Well, dear readers, our twentieth anniversary was very festively festive yesterday, with several dear readers returning for the first time in ages, which is always fun. And now, I am sitting here like so much fish, listening to John Mauceri conduct some violin concertos, three to be exact. Just finished was the brilliant Korngold concerto, and now we have the Kurt Weill concerto, and that’s pretty interesting, and then comes Ernst Krenek, which I like. Prior to the violin concertos, I watched about forty minutes of a motion picture on Blu and Ray entitled Poison, the first feature film of Todd Haynes. As some of you know, he’s probably my favorite director working today – very stylish and old-fashioned in the best way. But Poison simply isn’t my kind of movie. It’s stylistically interesting in certain ways, but it’s too fragmented and weird for my taste, but it was a very low-budget art house film and it certainly was a good calling card for him. And I spent much time getting everything ready so we can announce the two new Kritzerland titles at some point, hopefully today or this evening. I decided to change one of the titles for various reasons, so I had to write a blurb for that one and get Doug Haverty everything he needed for that one. He’s already gotten me the covers and inlay cards, so it’s just a matter of him getting the audio samples up and building the pages for the new titles. I think we could subtitle the Weill concerto Notes in Search of a Tune. It doesn’t really have much of the Weill style that we know, but it’s interesting and I’m enjoying it. I also listened to some more Barbirolli, but as time went on in his recordings, he became a grunter and a hummer and it’s quite off-putting sometimes. It’s usually in the fast sections that it’s at its worst. He occasionally sounds like he’s about to explode. And that’s enough of this paragraph, which I felt and feel lacked/lacks a little pizazz (zzazip, spelled backwards) and elan and flair and sparkle. I think I fell asleep twice whilst writing it.
Yesterday was an interesting day. I had another night of not being able to fall asleep, but once I did, I managed to get about six hours of sleep, not really enough if you ask me, which you didn’t, but I told you anyway because I’m feeling sassy right now as I write these here notes. As soon as I got up, I saw that we had us a little miracle around these here parts, so that was very good and put me in a good mood, so good, in fact, that I sang Yes, We Have No Bananas and Dinner for One, Please, James at the same time, no mean feat, and made even more extraordinary that I sang one of them in the key of B and the other in the key of G# – it was very avantgarde and outré, not necessarily in that order. I answered a plethora of e-mails, including one from Robert Yacko about having a late afternoon meal at Vitello’s, which sounded like a plan to me. Then I had a nice conversation with Cindy Williams. She’ll come over next week and we’ll set a key for the little song I helped her with so that we can have a track made. I’m helping her with one other little section of her show, and we’ll talk through that, too. She starts doing the show in January and has about ten cities booked so far. So, I got coherent and moseyed on over to Vitello’s. I had the caccia e pepe, light on the pepe and with some chicken, and Robert had his usual pasta with chicken. It was fun, and then I went to the mail place – hadn’t been in almost a week – and picked up several envelopes, including a lovely green envelope from the Writer’s Guild, containing a little residual for The Faculty. I love when that happens. Then I did a quick Gelson’s stop and got a muffin top and an amusing miniature bite-sized pumpkin pie thing, some Diet Coke, and some whipped cream for the bite-sized pumpkin pie thing. Then I came home, ate the muffin top and the bite-sized pumpkin pie thing with some whipped cream on it, and then I sat on my couch like so much fish and watched the first part of Poison. The rest you know.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, I’ll do whatever needs doing, then I’ll do some writing on the project I’m doing with David Wechter, I’ll choose more songs for the Kritzerland holiday show, we’ll hopefully announce our two new titles, I’ll eat, and then I’ll watch, listen, and relax.
The rest of the week is more of the same, then on Saturday I’m seeing some reading of a new musical, plus seeing a Zoom rehearsal of the singer’s act so I can make sure everything is working as it should and that her pianist understands what he has to do with the little bits of dialogue he has. They have no wireless mics there, so we’ll have to make sure the cords aren’t going to be a problem, especially for the duet with the kid. I was originally going to go to Palm Desert on Sunday, but I really can’t trust the motor car at this point, so we’ll Zoom the sound check and then I’m sure she’ll have someone film it on their iPhone. And I’ve also begun to think about what the new book will be – I have several ideas that I’m rolling around in the cranium.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up when I’m up, do whatever needs doing, write, choose songs, eat, and then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s Ask BK Day, the day in which you get to ask me or any dear reader any old question you like and we get to give any old answer we like. So, let’s have loads of lovely questions and loads of lovely answers and loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy to have had a little miracle and hoping for more.