The Launch

    So, this Wednesday I did not have to scoot downtown after my afternoon nap to buy a new flapper,  or drain valve, for the toilet. A week ago we were set to film some keyboard method, but the bathroom emergency blew that intention out the window, and it looked like my hope of getting some of the scheme out to the children and other beginners of the universe before Christmas was not going to be fulfilled. A household primarily given over to the prayer life simply cannot get creative just any old time it feels like it. It's not easy to find a time slot that works as well as Wednesday afternoon. Oh, well. Patience, jackass, patience, as the old joke says. And anyway there was still some consolidating to do with the busted triads, as I call them, which are turning out to be the most mellifluous and meaningful "arpeggio" studies I have ever seen and heard. It's taken 23 years to get there, but the journey was worth the trouble. Just imagine being able to contemplate the Trinity and practice your scales and harmonies at the same time. On this earth, you don't get much closer to heaven. But there were no surprises today, and at two p.m. I was summoned to the studio by Madame Producer/Director, and everything went reasonably smoothly for a beginning.
    There's nothing like arpeggios or indeed any kind of harmony on the first episode of Microstation Minstrels. Just the D mode, mode one, in its 11 note range, in four segments, with some historical chatter by myself, the first words of which actually came to me as I was walking back up the hill with the new flapper in my pocket. (Two days later I bought a back up. There is no negotiating with a malfunctioning toilet.)  MT, of course, valiantly, oversaw the raconteur and handled all the controls. I realized recently that on and off, she and I have worked together in a variety of performances for 40 years. We always wondered about a time when we would record the old Bluemantle Trio, but never thought about putting the music scheme on the Net until this summer, when Garry Waldie told me he would film the keyboard segments and send them privately, on YouTube, to a journalist at the Vancouver Sun, my old employer. Thus the spark of the ultimate connection was born, and the ultimate technoklutz realized he'd have to acquire some sophistication with the audio-visual aspects of cyber world. Then came the equipment I have mentioned before, some trial runs, and finally, this afternoon.
    And then the good clean fun of sending the message to family, friends, selected media, and even a well-placed soul in the American film business.