Confetto De Paris

My 1st Semifinal Picks - Favs

2009-04-30T19:57:00.000-07:00

First off, Inga and Anush Arshakyan, the Armenian entry are vocally outstanding and their performance of "Jan-Jan" really make the pop-dance song worthy of ending up in the top three spots in this semi-final. It mixes some really interesting rhythms and the sisters' stylings just compliment the ambiance of this R&B song.

Of course, the trick with Eurovision is they have to perform this live...who knows how this video will translate on the stage.

Next up on my list of favorites is the entry from Azerbaijan performed by Aysel and Arash, the song written by Arash. Their duet works well with this very dancey-pop song with eastern influences. It has all the elements of pop and is certainly entertaining performed by these amiable and talented performers.

Lastly, for today, this young performer from Norway, Alexander Rybak, has really taken me by surprise. His song, written by Rybak as well, is simple but has a great pop hook and after several listenings, the tune becomes infectious. Fairytale is exactly the kind of song that Eurovision hopes for in its contestants and Alexander, himself is quite the performer, as well as endearing and quite charming. He could pull in quite a few votes.

Eurovision 2009 Competitors

2009-04-29T18:04:00.000-07:00

Mark your calendars - May 12th, 14th and 16th...

Eurovision Song Contest - Moscow 2009 Preview Player

Colour Commentary

2008-09-14T07:23:00.000-07:00

I love these ads - some old, some new:

The whole Bravia campaign over the years has kept me fascinated and inspired. It is obviously more than just me, as each commercial seems to spawn its own website featuring the documentary of the "making of"...

Bravia through the years:

Bouncy Balls through the streets of San Francisco...

Paint Bravia...

And of course, the spools of thread...

Today I ran into this festive Office Max Post it ad....

It's all about colour for me....

Cheers,

sbl

Shag-a-lunch-ish

2008-07-24T07:21:00.000-07:00

I honestly think this speaks for itself - a Shag lunch box:

Available now at Shagmart

I've purchased four already....

I want your sex....

2008-07-11T23:17:00.000-07:00

Me...Tardy....sowwy.

We and two friends of ours attended the George Michael concert on July 3rd at Key Arena.

Of course, there is a story to tell....and oddly, there will be no use of the word mayhem anywhere to be found!?!

We arrived at the venue promptly and rambled to the section assigned to our printed tickets. Upon arrival at the properly numbered alcove, a green-smocked woman with official logos stopped us with a smile, she giggled and explained that they had improperly sold the section on our tickets and we were going to receive "better" tickets, two sections closer to the performance area.

Our group of four was quite pleased at our good fortune, as she had explained it, and we moved swiftly to our new seats, not quite at the other end of the arena. These were indeed "better."

Of course, this would be a satisfactory end to the story of our arrival as told above....but....no.

Jamie's cell phone range.

Our foursome was about to hit the "I'm at an arena concert" jackpot. Through a complicated string of relationships with so-and-so and so-and-so, we were suddenly directed to the suite level of Key Arena, where complimentary tickets to the Sonics' Owner's Suite were available for our use and enjoyment.

We had an incredible view of Mr. Michael's repertoire and over-the-top production values.

The concert was a veritable dance-fest, with occasional ballads showcasing the bluesy vocal acrobatics that George Michael has sustained throughout his "25" years.

His banter was personal, genuine and easy as he thanked the nearly full arena for allowing him to sustain a career in the States. The songfest was filled with both new and old material, with top performances of "Father Figure", "Roxanne", and a poignent "Praying for Time." We were all reminded of how much of an icon this pop singer was at one point, both on video and CD. The crowd responded in kind with a carefree spirit as it danced it way through the hits (10 #1 singles) and art songs. It was a nice two sets of music from yesterday and today.

His production and design team should be commended for an incredibly interesting stage performance which complimented Mr. Michael's selection for the evening. A LED "screen" that rolled from ceiling to floor and appeared to cascade off the stage projected relevant images which cascaded outward onto LED "panels." It was a mesmerizing experience and certainly hard to stop watching as it mimicked the songs being presently sung.

All in all, it was a very wonderful and special evening for us. And in the end, it was "Freedom" that ushered us out the door and into the twilight, freshly returned from our whirlwind tour of a man's star turn still twinkling in our mind's eye.

Thank you George...it was fun!!

My Coffee Maker is Cooler Than Your Coffee Maker...

2008-06-27T08:50:00.000-07:00

If I were a product spokesperson....I most certainly would endorse this:

It glows in the dark!!

Not only is it a stylish accoutrement to my kitchen, but it has all this scientific stuff to fancy your whimsy:

OMG - Cool!?! Right?

Although I'm not a product endorser, nor do I get paid to say wonderful things about this product (bummer), if you want to be as Cool as I am, http://www.keurig.com/.

Myron....Meet Astor...

2008-06-26T20:19:00.000-07:00

My life as an accordionist began in my early teens in the suburbs of Minneapolis.

At the time, my grandmother's and my hero of choice, naturally was Myron Floren. Myron was in our house every Sunday courtesy of the "The Lawrence Welk Show," entertaining us with polkas, waltzes and schottisches which showcased his accordion skills with a handsome smile. He was sort of the ambassador of the accordion and really the only gig in town if you aspired to make a career of it - at least in the States.

Today, however, as my musical tastes have matured, I squeal with delight over the music of Astor Piazzolla, the man responsible for "nuevo tango." His music surrounds my soul, captures my imagination and physically moves me so much that I am honestly sometimes overwhelmed. He pushes the instrument to its limits and shows the depths of emotion an accordion/bandoneon can muster.

It should be noted that Mister Piazzolla plays the bandoneón, which is different from the accordion in that it has buttons on both sides and the action of pulling out produces different tones than pushing in. Most of his music, of course, is transcribed for many different instruments.

As an introduction, I present a few favorites from his repertoire, beginning with probably his most commercially heard piece, Libertango, which was later recorded with lyrics by Grace Jones in the early 80's as "I've Seen That Face Before"

Libertango - Yo-Yo Ma

I've Seen That Face Before (Libertango) - Grace Jones

Piazzolla's music has been transcribed for guitar, guitar trio, piano, and cello. Just a quick search of Astor Piazzolla on Youtube.com provides a wealth of transcriptions and adaptions of this man's wonderful tango/jazz/classical fusion.

I leave you with this. A performance of "Adios Nonino" (written for his father) performed at the royal wedding of Prince Willem-Alexander and Princess Maxima Zorreguieta.

This is probably the most incredible performance of this piece I have ever seen. It makes my heart melt and it's obvious that Princess Maxima "gets it."

Enjoy...

Blogging Schmogging

2008-06-25T08:30:00.000-07:00

Okay - here's my Achilles heel on Blogging...

I'm not sure I really get it...

There - I've said it!?!

I do enjoy reading others' blogs though. I find them amusing, informative and if it's someone I know, it keeps me abreast of their goings on.

My challenge with blogging is twofold:

I don't feel like a blog is really a personal diary of things going on with me. I know I'm writing for an audience or at least someone, somewhere will view or read a sentence or try and find my e-mail address for marketing/spam purposes - so I write differently than I would to myself. It's an innate thing. I have often found blogs (Live Journal for example) that are personal in nature to be rather manipulative to the reader.

So writing about myself is difficult in a public forum - at least for me.

Secondly, I'm a ruminator!!!

My therapist has proudly made this pronouncement and I wear this title with pride and dignity. Being a ruminator isn't really a bad thing, but it can hamper me from getting things done or moving on.

So when I think about writing in my blog, I ruminate about what I should write. And then about why I should write. Then I write it all in my head and then ruminate about it for a couple more days. Of course the rumination then leads to the "Well that's not interesting enough" phase and I'm off to another subject to ruminate about yet again. The cycle repeats and has repeated for the last 30 years. I'm very accustomed to it actually.

I think....I think hard...

Sometimes I wish I could hardly think...

Eurovision Wrap Up

2008-06-07T07:21:00.000-07:00

I've continued to obsess all things Eurovision and have some closing comments.

Hat's off to this year's production team and the host country, Serbia, for such a wonderful show. The staging, lighting effects, and camera gymnastics make for an eye candy production. Kudos to the LED designer and programmer - with a back wall full of LED lights, every song and singer had a new and interesting backdrop tailored to his/her or their song stylings. Bravo!!!

If you have three hours to kill and would like to view this year's final production in European HD, I highly recommend downloading the Octoshape viewer and watching it here... Eurovision 2008 High Quality Finale. It really is good TV in the Ed Sullivan/Variety Hour vein. The last hour or so is the tabulation of votes and introduces a host from each voting country.

Although the controversy surrounding the voting has been quelled by this year's Eurovision TV Director, Sietse Bakker, I still don't think Russia's entry was the best - I just didn't care for Dima Bilan, himself - even if his song was produced by Timbaland. I really thought Ani Lorak's Shady Lady was a far more universally appealling sound and better produced. The whole skater/violinist thing that was included just seemed odd, at best, to me. And, well, I just didn't like the song at all.

After watching the entire show, another entry that I am certain fell prey to political standing rather than actual talent was Israel's entry. Boaz sings this entry by Dana International with heartfelt honesty and command. I can't take my eyes off of him. And the song, itself, is well constructed and quite beautiful. It certainly deserved more than the ninth place it recieved.

Another mention should be made of the group from Turkey. An admireable band, Mor ve Ötesi, their entry, "Deli" has a catchy hook and a lead singer worth watching...I very much liked this performance as well.

Perhaps no Abba was born out of this year's competition and perhaps it has fallen just a tad bit further away from it's origins and delightfully comic European ways (although it's opening production on Finale Night leads me to believe that it's European artistic tastes are alive and flourishing), I will look forward to next year's showcase of stars and dimwits in eager anticipation of a nearly lost Star.

p.s. Ani Lorak accepted me as a friend on Facebook...her career should be catapulting soon!!

Eurovision 2008

2008-05-24T23:15:00.000-07:00

Oh lordy - it's that time of year - Eurovision!!!

If Eurovision is something you are not familiar with...go here....EUROVISION SONG CONTEST!!

Eurovision has been around far longer than American Idol, is watched by far more people and has the benefit of having some of the best Euro-pop music around all performed as a big fat contest. These folks each represent their countries, perform live (this is my favorite - you'll see), have interesting and sometimes laughable production values (but far superior to AI, IMHO) and generally just make for a great time.

Of course, the most notable winners of Eurovision would most likely be ABBA...if you like ABBA, you must tune into the Eurovision Songfest yearly....I know I do.

Here's the Wiki history and rules

Here are this years winners - Enjoy cupcakes!!

(Five Bonus Points if you can name the skater in the Russian entry.)

At #3, Greece:

At #2, Ukraine:

And #1, First time Ever Winner, Russia - (This is way over the top):

George Michael Haiku

2008-05-16T00:46:00.000-07:00

In anticipation of the upcoming George Michael Tour, I have written a haiku...

Sing, George Michael, Dance

Undulating man of Faith

We will worship you