Gig Music Selections

I just drafted up my playlist for the "rock music" wedding this upcoming long weekend. The book I am using for most of the ceremony is a lot better than I thought it would be. Pretty decent arrangements.Here are some of my favourite books that I like to use at gigs throughout the year:

look inside

Classic Rock - Creative Piano Solo By Various. Piano Solo Songbook. Classic Rock, Rock. Softcover. 96 pages. Published by Hal Leonard (HL.138517).

look inside

Lounge Music Composed by Various. Piano/Vocal/Guitar Songbook. Vocal Standards and Standards. Songbook (softcover). With vocal melody, piano accompaniment, lyrics, chord names and guitar chord diagrams. 208 pages. Published by Hal Leonard (HL.310193).

look inside

The Best Fake Book Ever - C Edition - 4th Edition C Edition. Composed by Various. Hal Leonard Fake Books. Country, Fake Books, Jazz, Pop, Standards. Fake book. With vocal melody, lyrics and chord names. 856 pages. Published by Hal Leonard (HL.290239).

I recently purchased a jazz fake book but the title escapes me. I'll add that onto the list at a later date, once I've had a chance to try it out.

(c) 2006 by Musespeak(tm), Calgary, AB, Canada. All rights reserved.

Dancing to a Different Beat

Well, I'm nearly done my one week temping assignment. I will start the next one (same place, different department) tomorrow afternoon.

I have a love/hate relationship with temping. I miss my schedule of waking up later and staying up later. I miss Maestro "assisting" me with paperwork and forcing me to take a break. However, temping reminds me of my early career days, from the challenge of seeing how quickly you can "catch the beat" of a business to doing little things that I find basic, like scheduling meetings while using unfamiliar software, which people find impressive. I only had a two-hour training session but my early admin assistant experiences made it easy to slip back into "let's see if I can stay one step ahead of the boss" mode.

I used to come home from work, eat and practice. I've gone back to that routine. I feel...younger (must be the decreased responsibilities). Even though I'm working, I'm on a near-vacation from my business. I have just three more lesson days left for the month before I can call it a vacation. Believe me, I'm looking forward to it.

(c) 2006 by Musespeak(tm), Calgary, AB, Canada. All rights reserved.

Four Weddings, Two Filing Cabinets and One QuickBooks

July is nearly halfway over already? Where has this month gone? The office temp work isn't going so well. So far, I've only had one one-day assignment. I did register with a second temping agency (Mark Staffing), which sounded extremely promising and cast my resume off to a few community businesses. Someone has got to bite.

Oh I typed that in too soon. I just got a couple of phone calls - one from another temping agency that wants to see me and another from temp agency number one with a one week assignment next week. Things are starting to pick up.

In the meantime, Maestro and I have been keeping busy. We're having a lot of fun with our summer students, who are enjoying improvising, exploring popular and world music, and composing. I have completely caught up on the bookkeeping, including the adjusting entries for depreciation. Perhaps the biggest project that I finished was the filing cabinet merge/purge/clean-up.

I've got four wedding gigs slated for the summer so far, with two on the same day. Last night's rehearsal went all right. Unfortunately, the church doesn't have a piano, so the couple had to rent me a digital piano. Thankfully, I've got over a week to play with the sound settings.

This one is a unique gig because the bride is a friend and former co-worker. In the span of two hours, I wore four hats last night - hired musician, friend, kitchen helper and anime otaku. I'm looking forward to the wedding, which will be in English and Spanish. Of course, that's not the only reason why I'm looking forward to it. I'm always glad to see a friend marry a good guy.

Well, it's back to the grind. I promised Maestro an adventure as soon as I complete this afternoon's tasks.

(c) 2006 by Musespeak(tm), Calgary, AB, Canada. All rights reserved.

Popular Wedding Music Selections

What a busy day! I was up around 8 this morning (unheard of for a musician) and doing yardwork. I have a love/hate relationship with my yard. I love nature, but I'm allergic to most grass and weeds. As the sun touched the flowers surrounding me, I could almost hear "Morning" from Edvard Grieg's Peer Gynt Suite, swelling into a brilliant crescendo as the sunlight burst through the clouds. I needed to take a break from housecleaning and decided to do a quick blog entry. Since I'm meeting a couple this evening regarding their wedding music, I decided to muse on popular wedding songs. Common processionals include: Canon in D and Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring. Common recessionals include: Halellujah Chorus, Trumpet Voluntary and Ode to Joy.

I wind up playing Canon in D and Trumpet Voluntary at many weddings. As for the most unusual? It's a tie between Forever in Blue Jeans and Born to be Wild for a recessional. You can find out more about popular wedding songs at these sites:

• Wedding Ceremony Music & Song Lists

• Wedding Music - Piano Solo

Here are two of my favourite wedding music books to use:

look inside

The Classical Wedding Piano Solo. Composed by Various. Piano. Classical, Wedding. 160 pages. Published by Hal Leonard (HL.220029).

look inside

Wedding & Love Fake Book - 6th Edition Over 500 Songs For All C Instruments. By Various. Fake Book. Love, Wedding. Softcover. 456 pages. Published by Hal Leonard (HL.239950).

Seeing as it's summer (aka off-season for teaching), I'll cut down on my posts to one a week. Time to go enjoy some sun (er...houseclean, I mean houseclean). Really.

(c) 2006 by Musespeak(tm), Calgary, AB, Canada. All rights reserved.

Music Fun & Games for the Summer

Just two more sleeps before the end of the school year. I, like my students, can't wait. However, I do have seven summer students for July, which works out to eight more teaching evenings. With the exception of one student who is preparing for a theory exam, the rest get to enjoy a more leisurely musical exploration next month. I promised them that we will do plenty of pop songs, improvising and composing (with some finger warm-ups thrown in).

All students will have summer assignments, which consist of playing pop, movie, country, praise & worship and jazz songs, composing and improvising to their hearts content. I paid dearly for not touching the piano in the summer when I was their age. I gradually caught on that this was not a good thing (starting from scratch each year is a painful experience for everyone involved). Now, I stress the importance of keeping their skills up, but also encourage them to have as much fun as they want at their instrument. And yes, we teachers expect the students to have a more relaxed practice routine. Relaxed, but still consistent.

The exam students do have to start on their technical requirements and exam repertoire. If they work hard at it over the summer, then they don't have to work as hard during the school year.

Here are two music games for the students to goof off with over the summer:

• Music Online Games

• Funbrain.com

Enjoy!

(c) 2006 by Musespeak(tm), Calgary, AB, Canada. All rights reserved.