From your hospital bed
you stare out the window
at the empty bird feeder
unaware that the chirping you hear
comes from your satellite radio.
poem- quiet June 8, 2014
The house rests.
Five bodies drift on dreams.
One sits, enshrined in song,
strums softly
on strings:
a living lullaby.
poem- songful day June 1, 2014
The strings of the harp sing
and the back deck resonates
with the soundboard
as spring and summer harmonize
and time drifts lazily
on my melody.
music-Skye Boat Song on harp May 29, 2014
Here’s a little break from ranting poems or pugilistic poetry! In honour of the upcoming Outlander TV show, here’s an ‘arrangement in progress’ I’ve made of The Skye Boat Song, which I’m betting is incorporated into the TV show theme.
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For the technically curious:
I am playing a double strung harp. (This was definitely easier before I had bifocals, though it was challenging enough then). There are three octaves on each side of the harp, tuned to the same notes. 44 strings in all. This is a low-head Celtic harp, in the style of the famous Irish Brian Boru harp or the Scottish Queen Mary harp. It is also known as a Scottish clarsach. Specifically, mine is a Brittany harp, built for me by Stoney End 15 years ago or so. (When I bought it the Canadian dollar was around 70c US, so it was pricey!) It still has its original strings! This says it’s a tough little harp, and that I’m a lazy harpist (some people change strings a couple of times a year, to keep the sound bright). It is made from a lovely, shimmery grained cherry and has a Baltic birch soundboard with a pretty inlay strip at the base of the strings. It keeps its tuning brilliantly- rarely needing more than a titch of adjustment here and there. This is a rare blessing in a harp!
Here are The Skye Boat Song lyrics as I say them to myself while I’m playing (which does not in any way imply they are the correct lyrics!)
Speed bonny boat like a bird on the wing
Onward the sailors cry
Carry the lad that’s born to be king
Over the sea to Skye!
Loud the winds blow
Loud the waves crash
Ocean’s a weary bed
La la la la
la la la la (< < < < pretty sure those aren’t the right lyrics)
Watch o’er your weary head
oh (That’s the soft D sounded to start back into the chorus)
Speed bonny boat… (etc)
I always thought somehow Flora McDonald was on this boat with him, but I think that’s just me.
I promise OJ the standard poodle is only sleeping, though he certainly does look dead. He is snoring now, in the exact same position.
poem- dead horse May 27, 2014
You rode your high horse
to water, but you couldn’t make it drink.
You beat that horse
until its flesh was pulverized
and the putrid rot rose in a stench,
repulsing people you wanted to impress.
Still you keep beating
that equine cadaver,
imagining the rattle of its rib bones
is dressage music
for your one trick pony.
So, whatcha writin’ in that NaNoWriMo thing, anyway? July 11, 2013
In November, when I was actually on track with my NaNo writing, I had a few gems that still make me happy. This book is now with the editor (who has gone to Europe for 2 weeks, and abandoned me!) Thought I’d share this with you, in the hopes that it will inspire today’s Camp NaNo efforts to get more than 500 words a day, which is all I’ve been managing so far! (Arg). Enjoy.
Thought you might like to see what’s coming along. Ben is now at University of Calgary with his friends Paul and Ryan. (Craigie Hall is the music building). Grace is living in the Shuswap with her Auntie Bright. If you’re new to the story, you should know that Grace and Ben are connected telepathically. Ben is the earthly realm form of the demi-god Orpheus. He’s narrating.
—————————————————————–
I was walking down a corridor in Craigie Hall when a stab of pain crashed into my head. I staggered into the wall, and grabbed for support.
A girl rushed over to me, “Are you okay?”
I shook my head, gasping, and she guided me to a bench. I dropped my head between my knees. “I’ll be okay. It’s fine.” The pain wasn’t mine, it was reverberating from Grace. She didn’t know yet how to completely control her side of our connection. Her…
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kantele & noodles May 20, 2013
A few months back I posted about how I’d purchased a Finnish kantele (direct from Finland). It was by way of avoiding getting back to playing my harps, and I entertained myself noodling away on the five strings of my kantele for months. At the moment I have both harps back in circulation, but I still reach for the little kantele. It’s ‘no brain’ music for me, and I play it when I want to re-focus from some task (usually editing).
Here is my little kantele. It is tuned to a pentatonic scale. That is like the black notes of a piano. The notes are whole tones and so every string fits nicely with every other. You can’t play two dissonant notes when you’re tuned pentatonically (providing you’re in tune!). I noodle away, and most of my tunes sound more or less the same. I make them up every time, but there are only 5 strings, and I seem to make the same patterns, so my kantele playing always sounds something like this (with apologies for the terrible recording quality from my iPhone’s voice memo app). Here are 30 seconds of the 2 minutes I uploaded (not sure what happened to the other 1:30 minutes!)
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I’m feeling all (more…)
harping romance April 15, 2013
The strings and the fingers
are smiling tentatively at each other,
recalling long ago acquaintance
but feeling shy with each other.
Once, fingers danced with strings
for hours, without a glance to
the books of lines and staffs that
were their matchmaker.
Then they were separated
and the comfortable rhythm
they once shared
slowly dissolved
into awkward tentativeness
on the rare occasions
when they came across one another.
Relationships take commitment,
after all.
Now they’ve been reintroduced.
The matchmaker pushes them together
and fingers hesitantly
caress the strings,
leave them vibrating,
longing for more.
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It’s been far too long, but I’m finally back playing the harp. So far I’m working on a great book, Rose in Winter, by harpist Sharon Thormahlen of Corvallis, Oregon. Her original pieces are so pretty and fall easily on the fingers. In this photo (circa 2002) is my Bresch Jubal harp (33 strings) behind and my double strung Brittany from Stoney End in front. (The Brittany is cherry, and has the most beautiful, shimmering grain and a tremendously loud voice for a wee harp!)
band class April 11, 2013
Band room:
contained in music
insulated from the world
wrapped in rhythm.
Sanctuary
while I waited
for my love.
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While I was editing Grace Awakening Myth today, I came across this observation in chapter 3 or 4, and I thought Ben’s words sounded like a poem. Now they are! (How appropriate, since Ben is Orpheus, demi-god of music and poetry!)
What was YOUR sanctuary in high school? For me, it was either the art room where I spent hours working on school yearbooks, or Mr. Gobolos’ math room, where a gang of us hung out, played goofy drama games, and discussed theology.
Shawn L. Bird 
Join the Interstellar celebration September 1, 2012
Tags: amin bhatia, analog, anniversary, bhatia music, composer, Interstellar suite, music, recording, synthesizer
You know those people who have a single, straight forward dream, and from the moment they climb out of their cribs, they head toward it with determination? I have often wished I was as single-minded as my friend, Amin.
I’ve mentioned Amin before on this blog. When I met him (back when he was an oh-so-mature thirteen and I was a star struck ten year old), he was already striving toward his goal to become a composer for television and film. To his natural talent he added perseverance, practice, and experimentation. His whacky humour and considerable charm helped him attract people willing and able to support his dream. When he was in his twenties, he won major awards and prizes which led to the record deal that blasted Interstellar Suite into the universe.
Interstellar Suite isn’t popular genre music. It was hard to classify. Usually, it is labelled New Age, because how do you classify a masterpiece of orchestrated analog synthesizers? They didn’t have a big section in the record stores for “Electronic movie soundtrack for a non-existent sci-fi movie,” which is the truest label it could have had. “Stinking brilliant” would be a good label, too, but the sound afficionados shouted that far and wide. Amin composes for all sorts of shows you’ve known and loved (like Flashpoint), so you’ve probably heard his music. He’s won many awards; go to BhatiaMusic.com to be impressed by the list! You should go there just to listen to snippets of his work, actually. There is a delightful breadth of styles represented in his music.
This year Amin is celebrating the 25th anniversary of the original release of Interstellar Suite, and you are invited to be part of the grand adventure to commemorate the occasion with a galactic celebratory launch into new frontiers! Check out the details on the Interstellar Suite page and help the project go super nova! You know you’ve always wanted to mingle with the stars!
Now, if you know Interstellar Suite, and you have something amazing to share about it, you were asked to tell the crew about it. If you haven’t seen the plea, the deadline was yesterday, but the video about it is pretty entertaining and there’s some great music on it. Who knows, maybe you can still sneak your memories in if you contact them quickly…
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Here’s an added treat because you made it all the way through this post. While I truly wish there were photos of the 13/10 meeting, for all the inevitable mortification likely attendant, this one will have to do. This is my high school graduation weekend. I am chilling with a (soon to be) famous musician, and as you can tell by my laughter, I am having fun:
(What’s happened to our hair?!)
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