Sometimes I have ideas which I\u2019m not sure whether or not to post here. It\u2019s true that this space is really mostly for me, but I like for the things I post to at least be interesting to other people (other people being the small circle of friends who I know read the site). I had one of those moments this week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My relationship with music is kind of an odd thing. On the one hand, I have this oddly personal and emotional connection to the music I like. I get the feeling it\u2019s a bit atypical (and probably a bit comical at times *grin*). On the other hand, I have friends who have much more training and talent in music who probably understand that connection but are puzzled at my tastes. I\u2019m not as drawn to the purely original as most musicians are. So, you, my readers, end up getting really odd posts about Debbie Gibson<\/a> videos and concert band music<\/a>. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n Anyway, I sent an email to one of those very musically talented friends the other night. I figured she would understand, but I thought it a bit odd for posting. She thinks that I need to share it with all of you, though, so I\u2019m going to trust her. \ud83d\ude42 The text of that email follows\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m sitting here listening to some music, and wanted to write you, because I think you\u2019ll understand what I\u2019m thinking right now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You know how some people are pushovers for cheesy romantic movies? They go in knowing that the filmmaker is going to shamelessly manipulate their emotions, and it still works. Same thing with some people and romance novels. Then there\u2019s the old clich\u00e9 about people who \u201calways cry at weddings\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Well, I\u2019m a pushover for a Swearingen song. \ud83d\ude42 I figure back in high school band you must have played at least one piece by James Swearingen<\/a>. I played a couple at least. Best I can tell, he\u2019s the hit-maker of concert band music. If Diane Warren<\/a> wrote concert band music, this is the stuff she\u2019d write. \ud83d\ude42 None of it is complex, and once you\u2019ve heard one song, you can pretty much predict the pattern of most of his others. It\u2019s kinda like reading Heinlein<\/a>\u2019s later books. You know pretty much which kinds of characters are going to show up and what their attitudes are going to be. It\u2019s band cheese music. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n\n\n\n Anyway, I have a CD of the Washington Wind Symphony<\/a> playing some of Swearingen\u2019s pieces, and there\u2019s one in particular that just gets to me. It\u2019s called \u201cCenturia<\/a>.\u201d One of Swearingen\u2019s common things is to start out fast, slow down into a very sweet middle section, then pick back up with the original fast theme at the end (\u201dmovements\u201d, in a sense). The slow part in \u201cCenturia\u201d just messes<\/em> with my emotions. I know<\/em> Swearingen is manipulating me, and I don\u2019t care. \ud83d\ude42 He builds this big brass crescendo into a complex chord (I need to learn chord names so I can name it) that begs to be resolved and holds it in a fermata. Then the bottom drops out and a single plaintive little solo flute picks up the melody for a few notes before the band finishes it out. *sniffle*<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s polished pop music at its best, and I\u2019m a sucker for it. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hi. My name\u2019s Jeff, and I\u2019m a pop band musiholic. *grin*<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sometimes I have ideas which I\u2019m not sure whether or not to post here. It\u2019s true that this space is really mostly for me, but I like for the things I post to at least be interesting to other people (other people being the small circle of friends who I know read the site). I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[5],"class_list":["post-420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=420"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1813,"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420\/revisions\/1813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/slidingconstant.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n