Life’s Soundtrack’s – A Strong Run with B B King – An Afternoon with Trooper and Knopfler!

So I ran today for the third Monday in a row! Now if I can only get two more days in a week, maybe I can get back into some kind of shape. Today’s run was probably my best run since I started back running regularly last month. Like my last run, it’s nice to look down at the iPhone and see paces that are less than 10 minutes per mile. I think I also stayed below 11 minutes per mile going uphill on Pancoast!! On earlier runs, I struggled to stay under 12 minutes per mile going uphill!! Here are the splits according to the GPS: Read More

The Avett Brothers Come to Philly – and a “Shady Grove” Debate!

The Avett BrothersSo last night my wife and daughter went to see one of their favorite bands The Avett Brothers at the Mann Music Center in Philly. Like always, they said they were awesome and I’m sure they were, but like Mumford and Sons there is just some about the band that doesn’t thrill me. I know that my opinion is not held by many. To try to sway me, my wife said that there was a least one song that I would have liked. For the first song of a three song encore, the band performed a song from Doc Watson, “Shady Grove”. My first response was that everybody does “Shady Grove”. Her response was “So” and she’s right that the fact that lots of people have recorded the song really doesn’t change my opinion of the Avett’s cover! Read More

Life’s Soundtrack – An Afternoon of Football and Music from Jon Shain!

So today was good and bad, my son Andrew invited to come down to his house to watch the Eagles play. He has a much bigger and nice than mine and as a result of his wife’s efforts to cut their cable bill, he has the new Xfinity package with Red Zone, and yes Meaghan, that is a good thing!!Red Zone is perfect for Andrew who is a master of flipping channels!! Anyway that was the good! Thanks, Andrew and Meaghan. The bad was the Eagles lost the game!! But they are fun to watch, at least the offense!! The defense wouldn’t be bad if the could either cover the center of the field or get to the quarterback!! Read More

Evening Music – Victor Wooten leads to Rediscovering Brooks Williams!

Show of Hands 15So this afternoon I put Victor  Wooten‘s album A Show Of Hands 15 on the iPhone and listened to it on the way back from meeting with my All State Agent where I protected myself against mayhem and saved over $ 600 on my insurance with discounts I didn’t know I qualified for!! So I started listening to Victor in a pretty good mood! Now I must admit that I really didn’t think that a solo bass album could be that good, and I will say that I haven’t listened to the whole album yet, but now I believe that I have a new album and artist to listen to at work – overall what I heard was marvelous! Brooks WilliamsAs I was listening to Wooten, my mind wander to the music of another musician whose work is in my music library, but I haven’t written a lot, if anything, about and that’s Brooks Williams. There’s just something about the both Wooten and Williams that link them together in my mind. Both are masters of their respective instruments. Both can conjure up riffs and ,melodies that stay in your mind for a long time, Both also teach:. Read More

Lunchtime Music from Batdorf and Rodney – “One Day”…..

Off the ShelfSo sometime in 1971 or 72, I was walking through the  Graham Area lobby at the University of Florida and two guys were playing guitars and singing. I sat down and listened and was blown away by the songs. When they finished, I asked if the songs were theirs and they said, no they were covering Batdorf and Rodney. Within a matter of days, you know I was at the local record store looking for their album!! What I found was Off the Shelf and that album has been “off the shelf” and on my record player, in my CD player and now on my mp3 player for the last forty years. Read More

“Into the Night” with Fruition – Just One of Them Nights (and it is!)

Just one iof them nightsSo last night, when I went to Target to pick up a few things, I listened to the last release from a band that I’ve had on the iPhone for a little while now Fruition, Just One of Them Nights. Now when I came home from work tonight, as I was eating and getting ready to go to work at Target. I wrote a good amount about the band and the album, then the screen blinked and before I knew what was happening, I was back to the WordPress sign-in screen. That meant that everything that I had just written went away. I will try to recreate it tomorrow, but for now, let’s go “off to work” and “into the night” with the title track from this terrific Americana album!! Read More

Life’s Soundtrack – Running’s Easier with Blues from Lisa Mann’s Satisfied!!

So I ran last night, but I didn’t write a post about the run. I ended up spending the evening  transferring my iTunes library from the desktop to my laptop, because I use the laptop more than the desktop now, while I watched the Phils lose, By the time I was ready to write, I was too tired! I think the trick is to write the post as soon after the run as possible!! Read More

Morning Music from The Brothers Comatose on the road in Idaho!

Brothers ComatoseSo I was already to write about my four mile run yesterday, but you know it was pretty uneventful. I felt pretty good through the first 3 miles or so and then struggled through the last mile. It was pretty close to the time that I ran over the same course last week around that 10:40 per mile pace. Wait – did I just tell you about all about my run – well not everything I didn’t tell you about how the soundtrack of the run was Ricky Scaggs and Bruce Hornsby’s new album, Live, or that I wasn’t paying close attention to it because I was again trying to keep my heart rate under control! Read More