If music could follow me around....

If you've seen the movie "Sleepless in Seattle," you know the entire show kind of revolves around another old movie - a Cary Grant movie too, but he's another blog entry for another time.

Now, I haven't seen "Sleepless" in a long time and I don't remember anyones names in the movie, so you'll have to excuse my vague descriptions. The two girls in the movie are sitting together watching the Cary Grant movie and the one girl is talking to the other girl "You don't want to be in love, you want to be in love in a movie."

There are days I don't want to live my life, I want to live my life in a movie.  I want a soundtrack!  I want music to play to help express my emotions or add emphasis to what is going on at that particular moment in my life.

So, I was listening to the Narnia: Prince Caspian soundtrack the other day and was listening to a beautiful song called "The Kings and Queens of Narnia."  Oh, such beautiful music!  There is one particular part, and you must go to this YouTube page.  It is just the sound track, nothing else.  The entire song is beautiful, but please listen to 1:06 - 1:35.

click here: The Kings and Queens of Narnia

Did you hear it?  Isn't it just beautiful?  I want to have that music played during some moment in my life.  I want to walk into a scene of my life and have that music playing while I walk.

Ahhh, if only I could have that soundtrack.  I've seen shows where they are talking about movies and they show a scene without the music, like say, Lord of the Rings.  It's just a guy walking across a castle floor.  Yeah, OK, whatever.  Then, they add the music and suddenly, it's not just a guy and it's not just a floor, it's Aragorn becoming the King of the Men of Middle Earth.  The music completely changes how the scene is seen.  A couple on screen aren't just kissing, it's love's true one and only kiss.  You can tell by the music.

How different my life might be if I had a soundtrack.  I think that would be pretty cool.

Trans Siberian Orchestra

Last Tuesday, my husband's work's Christmas party for the employees, were tickets to see the Trans Siberian Orchestra.  I wasn't terribly familiar with their music.  I only knew a couple of songs.  If you aren't familiar with TSO, they are kind of an electric guitar rocking band.  They have an electric violinist, two pianist, a drummer on a huge set, and a small string ensemble.  They really rocked the house!  I'm not a head banging, electric guitar rocking fan, but their music was quite awesome.  I had a fun time.  The show lasted for about three hours.  The first half of the show they told a sweet Christmas story with the spoken story being in prose and inbetween the storyteller's tale, they had their music.  Some of it was original music and some was new versions to old tunes like Carol of the Bells (one of their more famous songs.)  The second half of the show was their own oringinal music and showing off their tremendous talents.

The light system was incredible and their were lights in time with the music, laser show, pyrotechnics, and everything you would expect of a rock concert. It was a lot of fun.

Sadly for me, that's the night I got sick, so I was cold, achy and not enjoying the experience nearly as much as I might have otherwise.

I was really amazed to see, among the concert goes, a lot of gray and white haired people.  I was kind of surprised to see so many older folks at the show.  I mean, this was head banging, loud electric guitar music.  But then I got to thinking about these gray haired folks.  These guys were teens or young adults in the 60's and 70's.  This was the generation that went to Woodstock.  This is the generation that saw the Rolling Stones and The Who.  They were the first to go to ear-bleeding, head banging concerts.  Why wouldn't they still enjoy it now? 

This is my 3rd concert I've been too.  If you know anything about me, you might be able to guess who two of my favorite bands are.  Can you guess?  The Monkees and The Beatles.  I was a kid when the Monkees had their 20th anniversary tour and I got to see them when they went to Dallas.  I sat out in the grass for hours, drinking Gatorade and being so excited I could hardly sit still. Then the thrill of seeing Peter, Micky and Davy was beyond anything I had ever experienced. The funny thing about that concert was "Weird Al" was the opening band.  At the time I didn't know who Weird Al was, but it was not a full year later that I was introduced to his music and became a big fan.  All I remember of Weird Al's part of the concert was the "Addicted to Spuds" song.  He had people dressed as potatoes dancing on the stage.

My other favorite band, The Beatles, broke up before I was born, but in the 90's, Ringo Starr and his All Starr Band came to Dallas and I went to see him.  Awesome!

Now I can can Trans Siberian Orchestra to my list of concerts.  It was so much fun.  Next time, though, I need to remember ear plugs.  It was a little louder than I was comfortable with.  I'm such an old fuddy-duddy.

If you've never heard any of TSO before, I recomend this - Carol of the Bells: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vNcGlM8O3I

if you like that, you should also listen to Wizards in Winter: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFLOh44P5z0&feature=related

Halloween movies and music

We love Halloween time here at our house.  Personally, I just love that the weather is cooler and I can bake with pumpkin til my heart's content.

We love watching our favorite holiday movies and shows:
Garfield's Halloween
It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown
Disney's Halloween Special
The Worst Witch

We listen to great music:
"Toccata and Fugue" by Bach (the great classic organ song)
"In the Hall of the Mountain King" by Grieg
"The Sorcerer's Apprentice" by Dukas
"Night on Bald Mountain" by Rimsky-Korsakov
"This is Halloween" from Nightmare Before Christmas by Danny Elfman
Monster Mash

I found this fun list:
Dracula’s top ten favorite songs
10. You’re so vein
9. Fangs for the Memories
8. You’ve got a Fiend
7. You Don’t Bring me Plasma Anymore
6. Bat’s the Way (uh-huh, uh-huh) I like it
5. You Light up my Crypt
4. Tie a Yellow Ribbon ‘Round the Old Oak Casket
3. Don’t Go Stakin’ My Heart
2. Stranglers in the Night
1. He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Donor

Those crazy kids and their music!

Permit me a little rant here, OK?

The kids have been home for the summer for the last two months.  We've had a lot of fun, but there are a few things that go on each summer that kind of bug me. 

Cue old lady voice: Back when I was young, I respected my elders!

Well, to really know the truth, you would have to ask my mother...
When I was 11 years old, the Monkees were in their 20 year reunion.  I loved watching the show on TV, everyday.  I got the cassette tapes of their albums and listen to and sang along with all the songs.  My parents really didn't like the Monkees.  Wrong generation, I guess.  They were fine with me watching the TV show and listening to the music, but I knew that they didn't like them.  I tried to be considerate of this and I only listened to the music in my room.  I never watched the TV show when they were around and I tried not to talk about them much when my parents were around.

Now, we move ahead 25 years and I've got my own kids.  They have their own music that they like.  I don't like everything they do, but that's OK.  However! They play their music on my computer in the living room, very, very loudly.  Some of the music, I like, but even then, I get tired of it blasting in the living room.  They have music players in their room that they can use, but I guess they just love the sound of the music in the front room.  They know I don't like a lot of their music, but they play it anyway.  The front room opens to the kitchen, so I hear it when I'm in the kitchen.  My loom is in the front room...  You get the idea.  I knew my parents didn't like the Monkees and I respected that.  My kids don't respect the fact that I can't stand most of their music.

Am I sounding old???
Yep, I guess I am.  Old lady voice again: Them youngens and their music.  I just don't understand what those whippersnappers hear in all that noise. 

Alright, rant over.  Thank you for your patience.  Time to go watch some Monkees.