I’ve always suspected it would be a song that transforms this often barbaric and brutal world into a kinder one where humankind can’t help but be decent to one another. I just never realized it had been recorded more than 45 years ago.
Last Sunday I brought a copy of Jimmy Smith’s The Sermon to Roanoke Vineyards, where I was scheduled to work for the day. I’d been bringing a few discs from my jazz collection to the winery, all with the hope of keeping the North Fork swinging at all …

Here’s my latest piano improvisation, a short piece that I think I channeled my inner Erik Satie to create.
Again, I’ve used a simple motive, in this case the movement between two chords, and have tried to create a piece that has steady degree on movement without relying on harmonic changes and instead leaning on a repetitive rhythm and dynamic changes to create the mood.
It reminds me of a see-saw, or a sunflower swinging back and forth on a growing and fading summer wind.
I’m happy with the outcome, it’s peaceful.
Enjoy.
Piano Meditation …

At last I’ve gotten around to a writing exercise I’ve been planning on trying for a while, something I’ll call “music writing” since I really can’t come up with a slug that explains it any better.
(UPDATE: My Twitter friend @badbadbad suggested “Writing to music,” which of course is the right thing to call these. Thanks, my friend.)
The idea is to listen to an album, a song, an orchestral work, a piano piece, a concert or any other type of musical composition and write as I’m listening to it, trying not …

The past few weeks I’ve shared some music, some photos and some best wishes. So it’s time to get back to writing.
For this next short piece in my growing collection of pieces inspired by Harvard sentences, I decided to alter the mind with a little jazz. I was more experimental with the prose here, almost musical, to better create the atmosphere. And, for the most part, it’s one long sentence.
Enough said. Enjoy.
A pot of tea helps to pass the evening
Charlie Parker never had a gig like this.
I imagined he did, …

Who said program music is rightfully dead? In fact, I love it when music evokes a scene, mirroring some living phenomenon. It already mirrors, amplifies and often juxtaposes our emotional and spiritual experiences.
In the case of my next piano meditation, the idea was simple: a storm.
In order to create the effect I played a series of arpeggios, often faster than my fingers could move, causing a few muffed notes and blurred passages that I felt the captured unevenness of a whirling rainstorm. At one point, I break the rhythm altogether, …