JCHRants
A compendium of musings on music and this business we call show
In With The Old Out With The…
11.9.2011
AKA, New Year, same ol’ whiney posts. But this will likely be the last post before I switch web hosts. As doctors so like to say, ‘Some side-effects may include…’ But hopefully there will be [...]
Film Scores 2011
10.3.2011
Some people are just head and shoulders above the rest in terms of execution; the Michael Jordans. John Williams and Steven Spielberg are like that in movies. I’m not saying everything they do is ‘the [...]
Do-Gooders
09.19.2011
Just when I think there are no new ways left for me to injure myself, I’m currently recovering from my first ‘guitar shock’. I’ve had plenty o’ mic shocks before, but this is the first [...]
One Hit Wonder
09.6.2011
I recently read an article in Rolling Stone (amazing they’re still in business) about the currently popular group ‘Foster The People’. And the leader, Marc Foster, said something like this: I don’t want to be [...]
There’s An App For That
08.27.2011
Time and again, I’m told to write something periodically to you, Dear Reader, in order that I may keep me at the forefront of your digital consciousness. But lately? I……………….got nuthin’. Or rather, I got [...]
Dying Is Easy
Comedy really is hard. I recently saw Le triplettes de Belleville again and was reminded of this fact. It’s one of the great achievements in animation—hell in all moviedom. It’s funny, sad, warm and uplifting [...]
The Origin Of The Mood Ring
08.3.2011
There’s a pretty good book title in there, right? In the immortal words of Woody Allen, this is a joke; that’s not a joke; but it is a joke. I have been told over and [...]
Dennis Ritchie, RIP
07.8.2011
Computer Scientist, Dennis Ritchie died this week. There was nary a mention of it anywhere in the major media, except perhaps below the fold on A6. But he was a hero to me for many [...]
Be Creative
06.27.2011
Maybe it’s this Great Recession or whatever but I can’t seem to turn around without hearing phrases like, ‘You just gotta be creative!’ or ‘You gotta think outside the box.’ Almost always this phrase is uttered in response to trying to ‘do more with less’. Sort of a ‘McGyver’ deal, I suppose. In other words, if you don’t have the money to hire someone to do ‘X’, just think up a lower cost solution ‘Y’ using the old noodle.
The Problem Of The Great American Novel
06.18.2011
But ya know why there hasn’t been a ‘Great American Novel’, one with the sweep of Tolstoy’s Russia or Shakespeare’s England, or Dante’s Florence? Because it’s really hard to start with a metaphor and then find a story to build around it. And that delusion seems to me now to be (irony of ironies) quintessentially American… If you build it he will come. If we start with a cool idea, all we need to do is throw enough man-hours at it and POW! To the moon, Alice!
