Memorize, memorize and more memorize

I have 47 songs completely memorized. That's 47 songs in about 4 weeks. Now granted, about 15 of these songs I've been playing for years, but even so, they were never memorized. So for a guy who always believed I have the worst memory of any pianist in NYC, I'm really excited about my progress. I have had some help. A friend of mine learned Russian while in the Army about 20 years ago. His job was to intercept their military communications. Very hush, hush, top secret and all that cold war nonsense. But he had to learn Russian very rapidly and I asked him how he had done it. He steered me towards a book by Harry Lorayne which tries to give you skills in association. For instance: suppose you are learning French vocabulary and you are trying to memorize the word for Duck, which is canard (ka-nar). If you visualize, i mean really visualize "someone throwing a can hard, and you duck," you can create an association between the English and the french word. This book teaches that the more ridiculous the picture you create for your association, the easier it is to remember. Suppose you are trying to remember a list of seemingly unrelated items in order. You would associate each item with the previous item in some very ridiculous way. For instance, if you are associating the word airplane with tree, you might come up with a picture of a million trees flying through the air; or big jetliner landing in a small tree. Even though I'm not even half-way through this book, it has me thinking in ways I've never thought before, and I'm sure it's helping with my memorization of songs. The latest two songs on my piano are Hey There Delilah and Hurts So Good. I have 10 more days before I go down South to perform all of this music.

Oh, Dios mio!

Last night my doorbell rings. Before I have time to walk the 20 feet from the piano to the door, it is ringing incessantly. Now I have a doorman that is supposed to screen all visitors and call up for permission to send up the visitor, but clearly this didn't happen, and I don't like people knocking on my door unexpectedly. It's a NYC privacy thing. This is why we have doormen. I open the door and there is this beautiful Puerto Rican girl of about 25 or so with her 10 year old son. It seems that she is from the Census Bureau and would like to ask me some questions. "Sure!" I say, knowing how important this is. She immediately begins firing questions at me, still standing in the hallway. I suggest that we move the party inside. After about 40 minutes of very personal questions, some of which I denied to answer, thank you very much, and 12 pages later, she finished. She didn't like the fact that I declined to answer some of the questions and spent a significant amount of time trying convincing me that this information was confidential and my government would NEVER use it in any way other than that which it was intended. Yeah, that didn't fly. I began telling her all about illegal wiretapping, arrogant presidents and the demise of the Constitution, an exercise in silliness considering that she really wasn't that bright. I did question her about the timing of the census as I thought it wasn't supposed to happen until 2010. But apparently the Department of Commerce and the City of NY sponsor this census and they do it every 3 years, and only 1 in 270 households gets to participate. Who knew?

After she finished she turned the form back to the front page where I happened to notice that this particular form that we had just filled out was intended not for my apartment at all, but rather the one across the way. I pointed that out to her and she responded by saying, "Oh, Dios mio," or some such expletive and her pencil eraser began flying a mile a minute over every personal answer that I had just spent 40 some damn minutes giving her, right there on my kitchen counter (the very same place that my roommate would to park his stoned ass a short 26 hours later and pretend he was Michelangelo Lloyd Webber, but that's another post). So there we all were, her, her kid, myself, and eraser dust flying everywhere, getting all cozy and laughing about the whole thing. I found out that "dad" was also a musician, and that today mom had bought the boy a cute little puppy for $800 and that it was making mommie sneeze and she was considering taking it to the pound. When the entire thing was all through, I think I learned more about her, her kid and her "kid's father" than she had erased about me and my "household." She left around 10:15 pm, and I could hear her banging on the door across the way 30 seconds later.

Cut to the following day.

I entered my building at 5 in the afternoon with "Tenacious D" blasting "F*#k Her Gently" in my ipod head phones when a small child comes running up from behind me and grabs my hand and begins pulling it hard, trying to get my attention. I turn around and see it's the 10 year old boy that was in my apartment last night. He is very excited to see me. I guess I hadn't really realized the extent of our bonding. He wants to show me his little puppy that is apparently helping out with the census today, as his mother was talking to the doorman, (puppy in hand) no doubt to torture another hapless resident. Oh, Dios mio!

work...continued

Ok...it seemed to work. Judy and I got a lot of good work done tonight at our rehearsal, and she realized that the charts she gave me from her last music director were very umm....unclear. She accepted my suggestion and we worked out only 4 songs, but we spent an appropriate amount of time on them and they came out really well, and both of us began to feel much better about working together. I came home to my stoned roommate trying to make a clay "Phantom" mask all over the kitchen counter with Bernadette Peters' Sondheim, etc. Concert blasting. Oy!

Work

Well I got a phone call last weekend. A very nervous cabaret singer with a music director that had gone MIA. She's got this Judy Garland tribute show she's doing (does this town really need yet another Judy Garland cabaret show?...really really??) and so I'm stepping into someone else's shoes and have to make this work. She is very nervous and it is affecting our rehearsals because she is coming from a place of fear. She wants to rush through a run-through all the songs she is doing rather than spending quality time on each and then putting it all together in a later rehearsal. And in her rapid run-through, because she has not articulated, and in many cases not even thought of what exactly she wants, we are not in sync, and she's freaking out. I think tonight I will take control of this rehearsal and see if I can get her to do it my way. I'll let you know how it all works out.

one week later

Comments anyone?

Job offer

Well, it is beginning. I got my first real job offer as a Dueler yesterday. The owner of the club I was training at all last week made a phone call and as a result I was invited to play a four night gig at another club down South. It will still be training, but the pay is fair, the travel expenses will be picked up and I will be playing the entire gig, not just sitting around watching. The guy I will be training with has an amazing reputation as an entertainer and as a musician, so I expect to learn a lot. I can already tell from talking to him several times that he has a very strong personality. This will be a real good opportunity to practice humility. Oy!! Oh, and I have been instructed NOT to bring any music up on stage with me. Which means, I have reduced my available repertoire down to about 25 songs. I expect that by the time I do this gig, in 3 weeks from now, I will have memorized another 15. This should be reeeal interesting. At least the guy training me is fully aware of where I'm at.

Busy Week

Well I'm finally back in NYC after spending over a week at my "audition" down South. The original audition was only for the first weekend, but they asked me to stay a second weekend to continue the process. The answer to the question everyone seems to ask is, No, I didn't get exactly what I wanted. They didn't offer me a real job. I was told I still need more time for preparation and training. Well, that's why I went down there in the first place. I was applying for a "training" position as a dueling pianist. I think my presence there helped the club owner and the other two pianists define what they were really looking for, which was not a trainee at all, but rather an "A" player to replace the guy that left. This is all fine. I was treated very well by the club, the owner, and the other pianists. They paid me a nominal fee for my training and housed me. I was responsible for all travel.

Meanwhile, after having been immersed in the world of Dueling Pianos for the past 9 days, I am as motivated as ever to continue my practicing. I currently have 230 rock songs that I know, so I will now change my focus from adding new songs to memorizing and mastering the ones I know. Everyone I speak with tells me I should work to get "off book". OK. Message received, loud and clear. Even though I have always believed I have a really shitty memory, I'm motivated, so I will do this. I already have about 20 songs under my belt.

It was very cool being up on stage in a real venue with several hundred people paying attention. And I have always been very nervous about being on a stage like that, but this week i discovered that it wasn't all that scary, and even though I was unsure of how well I would do each time I got on stage (that due to all the critisism I was getting all week) I found that I wasn't nervous. I managed an attitude that I would either do well or I wouldn't but either way I would learn. And that is unusual for me. I have always been terrified of doing badly on stage. And when I was up there, I found myself much more focused than ever been, even though everything was unfamiliar and I was juggling so many things at once.

One cool number the other pianists did was Sweet Child of Mine. One of the pianists got in costume as Axel Rose, jumped up on top of the two grand pianos and played electric guitar. They had special lighting, and we were working with a drummer. It sounded amazing. Meanwhile, the bar manager poured Bacardi 151 on top of the pianos, at the guitarist's feet and lit them so there were flames shooting up. He then used the rest of the 151 to blow fire out of his mouth in front of the pianos...it was quite spectacular.

DuelingPiano Audition

I was invited down to the Carolinas to audition at a dueling piano bar. I sat in on Saturday with 3 other players and an adoring audience of 300 rock-lovin' southerners, singing Sweet Home Alabama and Santeria. Apparently the bar can and does hold 425 but it was a "light" night because of the NCAA final four games that night. So the good news is that I was invited to stay on through this weekend to continue the audition process. I expect to be back in NYC on Sunday. Now back to memorizing more lyrics!

for thought

Why in this country are we violent and literate?
Answer: Because we are taught to read.

rant: suspension of reality

Have we as Americans, smart and stupid alike, all gotten together and decided to suspend reality and enter into an alternate universe where George W. Bush shouldn't be run him out of town or impeached and imprisoned for high treason and crimes against humanity? Did we all actually agree to re-elect him and hand over, again, the public trust that he would act in our best interests after seeing his act for 4 years? Did we all agree that when he or his press secretary says something, it should reported as "news" rather than propaganda and manipulation? And this after 7 years of continual mistruths, lies and fantasy spewing out of the spigot of disinformation formerly known as The White House; lies that have proven themselves as such after only a few short weeks or months. How can the press look their audience in the eye night after night and say that the White House says this or that without at least a twinkle in their eye that belies the shared joke that our executive leadership has become? If you had a friend or family member that continually altered the truth to suit their needs, wouldn't you stop listening? And if you were recounting something they said, wouldn't your face reflect exactly how much trust you had in the veracity of such a statement?

REALLY!!...how is this possible? Has black become the new white?

Activity

So my life has come down to essentially this: Since I returned from all my travels last June I've devoted my time to 1. rent my apartment and 2. learn the dueling piano canon. It took me all of 6 months but by Jan my apartment was finally rented. If any of you have seen or know my apartment, you know that it's a bit of an extravagant space and since I was renting it furnished replete with all the fussy decorations, etc I was extremely picky about whom I chose as my tenant. Another reason it took so long was because I chose to test the market, to see how much I could get for it. I originally overpriced the rent and then slowly brought the price down to reality. A good lesson. Finally, the main bedding area is up in a sleeping loft that is accessed by a ladder, which limits the upper age range of interested tenants. Anyway, as far as I can tell, the right person IS in there, and he seems to be treating the space with dignity, as I had hoped, and hasn't fallen out of the sleeping loft head first. So with the positive cash flow that generated, I rented a more humble space and have been living with piano and with my best friend, spending much of my time working on music. Well now I feel as though I'm spinning my wheels. I haven't actually worked a steady gig since December, and I'm feeling slothful [is that a word??]. So in spite of my practice, I felt that it was time to put some feelers out for employment. The interest was immediate. While I have received no offers yet, several possibilities have been presented to me, including Europe, the Caribbean, Southern California, and the most solid possibility so far,....wait for it....wait for it.... waaaaaiiiit...... Detroit!!! About 20 minutes after I got that phone call I saw a piece on CNN about how the Detroit mayor is being criminally prosecuted for perjury and, apparently as a result of this (alleged) perjury, has cost the tax payers of this "already cash-strapped city" like 9 million dollars, or some such nonsense. So I switched channels to CNBC, to learn only 5 minutes later that GM is closing yet another auto plant in Detroit which will cause more layoffs, penury and general misery in the Detroit area. Oh happy day! I'm packing my bags right now!

Oh, PS...am I the only one that consistently misspells "Caribbean"?

Six hours!

Last night after the roommate left for the evening I decided to organize my photos on the computer. (Just this past weekend I spent way too much time organizing the naughty pictures, only to remove them completely from the computer. I think i enjoy the idea of acquiring them much more than would be proportional for the amount of times I actually...um..."use them.")

So there I am last night, for six hours, going through all the pictures from my life for the past few years, everything from the beaches of Boracay, the parks of Siagon, the rice paddys of Luzon, the Ferris Wheel at Coney Island, Friends, Family, to dead mother's defective tomb stone, dueling piano bars, Zen retreats, and past and current lovers (um...only one current one). It is an interesting way to spend a night. It's good "alone time," at times sad, at times happy. It makes you keenly aware of the impermanence of life. That's a good thing.

After I finished, I began reading an autobiographical book about a Dutch guy who decides to travel to Japan and knock on the door of some random Zen Buddhist monastery and asked to be admitted to live, and to study and practice Zen for 3 years alongside the monks. He says in the beginning that he was searching for "...indifference of a higher order." I think that's a great descriptor of Zen. I'm 1/3 of the way through the book now and it's a really fascinating tale so far. It's not designed to be a religious text or even a call to conversion. It's just a story; an account. I like that. It's called The Empty Mirror by Van de Wetering.


So here's your moment of Zen. This is a picture I took on the Philippine island of Boracay last May. It is an advertisement in the window of a doctor's office. The text states:

Circumcision Package.
Including:
- Medication,
- Supplies.
-P1,000/head.
-P900/head for group of 2-5
-P800/head for group of more than 6

At the time, the conversion was about 40 Philippine Pesos (p40) to the Dollar. So if you want to purchase one circumcision, the cost is about $25 USD. If you have a group of six to circumcise, well then you save 20%! It's only $120 for the entire group (of heads, apparently).

Cool friends

So it's 6:30pm Easter and I just returned from a friend's Easter party. He's always doing something, and he'd definately one of the ultra cool set here in NYC. So I rearranged my schedule to go to his "Easter Brunch." He lives in one of the sweetest spaces I've seen here in Manhattan, with cathedral ceilings and lots of open space in a 5 story townhouse in the east 60's. I normally don't like to drink while it's still daylight, but I made an exception and began drinking Bellini's, which are a mixture of champagne and peach, at 2pm. Some people I knew and some I didn't. He has some pretty fancy friends, and there was more than one tucked chin and lifted brow in the set. As it was Easter, he had Easter eggs "hidden" in plain sight, wrapped in cool easter paisley fabrics which we were supposed to "find" and open. Inside the wrappings were easter eggs and some of them had notes, such as "kiss the chef", or "lunch with the host" or "stay and help clean after the party", while others had money in the wrappers alongside the eggs. What a cool idea for an adult easter party. And New York holiday parties are pretty cool in general because you never know who will meet. Many New Yorkers are far from their families, so in such settings it's almost as though you have an adopted family for the few hours you are together. I spent a while chatting with a woman who runs a hedge fund and is an expert in Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs), which I have a passing interest in. I got to catch up with some friends and the host and I got into a showdown where we tried to out do each other with (of all things) Sophie Tucker jokes. Then I found $100 bill in my Easter egg wrapping!!!....and then we all got to hunt for a second one. Another $20!!! Yay! It was the first party I have been where I wasn't entertaining, and yet still got paid! Now I'm back home, shaking off the Bellini's and thinking about writing a thank you note to my host and heading downstairs to the gym.

Sophie Tucker: I was in bed with my boyfriend Ernie and he said to me, "Soph" (he always calls me Soph), he said to me "Soph, you have no tits and a tight box." I said to him, "Ernie, Get Off My Back!"

Tortoise love and TV theme songs

OK, this is just strange. I was lying awake, not able to sleep at 3 in the morning, so I turned on National Geographic where there were having a special on the Galapagos Islands. Cool, right? Well they showed two tortoises mating. And apparently the females are smaller than the males. So here is this huge tortoise mounting a little turtle half it's size and going at it like a Craigslist personal ad gone very very wrong. And amid all the knocking of shells, they were grunting too!! Loudly! Like pigs, I guess. It was a clumsy, noisy, awkward affair that was more than a little bit disturbing.

I finally went to sleep and dreamt that I was playing a dueling piano gig out in some Midwestern state, and there's hundreds of people waiting for me to play, but I didn't have my music so there I sat there as useless as teats on a bull. So the other pianist asked if I knew TV theme songs--which I have always resisted learning--12 years playing piano bar and no Gilligan's Island! So I had to tell him no, and continue being useless. It was kind of like when I was in 7th grade and would dream that I was on the school bus, and suddenly realized that I must have forgotten to put on any clothes before I left home, but no one had noticed quite yet, and I was frantically wondering what the hell I would do when we arrived at school and I would have to stand up and get off the bus. So today (after I woke up from my pianistic nightmare) I promptly did my research and discovered that apparently there is a very specific TV theme medley that the duelers play. It goes: Brady Bunch, Gilligan's Island, All in the Family, The Jeffersons and Cheers...in that order. (I didn't get that memo). So the next time you see me perform, you can hear me imitate Edith Bunker in all her melodious glory singing "Those were the daaaaaaa-a-aaa-ays!!"

The newest incarnation of the Townhouse Restaurant

Having worked in the restaurant/bar business for about 12 years now, it always fascinates me as to what makes a restaurant or bar "work" and what doesn't. Oh, I understand the basics: service, pours, pricing, quality of food, ambiance, location, management...but we've all seen places that seem to do everything right and they can't seem to get off the ground, and then there are places that seem to make every mistake in the book, and they do great. Well, the owners of a place called the Townhouse Restaurant closed their restaurant a couple years ago, presumably because they weren't making any money. Then they partnered with someone who came in and made it a nice casual Italian restaurant. They spent much time and money completely redoing the place into what was a very comfortable, fairly priced bistro with decent food. It completely flopped. In fact it did a heck of a lot LESS business than the Townhouse Restaurant that they closed in order to open the new place. So finally after many long and completely uneventful months, I guess they took their losses and got out.

In came Donatella Arpaia and chef Michael Psilakis, who completely redid the space (again) with an absolutely outstanding design, created a casual Italian menu and it has only been open only a couple of weeks under the name Mia Dona and it seem to be an immediate and smashing success. I've been their twice now and these people know how to do it right. The menu is unique and clearly designed by a master chef, the interior design is truly inspired, and the service is superb. The food quality has been wildly mixed. The Polpettone florentine meatloaf, made to order with a poached egg expertly cooked inside the loaf was a masterpiece, and so was the Spinach, béchamel & pecorino side dish. Creamy and interesting, it could have been a very satisfying meal in and of itself. The grilled octopus starter was very meaty and tender (yay!) but way too salty (boo!). The exact same can be said for the Roasted Pork Chop (meaty, tender and too salty). The pickled vinegar french fries were tasty but too bold and vinegary which overpowered whatever it was paired with, except perhaps the octopus and the pork chop. The Braised Beef Ribs with smoked mozzarella polenta, cipollini and tomato was very tasty. In spite of the issues I have with some of the flavors, the place is too interesting not to go back. It's a great study in how to do a successful restaurant in NYC.

Memorization

One of the things I continue to be told is that I have to memorize my music. I have always struggled with that. I have put in untold hours to memorize chords and lyrics for a one hour show, only to start forgetting them a few short weeks after the run finished. But in order for me to really be successful as a dueling pianist, I need to memorize hundreds of songs. It has always amazed me at the sheer breadth of material these guys know without any music or lyrics to remind them. So I began hunting for help with memory training. I found this one school called The School of Phenomenal Memory (PMemory.com) that makes all sorts of fantastic claims, but it somehow involves learning an alpha-numeric code, that you need to really integrate into your mind in order to quickly access it, sort of like learning shorthand, and only after you master this code, can you utilize it to help with the memorization process. I don't have a problem going through all that work, if I can be assured that it is a legitimate system, but I couldn't find any truly independent reviews or analysis of this School or method, but I did find that they had a couple of unresolved complaints with the BBB. And I gathered from those complaints that their "No Time Limit, No Questions Asked Money-back Guarantee" did indeed have Questions Asked, and apparently not answered satisfactorily. Moving along, I did, however find a cool website called www.memory-key.com which has a lot of different articles and resources for cognitive strategies and memory improvement. Now back my practicing. Was it Leroy Brown that learned a lesson 'bout messin' with the wife of a jealous man, or was it simply Leroy that learned the lesson 'bout messin'? I can't remember. Dammit!

Back from Bush Country

I spent a full week in Texas, first visiting my family in Dallas/Ft Worth, then down to Austin for a visit with my friend J, and then back up to Dallas to spend some time with friends. I performed 3 times in Texas, all unexpectedly: Once at a Dueling piano bar in Austin, and then at a private party where I was the featured entertainment, and finally I was asked to put together a 30 min Cabaret spot at a bar in Dallas. It was fun to do that kind of music for such an appreciative crowd.

Now I'm back from Texas, and have spent an enjoyable week with my music, meditation and friends here in NYC. I've been busy learning some of the songs I heard in Texas that I will need for my reportoire for the Dueling Pianos act. Many of my friends in Vietnam have sent me Happy Lunar New Year greetings and I've gotten a couple of wonderfully long emails from friends abroad. I'll close this blog entry with some text found on a Vietnamese travel agency website regarding their "SuperDong boat":

"We assures the punctuality in departure time. Here, aboard the boat, guests will have the good sensation of living in a warm and spacious home for its harmonious interior decoration and with all the entertainments such as watching movies, enjoying snacks, light meal in the friendly and pleasant atmosphere of the boat staff. Smart steward and stewardess are ready to serve guests by their courteous manners. And with SuperDong boat, clients gill get more excitement during the voyages across the sea to make a conquest the immense Ocean. The will be healthy and fine when leaving the wharf to welcome a new day with the bright sunshines as desired."

Incidentally, this mighty "ocean voyage" is actually a 20-minute ferry crossing to an offshore island.

Trung, Nhi and Y

Yesterday was a relatively uneventful day, however I did reconnect with Rob, who had hosted the benefit we both had put together in June for the English-language students in Siagon. I met him and a couple of his friends at Bill's Hideaway Lounge in Dallas for a couple of drinks while we sat and watched a cabaret show. I was asked if I would perform a half-hour cabaret set next monday, which I was happy to agree to.  It's a cute space and they have a baby-grand piano. Now I have to come up with something! Anyway, I promised Rob that I would finish posting Nigel Veal's descriptions of all the folks that are being schooled in Siagon as a direct result of this benefit and the generosity of his friends. So here are the final three:

• "Trung. Email has now become an important extension of my teaching at intermediate and advanced level. Over the past few months I have built up a large collection of grammar and reading comprehension exercises. Students also sometimes send me their written work to correct by email. One example is Trung, whom you [Eddie] know well. Although I see him in the park most evenings, it was difficult to find a suitable time and place to give Trung private tuition. Then I discovered that he spends a lot of time during the day logged onto his computer so I asked him if he would like to receive email exercises pitched at his level (which is pre-advanced). He jumped at the opportunity. The first exercise that I sent him was completed and returned withing 5 min. I correct it and sent him a 2nd exercise which was, again, returned immediately. We now exchange emails several times a week. On the rare occasion that he doesn't understand something, he can ask me in the park. I'll also try to find a suitable weekly time slot to give him one-on-one conversational practice. ..........................................................................
• "Nhi is the other student you know who now receives regular private tuition from me. Initially she started to study with Vinh on Saturday evenings but it wasn't ideal because Vinh tended to monopolize the conversation and with Nhi's limited vocabulary, she had difficulty following. So now I teach Vinh on Saturdays and Nhi on Sunday. She comes to my hotel where we study in a quiet corner of the reception area. Nhi is keen (almost impatient) to learn. She realizes that proficiency in English is the key to obtaining a decent job in this city. After studying for an hour or so at my hotel, we go to drink fruit shakes and then relocate to the park for conversational practice and gentle exercise. Usually we complete a walk of 6 or 7 circuits around the perimeter. I am a firm believer in the peripatetic method of teaching prescribed by Aristotle, and Nhi certainly seems to learn a lot this way. Walking also seems to deter other people from joining or interrupting us. ..........................................................................
• "Y (a one-letter name pronounced like a long E) is the new night-time receptionist at my hotel and she has become my late-night student. That is to say, I teach her for an hour around midnight practically every night before I go to bed. Her level is intermediate buy she is trying hard to expand her vocabulary and improve her speaking skills. On her first day in the job, with no suitable books to hand and a long night of boredom ahead, she was pouring over a travel brochure and jotting down the words she didn't understand. She asked me to explain these words, half of which were misprints. As an alternative to the badly-translated brochure, I produced my Vocabulary in Practice text and a story book. Now, every night we do one vocabulary exercise and read one story. I also test her on her new vocabulary from the previous day. Y's nocturnal boredom is temporarily banished, and for me it's quite a pleasant way to end the day."

-- Nigel Veal

First Communion...such an innocent time

The text below has been taken directly from The New St. Joseph First Communion Catechism (1963), available in the bookstore of the St. Francis Roman Catholic Church in Grapevine Texas.  This is where my brother is sending his children to "Faith Formation":

"What happens to those who die in mortal sin?

...Hell is a terrible place.

...Those who are there suffer great pain.

...They are slaves of the devil.

...They hate God and everyone else.

...They love only themselves.

...They can never be happy."