Legacy

Gonzaga coach Mark Few was recently asked if his team's trip to the Final Four cements his legacy, and "gets the monkey off his back".  I love his response, in an article at espn

"I'm schlepping along right now, like, vastly far behind my father, who is 54 years a Presbyterian minister, man," Few said. "He's saved thousands of souls. He's helped hundreds and thousands of people through all their tough times, you know? And that's kind of the legacy that I'm looking at. I've got a long ways to go to get to first base living up to that guy's standard. He's a titan of a man, talking about the impact he's had on people.

A scarcity of time

Heard something on NPR about scarcity and impulse control.

 MULLAINATHAN: The same person, when they're poor, should have very different cognitive capacity than when they're rich. So how would we test that? Well, unfortunately, we don't have the kind of money to go around making poor people rich, but sugarcane farmers actually create a natural experiment for us.

VEDANTAM: That's right - sugarcane farmers in India. These farmers, it turns out, are paid only once a year, right after the harvest.

MULLAINATHAN: The month after they get that income, they're pretty rich. But like anybody who gets a huge windfall all at once, the money gets spent a little too fast. And so by the end of the harvest cycle, they're relatively poor. So now we have the same person a month before harvest poor and a month after harvest well-off.

VEDANTAM: Sendhil and Eldar tested the farmers on their long-term thinking when they had no money and when they had plenty of money. The results were stunning.

MULLAINATHAN: We found a huge difference. So we found that post-harvest, when they're well-off, they have much more impulse control.

More at npr

I find I have this problem, but I don't have a scarcity of money necessarily.  I have a scarcity of time.

George Winston Reflection - Time Signature Change

Couple of things. I love the recording. Also the change in meter in the middle of the song.  It switches time signature from 4/4 to 3/4 in the middle, with a tempo change

From 0:38 to 0:57


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLTZ_HY80ow

George Winston and James Booker

I wore out my George Winston plays Vince Guaraldi CD in high school, and I always liked the rhythm pattern in "Peppermint Patti". 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjflBbGqFts

I was listening to James Booker's "Junco Partner" today, and found some of the same rhythms and bass patterns.  (They start about a minute into the piece)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BER0QpV7O8

James Booker Jazz Piano

I switched to the Stephen Flaherty channel on Pandora today.  He co-wrote "Once Upon a December" with David Newman, so it seemed appropriate.  David Newman's channel was mostly film scores, 20th century piano, and classical Russian pieces by Tchaikovsky and Shostakovitch.

Stephen Flaherty's Pandora channel is '70s era New Orleans Blues piano and George Winston, which has been a hoot.  My favorite has been James Booker.  Here's his recording of St. James Infirmary, a classic blues tune.  I love the chromatic stuff he adds into the melody line.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3IL8q8ahWI

On the subject of James Booker, here's his Blues Minuet.  I love this.  Last week, I posted some classical pieces by Kasputin that had Jazz influence.  This is a blues piece with classical influence.  It's got some fun counterpoint going on.  I don't hear that much in jazz, and I really enjoy it. The Blues minuet is the first three or four minutes of this piece. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jI5G2T9r_c

Russian Waltzes from Khatchaturian and Shostakovich

 Heard these two Russian waltzes today.  They're pretty similar in style, strong timpani, minor key, and tempo.  The Shostakovitch starts out with saxophones, which is pretty interesting.  Also, the crowd sings along in this recording, which is pretty fun.

Khatchaturian Masquerada Waltz
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7JxLgf3wLM

Shostakovich Suite for Jazz Orchestra, No 2, Waltz
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vauo4o-ExoY

Kasputin preludes in a jazz style

Ran across Nikolai Kapustin music on Pandora today.  He's a classical composer who composes a weird mix of 20th century and jazz. 

Kasputin preludes in a jazz style op. 53 no 17 sounds like 30's era stride piano.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14SWYVY09so


Toccatina Op. 36 sounds like someone merged George Winston with Hammie from "Over the Hedge"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b--1FHTgAQs

Concert Etude Op. 40 starts out sounding 20th century and keeps getting more jazz like.  Pretty fun!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=116QHk9jNGI