Month: May 2013

Morosco Exercise, And Moving Forward

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So, a little digging reveals the Victor Morosco exercise that Phil Barone described to me has been posted online with more detailed explanation. (Presumably posted by another of Morosco’s students?) Or, at least, it’s an exercise that very, very closely resembles the one Phil reccomended to me, and which seems to teach the same essential things. Since I’ve only been doing the Morosco exercise a couple of days, I can see what I’ve been doing wrong in terms of the articulations, and it helps me understand parts of the exercise I didn’t get from Phil’s explanation. It’s also pretty in …

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Sax Practice Notes

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Well, I’m still doing those exercises Phil Barone gave me to do. I’m pretty happy with the result, and I’m finding that taking more mouthpiece is making a big difference, and that overtone exercises are also helping a lot. Maybe it’s just that I’m recovering my embouchure, I’m not sure–that must be part of it–but I have begun to develop a largeness of tone that I remember wanting and needing, but not knowing how to get, back when I was playing in Dabang Band. This, of course, also brings me to a couple of problems: First, I think I’ve truly …

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Dread: Saigon Falls

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So, the other night we played through my new scenario for Dread, titled “Saigon Falls,” with my housemates here in Vietnam. It was an interesting experience for a few reasons. For one thing: we were playing imaginary characters living in our real (shared) house. That was odd, because a lot of the story took place inside the house, and the geography of the house played a part in a lot of scenes. It was interesting secondarily because the characters were modeled on the previous occupants of the house we’re staying in, a group of frathouse morons who apparently had huge, …

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The Day I Made a Gumbo…

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… was today. My first gumbo, too. Vegetarian and gluten-free, because I was cooking for the house. Apparently a success. The gumbo itself is sort of a mishmash of recipes I saw online. I found such an incredible amount of diversity among the recipes that finally I decided, there is no such thing as a definitive gumbo recipe. Gumbo is conceptual: stew, with chunks. Herbs, spicy if you like that. Slow cooked. Okra and smoked sausage are nice, but not absolutely required. (The latter I’m omitting only because this meal is to be en famille.) Often served with rice. Beans …

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