Hi. A little tired. Been civilly serving. Yesterday I was subbing at a high school in the zone. In 2 of my classes, students surprised by requesting I play my song "February" for them. They were genuine and I was flattered, so I obliged. I played them each versions and conversed with them briefly after. They wanted to know what it was about.
I said, a long time ago some ago, some pretty unfortunate things happened in my life in February and I wrote this song as sort of a make-up song all these years later as an olive branch, a burying the hatchet if you will. High school kids as they are... Well, they wanted to know what happened and I told them. My best friend died when I was 17. Most of them were able to deal with it pretty well, save for one exception.
These things happen I told them. I believe everything happens for a reason and it was a long time ago. It was a bit more involved then that as you may imagine, but that's all I feel like sharing now.
In any case, in honor of those kids and their appreciation for "February" the tune, I put up 2 versions today. One recorded at TheStudiosInSanDiego shortly after it was written in February 2010 Originals - available here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kZqe_dVKZo
...and another one recorded live on March 21, 2010 with Paul Ruiz on trumpet, Paul Lopez on congas, and The Soul Man. This group of people was one that joined my frequently in those months. When we had a drummer, we'd be called The Jefferson Jay Band, but when it was like this, I called The Jefferson Jay Experience. I always love playing with all of those guys. That version is available here as today's archive selection and it is available here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9ErbsNCQCk
My 3rd offering of the day, my "Cover" is a version of Led Zeppelin's "Down By The Seaside" also recorded at TheStudiosInSanDiego. It is here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhQjDlIa2wA
In other news, I helped get P.A. for some disadvantaged kids' music room today. Hooray!
Peace
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Monday, November 29, 2010
Operation 365... Blog 2
Hello.
Blogging it up on a lunch break from teaching. Chose Wes Davis and Becca Warner for today's choice form the archive. Very interesting. Just another example of how much and how quickly things change. I will spare you ALL the details but the first lyric of their song is " the nights that I think about moving..." Well, it's 15 months later now, and they've both moved. I miss them both bunches and feel this video shows a little bit of both of their charming and colorful personalities.
For my original jamboree, I played "May", one of many many tunes written from a month's perspective. February should appear tomorrow. Today at school, two of my classes requested I play "February". I was somewhat flattered and obliged and they were (well, except one kid) a really great audience. Well, gotta get back to work now. See you soon.
Blogging it up on a lunch break from teaching. Chose Wes Davis and Becca Warner for today's choice form the archive. Very interesting. Just another example of how much and how quickly things change. I will spare you ALL the details but the first lyric of their song is " the nights that I think about moving..." Well, it's 15 months later now, and they've both moved. I miss them both bunches and feel this video shows a little bit of both of their charming and colorful personalities.
For my original jamboree, I played "May", one of many many tunes written from a month's perspective. February should appear tomorrow. Today at school, two of my classes requested I play "February". I was somewhat flattered and obliged and they were (well, except one kid) a really great audience. Well, gotta get back to work now. See you soon.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
OK, so Operation 365... Take 1
So I've got tons of material (and a screenplay, two master's theses, 4 albums and a movie, but that is neither here nor there) that I've been wanting to share for a long time but havent; know how to do it. I thought a bunch about what would be the best way to do it so it was interesting and appealed to people in the most compelling manner possible. I talked to people. I asked friends. I decided for awhile I was going to make a website/network and try to share from my massive archive of original material, but "how would I get people to that site?" was always a question I knew I would have to answer eventually and I had no idea on that one.
I asked my good pal Dylan Avery, an accomplished video manipulator in his own right, what he thought the first step should be for me in this pursuit. He said rip all your tapes. SO I did. That is just the type of job that a multi-tasking, occasionally procrastinating, archivist who doesn't' know what to do with his material can sink his teeth into and I did.
So I ripped. And I ripped. And I ripped and I ripped and I ripped and I ripped and I ripped and eventually it was all in there. Great. I still didn't know what to do. In the meantime, months passed and little changed (well a lot changed, but...) my content (tons of videos, hundreds of original songs specifically) still remained unshared and I didn't have much going on creatively and I decided.
I was going to share. I had realized since January 2009 when a little birdie whispered to me in the shower that I needed to "put it out there". Now was finally time. I wasn't going to worry about the best possible presentation. I was just going to put it out now. Dylan and my other friend Wes Davis made a cool movie which will come out next year called "Buzzkill". I saw an early version and what I got from it personally was that if you do something today and then again tomorrow and the next day, it radically improves the likelihood that you will do that thing the next day after that and so on. I liked that idea and wanted to put that thought into motion for myself and like my friends in "Buzzkill", wait and see what would result.
Saying you're going to do stuff is scary so I didn't say much to anyone at first, but it's been a few days now, so I figured I'd catch the world up on what I'm up to.
I want to post 3 videos each day for a whole year. I will be posting them on youtube at my page jeffersonjaydotcom.
http://www.youtube.com/jeffersonjaydotcom
One of me playing one of my tunes. One of me playing a cover tune, which is a tune written by somebody other than me for those who don't know the lingo. And one clip form my archives which will usually spotlight one or more of my friends but may include me as well depending on how I feel that day. I am not going for greatness, but I am certainly not aiming to embarrass myself either of course (well not too much) I am not going for anything at all in particular beyond the goals I've already stated. I have no idea what will happen or what I hope will come of this but I figure something will and I am interested in seeing what that will be.
Challenges ahead: The clearest challenge is obviously doing something every single day. It's quite a commitment and I am am even a bit sheepish myself about it as we speak but hey, what the hey. The other biggest challenge I can see ahead is... I've only written about 200-250 songs at the most I think. So even if/when I get that far, I'm going to have to figure out a way to have a new song each day when I'm out of tunes. My archive is extensive so I will easily have enough material for that one and well, there are plenty of tunes out there to cover and I'm sure I can play 365 of them so that shouldn't be too hard either.
I may have some guests sometimes but it will mostly be me I believe and I'm going to try to blog about it all a lot because that just seems like a thing one should be doing with a project like this. SO i hope you enjoy my songs, my verbiage and getting to know me as Operation 365 marches on.
P.S. I wrote a new tune in 5 minutes or so yesterday while on of the vids was bouncing so that's #251 (about) and here I come. Hope to see ya all some time.
Peace
I asked my good pal Dylan Avery, an accomplished video manipulator in his own right, what he thought the first step should be for me in this pursuit. He said rip all your tapes. SO I did. That is just the type of job that a multi-tasking, occasionally procrastinating, archivist who doesn't' know what to do with his material can sink his teeth into and I did.
So I ripped. And I ripped. And I ripped and I ripped and I ripped and I ripped and I ripped and eventually it was all in there. Great. I still didn't know what to do. In the meantime, months passed and little changed (well a lot changed, but...) my content (tons of videos, hundreds of original songs specifically) still remained unshared and I didn't have much going on creatively and I decided.
I was going to share. I had realized since January 2009 when a little birdie whispered to me in the shower that I needed to "put it out there". Now was finally time. I wasn't going to worry about the best possible presentation. I was just going to put it out now. Dylan and my other friend Wes Davis made a cool movie which will come out next year called "Buzzkill". I saw an early version and what I got from it personally was that if you do something today and then again tomorrow and the next day, it radically improves the likelihood that you will do that thing the next day after that and so on. I liked that idea and wanted to put that thought into motion for myself and like my friends in "Buzzkill", wait and see what would result.
Saying you're going to do stuff is scary so I didn't say much to anyone at first, but it's been a few days now, so I figured I'd catch the world up on what I'm up to.
I want to post 3 videos each day for a whole year. I will be posting them on youtube at my page jeffersonjaydotcom.
http://www.youtube.com/jeffersonjaydotcom
One of me playing one of my tunes. One of me playing a cover tune, which is a tune written by somebody other than me for those who don't know the lingo. And one clip form my archives which will usually spotlight one or more of my friends but may include me as well depending on how I feel that day. I am not going for greatness, but I am certainly not aiming to embarrass myself either of course (well not too much) I am not going for anything at all in particular beyond the goals I've already stated. I have no idea what will happen or what I hope will come of this but I figure something will and I am interested in seeing what that will be.
Challenges ahead: The clearest challenge is obviously doing something every single day. It's quite a commitment and I am am even a bit sheepish myself about it as we speak but hey, what the hey. The other biggest challenge I can see ahead is... I've only written about 200-250 songs at the most I think. So even if/when I get that far, I'm going to have to figure out a way to have a new song each day when I'm out of tunes. My archive is extensive so I will easily have enough material for that one and well, there are plenty of tunes out there to cover and I'm sure I can play 365 of them so that shouldn't be too hard either.
I may have some guests sometimes but it will mostly be me I believe and I'm going to try to blog about it all a lot because that just seems like a thing one should be doing with a project like this. SO i hope you enjoy my songs, my verbiage and getting to know me as Operation 365 marches on.
P.S. I wrote a new tune in 5 minutes or so yesterday while on of the vids was bouncing so that's #251 (about) and here I come. Hope to see ya all some time.
Peace
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