoming today. More later.

Association Day

On this day in 1995, a group of brothers in Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, meeting at what was then called Friday's Front Row Grill at the Ballpark in Arlington (site of a hopeful Rangers victory tonight!), voted to form what we now know as the Dallas/Ft. Worth Area Alumni Association. We're the oldest of the modern-era alumni groups in the fraternity, and we're still going strong. (The anniversary of our founding, coming nine days after the national Founders Day, often gets lost in the shuffle, so I'm plastering this news in as many places as possible today in an attempt to rectify that situation.)

Thanks to those who have built upon what we started that day, and may our banner truly "float for aye"! (And if you're a Sinfonian in the DFW area who has stumbled across this post, please hit the second link above to contact the organization; we'd love to see you!)

RANGERS WIN!

Fifty years of franchise futility came to an end tonight; what more can be said? (And if, as I predict, I end up being too excited to sleep for a while, I might come back and say more later.)

A Beautiful Day in a Beautiful Hall

I've hyped this for a few weeks now, strictly on the basis of an "artist's rendering" picture from UNT's website. But I'm happy to say that the beautifully-renovated and newly-christened Voertman Hall is absolutely gorgeous:


View from the inside entrance


View from the stage
The concert went extremely well, and we helped break the place in with everything from big band to rock band, and from full chorus to "chanted" chorus. This is a great addition to the College of Music's facilities, it repurposes an aging venue in fine fashion, and it will be the home of great music for decades to come. Kudos to all who were involved in the planning and construction of this wonderful room.

10.10.10

Here we are again--the day when all three numbers of today's date converge in two-digit form everywhere in the world (even the places that would call today 10 October 2010). I've been blogging about this phenomenon for the past five years, and, as noted before, I'll almost certainly keep it up all the way through 12/12/12.

As for today, I'm spending the bulk of the day in Denton for the annual Sinfonia Founders Day Concert, where I get to direct the province-wide big band in its one gig of the year. It starts at 3:30 p.m., admission is free, and it's in the newly-renovated Paul Voertman Concert Hall that I talked about a few weeks ago. Seeing the hall itself would be reason enough to come to the concert, plus you'll get to hear the music of talented Sinfonians from around the North Texas area.

Also, the One O'Clock Lab Band is taking its CD release party to Ft. Worth tonight, celebrating Lab 2010 on 10/10/10 off-campus at McDavid Studio in much the same way it did with its 2009 effort on campus a year ago last month. If you're in the area, it's something not to be missed.

A Glimpse of the Future at My Alma Mater

(The new stadium that's under construction at UNT, as seen from the parking lot of the current one.)

It's a shame that there will likely be a new coaching staff leading the Mean Green into this place next fall, as the team can't seem to steal a win this season. Tonight's loss was by a mere five points, which has been par for the course this season. With the team's record at 1-5, it would take a miracle to save the Todd Dodge regime; can the guys pull it off over the next month and a half?

Among the good things that happened in the game: Four field goals by Zach Olen, and fourth-string quarterback Chase Baine did pretty well, and--unlike most of his predecessors this season--came back from an injury scare to rejoin the game. He was replaced by Riley Dodge for one series, who was playing with a broken wrist on his non-throwing hand.

Can this season still be salvaged? Next week's homecoming game should tell us a lot.

All Hail!

On this day in 1898, a group of men at the New England Conservatory decided to form a club for the male musicians at the school, who were massively outnumbered by the women at the time. Since then, the "Sinfonia Club" has grown into Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity of America, which boasts over 200 collegiate chapters and alumni associations nationwide. It's also an organization in which I've had the privilege of spending virtually my entire adult life in some sort of active involvement.

Happy Founders Day, my brothers. And may the Sinfonia's banner "float for aye."

Today Was a Walk in the Park

Literally:

I visit Southlake Town Square about once a month, during my break between church and my monthly alumni meeting in the Mid-Cities, and I'm really glad that the weather is nice enough to take long walks through the place again.

Some days are just too nice to spend inside, so the incomplete blog posts will have to wait a little bit.

Words to Live By

I'm enjoying a partial four-day weekend right now (the "partial" part means that I'll be teaching college as usual on Monday and Tuesday, but the public schools are off, and any day that doesn't require waking up at 6 a.m. counts as a "holiday" in my book), so I'll be catching up on many, many incomplete blog posts in the next few days. But in the meantime, I had to post this great quote from James Lileks in his Thursday Bleat. Earlier in the day, he had words with his daughter, who was updating something and nearly missed her school bus. Eventually, the subject came around to work:

You work, you fill up the day, you tote it up when the day is done, and figure you earned your stint on the right side of the dirt. I have the usual panoply of failings as a person and a parent, but I think I’ve instilled in my daughter one lesson: make something every day. Make something that wasn’t there before. Produce. It’s what we’re here to do, after all.

Amen and amen. And those last three sentences should be printed out and plastered on the bathroom mirrors of everyone who works in government, not to mention those who believe that said government should take care of them, rather than relying on their own personal productivity.

End of sermon. Have a great day! Updates linked as they get completed.

This Band Will Need a Hand

This was all over Facebook and various forums today, and my heart goes out to these kids and their director: The Powahatan High School Marching Band from Virginia pretty much lost all their stuff--instruments and brand-new uniforms which had only been worn twice--when their storage trailer caught fire soon after a return from an out-of-town competition this past weekend.

As noted in the video, there was a lot of time spent doing fundraising to get the new uniforms and equipment, and I'm sure there will be some sort of fund set up to help these folks; I'll post an update here as soon as I find out.

We're Still Having Fun, and They're Still the "One"*

Everyone has their own early-autumn rituals, and one of mine is making the very short trek to UT-Dallas on the last Friday in September to see the One O'Clock Lab Band perform about as close to my backyard as they get. Director Steve Wiest, a former college classmate of mine, calls this performance their "first real breakout gig" of the new year after a few early appearances on campus in the Syndicate (which I had to miss this year due to an obligation with my Region Jazz students) and the One O'Clock Lounge (which seems appropriate enough, doesn't it?).

It's always impressive how this band can put together a concert at such a high level in such a short time, especially considering the fact that there's often quite a bit of turnaround from the previous semester (this year, it's two new saxophones, two new trumpets, three new trombones and an entirely new rhythm section). Whether playing things from the new CD, Lab 2010 (which they had to learn in its entirety in about three days' worth of rehearsals for the Syndicate gig) or timeless One O'Clock classics from decades past, the band progresses seamlessly from year to year without missing a beat (*insert rim shot if desired*).

This year's concert opened with the Grammy-nominated "Got a Match?" from Lab 89, and the band made its way flawlessly through the intricate lines (which Chick Corea originally wrote to be played just by himself and John Patitucci). Since Lab 2010 was for sale in the lobby at intermission, a generous selection of tunes from the new CD were sprinkled throughout the evening, including "Prime Directive" (a Dave Holland tune arranged by student Josh Dresser), "The Oracle" by student Kevin Swaim, Director Emeritus Neil Slater's "Not Yet," and current director Wiest's "New Cydonia."

Closing the first half was a tribute to Director Emeritus Leon Breeden, who passed away in August. The triumvirate of tunes opened with "Willow Weep for Me" (performed by Breeden himself on clarinet on his final album with the band, Lab '81, and masterfully done tonight by Brian Clancy, who holds the lead tenor chair in the band) and was followed by a mash-up of two Lou Marini compositions from the '60s, "Looking with New Eyes" (which started out with a flowing melody to which one might picture Mary Tyler Moore walking through downtown Minneapolis, before descending into wonderful chaos) and "Hip Pickles" (a screaming blues-rock romp).

Certain things are expected at a One O'Clock Concert: Will they play some Stan Kenton? Of course they will; this time, it was the wonderful Marty Paich arrangement of "Body and Soul," featuring new pianist Colin Campbell. Will they choose the two-minute barn-burner "Machito" as an encore? Well, for a second it appeared that they wouldn't this year, choosing instead the fine Bret Zvacek arrangement of "Harlem Nocture" that opens Lab 85 (which would be my personal choice as the next "old" recording to be re-released on CD). But that generated enough applause at the end to warrant playing an "encore to the encore," so the tune I've dubbed a "two-minute, eighteen-second ball of energy" did indeed end the concert on a good (and very high) note.

Somebody asked me at intermission if I preferred the Wiest version of the One O'Clock to that of Slater; my initial answer was that it would be very hard to choose between my former professor (Slater), whose offering of a spot directing lab bands for two years in grad school set the stage for most of what I do now, and my longtime friend and former schoolmate (Wiest). But I also added this: I think that Wiest has brought some new youthful energy to the band (he may be in his early fifties, but I've considered him a "young soul" for the entire time we've known each other). He's also taken the band in some daring new directions (sure, some things get a little more "out" at times, but as I've noted before, the older I get, the "outer" I like). Besides, no matter how much some tunes seem to leave the planet at times, they're always anchored by that underpinning of swing that's so vital to good jazz.

I'm also quite impressed with some of the little touches that Wiest has added to the band--most notably, the increased attention to dynamics; the One O'Clock has long been known as the "higher, faster, louder" band, but Wiest has expanded the dynamic spectrum to include a lot of softer passages in certain places. It's extremely effective, and it's more than a casual nod to those pioneers of big band, the Count Basie Orchestra, whose dynamic range varied from a whisper to a scream. I also enjoy the things that Wiest does with the rhythm section during certain solos--adding stop-time or allowing the time to get very loose and combo-ish on occasion.

As noted many times before, I received both of my degrees from UNT, and you already know of my ties to the director, so I realize that all of this could just come off as excessively rooting for the home team. But I've never been hesitant to offer constructive criticism when necessary; it's just that, more often than not, all I can do is rave about what the One O'Clock is doing. This is one of those times.

*Did I really just riff on the lyrics of a rock song from a '70s two-hit wonder for the title of my jazz concert review? Why yes, I did.

Well wishes: I should also include a shout-out to my longtime friend Micah Bell, the new second trumpet player in the band, who's been sidelined by illness this week and had to miss tonight's gig. Get well soon, Micah, and I look forward to seeing you play in the band before long.

QUOTE OF THE DAY: "That last piece you played? I can't hum it...any of it."--Old-timer at the concert, to Steve Wiest during intermission. (And the guy had just the right Southern accent so that it really came out as "Ah cain't hum it." Priceless...)

Extreme Makeover: Concert Hall Edition

I don't get up to visit my alma mater, UNT, nearly as much as I used to a few years ago, but I've been there enough to be aware that the Concert Hall--the major performance venue of the College of Music until the opening of the Murchison Performing Arts Center in 1999, and a hall that was, until now, virtually unchanged since the opening of the older portion of the Music Building in 1960--was undergoing a massive renovation, and I also knew that it was about to have a "soft" opening in the next few weeks. But until today, I had no idea that it would be this beautiful:


Nor did I know that it was being named after a major Denton figure whose name is known to virtually everyone in town. Here's the skinny:

A redesigned concert hall in the University of North Texas Music Building will be unveiled this fall, after a $6.4 million renovation project to create a more intimate performance space, enhance the acoustics and install state-of-the-art equipment.

Formerly known as the Concert Hall, the performance space has been renamed The Paul Voertman Concert Hall in honor of Denton philanthropist Paul Voertman (pronounced "VERT-mun").

"We are thrilled with this transformation of a tired, worn-out and dated hall into a beautiful and acoustically splendid space that will serve our students and faculty for their many performances of solo and small ensemble music," said UNT College of Music Dean James C. Scott. "There is no doubt that Voertman Hall will house more of our performances than any other College of Music space."

Read the full story here.

The Concert Hall was always something of a white elephant when I was in school; the design was plain, the seats were bulky metal with worn cushions (and they creaked when the seat bottoms went up and down), and it was starting to show its age (I'll never forget when a large fluorescent light bulb just fell out of its socket and crashed onto the back of a [thankfully unoccupied] seat a few rows away from me during a recital). It was too big for most recitals (it seemed cavernous whenever it was less than half full), and it was almost too small for the large ensemble concerts. It was definitely due for a makeover, and it looks like those involved have outdone themselves with this effort.

As Dean Scott noted above, this venue should be the perfect complement to the 250-seat Recital Hall (also in the Music Building) and the 1,025-seat Winspear Performance Hall in the Murchison Center. I'm looking forward to seeing this venue in person very soon, and when I do, I'll pass along my thoughts (and an actual picture or two).

Todd and Co. Can't Dodge a Bullet Right Now

I didn't get to hear all of today's UNT/Army game on the radio, as I had a lunchtime engagement (one at which it would have been rude to constantly check the scores on my phone). But it wasn't looking good when I got out of the car at noon, and when I came back, the game had just ended, and it was bad news once again: The Mean Green lost to Army, 24-0, falling to 0-3 on the year.

And once again, the game wasn't a blowout in the beginning, and that's been the story all season so far. They played Clemson tough for the first half; they very well could have beaten Rice last week. And in the first half of today's game, they held the ball for far longer than Army and kept things close, only trailing 7-0 when I got out of the car. It's been close--oh, so close--but since this isn't horseshoes, hand grenades or atom bombs, close doesn't count. And I'm afraid that if this ship doesn't right itself pretty soon, Todd Dodge won't get to reap the benefits of the new stadium that I'm sure has been a key part of recruiting for the past several years.

The worst thing is this: If the team does have a losing season, it can be blamed on something largely out of Coach Dodge's control: Injuries. This paragraph pretty much tells the whole story:

Injury woes have taken their toll on the Mean Green this year, and hit home again at West Point. After losing center Nick Leppo in the game's second series, quarterback Derek Thompson left the game with a leg injury. Starting receiver Christopher Bynes also left the game with injury, making nine starters lost to injury this year.

Thompson was filling in for Nathan Tune, who left last week's game against Rice with a hip injury, and Riley Dodge was once again called into action.

And remember, Riley Dodge used to be the starting QB himself, until he was switched to receiver because of...wait for it...injuries. And Leppo was filling in at center for J.J. Johnson, who was lost for the season to a foot injury in the opener against Clemson. So that means that, by the second quarter yesterday, the third-string center was snapping to the third-string emergency quarterback...in the third game of the season. It makes one wonder if the team will eventually run out of players at this rate.

Granted, there are still a lot of games left to go, including the entire conference schedule. One could find hope in the fact that the Green have hung in there well against their non-conference foes. But considering what happened earlier tonight, when Texas A&M barely beat Florida International, a Sun Belt team, earlier tonight, it reminds us that the conference won't exactly be a cakewalk either.

I haven't given up hope yet, but these injuries are killing North Texas. I still believe in Coach Dodge, and I'd love to see him still in charge when the new stadium opens next season, but things have to get back on track very soon.

Where Were You...

...nine years ago, when you heard the news? I've posted this in some form every year since I started blogging, and I pause to remember again:

I was on a break from teaching, like every Tuesday, and actually spent the time of the attacks in blissful ignorance at a nearby Starbucks. I had CD's on in my car instead of the radio, so I totally missed the news on both the way over and the way back. I did hear someone listening to a radio on the Starbucks patio and they were talking about "the second plane," but it didn't register with me at all. (It amazed me later that nobody walked inside and told us about it.)

When I got back to the school, the flute teacher stopped me in the hallway and asked me if all my students were being pulled out of school (evidently hers were). I said, "No, why?" and she told me what had happened. I spent the rest of the day like everyone else, in shocked, depressed amazement, catching the news when I could. There I was, not even two weeks into being a homeowner, and the world suddenly felt so different. It added to the pall cast over everything when I found out that the sister of a girl I graduated from high school with was on Flight 93, the one that crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. (I know that there have been quite a few lists of names read aloud today, so let me share hers: Lauren Catuzzi Grandcolas. May she rest in peace...)

The whole thing felt so surreal; how could anyone hate us that much? The concept of the suicide hijacking was unprecedented as well (before that, hijackers just usually wanted to go to Cuba, and that's why airline personnel were taught to cooperate with them rather than try to subdue them).

I know there are still terrorist plots being hatched, and people capable of carrying them out...but I hope nothing like this ever happens on U.S. soil again. Or anywhere, for that matter.

For those who may be new to reading this blog since then, I'll invite you to share your recollections in the comments to this post.

As I've said for several years now, I hope nobody tires of talking about this every once in a while, because if we stop talking, we might forget, and this is a day that need not be forgotten anytime soon.

I'm sure that the blogosphere will be full of great tributes today, and I'll add links to those later, after I get back from judging a competition this morning.

LATER: A few more items...

• Lauren Catuzzi Grandcolas had a memorial garden in Houston dedicated to her this morning.


• Gerard Vanderleun has some first-person recollections from Brooklyn; here's another one with extensive quotes from a Cantor Fitzgerald broker whose life was spared by what can only be called divine providence.


• A couple of other "reruns' are work your time: this 2003 piece from James Lileks, and a collection of same-day postings from the early days of Instapundit.

If I run across anything else noteworthy today, I'll come back and post it here.

No Ark Needed Today, But It Was Interesting

Living as far inland as Dallas/Ft. Worth, it's not too often that we're directly affected by hurricanes. And while Tropical Storm Hermine never quite made it to hurricane status, she certainly wreaked havoc with our weather all day today.

It's not as if we don't need the rain up here; we certainly do. But getting it all at once as we did (some areas of the Metroplex have gotten ten inches since yesterday) causes all kinds of problems--flooding, treacherous commutes into work, and so on. And the event that seemed to get the most news coverage was the early evening tornado that sheared part of a wall off a paint warehouse on Mockingbird Lane near Irving Boulevard just west of I-35. (I myself was teaching right through a tornado warning, blissfully ignorant of same until someone texted me about the status of an evening event.)

I can count myself among the thankful, because the only effect that today's weather had on me personally was a couple of really rainy trips between schools. I use a few back roads on my Wednesday commute, and they were almost flooded, but not quite; the afternoon activities at my last school of the day (which would have included five of my lessons) were almost canceled (actually, they were for a second, but they were subsequently un-canceled by the time school let out), and the bridge that would have taken me home was almost closed due to high water, but the levels dropped by the time I used it.

I hope that everyone else was as lucky as I was, and may tomorrow be a much less eventful (and drier) day.

It's Sonny on a Rainy Day

As I noted on Facebook a bit earlier, I can't let another minute of today go by without wishing a happy 80th birthday to Sonny Rollins. Not only is he one of the few remaining national treasures of his generation of jazz, but he's still tearing it up on the tenor and has a rather active touring schedule for a guy his age.

I've had the privilege of seeing Sonny three times: At the late, lamented Caravan of Dreams while in college; in New Orleans at the House of Blues in '99; and at the Burlington Discover Jazz Festival in '03. That most recent time was highlighted by the 30-chorus blues solo that he took on one tune--yep, he played for 15 solid minutes and it never got old. That was at the age of 72, and from everything I hear, he hasn't lost a step. I hope I get a chance to see him at least one more time.

Happy birthday, Sonny, and thanks for all you've done for our music.

I Have No Idea What This Means...

..but I'm sure there's a good story behind it:


Since it was so unusual (and since my mom's name is Barbara) I had to stop and take a picture of it (and email it to her, saying "Wish you'd been in Dallas today"). I'm guessing it has something to do with one of the owners or a close friend or family member of theirs, but who knows.

Update on me: My guess is that the toe isn't broken, just deeply bruised. I've got it splinted up (as much as a little toe can be) with that special tape that sticks to itself but not to skin, and it hasn't been too bad getting around today. I'm not necessarily looking forward to having to wear shoes tomorrow while teaching, but I'll deal with it as best I can.

Not too laborious over here: Did you get to enjoy the Labor Day holiday, or did you have to, well, labor? I taught two people and ran an improv session for a couple of the high-schoolers trying out for Region Jazz this weekend, but other than that, it was pretty chill over here.

This Pain Was Toe-tally Unexpected

I wonder how many stories about mishaps start with the phrase "It seemed like a good idea at the time." Except in this case, it really was a good idea--just one, I suppose, that needed slightly better execution.

I had a gig this afternoon, in a part of Dallas that's not too far away from my church, just a few hours after church let out. Since I didn't want to make the trip from home to almost-downtown twice, and since the intervening time would allow me to have lunch at Zuzu along the way, it made sense to me to turn it into one big excursion.

But the thing is, I'm not used to taking a lot of things with me to church, and certainly not the four things (bari sax, bari stand, music stand, and flute) that I'd need to bring to this gig. And since I tend to be a little slow on Sunday mornings, I could totally see myself running out the door without any of the gig stuff, which would require the double round-trip. So I decided it was best to leave everything near the door, just in case.

Looking back, I probably could have just done what I did last night--leave the music stand near the door--and I would have remembered everything else. But when I got up this morning, I decided to be efficient and move the rest of the stuff to the front.

And when I did that...well, I thought I had left myself plenty of room to walk back and forth to the kitchen, but I guess not. Because right before I was about to leave, I managed to walk right into the bari stand (which was sitting on the floor parallel to the bari case), whacking the living daylights out of my right little toe in the process. (In a fit of clumsiness that's not altogether foreign to me, I also managed to get somewhat snagged in the stand after running into it, which gave my left ankle a much gentler smacking as well.)

It hurt like crazy, of course, and I said a few choice unSundaylike words right afterwards, but I could find no immediate evidence of damage. Still, I decided on shoes rather than sandals for the immediate future; it might hurt more, but at least I'd be protected from any further damage. (And while at church, I found the most remote part of the balcony so that I could have a row to myself--this made it much easier to slip out of my shoe and sock, to let it "breathe" and check for any signs of swelling or bruising, though none was found.) And I was most happy to get a very close-in parking space at my gig; it was all street parking, so that was very much in doubt until I got there.

But when I got home from my gig about six hours later, there was in fact a fairly substantial bruise. There was not, however, a ridiculous amount of swelling, so after a bit of research, I've decided to play things by ear and see how things are going in the morning, hoping all the while that the bruise is just that, and not a sign of a fracture. I've done some ice and elevation, and being out of shoes for the past six hours has helped a lot (and with tomorrow's holiday, I don't technically have to put a shoe on again until Tuesday morning).

So wish me luck; with the schedule I have for the next several months, this is something that needs to be able to heal quickly and on its own. And while I'm walking carefully (and watching my step, of course), I haven't really had to limp for the past several hours like I did when I was in shoes; needless to say, I had more than a few unpleasant flashbacks to last year's knee injury when I was hobbling around.

More as things develop...

Lots to Blog About, No Time to Blog It

There is so much that I want to talk about this week, but thus far, the clock hasn't been my friend.

Most of my waking hours at home lately have been devoted to a fairly large arranging project for one of my combos at school; it involves not only making parts to all our music for some new players, but also entering them all into notation software, so that I have a permanent copy of everything (and so that the players don't have to read my handwritten parts anymore). It's finally done, but not with enough time to blog tonight (if nothing else, I "curfew" myself at midnight on days when I have to wake up at 6 a.m. the next morning, though I'd prefer to hit the sack at 11 most of the time).

So thanks as always for your patience, and the discussions from the last two days (as well as the conclusion of last week's three-part series on teaching and technology) will be up before too long.

Advertising As Art (or, The Greatest Song You Can't Download...Yet?)

As a jazz musician, the bulk of my listening over the past several years has been in that genre. Still, that's not to say that I don't have a soft spot for a really well-crafted pop song every now and then, and my CD collection supports that idea.

I should also mention that, during their visits over the years, Mom and Dad have gotten me hooked on HGTV, which they watch religiously during Clock Tower. During the summer, I've been known to flip over there after the Rangers game, and I watched a bit last night to take my mind off how badly both the Rangers and Cowboys did at the same time. (If you're wondering, my favorite HGTV show is "House Hunters"; I always like to try and guess which of the three houses the prospective buyers will choose, and I'm right more often than not.)

Needless to say, most of the commercials on HGTV are of the home-improvement variety, and one that's been airing for a while really jumps out at me. It's an ad for Olympic paint, and not only is the concept cool--the person doing the painting sees future enjoyment of the room being painted (Mom holding up baby, Dad or Son reading the paper while drinking coffee at the table, kids jumping on the bed, etc.) in shadows on the wall--but the tune being sung behind it is thirty seconds of pure pop perfection. And thankfully, it's on YouTube so I can share it here:



After seeing the spot a number of times, I decided to find out if that was in fact a real song (as opposed to something created specifically for the commercial) and who the artist was. But a bit of Googling led me to some advertising music forums (yes, you truly can find a page for nearly anything on the Internet!), and discovered that it was in fact written for the commercial.

But one of the posters at the first linked forum provided a bit of hope with the response he got from writing the company directly:

Campbell-Ewald created the music specifically for the commercial. There is currently no name to the song or a particular group that it belongs to. Because of the positive feedback that the commercial has obtained, further development may occur and the song may be extended.

So maybe it will become a full-blown song someday. And kudos to the Campbell-Ewald folks for putting a bit more artistry than usual into their advertising.

Forward March!

If you have no connection to the world of academia, you might still consider it "summer," but those of us in education have already switched over to fall mode. And even though it's not yet September, the beloved annual ritual known as high school football is already underway here in Texas. (Not everyone has started, mind you; this is "Zero Week," which means that the teams who played last night or Thursday will have a bye week later in the season.) And with the launch of football means the launch of another annual ritual that's much closer to me: Marching band.

As I've mentioned before, I have all kinds of appreciation for marching band--as long as I'm not the one having to direct it (or march in it, for that matter; I did my eight years in high school and college). I'll go to the big UIL contest (which has several parts this year, being a "state year" for my 5A schools) and at least one game per season. (I missed out last year because of my injury; I was having a bit of trouble with stairs during my recovery, and what is a stadium if not a giant set of stairs?) I also have a bit more connection with one of my two schools' shows, as I did seven days of sectionals over their music for them during summer band.

So I was happy to open up my newspaper this morning to see a positive piece about band on the op-ed page. The writer, Mike Shepherd, is from Duncanville, whose band has won all kinds of honors over the years, but a few things he says can be applied to band as a whole:

I still believe that the marching band is one of the best things about fall in Texas.

[...]Much of the success of the band is attributable to the band directors, who push the kids to improve and drill them many hours during the school year and in summer camps.

[...] My community is a better place to live because I know that – rain or shine, win or lose – the band plays on.

Indeed. And participation in school music programs helps build better students and citizens. (But you knew that already if you've been reading this blog for a while.)

Anyway, with all the bad press that school-age kids seem to get these days, it's nice to see something so positive so early in the school year. Let's hope for a lot more of this type of coverage.

Teaching and Technology, Part I

With the beginning of school upon us, a lot of the big feature stories in the news right now are about education. And while more than a few of those are very local in nature--the opening of a new school, just to name one popular theme--there have been quite a few stories lately about teaching and technology, with one big theme being this: In a classroom full of younger students who have fully embraced the latest gadgets and social networking sites, but led by a teacher or professor who may still be warming up to email, what's the best way to communicate? Is any one way better than the rest, and should anything in particular be avoided?

Let me start by explaining a little bit about where I stand with this, and I'll cover the rest of that later: As far as new technology goes, I'm about as plugged-in as the vast majority of my students, and most of their favorite ways to communicate are mine as well. (In case you're new to the blog, here's some further background: I teach both at the college and secondary [middle and high school] levels, though in the latter case, it's all private lessons, which--mostly due to the fact that I don't give grades for what I teach--serves to differentiate me a bit from the students' regular classroom teachers and places me more in the category of a mentor or personal coach. At the college, I direct music ensembles and also teach privately, so while I do award grades, my situations are not of the typical "I lecture, you listen" variety.)

The large-scale discussion started last week with an article at the Inside Higher Ed. blog about a college in Georgia that is outfitting its 300 faculty members with high-end smart phones in an effort to improve communication between the profs and their students. The idea is that the profs are supposed to respond to text messages or calls from their students within 24 hours. (The cost is estimated at $1000 per phone, which obviously means that the school is kicking in for most, if not all, of the calling/texting plan as well.) And so far, the college says that the idea appears to be working:

[Georgia Gwinnett College vice president for instructional technology Lonnie D. Harvell] says the college has observed a bump in faculty productivity as a result of the phones equivalent to “hundreds of thousands of dollars” in labor. For example, Georgia Gwinnett faculty are not required to hold office hours — the idea being that a big bulk of outside-of-class communication with students can be handled via the mobile devices, allowing faculty to deploy their energies on other things. Also, the desktop phone bills are down and inter-faculty communication is up, Harvel says. “A cost analysis demonstrates that the program saves more money than it costs,” Harvel says (though he adds that the benefits are “only valid if the institution is intent on expending resources on student engagement”).

And the professors contacted by Inside Higher Ed. don't seem to consider the added connectivity to be a burden, and they tend to set appropriate boundaries right away, some of them even playfully rebuking excessive texters to check the syllabus or other readily available sources for answers to questions that don't really require professorial help. (The comments to that post are, as you can imagine, all over the map, and several Georgia Gwinnett faculty chime in as well.)

This story was picked up by one of my favorite blogs, Althouse, where the bloghostess--a noted law professor--falls into the naysayers' camp:

You want students dashing off little notes full of typos and abbreviations and professors struggling with teensy keyboards and adapting to the ultra-concise writing form? And what happens when there are misunderstandings? These are inevitable in texting.

Leave texting to friends and family and to coworkers who interact casually. Professors — however friendly they may seem in person — must relate to students in a professional way.

Count me as one who doesn't believe that those two things--using texting and relating to students professionally--are always mutually exclusive.

Althouse's commenters are as divided as those at the original post, but this time, as a semi-regular at Althouse, I chime in:

There are situations where texting could come in handy; mine is one of them.

I teach music ensembles and applied music (a.k.a. private lessons), so I'm rarely able to answer the phone during the business day, and emails get checked only every few hours. In addition, since I'm not yet a full prof, my "office" is shared with 100 other profs, and no way do I want to burden the administrative assistant with taking phone message for me, as I wouldn't likely get them in a timely manner in the first place.

Since most of my ensembles (jazz combos) are one person on a part, you'd better believe that I want to know ASAP if the drummer is sick and can't make rehearsal today, as that gives me a lot more time to find a sub. So I'd much rather find out this news right away (via text) rather than, say, a few minutes before rehearsal starts (which could happen if the student emailed me instead). We also have a lot of non-traditional students (who may work as far as 20 miles away from school) in one of my groups, so a quick "I'm running late" text is appreciated, as taking a quick peek at the screen is much less disruptive than listening to a voicemail once class has started.

I've had texting capability for six years now, and for me, it's been overwhelmingly positive, and I have yet to have a student abuse the privilege.

So texting is a plus for me (as it appears to be for many of the Georgia Gwinnett faculty), while others seem to think it would be a really big minus. Is it a generational thing? (And let's assume "generation" might be a "where you are inside your head" idea, as opposed to strictly chronological age; I know that I skew a generation younger than the one into which I was born.) Is it truly the wave of the future, and will those who don't embrace it inevitably get left behind?

It's been a while since I've had a vigorous discussion in the comments, so I'd love to hear from lots of different people on this one. Let me know if you're a teacher, student or interested observer, as well as where you fall in this debate. And there will be another angle on this subject tomorrow, as it has many different angles.

Sound Advice for Day One

It's the first day of school for both my college and the public schools, even though I personally get one extra day of summer (I don't teach in the public schools on the first day--too much chaos!--and my first college class isn't until tomorrow). Earlier in the day, I met up with a former student who still has a week before college starts (he's headed northeast, where they start a little later), and he asked me for a few general pieces of advice. A few hours later, I noticed this post from blogger Ross Wardrup that's chock-full of good advice for people starting college. And while he gears his post toward students at UNT (which, ironically, doesn't start classes until Thursday), the information he offers could be used at pretty much any school across the nation. A few of my favorites:

• Figure out which buildings your classes are in before the first day of class.


• If you’re going to be more than 15 minutes late to class, just don’t show up.


• Know the exam dates, and don’t ask me if you can look at my review sheet 5 minutes before the exam begins. I’m studying the sheet that I went through the effort to create.


• If you ride a bicycle to class, don’t try to be a ninja and run me over from behind without warning.


• our freshman year is the year in which you set your GPA. If you slack off this year, you’ll have to work extremely hard to try and bring it back up.


• Always go to review sessions. Even if you “must” work. Get someone to trade shifts with you, etc…


• Read ahead in your textbook! You’ll understand the lecture ten times better.


• Befriend your professors.


• Don’t worry about looking stupid if you need to ask your professor a question. I guarantee you that there is at least one other person with the same question. If it’s really that bad, ask them after class.

Read the whole thing. And let me add one: Show up to class. That sounds basic, but once you skip more than, say, two times, it's really hard to get caught up again. And with the "six-drop rule" here in Texas, dropping the class after the "census date" ls often not an option. I always say that the dumbest way to fail a class* is to stop showing up and not drop, but sometimes, there's little choice. The best way to avoid this is to never get yourself in that situation in the first place.

*One time, when I made that statement in class, a smart-alecky older student (as in a guy in his 50s) asked me, "So what's the smartest way to fail a class?" Wise guy...

'Twas the Night Before Fall Semester...

...and all through the house, only a keyboard was stirring--and sometimes, a mouse.

(Don't worry; I'm not going to write a parody of the entire poem or anything.)

So am I ready for the semester to start? Not completely, no. For one thing, I don't teach on the first day of school (too much chaos!), so I don't have to be totally ready yet. Also, the Dread Sked--or at least some major component of it--gets worse and worse every year. I'm at the point now where I pretty much just need to hear back from people who didn't take lessons over the summer, so I can figure out which of the multiple scenarios for certain parts of my week will need to be invoked. (Those unknown people drive the hard-to-schedule high school, which drives the college, which drives...me, all over the place.)

It's been a good summer--much better than last year, what with the knee surgery and filling in for an ailing colleague and all. And once everyone gets scheduled, it should be fairly fruitful as well; that's certainly my aim (OK, it always is, but prospects for this year are looking good).

Now I just have to convince myself that I'm tired, so as to start a school-year sleeping schedule again. And I think it might be working.

Quote of the Day

"Make your hobbies your jobs, and you’re happy. Making your job your hobby might make you happy in the short run but eventually someone notices."--James Lileks, from today's installment of The Bleat.

One of our national treasures among writers, he is. Visit him daily, you should. (Talking like Yoda, I am; stop now, I will.)

We Still Live in Trying (-Out) Times

It may be a few days before I get caught up on old posts. There's really no shortage of things to talk about, but they'll have to wait, because today, I'm spent.

It was audition day at the college, and things went pretty quickly for the first five hours (no, seriously). The last hour was a bit draggy--not in any way because of the people who were auditioning, but I think I just hit my limit of staying in the same room doing the same thing. Or maybe it was the lack of food talking; after a fairly small lunch (that was generously provided by the music department), I probably should have gotten a small snack during the midday break.

But really, I can't complain too much; I love what I do, and when we only have two days of auditions and two days of juries every year, that's not an excessive amount of mass evaluation in the grand scheme of things. But it does make me tired, so any big topics are off the menu for today.

Tomorrow's a teaching day at home with plenty of breaks. More blogging then, no doubt.

It's Dread Sked Time Again

Wow--it's been a while since I've posted. I do have a few things "in the pipe" as always, and I will catch up eventually.

But not today, as it's the day I start the Dread Sked--that's Kevspeak for the dreaded compilation of my fall teaching schedule in the public schools. It should theoretically be easier this year, since I'm down to five schools and both of the high schools among them are on trimesters (getting trimester and semester schools to mesh was never easy because of the difference in bell schedules), but there's still the issue of marching season, especially when some students are in different classes for the first "tri" than they will be for the rest of the year (and the fact that those two high schools only have jazz band during second and third tri's limits my flexibility even more).

There's bound to be a way for it to work; it just takes some work, and I'm dealing with a few other things this week as well. And while this may end up being easier than in any previous year, it's still one of my two least favorite business-type things to do every year (the other one, of course, being income tax). So if I'm a bit of a hermit, blog-wise, for a few more days, that will be the reason. As always, thanks for your patience.

Blowing out the candles: Happy birthday to Micah, my youngest nephew, who's 4 today. (Obligatory cute baby picture from his actual birthday here.)

Remembering a Lion of Jazz Education

The world of music education, and jazz education in particular, lost one of its giants today with the passing of Leon Breeden after a long illness.

Breeden was the chair of Jazz Studies at my alma mater, the University of North Texas, from 1959 until 1981, and he brought national and international acclaim to the flagship ensemble, the One O'Clock Lab Band, during his time at UNT. Among other things, he started the tradition of recording an annual album (and two of those, Lab '75 and Lab '76, were the first collegiate big band recordings to garner Grammy nominations), and his relationship with the legendary bandleader Stan Kenton led to Kenton bequeathing his entire library to UNT upon his passing in 1979; the university would later bestow the name Stan Kenton Hall upon the larger of the two lab band rehearsal halls in the Music Building.

In retirement, Breeden spent a number of years on campus cataloguing the Kenton library (it was during those days that I had the privilege of working with him to deliver a talk for a series called Sinfonian Forum, as he was a brother in Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, having been initiated into the Delta Mu Chapter at TCU in 1948). In latter years, he would make an occasional appearance as clarinet soloist with Jim Riggs' Original Texas Jazz Orchestra, and I had the privilege of being in the audience for many of those performances (one of which was chronicled here). He also capped off his long list of accolades with an honorary doctorate a year ago this week.

Having received some emails recently from Riggs (though, oddly enough, I have yet to get the one from today that announced his passing), I knew that the end was probably near; he was described as being "gravely ill" after a long emergency surgery back in July. (He had also lost his second wife back in April.) Still, a lot of us were cheering him on to a hopeful recovery; how great it would have been to hear a few more golden notes from that clarinet again.

It was said during Breeden's time at UNT that when he walked down the hall, the waters parted. He was truly a giant even among all the noted professors at the school, and his contribution to jazz education was immeasurable. Aa watched the Facebook tributes from UNT alums pour in, I wondered how many of us--even those who didn't major in jazz studies, including my own undergrad self--might never have attended the school if not for Breeden's work; his work to put the One O'Clock and the jazz area on the map also raised the profile of the entire school in those pre-Internet days; who's to say that UNT would have been anything more than a small regional school were it not for his accomplishments?

The name Leon means "lion" in Latin and several of its derivative languages. Leon Breeden was aptly named, for he was surely one of the lions of our discipline. R.I.P., Leon, and thank you for all that you gave us.

Too Hot For You?

Maybe a nice cold "smothie" will do the trick:


I've passed by this sign for over a week now, and I had to stop and take a picture of it. (And yes, I'll catch up on the past few days' unfinished posts in a little bit.)

UPDATE: I drove by the same restaurant the next day and the spelling was corrected. Is McDonald's reading my blog?

The Good Guys Won--On and Off the Field

A few random thoughts regarding the Rangers auction, which ended around 12:45 this morning with the Crane-Cuban group pulling out, thus awarding the team to the Greenberg-Ryan group:

• As I've noted all along, Greenberg-Ryan were the good guys in this whole thing. The list of bad guys could be many: Greedy creditors, greedy ex-players (c'mon, A-Rod, are you really having trouble feeding your family on your current salary?), a judge who might have been a bit of a publicity-seeker, and of course, Tom Hicks, for getting the team in this mess in the first place.


• Mark Cuban noted that if his group had won, he would have invited Greenberg and Ryan to be part of the process. But there's no saying whether they would have accepted such an arrangement or how long they would have stayed if they did. And as I've said all along, any scenario that didn't have Ryan as the long-term team president would be unacceptable; just look at how much he's turned the team around in a few short years.


• And if Cuban-Crane had won, there was no guarantee that they would have been approved by Major League Baseball owners in the first place. After all, a major player in that group was Jim Crane, who left a bad taste in a lot of people's mouths a few years ago when he made an agreement to buy the Astros and then pulled out at the last minute. Crane had also hinted last year, when he was among the original, pre-bankruptcy bidders for the team, that he would let Ryan go, serving as his own team president. Again, unacceptable.


• I've long been a defender of Cuban as Mavericks owner, but I was skeptical of how he might turn out as a baseball owner. I don't see the same passion for baseball in Cuban that he has for basketball, and his overly-hands-on style wouldn't work as well as it does with the latter.


• And finally, I've said this before, but it bears repeating: This bankruptcy process shows that there's a real need for some serious reform in the financial sector in this nation. The company that was squawking the loudest about Greenberg-Ryan's original bid being "too low" was Monarch Alternative Capital, which bought a lot of Hicks' debt at pennies on the dollar, yet they seemed to demand to recoup the original price of the debts in this auction.
  
  This brings up two questions: 1) Should a debt buyer in this situation be able to demand full compensation for the original price like this (which would be an amount exponentially larger than they originally paid), or should they be satisfied with "only" making a handsome profit? (And believe me, I'm as big of a capitalist as anyone here, but this demand just struck me as excessive.)
  
  2) Should firms like this--which buy debt from other lenders--even be allowed to exist in the first place? It seems like lenders would be much more responsible in their lending if they knew they would have to follow through with their loans to the end, rather than being able to sell them at bargain-basement prices and then write off the loss.

But at any rate, I'm happy. Now let's look forward to the rest of a great season on the field, without all these distractions.

And the Winner Is...?

Well, we don't know yet. But the NBC 5 guys are liveblogging the Rangers auction, so follow it there and I'll talk about things when it's done, even if that's tomorrow.

UPDATE (1:00 a.m., Thursday): Greenberg-Ryan group wins! I'll have more tomorrow, but now I can go to bed happy.

Booker T's Jazz Icon Doesn't Have to Blow His Own Horn This Time

I'm always happy to see positive articles in the media about education, music or jazz, and today, the DMN hits the complete trifecta with its feature article on Bart Marantz, the longtime jazz director at Dallas' Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts (its abbreviation, BTWHSPVA, is still a mouthful, so we'll call it Booker T. like most people do around here). Marantz can claim the likes of Roy Hargrove, Norah Jones and Erykah Badu as alumni of his program, and he says he's learned as much from them as they have from him.

What's great is that the article seems to have been written without being connected to any special occasion--Marantz isn't retiring, he's not celebrating a "big number on the left" anniversary at the school (his 30th will come in 2013), and there's no new alum who's recently made a big splash on the scene. It appears that this article was published just because someone figured out that this iconic educator deserved some recognition. (By the way, among the many talented Booker T. grads are Marantz's own two sons; saxophonist Matt recently released what I believe to be his first CD, and younger brother Luke excels at both piano and vocals.)

As always, read the whole thing.

Hoping to Soon Return to Pod-acity

So it appears that my car's iPod adapter has bitten the dust; one of the two contacts at the bottom has recessed into the opening to the point where I don't think I can get it to come out. The current one is made by Monster, and it's OK, if a bit static-y. If I choose to replace it, can anyone out there recommend a good quality brand that's not break-the-bank expensive?

Needless to say, if you know how to fix the problem I described above, I'd be interested in hearing from you as well. Until then, I guess I'm kicking it old-school and listening to CDs.

Want to Bring History to LIfe? Add a Little Color...

I've had a pretty long teaching day today, so I'll keep my own comments brief and link to the most interesting thing I read today: John Hinderaker at the Power Line blog responds to an age-old question with what I believe is the proper answer:

Why does the past seem so far away? In part, because we so often see it in black and white.

I think that lots of us have seen so many old pictures--taken during a time when black-and-white photography was the norm--that it's easy to forget that the world itself really was in color back then.

If you have a lot of time, go visit this collection of color photos of various places in America from 1939-1943; the pictures bring that era to life in ways that black-and-white simply can't do, so you're seeing that point in time through new eyes--through the eyes of those who were there, for that matter. (And if you have just a little time, go to the Power Line post linked above, where he's included a few of the pictures as well. But really, the big collection is worth your time if you're into such things.)

And of course, if you do like the old black-and-whites, there's no better place to go than Shorpy, perhaps the best vintage photo blog ever.