This November two things stand out to me: Veteran’s Day on November 11 and Election Day on November 6.  Veteran’s Day calls on us to support those citizens who volunteered to serve our country for a period of time regardless of the hardships and consequences that may occur.  Many of them are living examples of these hardships.  They have lost arms, legs, hands and sometimes their minds and future lives.  Many are too broken to live with those who had supported them and are now homeless.

Election Day is highlighted by citizens who have strong opinions about politicians and issues and use the power of their vote to make our country stable, lawful and constitutional.  This day is sacred to those who care about their country and want to keep it free. This is a day when changes can occur that determine whether we either stay the course or change direction.  Both of the above days depend upon each citizen supporting the basic ideals of the country in which they live, and this in a word is Patriotism.

Most of us believe that we support our country.  We live comfortably, we vote, we pay taxes, we raise our families and we live and die in, and for, our country.  But, do we love our country?  Really deep down love our country?  I don’t hear this expressed very often any more.  Has the love of our country gone out of style?  Has it lost its meaning?  Have we forgotten our roots, foundation, and the paths we traveled to get where we are now?  Do we believe in, or have doubts about, the greatness of our land and the reasons it is great?  Do we love our country anymore?

The political left considers this unnecessary and even at times “silly.”  The media of all sorts tend to lessen the whole idea and even obscure it by various smoke screens like dutifully covering it with symbols and short clips and flag waving segments.  But this is superficial.  What is it that is missing?  In a word: Passion!  A passion which signifies a true love of our country and its original ideals and our firm foundation.  Cosmetic patriotism is rampant except in the military and some segments of law enforcement and even segments of our government itself.  But even in these,  the deep down idea of being unafraid to express our true love of country is sometimes superficial.  It is missing in our schools, so our children become unaware of the importance of this deep love.  It is also, unfortunately, missing in our colleges, universities, businesses and places of work.

Do we have deep feelings anymore when we see our flag displayed, our National Anthem performed or our Pledge of Allegiance spoken?  Does anything really move us deeply anymore besides movies and songs as superficial expressions of nationalism and patriotism?  True love of our country must be self-motivated and come from deep down in our hearts and psyche.  It should be felt when we are touched by the true meanings of those who have fought and died for our rights and freedoms.  Respect must be present in our love of country, and a profound understanding of our responsibilities to the land that protects our thoughts and our ideals.  Without our full participation and respect and realization of our responsibilities, a deep and true love of our country is not possible.

How do we wake up?

A large part of our love of country is made possible by faith in our system of government;  judicial, legislative and executive branches.  I first became aware of the office of the president when Harry Truman was in office in the 40’s.  In my own elementary way I supported him.  He was a wartime president with unimaginable responsibilities.  I respected the office that he held.  Thereafter from Dwight Eisenhower through Bush 1, Clinton, Bush 2, Obama and now Donald Trump I have supported that office even when I did not agree with decisions and policies.  I realized early on that I did not have to like the person, but I did have to support the office.  I still feel that way.  And this goes for all of those who hold elected office.  This is why our vote is so important.  We are free to use this power to express our own opinions and ultimately our love and respect for our country.

The existence of our country depends upon our true love and respect and support.  We need to retrieve the right to freely express our love for our country.  We need to respect our flag, our National Anthem and our Pledge of Allegiance. And we need to be able to show our patriotism and nationalism without reprisal or derision.  It starts with each individual citizen.  We will know that this is happening when we are unashamed to express our love openly and unfettered. We should all welcome this idea and crave it deeply for it will ensure our continued existence in freedom.  Say this clearly:  sing it……shout it……….!

“God Bless America!”

I am an American.  I was born here. My parents were born here. My grandparents, however, were immigrants.  In those days everyone who came to this country went through a process that made them aware of our rules and regulations and our way of life.  It made them proud to be part of such a great and powerful nation which was bursting with opportunities.  My paternal grandfather worked in a steel mill and eventually died while working there.  My grandmother initially found housing for those immigrants who came through the steel mill.  She became interested in this process and gradually started to help others find housing when they came from other countries in Eastern Europe to work in the same mill.  She didn’t work for the mill or officially start her own business, but she was able to help many people find housing by buying small houses for them to rent until they could buy their own places.  These immigrants became proud of this country with its securities and its opportunities.  All of this was based on responsibilities and an innate incentive to work hard and raise a family of responsible citizens.  When you invest your time and your life by assimilating, you end up loving the process that gave you the opportunity to live and grow and raise a family and help others to do the same.

At what point in our lives did words like patriotism and nationalism and Americanism become epithets?  The whole idea of America and its freedoms implies work; requires work.  Each of us must search for, and find and grasp opportunities when they appear.  They don’t find you and surround you. You must do the work.  You must become responsible and teach your children to become responsible.  Then and only then can you reap the rewards of our freedom and then become proud of the processes we live by and truly appreciate the country that made them possible.  At that point, after the toil and sweat in whatever type of endeavor, you become increasingly proud of our country and its freedom and opportunities.  Love of country implies responsibility and hard work.  Remember that this country has given you the opportunity to find your own way by working responsibly for your own life and its rewards.

There is a growing segment of our society that no longer adheres to the above ideas.  This growing segment increasingly turns ideas and practices and responsibilities upside down.  These people would like for the government to do the work for them, and to provide the processes and the research and the rewards for them.  Ultimately thinking “Why should I work? The government can, and will take care of me.”  This is backwards and upside down and very wrong.  Why?  Because the people who think this way are no longer invested in the welfare and health of our country.  They are only interested and invested in themselves.  They are no longer proud of our country, and they would like for everyone to feel the same.  They no longer believe in majority rule, the idea that what most people think about the rules and processes of our country is right.  This upside down approach has never worked historically and they fail to realize this. The wrongness of the government as sole provider is obvious to intelligent and thoughtful people. But there is a barrage of propaganda against them.  This has infected our educational system, our news media, our politics and our way of life.

This has to stop!

The vast majority of hard-working, thinking people must awaken as a united populace and say collectively that we have had enough of this wrong thinking.  We are proud of our country and its freedoms.  We are proud to be Americans.  We each have the power of one vote.  We need to be willing to use it to preserve our responsible way of life.  We are the people!  God bless us and may God Bless America!

September 5 is St. Mother Teresa’s feast day.  I became interested in her story several years ago and when I read books and articles about her life, I decided to write a musical piece about her. She was a dedicated and powerful force in our world at that time.  She worked tirelessly for the poor and homeless and downtrodden.  And she organized her order of nuns and trained them in the same vocation that she was living.  The musical piece features a soloist and choir and instrumental accompaniment.  The choir serves to elicit the response of the soloist who is singing poignant words and phrases that she used during her life.  May her words have a ripple effect in your own life.

By Bill Svarda

REF:
I alone cannot change the world,
but I can cast a stone across the waters to create many ripples,
to create many ripples,
to create many ripples.

© 2018, International  Liturgy Publications

PO Box 50476, Nashville, TN 37205

www.ILPmusic.org, 888-898-SONG

All rights reserved. International copyright secured.

Some thoughts on the state of our arts:  When was the last time any of us used the terms awesome or beautiful or uplifting for contemporary works of art?  Music, painting, theater, sculpture, architecture, literature, etc.  When was the last time any of the above moved you in a spiritual manner?  Are we becoming immune to beauty?  Have we lost touch with our inner feelings?  Or has the art itself become trivialized or uncommunicative or irrelevant?  Are we losing our ability to feel deep-seated emotions?  It it the art? Or is it us?  Whatever the case, we are not connecting.

Have we reached a saturation point?  Is there so much music, visual arts, literature, etc, that we have become numb to anything specific in the arts or everything in general?  Is everything so accessible that it has lost its meaning?  Has everything become mediocre just by sheer quantity and weight?  Are we mass-producing art in every way that makes all of the above possible?  And what are the long-term effects of this?  Will our children and grandchildren forget how to appreciate something special because there is nothing special anymore?  And, how do we reverse this?

How do we take the numbers and the business commodity aspect out of our arts?  Any solution will take time to implement.  True art takes time.  The crafting of anything takes time, especially when it is one-of-a-kind.  One special painting rather than one thousand.  Something unique in any of the arts rather than everything in general.  But then, how does the artist of any kind exist?

Survival of the artist is paramount if there is to be art at all.  And survival means money and money means mass-producing, and then we have come full circle. Back to the present.  In the past there was a system of patronage.  The patron provided funding and the artist provided the art.  This seemed to work at times in the past.  Now, I’m not so sure.  Complacency can enter the scene:  just produce anything and get paid.  Not a good idea for the arts. Is the starving artist the solution?  Art of any kind does not exist in a vacuum.  It needs fresh air.  Does art reflect our times or does it cause trends?  Is it active or passive?

What will last indefinitely can’t be recognized in its own time.  Our own feelings are too adaptable and malleable.  Art is a hook, but we have trouble because of this when we try to make judgments or discriminate within a style. Ancient art is specific to its own times. It is special because of its craft and also its limited quantity.  It is special, unique and one-of-a-kind.  Some of today’s art will become special and unique and also limited.  Keep in mind that all artists have an expiration date.  Art does not.  The artist lives long enough to produce.  There are no parameters, only time.  Present likes and dislikes become irrelevant .  Future likes and dislikes will determine what is special and lasting.

For now we produce our art of whatever kind and hope for the best.  Truth and beauty will ultimately win over quantity and the expedient.  Auto-exoticism.  Only time will tell.  Time after time.

COMMON SENSE #2  (Boundaries)

Would anyone now leave their house unlocked when they leave, or even when they are at home? Does anyone leave their car unlocked? Their place of business?  Would anyone not try to prevent disease or virus or infection from entering their body?  Protection, security, safety, prevention:  we live with all of these daily.  Life is unthinkable without them.  Our cities, towns, organizations, societies and our country have laws for the above.  We live with them daily and abide by them and in all of them there are penalties for infractions.  This insures that all citizens may be safe and secure and live without constant daily fear.  Our military, our police, our doctors, lawyers and judges are all supposed to enforce and interpret the laws that our representatives have drawn up.  Our government itself with its executive, legislative and judicial branches as checks and balances is supposed to maintain our systems of safety and security so that we don’t live in fear from month to month and year to year.

When all of this is working properly, then all of the above is possible.  We trust in our system of government which is based on the very simple premises of common sense and logic.  Common sense should permeate our society.  It makes the normal interactions of normal people possible, actions such as driving a car, waiting in lines patiently, crossing a street, helping someone in need.  All of these mean that our existence is assured. Problems are caused when common sense is blurred or when there is a mental breakdown either individually or collectively.  If your plumbing or electricity breaks down you either fix it or have someone else fix it.  The same with your car, and any of your body parts or functions.  This thinking is logical and depends upon common sense.  But what happens when common sense gets blurred and our mental capacity gets impaired either individually or collectively?  When this happens we have breakdowns in our daily living, our bodies, our conveniences and our systems of government.  The question becomes “how do we fix it?”

It only takes one person with common sense and the will to use it to fix things.  Sometimes there is such a person and sometimes there is not.  When there is, the mentally impaired will not immediately recognize the need and value and the necessity of the “fixer.”  How do we distinguish between a true leader who is altruistic (and knowledgeable and competent), and an anarchist or fascist or socialist who wants only personal control and absolute power over everything and everyone?  There is only one way: the use of common sense, logic and dependable information gleaned by dependable education.

When all are blinded by the expedient, common sense needs to prevail.  It may begin with one person, but it needs to spread through the whole populace.  The value of common sense in our leaders and citizens and in ourselves must be recognized in order for us to live our lives without fear.  Common sense means: locking your house, your car and your business, supporting our military and our police, using our medical facilities and being financially responsible.  Our credit cards depend on this.  We are indentified by them and by our license to drive.  These guarantee that we are responsible.  When we write a check we are connected to a bank and we are indentified.  Our society is permeated with our connections and our identifications which validate us as being responsible.  When we vote for our leaders we are identified.  All of this is based on common sense, and common sense like freedom, takes work.  Our minds and our freedoms aren’t free. We must be constantly vigilant against those whose idea of common sense is mentally blurred and would little by little erode the structure of our society and its laws which give us freedom.

The structure of our music mirrors the structure of our society or the eroding of it.  The aimless lack of structure in our music is a warning to be vigilant and active.  Heed it!  Listen actively!  Be discriminating with your listening and viewing.  Think: “Common sense…!

I am beginning to wonder if anything is funny anymore. What used to be funny isn’t anymore, or it is just not allowed.  This is really a lousy time in our history to be a comedian.  Nothing is funny when everything is censored by PC codes which are put forth and monitored by…whom…?  Nothing is funny when everyone has a thin skin.  Nobody can take a joke anymore.  Not only is everything nauseatingly serious, but everything is also recorded and filmed. Why?  So the situation or material can be used in a lawsuit where the deck is stacked toward PC standards…formulated by whom…?  The slightest misstep is instantly available globally to an unforgiving media which is duplicitous at best and biased at the least.

This would all be funny, even hysterical if we were looking at it from afar in distance or in time.  But not when everything is deathly serious; when every word you use, every joke you tell, whether story or anecdote, demeaning or uplifting could have contained in it a time bomb or a flash bang. At this point it can be difficult to convey humorous content.  Could any of the older, great comedians work now under these conditions?  Benny, Burns, Berle, Barbutti; Caesar, Cosby, Corey, Carlin; Dangerfield, Diller, Foxx, Pryor, Rickles, etc…?  If they were tied up and artistically strangled as in our day, could they even perform, let alone figure out how to be funny, or even determine what exactly is funny. Can you really be “on” night after night when you feel as if you are walking through a minefield?  Thinking: Watch where you step!  Will this one blow up?  Is this the end of my career?

And think for a moment about satire.  Comedy used to be free to criticize, put down, draw similes to, make fun of, and point out the deficiencies and foibles of anyone famous or just anyone:  politicians, actors, musicians, everyday workers and the average and below average personality without fear of instant retribution.  This backlash is the reason books like “Gulliver’s Travels” and “Lord of the Flies,” etc., were written.  They wore a thin disguise to save face (or life and limb) to get their point across.  There was a time when nothing was so sacred that it couldn’t draw a laugh.  I can’t put my finger on it, but I’m sure that it happened.  More recently time wise we had “icebreakers” like Lenny Bruce, Eddie Murphy, and Richard Pryor that paved the way for “all out,” “no holds barred” comedy. The ice got broken, but it again froze over and the door slammed shut again.

Now we have new personalities like Amy Schumer, Sarah Silverman and Roseanne Barr that again push the envelope.  They also are quickly shunned or dropped if they cross the line.  But…where is the line?  No one knows unless someone pushes the envelope again or breaks the ice again until PC’s unknown entity says through the complicit media that “you crossed the line.”  So besides getting shut down, the line comes closer and then its cohort, the net, gets even tighter so that the only thing that is left is…SAFE!  And now what is safe?  Mr. Rogers was safe.  Pinky Lee was safe.  Pee Wee Herman was safe (and then he wasn’t safe anymore).

So what are we left with?  Potty humor and toilet jokes, and all of the safe items in the PC agenda.  Is multiculturalism funny?  Is the transference of the sexes (either way) funny?  Is anything at all in the news funny?  Were you content with the Teletubbies or Barney?  Is the last action of satire and comedy “South Park?”  Is this show just hanging on until the hammer falls?  I’m waiting…waiting…!  We are in the midst of a battle for free speech and thought again.  In other words freedom from a life-sucking censorship.

And what is the answer?  Is there a solution?  Usually my answer has something to do with music.  This time I am not so sure.  The glut of music which we experience daily everywhere and in every conceivable style has been dumbed down to be used as wallpaper or background just to sell products that for the most part we don’t need.  But the music is supposed to put us in a malleable mood so that we might just consider the product.  Any product.  And this music has been sanitized to appeal to the absolute lowest mentality.  Thankfully in our daily lives there are a few exceptions.

A large percentage of film music is honest, because it is married to a story or a situation.  There are small pockets of music in almost every style that show craft and artistry in the composing and production.  They are not easy to find; you have to dig for them, but the effort is well worth it.  Even so, will this help the present situation?  In my opinion yes, because music can be a sort of “bellwether” or even a kind of thermometer or barometer held to our society to measure somewhat our truthfulness and our honesty.  And, if there is to be a solution, this could very well be it.  For if music is overcome by the same evil forces that plague comedy, then we are done as a free society.  But if it holds its stance, then comedy again will have a chance to be truthful and honest. And if that happens then all of our intellects will be able to survive the impending dark age.  We will again have something to genuinely laugh about.  Just remember again that freedom isn’t free.  We all have to constantly work for it.  While laughing and listening to music…!

I have been doing a lot of thinking about the present direction of our society.  Not just in this country but throughout our entire world.  Our priorities have changed drastically.  The ways in which we satisfy our needs and interact with others also have changed drastically.  Our day to day living is blurred.  Our balance is off.  Some examples:  right/wrong, mine/yours, old/young, rich/poor, light/dark, etc.  The way we now view these or choose to ignore them is significantly different from a decade or two ago.  The preceding examples used to be distinguishable, now they are blurred.  We have lost touch with our societal roots.  Our balance is teetering daily due to over communication and over-exposure to the news of the world which is spooned out to us by a self-censored media. All of this affects our balance, our mind-set and even our integrity.

With all of our voluminous daily flood of input from texting and social sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, we now have a loneliness epidemic.  A What!!?  A loneness epidemic.  Why?  We are bloated with information.  We are over-exposed to almost everything from our phones, TV, and the endless commercials that constantly break up our train of thought into small segments and make continuity a fading memory of the past.  So, not only are we lonely, but we are segmented.  There are so many distractions in our lives that we are forgetting how to interact with living humans.  There are those who talk to their pets more because they don’t talk back.  They just acknowledge your presence and moods without judgment.

What happened to free, unfettered thinking?  Is it possible or just blurred by our present culture?  Is innovative thinking becoming less frequent and discouraged by our present circumstances.  Are our cultural norms, habits, rules and guidelines now a help or a hindrance to our thought processes?  Maybe we can answer some of these questions and maybe not.  Maybe we are just too close to them, immersed in such a way that our lack of balance makes creative thought anywhere from just difficult to impossible.

Along with all of the above thoughts about balance and blurred thinking are the basic ideals we have so enjoyed in the past which have also faded.   We have either lost or are rapidly losing our respect, honor and civility to each other.  Is this due to the loneliness epidemic or just advances in technology in general?  We are not as nice as a society anymore.  Instead there is a spirit of meanness.  This is harmful and in some cases even shameful.  All too common are hurtful actions such as: men to women, women to men, insensitivity to authority which we as a nation have set up, and ignoring the aged and the downtrodden.  None of this is helping us to advance as a civilization.  We shout and pray for peace, but ignore it at every level of our society.  Our loneliness and removal from social interaction allows us to objectify which also allows us to be mean and hurtful with impunity.

How do we heal and repair our blurred outlook and our precarious lack of balance?  In a word – music.  Real music, not the mass of mediocrity dictated by a business that only cares about numbers and sales and image and merchandise.  This type of music can’t heal any of our ills.  It only exacerbates them.  It is intended to keep us off balance and blur our thinking and promote antagonism to authority.  It is a good part of the problems we are now facing.

Music that can heal and repair contains form and balance and continuity.  It makes possible coherent thought by its inherent creativity.  I wonder if this kind of valuable music ended in the early 20th century.  There has been very little innovation in music since then that stimulates thinking instead of trying to control your thinking.  And it is not style or acoustic or digital or vocal or instrumental that makes the difference.  It is substance.  So how do any of us recognize what is substance and what is not?  It takes education in music which is now missing from all levels of our school systems.  Exposure to music which is based on creativity and innovation is vital.  We need to find it and learn from it.  It is in concerts by symphonies and chamber orchestras and ensembles of all kinds that we can awaken to true art and innovation and creativity. And it is then available on iTunes or YouTube or Amazon, etc, to purchase or download or stream.  If enough people start this process then maybe, just maybe we can reboot and re-adjust our society and regain our balance and re-calibrate our moral compass as a society and a civilization.  Maybe…

All religions have teachings that say, in essence, “Love thy neighbor.” All of us have lived with this phrase practically from birth. It is part of our thinking, but usually buried quite deeply in our psyche.  We acknowledge its importance, but don’t necessarily follow its meaning.  Why is this so common? The answer is that it is so very difficult to abide consistently by such a simple idea as “Love thy neighbor.”

Sunday is fairly easy because of the worship services that we attend or at least realize that someone is attending somewhere.  And we at least make an attempt to be pleasant to anyone even in the parking lot, though this can be very difficult at times.  Patience seems to be directly proportional to “love” in a parking lot, i.e. as patience thins and wanes, so does our love of neighbor.  Even with this exception, Sunday is still a relatively happy day to get along with those that we meet. But what about the other six days of the week?

It is much more difficult to love your neighbor through the week with all of its stresses and variables when we come in contact with people in general, all of whom seem to be mentally disturbed and off balance. Driving a car on any street or freeway will bear this out.  Dealing with people on the phone or in stores or a workplace or an office, especially a government office will begin to try the patience of even the most sedate personality after only a few minutes.  Watching any news program on TV or listening to news on a radio can cause us to take sides on any issue immediately and develop animosity toward the opposite side.  Sometimes it is almost easier to switch sides and despise our own side just for some momentary relief.

So what can help us to reset our moral compass, reboot our minds and restore balance to our spiritual side so that it is possible to love our neighbor?  There are those that will try anything that they can smoke, drink, or swallow, but the relief is only temporary and sometimes the after effect is worse than the cure.  There are those who try Zen or Yoga or exercising to the extreme, but even with these the mind still returns to our original premise that people are the cause of any problem, so “why should I love them or even like them?”

There is only one solution that goes deep enough into our minds and has an effect that is lasting enough to provide relief, balance, and an outlook towards our neighbor that includes love… music!  We have music in our cars, music in our homes and workplaces and music in our headphones and earbuds when we walk or exercise.  We have music when we shop in stores or eat in restaurants or fast food marts and even “live” music in church.  This ubiquitous use of music tends to keep us sane.

Music gives us the impression that other people are also sane and not just annoying.  It makes it possible for us to truly “Love our neighbor.” So we need to regularly equalize our feelings and psyche by partaking of the soothing vibrations that can heal.  And be sure to make them good, good, good, “Good Vibrations.”

When I think back over past decades, the memories that stand out are the ones that are very special, but in very different ways.  After graduating from college, I played trombone in night clubs over a period of time that was mostly routine. But there are a few instances that I remember that became magical.  There is something that happens that lifts the musical experience to another level, another dimension.  These moments don’t happen very often, so when they do, it is best to enjoy them to the fullest because it may be a while before another one happens.

Most of my playing days were in the sixties.  I was young, callow and malleable.  Everything was new.  Even the old acts like Nelson Eddy, famous for his operatic style and parts in movies where he played the singing Canadian Mountie.  His voice was still great, but his sight was terrible, and he would not go on stage with his thick glasses.  So he always had his singing partner, Gail Sherwood, a soprano, point him to the microphone, tell him about how far to walk, and then give him a gentle shove during the play-on music.  After that the magic began.

Vaughan Monroe was distinctive because of his voice and his personality.  My music stand onstage was on the end and near a dinner table. One night in the middle of the week someone at that table reached up and took the top chart from my stand, “Racing With the Moon” which was his theme song.  He became very upset with me because it was difficult to replace a handwritten copy in those days, before computer generated parts.  Now you can just email another part and print it out.  Since I had the part memorized by then he calmed down. Both memorable and historical.

While playing a concert with James Brown, the “Godfather of Soul,” I turned to another trombone player and remarked how fantastic this music was. He looked at me and said, “I hate this crap.” I was shocked and confused because he was African American, but I wisely said nothing further.  James went way beyond magical into another dimension.  After each concert the conductor would say, “Grab your music and your horn and get out quickly, the fans will be rushing the stage.” And they did…

The first time I played the Kim Sisters, three Korean girls, I knew that they would be very special.  The stage was covered with instruments that they all played in their act. Brass and stringed instruments, guitars, kotos, and many more, besides their vocals.  It was the first time I heard  the song “Try To Remember,” and I have loved it ever since.  Every show they did was enchanting.  I couldn’t wait for the next one, and was very sorry to see them leave at the end of the week.

Other memorable gigs were:  A four hour job at the Dayton Country Club playing lead trombone with the Woody Herman Band.  The other player had left the band suddenly, so I got a call to fill in.  Absolutely magical.  Also at the Dayton Country Club I was playing with the Warren Covington (trombone player) Band.  The guests had been golfing all day and were ready for drinks and fun.  The highlight of the evening was  singing by Jimmy Durante and Ray Bolger.  After singing some standards, they started ad libbing.  Songs and schtick from their old vaudeville acts.  Both just messing around and having fun with themselves and the audience.  And the band following along seamlessly, not knowing what would be coming next.  Truly magical & historical & mind-blowing, all at the same time.

Riverfront stadium in Cincinnati, playing Gladys Knight and the Pips was another memorable evening.  Part of the memory is of the echo in the stadium, especially of the drums.  It took heavy concentration to consistently distinguish the original beats from the echoes.  And, lastly, playing Sonny and Cher in Cincinnati Gardens with David Paich conducting.  It was one of the concerts with Cher wearing the large Indian feather bonnet, (and not much else).  I had to be very careful because trombone players are very easily distracted by the unusual.  And these are just a few of the many acts that I played.

It is worth repeating that you must first realize that these are truly magical moments when they are happening, and then enjoy them to the fullest because they are so very rare.  So, until the next one happens to any of us, take the time to listen to the great Burt Bacharach/Hal David song “Magic Moments” for inspiration.  Then maybe some magic memories will “bubble up” into your consciousness and you will be able to savor those moments. Make it happen…!

February is the month of Mardi Gras, Fat Tuesday, the last hurrah before Ash Wednesday and then Lent.  It is a time to dress up in the wild and bizarre. It is a time of parades with bizarre floats. A time to eat without restraint and drink with abandon.  All of this is packaging of sorts. Wrapping the mundane with the fantastic.  Dress up or dress down, but the result must be unusual.

We all do the same thing in our daily lives.  We cover our real selves, and we experience this constantly in everything our brain acknowledges.  All of the commercials that we see on television are gift wrapping a product, making it desirable to have because of the packaging and the presentation.  Cars, trucks, vans and RV’s are sold because of their looks and “bells and whistles,” not because of the inside, the motor.  Our persons are masked in many ways.  Make-up can change your whole look and sometimes a part of your personality.  Clothes determine where you will fit in, who you will fit with and how you will feel in relationships. Hair styles help us to be accepted by a specific group and even our speech patterns can hide our real thoughts by being superficial.

Sales of anything depends on packaging and the salesperson is necessarily a master of deception.  Their personalities morph to fit the customer, they relate to anything that will connect with you and help to make you pliable and amenable to the pitch.  Real estate sales depend on the outward and inward look of the house.  But what about about the plumbing and the electricity?

Actors depend on their packaging to become a character.  They assimilate all of the above to promote belief in their character and the situation in which they find themselves.  They are very charismatic.  And charisma is another form of packaging which is all too prevalent.  It is the ultimate personality packaging.  It hides the person’s real intentions.  Serial killers depend on this to mask their real intentions as do people who just want something from you now or later.  Beware the party personality.  All of the billboards and electronic ads we see are there to implant feelings and needs.  We are inundated with this all of our waking hours.

So how do we sort out what is real beneath the packaging?  How do we guard against the unreal or even dangerous?  How do we even stay sane?

Our instincts our usually reliable if we are aware and listen to them.  They can help us to guard against what is beneath the packaging.  These have been fed all of our lives with basic rules to live by and basic ways to survive and exist in a world of seductions.  Our instincts are triggered by those imbedded guidelines to living and surviving.  They usually “kick in” when something seems to be not quite right, but we don’t know exactly why.  Ignoring our instincts during this split second of “heads up” can be embarrassing or inconvenient or even dangerous.  Listening to this little voice can give you that instant in time that saves you from whatever consequence that might be waiting.  We must be constantly aware.  Not paranoid, but aware.

And there are very few things more seductive than music.  It permeates our consciousness, sometimes to the point of annoyance by its insistent presence.  It is the stuff of sales, and it can be overt or subliminal.  It can be soothing or abrasive or cerebral or superficial. Even its very vibrations can be seductive especially when combined with anything that dulls our consciousness.  It is a packaging for many and varied motives.  Another reason to be aware and beware.  Listen to all kinds of music, but keep in touch with your instincts.  They are sometimes the only thing that can save you and keep you sane.  “Make your own kind of music!”