Flaming Lips
A Music Related Bucket List
15/07/11 10:37 Filed under: Personal
- dance on stage dressed in a furry animal costume at a Flaming Lips gig
- compose a demo for Tonehammer
make a musical tribute for David Bowie and have him hear it- achieve my PhD
present a seminar at Cambridge University- compose for the Piano Circus
- stage invade at a Morrissey gig
- get a PRSF grant to do something very cool
- perform a live set of Tool covers with a string quartet
build my own studioearn enough from music to teach part-time- go to Cannes film festival to see a film that I composed the soundtrack to
- remix something released by Nonclassical
- finish a large scale orchestral/choral/multimedia work by the time I am 35
- be involved in the music or sound production on a AAA game (preferably Bioware, Rockstar or Bethesda, but I’m not fussy)
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Winter blues, singing along with The Flaming Lips & remembering Rostropovich
2009 is rolling along inevitably towards a bleak winter and new year; mid-November already and I can barely remember October at all beyond a general dark cloud of bullshit college stress, being tired and fighting off a cold. Oh, I did go and see "This is it" with Matt on Halloween night - a great film no doubt, so tragic and bittersweet. Left me feeling slightly raw, though. I guess this is our generation's Lennon or Elvis "is gone" moment. Surreal. |
| Dudley gets bigger by the day, and he's totally integrated into our lives now, it's hard to imagine what we did without him. Such a sweet pup, Matt and I had a minor scare when he ate a pig's ear a few days ago.... one minute he was happily chewing on it, next thing we knew he had gulped it down and let out a big burp. We freaked out for a bit, not knowing what to do. We looked online - which is probably the one thing a slightly paranoid puppy owner should NEVER do - and scared ourselves silly reading stories of dogs that died because of intestinal blockages, etc. We made such a fuss, but he wasn't bothered. He's a little toughian. Who will never get to nom on a pig's ear again. |
| Finally, I recently dug out some old Rostropovich recordings to compile into a mix tape for a friend - Lady MacBeth of Mtesnk District, the Shosta Cello Concerto and his wonderful recording of Britten's Cello Suites. Too good for words, honestly... I can't even begin to blog about how special these recordings are. I encourage anyone who likes their soviet era music to be bleak, tragicomic, intelligent, powerful and bleeding with raw downcast emotion to seek them out. Particularly the Lady Macbeth double disc from 1979. Perfection. |
More quartet action coming up
Got another string arrangement to do for Monty (I worked for him previously on “Ballad of St Valentine”, there’s a clip on the audio page). The deal is if the recording session gets done early enough I may get some time with the players to record some new material for myself. My head is racing with ideas already, there wouldn’t be enough time in the world to record everything I’m thinking of right now. Got to narrow it down...
I see my name has been added to the Classical Composer’s Database. Definitely getting a kick out of seeing my name listed here alongside Sculthorpe and Brumby! Check it out, Ma! heh
On the weekend I got out into the garden and got my hands good n dirty. This summer I want it to be spectacular! And mostly edible. If the credit crunch kicks me down, at least I’ll have loads of courgettes and garlic to get us through for a few months. For the first time ever I am going to attempt growing pumpkins - the really big-arse kind. I might document my progress in this blog, why not, eh? Also starting from seed with rhubarb, gooseberries, black chilli, bell peppers, onion, romero tomatoes, more courgette and eggplant. Planted out a stack of garlic cloves too. When it’s all ready I’ll be able to make wicked antipasto. Mmmm.
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