Crotchet equals one hundred and forty.

That's the speed for a bass tune of mine called 'Swing In, Swing Out'.

It's Sunday. Actually, that's an unusual name for a day of the week. Perhaps it should be called Churchshopday.

Well, it is the day that church shops are open all over the country. It would be different in India because they have a different god who might not like church shops. Quite a few other countries do as well. There are quite a few gods out there. I wonder if they're all related?

I have the intention of doing more double bass practice today because I have the intention of working up seven of my Double Bass Melodies. I have a gig coming up at a library (or two) in May and thought that it would be good to get a few of my bass melodies played - I have a book with about 17 of these tunes in it.

Robert Testore told me recently that the double bass is not really a melody instrument. Jeeze (you can read 'Sheesh!' there if you like, Peter), I hope he's not right. The gig could be a disaster!

"Damn! I can't get this melody
to work! It sounds just like a
bassline!"

Obviously, I'll do some violin practice too. I'm playing at a jazz jam in a couple of weeks. It's at Raumati and is for the 100th. birthday of an old jazz playing friend. As I told you before, I'm also working up some bluegrass pieces that I hope to play at the Bluegrass Society sometime early this year. They are pieces for solo violin. I have three but will only need two - Blue Moon of Kentucky and the Orange Blossom Special. It's always good to have an extra piece that is ready to go. When you play pieces like this solo, you need to really fill them out. That means lots of double stops (two notes played at once, Peter). That is why I've done a lot of work on playing two chord notes at once. I can play different inversions all over the violin.

Harmonies and scale choices are much simpler in Bluegrass than they are in Jazz. Bluegrass players generally seem to go for the major pentatonic scale, so, if you play this scale, you sound more like a Bluegrass player. I've got to be careful not to drop in any jazz licks. Peter will be enjoying this.

There will probably be ideas in this post that Peter can use to get a post together for himself. His last post was virtually a repetition of my last post, with something about my Wellington tours. Ah well, it keeps the old guy busy.

Ciao tutti.