I used to march in the Newark High School Marching Band. Yup! A band dork! I played in the drumline. My freshman year I played Quads, my Sophomore, Junior, and Senior year I played snare drum. I remember coming up from middle school and knowing very little about the drums, and music in general really. I struggled reading sheet music and I barely knew how to do a drum roll.
The first thing I learned the summer before my freshman year "at band camp" was the importance of the percussion rudiments. A rudiment is a simple pattern set of stick combination that are meant to practice stick control. Think of it as the vocabulary for drummers. In order for a non drummer to appreciate the importance of rudiments, just watch this video of the Blue Devils warming up. Be sure to pay close attention to their sticks and hand movements (link):
This is an example of rudiments at their best!
My favorite rudiment is the paradiddle, hands down. It is nothing more than RLRR LRLL RLRR LRLL RLRR LRLL, over and over. In high school, I understood the importance of rudiments, but didn't really "appreciate" them. I just knew I had to know them. However, as a drummer sitting behind a drumset, my knowledge of rudiments has really given me the ability to play complex grooves with very little effort. The faster you play them, the groovier they sound. It is also true that the faster you play them, the easier they are to play honestly. I remember the process of learning them and recall how difficult they were to learn. Not only that, but when I would have to also march to a steady beat, my sticks would just get tied up.
Anyway, I saw that video today from the drumfunny twitter feed and it too me back about 12 years.
Showing posts with label drumming. Show all posts
Showing posts with label drumming. Show all posts
Monday, August 10, 2009
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Full Body Experience - XBox 360 Video Games
Too cool! I saw a retweet from Scott Hanselman on my twitter feed and had to share this!
It's simply amazing; especially when the guy breaks out an old game using his hands and feet to drive the car. The technology being used understands all the movements of driving, just like you would if you were mimicking driving a car to a friend.
This could add a whole new element to "air drumming"! That's what I'm most excited about I think. :)
It's simply amazing; especially when the guy breaks out an old game using his hands and feet to drive the car. The technology being used understands all the movements of driving, just like you would if you were mimicking driving a car to a friend.
This could add a whole new element to "air drumming"! That's what I'm most excited about I think. :)
Thursday, January 08, 2009
CodeMash 2009 - Day 1
Well, I arrived at CodeMash last night right before the roads got bad. Found my old DD family immediately as I walked in the door (James, Mike, and Phil). They helped me move my drums in (thanks guys) and then we headed out to get some dinner. I ended up eating WAAAAAY too much and wound up refunding my dinner later that night into the porcellan bucket. I suffered from some insane insomnia well after that ordeal and didn't get to sleep until after 3am.I wanted to wake up early and get in my 3 miler, but ended up sleeping in til almost 7:30am (alarm clock "am/pm confusion" issues). Since breakfast was almost over, I just grabbed my room key and headed down to the dining area to get in on the feast. Breakfast was excellent and I made sure I didn't over indulge this time. :)
Venkat Subramanium keynoted here at CodeMash this morning and he was a great keynoter, I laughed a lot and learned a lot. The first session I attended after that was 'Introducing Prototype and Scriptaculous" presented by Leon Gersing (aka: FallenRogue). He talked about using Javascript utilities (namely Prototype and Script.aculo.us (as well as various references to JQuery)) and I must say that it was very informative. I couldn't find any gleaming reasons for me to switch from my focus of learning JQuery to using these though (thoughts?)... I think I'm full speed ahead on my endevor to master JQuery. (Sorry Sergey) :)
The next session I attended the "Developing for Microsoft Surface"computing by Jennifer Marsman and... "Joe" from VectorForm (sorry Joe, great job though) :) 
It was very cool. They showed how all the pieces work together to provide the rich experience, including the way that real world objects can be recognized using a new type (infinitely unique) "bar code" pattern. Jennifer Marsman sat down and even took an old WPF sample app and converted it to a Microsoft Surface app using simple RegEx find/replace in the XAML, and had it running on the Surface in less that 2 minutes (literally). This is not recommended of course, but the fact that they CAN do it says that it should be fairly easy to get geeks using it. After the session, I went out and tinkered on one of them in the hallway. They are very cool to play with, but that's about it for me...
It was very cool. They showed how all the pieces work together to provide the rich experience, including the way that real world objects can be recognized using a new type (infinitely unique) "bar code" pattern. Jennifer Marsman sat down and even took an old WPF sample app and converted it to a Microsoft Surface app using simple RegEx find/replace in the XAML, and had it running on the Surface in less that 2 minutes (literally). This is not recommended of course, but the fact that they CAN do it says that it should be fairly easy to get geeks using it. After the session, I went out and tinkered on one of them in the hallway. They are very cool to play with, but that's about it for me...After that, we broke for lunch and then I headed to the "Adobe Flex with MVC Frameworks" session by Robert O'Malley. Unfortunately I thought it was something that it wasn't and I wasn't understanding anything that he was talking about. I think the session assumed that I was familiar with (at least) one of the technologies that he was talking about, and I wasn't. :( I turned to Mike and we went out into the hallway and geeked out on our laptops instead and talked about some programming issues we were both struggling with. Much more funner?? IMO. :)
The next round of sessions, I chose to attend the "Functional Concepts for OOP Developers" session by Brian Webber and it was pretty intense. It was well done, but it covered a lot of different functional syntaxes (namely Haskell) and functional concepts (namely these) that I simply wasn't familiar with (YET). I was able to "keep up" for the most part with my understanding of how implementing the same object oriented concepts would work, but the talk was a little more involved than I thought it would be, to say the least.
For the last session of the day, I headed over to see the "Microsoft Virtual Earth Now in 3d" session by Aydin Akcasu. The last talk I saw from this guy included a Wii remote sending data to a C# app that (in turn) controlled a robot bird (that flew) the he let people fly over the crowd using bluetooth to send commands to it... again, using a wii remote. Talk about cool!? Anyway, this session Aydin showed people how to EASY it was to embed rich 3d mapping technology into existing apps with absolutely zero effort (3 lines of HTML, that's it); here is the page he built to give his talk with, right click and view source to see what I mean. Basically, Microsoft Live Maps offers a free mapping technology that lets users (ie. anybody that has a web page) expose an interactive 3d world (think Google Earth... but...) inside a web browser. To extend it and make it do things, simply create buttons with javascript to call methods on it. Beautiful! At the end of his talk, I went up to shoot the breeze with him and he showed me this cool 3d mouse called SpaceNavigator that he used to fly around the (virtual) world with. Very slick!
Dinner was damn good, then I hit the gym to get in my 3 miler before attending the jam session. The jam session was really cool! I only played a couple of times, but I did got to rock out with Carl Franklin, Brian , , and . It was a very bluesy mix this year. Last year was mostly acoustic and low key for the most part; whereas this year was ampliphied crowded and bluesy. Carl rocked out like a true entertainer, and I got to see Dustin Cambell jam on a guitar too (that dude is good). Corey Haines brought his harmonica and guitar again this year, and he played some really cool stuff (major talented musician). Surprisingly (maybe not?), there were a lot of poeple playing instruments this year, and it was much more "the norm" this year than last year. This was awesome to see. CodeMash is so cool. Plus I think they're starting bring out the good musicians (marketing ideas guys, Jim, Jason, Jeff,..). :)
I ended the night with a bunch of geeks down at the bar. We discovered that Raji loves to buy drinks for people, just don't ask him for water... :)
Monday, November 24, 2008
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Novosibirsk - Day 19
Today was an extremely great and glorious day. Ok, so I ran out of good openers for my posts and this is all I got tonight...
So, I woke @ 9am to a call from Konstantin. He asked me to meet him at the Chocolat in 10 minutes. I said... "It'll be amazing, but I'll try". Sure enough, I was out of bed and out the door in 5 minutes. It was about an 8 minute walk to the Chocolat (in the Siberian cold, mind you), so I didn't keep him waiting too long. Maxim met us there shortly thereafter, and we had a quick breakfast before heading to the баня (pronounced "bahn-ya"). For those that don't know what a banya is, it's a Russian sauna. It's different from an American sauna in that it uses wet heat (aka: steam) rather than dry heat. Anyway, when we got to the banya, we met up with Alex M. and Alex S... We were ready to sweat! :)
Over the last 2 weeks, I've heard many people talk about the banya, and it was great to finally see what it was. We basically had a 3 room hut that was laid out like an "old school" Russian banya made from logs. We had a blast, they told me Russian jokes, and I taught them all the "paradiddle", the "double paradiddle" and the "triple triple paradiddle" using a fork, a spoon, the table and some bottles. :) The first couple of times that I went into the banya, I got a little light headed, but otherwise I was fine. The more I got in and out of it, the more accustomed I became to it. We were all sweating like some banchies and it was great! :) The rule is that you should not shower or drink anything cold after going to the banya. It's good for the body to keep your pores opened up for the rest of the day. I must admit that I felt very good (and clean) long after we left the banya; highly recommended! I'm going to talk to Jennifer when I get home about building one outside... according to these guys, it's very easy to build. :)
From the banya, Maxim helped me buy some [secret gifts] at a local market and then dropped me off at my flat. When I got inside, I immediately called Anna & Sasha so that we could all hang out today. They had invited me to lunch and ice skating. Sasha came and picked me up at 1:30 and we headed back to their flat. As soon as we got up to their floor I could smell Anna's cooking. It smelled delicious!! Sure enough, it was! :) She made beef and potato soup and two sets of these potato cakes: one set had sausage in them, and the other set had apple in them. They were way tasty!
After lunch, they showed me pictures from their wedding and it was nice to see all of their family. Sasha looked like a total stud and Anna was very beautiful. Anna then showed me all of the medals from her father's military acheivements and I must say that he is nothing less than a true Russian hero. He had so many medals and what an honor it was to hold them while they explained to me what each one was. He had entered the military at age 17 and fought in World War II. He died 10 years ago, but he left a legacy. Thank you for sharing his story with me Anna. Hold onto those medals. :)
I was also able to meet their son, Maxim. He is 10 years old and is a very nice boy. :) He is learning to speak English and I must say he is very good. It is safe to say that he is better at English than I am at Russian. I introduced myself and he told me all of his important information in English to me: "Hi, my name is Maxim", "I am 10 years old", "I live in Novosibirsk, Russia", etc..). Very good!! He knew all about "Laizy, Jaizy, and Daizy" before I could even tell him about them. So it was clear that Anna and Sasha had shared my story with him, and I thought that was very cool!! He is a very funny kid and I think that Anna has her hands full with not only him, but also Sasha. I told her it is as if she is raising two boys. :) She agreed!
From their house, we drove around and did some sight seeing at the Botanical Gardens (this is where Scott and I ran my first week here). Also, I was finally able to see Obb Sea. They call it Ob Sea, but it's really a huge reservoir that is the largest man made lake in Russia called Novosibirsk Reservoir. Right now, it is completely frozen with 1 meter of ice... the whole thing! And it's huge! We were able to see many people ice fishing out on the lake from their car. Sasha stated that it is very cold to be down on the lake because there are high winds that pick up and (of course) it's very cold. I totally believed him and enjoyed seeing it from the warmth of my popo-grieshka. Oh, I can't forget to mention that Sasha talks to Hummers. :)
After doing some site seeing in their car, we headed to the ice rink and I was a bit nervous about getting on two razor blades and balancing, but I did surprisingly well. We were there for almost 2 hours and I didn't fall ONCE!? I looked like a newborn calf the whole time, but I didn't fall! Maxim was blowing me a way, he was skating very good frontwards, backwards, upside-down, etc... Anna helped me around the rink the first couple of loops, then I decided to try it myself and I was off and skating for the rest of the night. I commend my friends, Chapel and Phil for their months of training with Ice Hockey; I see now how difficult it really is. :)
To all those that got a kick out of my ski post, which was (by far) the most popular post from my journey to Novosibirsk... Eat your hearts out:
From the skating rink, they brought me back to their place for DINNER!?!? I couldn't believe it! I only ate mandarin oranges and drank water yesterday and today I'm eating like a king. Anna had fried potatoes and turkey prepared for dinner. I had no problem cleaning up my plate and was extremely satisfied... and what is dinner without ice cream!!?? Like I said, I ate like a king today. I turned and complimented Sasha with, "Your wife is a very good cook.", and (of course) I told Anna the same thing, over and over I think. Then, after dinner and desert, they took me shopping at the trade center so that I could get some last minute souvenirs for my family. When we finished, I said my good byes to them and we went our separate ways. It was so nice of them to let me spend the day with their family and welcome me into their home. It's clear that I have made some lifelong friends today.
To Konstantin, Maxim, Alex M., Alex S., Anna A., Sasha, and Lil' Maxim: Thank you for a great day!! :)
So, I woke @ 9am to a call from Konstantin. He asked me to meet him at the Chocolat in 10 minutes. I said... "It'll be amazing, but I'll try". Sure enough, I was out of bed and out the door in 5 minutes. It was about an 8 minute walk to the Chocolat (in the Siberian cold, mind you), so I didn't keep him waiting too long. Maxim met us there shortly thereafter, and we had a quick breakfast before heading to the баня (pronounced "bahn-ya"). For those that don't know what a banya is, it's a Russian sauna. It's different from an American sauna in that it uses wet heat (aka: steam) rather than dry heat. Anyway, when we got to the banya, we met up with Alex M. and Alex S... We were ready to sweat! :)
Over the last 2 weeks, I've heard many people talk about the banya, and it was great to finally see what it was. We basically had a 3 room hut that was laid out like an "old school" Russian banya made from logs. We had a blast, they told me Russian jokes, and I taught them all the "paradiddle", the "double paradiddle" and the "triple triple paradiddle" using a fork, a spoon, the table and some bottles. :) The first couple of times that I went into the banya, I got a little light headed, but otherwise I was fine. The more I got in and out of it, the more accustomed I became to it. We were all sweating like some banchies and it was great! :) The rule is that you should not shower or drink anything cold after going to the banya. It's good for the body to keep your pores opened up for the rest of the day. I must admit that I felt very good (and clean) long after we left the banya; highly recommended! I'm going to talk to Jennifer when I get home about building one outside... according to these guys, it's very easy to build. :)
From the banya, Maxim helped me buy some [secret gifts] at a local market and then dropped me off at my flat. When I got inside, I immediately called Anna & Sasha so that we could all hang out today. They had invited me to lunch and ice skating. Sasha came and picked me up at 1:30 and we headed back to their flat. As soon as we got up to their floor I could smell Anna's cooking. It smelled delicious!! Sure enough, it was! :) She made beef and potato soup and two sets of these potato cakes: one set had sausage in them, and the other set had apple in them. They were way tasty!After lunch, they showed me pictures from their wedding and it was nice to see all of their family. Sasha looked like a total stud and Anna was very beautiful. Anna then showed me all of the medals from her father's military acheivements and I must say that he is nothing less than a true Russian hero. He had so many medals and what an honor it was to hold them while they explained to me what each one was. He had entered the military at age 17 and fought in World War II. He died 10 years ago, but he left a legacy. Thank you for sharing his story with me Anna. Hold onto those medals. :)
I was also able to meet their son, Maxim. He is 10 years old and is a very nice boy. :) He is learning to speak English and I must say he is very good. It is safe to say that he is better at English than I am at Russian. I introduced myself and he told me all of his important information in English to me: "Hi, my name is Maxim", "I am 10 years old", "I live in Novosibirsk, Russia", etc..). Very good!! He knew all about "Laizy, Jaizy, and Daizy" before I could even tell him about them. So it was clear that Anna and Sasha had shared my story with him, and I thought that was very cool!! He is a very funny kid and I think that Anna has her hands full with not only him, but also Sasha. I told her it is as if she is raising two boys. :) She agreed!From their house, we drove around and did some sight seeing at the Botanical Gardens (this is where Scott and I ran my first week here). Also, I was finally able to see Obb Sea. They call it Ob Sea, but it's really a huge reservoir that is the largest man made lake in Russia called Novosibirsk Reservoir. Right now, it is completely frozen with 1 meter of ice... the whole thing! And it's huge! We were able to see many people ice fishing out on the lake from their car. Sasha stated that it is very cold to be down on the lake because there are high winds that pick up and (of course) it's very cold. I totally believed him and enjoyed seeing it from the warmth of my popo-grieshka. Oh, I can't forget to mention that Sasha talks to Hummers. :)
After doing some site seeing in their car, we headed to the ice rink and I was a bit nervous about getting on two razor blades and balancing, but I did surprisingly well. We were there for almost 2 hours and I didn't fall ONCE!? I looked like a newborn calf the whole time, but I didn't fall! Maxim was blowing me a way, he was skating very good frontwards, backwards, upside-down, etc... Anna helped me around the rink the first couple of loops, then I decided to try it myself and I was off and skating for the rest of the night. I commend my friends, Chapel and Phil for their months of training with Ice Hockey; I see now how difficult it really is. :)To all those that got a kick out of my ski post, which was (by far) the most popular post from my journey to Novosibirsk... Eat your hearts out:
From the skating rink, they brought me back to their place for DINNER!?!? I couldn't believe it! I only ate mandarin oranges and drank water yesterday and today I'm eating like a king. Anna had fried potatoes and turkey prepared for dinner. I had no problem cleaning up my plate and was extremely satisfied... and what is dinner without ice cream!!?? Like I said, I ate like a king today. I turned and complimented Sasha with, "Your wife is a very good cook.", and (of course) I told Anna the same thing, over and over I think. Then, after dinner and desert, they took me shopping at the trade center so that I could get some last minute souvenirs for my family. When we finished, I said my good byes to them and we went our separate ways. It was so nice of them to let me spend the day with their family and welcome me into their home. It's clear that I have made some lifelong friends today.
To Konstantin, Maxim, Alex M., Alex S., Anna A., Sasha, and Lil' Maxim: Thank you for a great day!! :)
Friday, February 08, 2008
Novosibirsk - Day 17
Today rocked! Literally.
I woke up at 7:30 and got ready to head out the door for the Chocolat. This place is gonna miss me! All of the waitresses know me by my face now and actually bring me a "menu engleski" as soon as I walk in the door. Honestly I don't know why really, because I pretty much order the same thing every time. I either order the ham & cheese omelet or the fried eggs. Of course, I always get the "fruncheski press", which is basically a small pitcher of water with coffee beans in it. The top has a stem on it that you "press" down on after so long... Ok, this isn't making any sense, I'm sure... Basically, they grind up coffee beans and put it in this small pitcher of water and the beans float on top of the water making it browner and browner by the minute (aka: making the coffee). The stem on the top actually has a filter on the bottom of it, and after 4 minutes, you slowly push down on this stem which (of course) pushes the ground up coffee beans to the bottom. At this point, you have a small pitcher of coffee sitting above the filter. I'll try to take a picture of it on Monday before I leave and post it to my blog. It's only fair since it's really all I've been drinking over here (along with water, beer, and chai (aka: tea)).
Scott and I decided to call Semyon to join us and he said to go ahead and order him the usual (fried eggs and a latte). I actually struggled with this order because it's not actually on the menu, but I order it all the time. Typically the waitresses know enough English to understand "fried eggs", but this waitress didn't speak any English, and I had to bust out the handy-dandy dictionary to assist us all through this process. We nailed it after looking up 3 words (ham, eggs, beans). :) When Semyon got there, we had a blast. We taught him a few English phrases that he had never heard before. We made sure to tell him that when he uses this phrase, he can NOT forget the word "with". :)
While we were sitting in the cafe finishing our coffee, Ivan showed up with his son and I was able to snap a photo of them together. It's unfortunate that I don't have a picture of him with his wife, but I'm very happy that I was able to get a picture of him with his son. Sorry Ivan, I forgot his name already! :( Please comment below if you read this. :)
So, after breakfast Scott and I took the mashrutka (a minivan with seats) to work and I stayed busy pretty much all day. Rather than giving Scott his daily "tennis lesson" on the Nintendo Wii, I was given a "table tennis lesson" by Sergey P... Man, this guy is good! It started out as a friendly game of table tennis (aka: ping pong) between Alex M. and I. It got serious when Sergey P. showed up with his ping pong paddle. I was able to play a few games with Lena, Semyon, and Alex M., before getting schooled by Sergey P. He litterally put the smack down on me. I wish I had video of this guys ping pong skills. He's damn good! I was able to steal a few points here and there, but it was mostly luck. :)
Oh, don't let me forget to wish Alex S. a happy birthday. He turned 24 today! We had a party for him in the break room with cake. I was very surprised to learn that nobody sang for him!? I actually sang the song by myself in front of everybody as I was teaching it to Oleg and I'm sure they got a kick out of it. "They" being most of the DataWorks crew. :) The best part about the party is that we all at cake on "mexican paper plates", which was literally plates made of paper. In other words, they were pieces of paper folded in half with a piece of cake laid on them. :) Alex, I bet you didn't think I was going to use this picture, did you!? Happy Birthday man! :)
So the rest of the day @ work was busy / productive / fun, then I got a ride home from Konstantin. This is where I pause and explain how good of a friend Konstantin has become. Before I came over here, I explained to him over Skype that I wanted to run in a race so that I could get a "Russian bib number". A bib number (for those that don't know) is basically just a flemzy piece of paper that runners get when they run a race. Over the last year, I've been collecting them from the various races I've ran and I have a small bundle of them in my basement that really serve no purpose. Anyway, when I told this to Konstantin over Skype many weeks ago, he contacted his mom, and asked her to make me one. Well, today he gave it to me and I am so impressed by it. It is very... what's the word... PERFECT! I could not have asked for a better bib number, or a better (new) friend. Thanks again Konstantin!! You are what us Americans call "Good People!" Please don't forget to send me your mothers address in an email, so that I can send her a postcard... yes, that's right, I said a "POSTCARD!" :)
After Konstantin dropped me off, it was time for me to turn right back around and leave again. A few days ago I had asked the guys at work where I could find some live music before I left Akademgorodok in a few days. I was looking to see any live music really. Being a musician it's just fun to go see other musicians entertaining, and I wanted to see the live Russian music scene. As soon as I asked them, they immediately pointed me to Julia. I guess she's well trained in all the details of such places. Julia got on the case immediately and booked a table at a the Нии Куда (pronounced "nee kooda" which means nowhere). This place is actuall one floor below the "Prime Time" sports bar that the support crew took me to on Day 14. It ended up being Julia , "The Anna's" (Anna A. (aka: Ushanka Anna) and Anna M.), mysef, and Anna A.'s husband, Sasha. I was very happy that Sasha came along for the ride too. Not only is he fun to hang out with, but he helped me not be the only guy! :)
Tonight was "Irish Band Night"! I was elated!! I love Irish music. My sister turned me on to a few Irish bands over the years; namely Gaelic Storm and The Elders. Every year, the whole family goes to Dayton for their annual Celtic Fest. If you've never been to this, you really should go! We take the girls every year and will be taking them again this year... Check out one of the movies that I uploaded to YouTube from last years event: Dayton Celtic Festival 2007
Trust me, Irish music, Irish beer, and an Irish atmosphere make for a good time! Needless-to-say, I was excited for this night to get started. :)
When we got there, I ordered my "farst pint ah Guinness" as we got settled in right beside the band. Our table was in the back right corner of the club, which was literally... "right beside the band". The name of the band tonight was Fire Water Folks and when they came out, they immediately began with their Celtic music and I formed "perma-grin" (no, it wasn't the Guinness at this point). This band was awesome! They were a bunch of Russians, singing Irish songs, in English. I didn't care how weird the whole scenario was, I loved it! They are made up of an accordion player, a bass guitarist, a singer / guitarist, and the drummer. Of course, the drummer was awesome (you had to expect such a statement from another drummer). He had total control of his kit and really drove the band the entire time. The crowd was totally into it and I (personally) was having a great time!! There were even some Celtic dancers that got up and danced the famous "I have no arms, just crazy legs" Irish dance moves.
Half way through the show, some of Julia's friends joined us (another Julia and Nina); they were very nice. I learned lots of Russian tonight and shared lots of English in return. After tonight, Sasha is officially my new "ruskie bradt" (aka: Russian brother). I told him that when he and Anna come to the states, they have to come visit me on my farm and meet my family. He has cousins that live in Pennsylvania, so this is very possible, I hope. We all took turns yelling back and forth at each other over the music and had a great time.
One of the highlights of the night (then I'll wrap up my post, I promise :)) was getting to actually meet the band. Anybody that knows me, knows that I just don't care... Anna wanted to get a picture of the band behind the stage (aka: behind us), so I went with her and we got to meet them. They all spoke pretty good English and really appreciated our enthusiasm (aka: drunkenness). I commended the drummer on his skills and told them all that I really enjoyed their music. I was also happy to know that they had heard of Gaelic Storm. They asked me how their English accent because they really wanted to make it sound "authentic", to which I (of course) said it was awesome... even though... whatever. Anna's husband took some pictures for us with the entire band (including the sound guy) and I walked away with a night too remember.
Well, sorry for the short post!! What else is there to say? Thanks Julia, Anna A., Anna M., Sasha, other Julia, and Nina!! I had a great night!! :)
Russian Words
And... lastly, here's my icestache (it looks like snot, but it'sss not):
I woke up at 7:30 and got ready to head out the door for the Chocolat. This place is gonna miss me! All of the waitresses know me by my face now and actually bring me a "menu engleski" as soon as I walk in the door. Honestly I don't know why really, because I pretty much order the same thing every time. I either order the ham & cheese omelet or the fried eggs. Of course, I always get the "fruncheski press", which is basically a small pitcher of water with coffee beans in it. The top has a stem on it that you "press" down on after so long... Ok, this isn't making any sense, I'm sure... Basically, they grind up coffee beans and put it in this small pitcher of water and the beans float on top of the water making it browner and browner by the minute (aka: making the coffee). The stem on the top actually has a filter on the bottom of it, and after 4 minutes, you slowly push down on this stem which (of course) pushes the ground up coffee beans to the bottom. At this point, you have a small pitcher of coffee sitting above the filter. I'll try to take a picture of it on Monday before I leave and post it to my blog. It's only fair since it's really all I've been drinking over here (along with water, beer, and chai (aka: tea)).
Scott and I decided to call Semyon to join us and he said to go ahead and order him the usual (fried eggs and a latte). I actually struggled with this order because it's not actually on the menu, but I order it all the time. Typically the waitresses know enough English to understand "fried eggs", but this waitress didn't speak any English, and I had to bust out the handy-dandy dictionary to assist us all through this process. We nailed it after looking up 3 words (ham, eggs, beans). :) When Semyon got there, we had a blast. We taught him a few English phrases that he had never heard before. We made sure to tell him that when he uses this phrase, he can NOT forget the word "with". :)
While we were sitting in the cafe finishing our coffee, Ivan showed up with his son and I was able to snap a photo of them together. It's unfortunate that I don't have a picture of him with his wife, but I'm very happy that I was able to get a picture of him with his son. Sorry Ivan, I forgot his name already! :( Please comment below if you read this. :)So, after breakfast Scott and I took the mashrutka (a minivan with seats) to work and I stayed busy pretty much all day. Rather than giving Scott his daily "tennis lesson" on the Nintendo Wii, I was given a "table tennis lesson" by Sergey P... Man, this guy is good! It started out as a friendly game of table tennis (aka: ping pong) between Alex M. and I. It got serious when Sergey P. showed up with his ping pong paddle. I was able to play a few games with Lena, Semyon, and Alex M., before getting schooled by Sergey P. He litterally put the smack down on me. I wish I had video of this guys ping pong skills. He's damn good! I was able to steal a few points here and there, but it was mostly luck. :)
Oh, don't let me forget to wish Alex S. a happy birthday. He turned 24 today! We had a party for him in the break room with cake. I was very surprised to learn that nobody sang for him!? I actually sang the song by myself in front of everybody as I was teaching it to Oleg and I'm sure they got a kick out of it. "They" being most of the DataWorks crew. :) The best part about the party is that we all at cake on "mexican paper plates", which was literally plates made of paper. In other words, they were pieces of paper folded in half with a piece of cake laid on them. :) Alex, I bet you didn't think I was going to use this picture, did you!? Happy Birthday man! :)So the rest of the day @ work was busy / productive / fun, then I got a ride home from Konstantin. This is where I pause and explain how good of a friend Konstantin has become. Before I came over here, I explained to him over Skype that I wanted to run in a race so that I could get a "Russian bib number". A bib number (for those that don't know) is basically just a flemzy piece of paper that runners get when they run a race. Over the last year, I've been collecting them from the various races I've ran and I have a small bundle of them in my basement that really serve no purpose. Anyway, when I told this to Konstantin over Skype many weeks ago, he contacted his mom, and asked her to make me one. Well, today he gave it to me and I am so impressed by it. It is very... what's the word... PERFECT! I could not have asked for a better bib number, or a better (new) friend. Thanks again Konstantin!! You are what us Americans call "Good People!" Please don't forget to send me your mothers address in an email, so that I can send her a postcard... yes, that's right, I said a "POSTCARD!" :)
After Konstantin dropped me off, it was time for me to turn right back around and leave again. A few days ago I had asked the guys at work where I could find some live music before I left Akademgorodok in a few days. I was looking to see any live music really. Being a musician it's just fun to go see other musicians entertaining, and I wanted to see the live Russian music scene. As soon as I asked them, they immediately pointed me to Julia. I guess she's well trained in all the details of such places. Julia got on the case immediately and booked a table at a the Нии Куда (pronounced "nee kooda" which means nowhere). This place is actuall one floor below the "Prime Time" sports bar that the support crew took me to on Day 14. It ended up being Julia , "The Anna's" (Anna A. (aka: Ushanka Anna) and Anna M.), mysef, and Anna A.'s husband, Sasha. I was very happy that Sasha came along for the ride too. Not only is he fun to hang out with, but he helped me not be the only guy! :)
Tonight was "Irish Band Night"! I was elated!! I love Irish music. My sister turned me on to a few Irish bands over the years; namely Gaelic Storm and The Elders. Every year, the whole family goes to Dayton for their annual Celtic Fest. If you've never been to this, you really should go! We take the girls every year and will be taking them again this year... Check out one of the movies that I uploaded to YouTube from last years event: Dayton Celtic Festival 2007
Trust me, Irish music, Irish beer, and an Irish atmosphere make for a good time! Needless-to-say, I was excited for this night to get started. :)
When we got there, I ordered my "farst pint ah Guinness" as we got settled in right beside the band. Our table was in the back right corner of the club, which was literally... "right beside the band". The name of the band tonight was Fire Water Folks and when they came out, they immediately began with their Celtic music and I formed "perma-grin" (no, it wasn't the Guinness at this point). This band was awesome! They were a bunch of Russians, singing Irish songs, in English. I didn't care how weird the whole scenario was, I loved it! They are made up of an accordion player, a bass guitarist, a singer / guitarist, and the drummer. Of course, the drummer was awesome (you had to expect such a statement from another drummer). He had total control of his kit and really drove the band the entire time. The crowd was totally into it and I (personally) was having a great time!! There were even some Celtic dancers that got up and danced the famous "I have no arms, just crazy legs" Irish dance moves.
Half way through the show, some of Julia's friends joined us (another Julia and Nina); they were very nice. I learned lots of Russian tonight and shared lots of English in return. After tonight, Sasha is officially my new "ruskie bradt" (aka: Russian brother). I told him that when he and Anna come to the states, they have to come visit me on my farm and meet my family. He has cousins that live in Pennsylvania, so this is very possible, I hope. We all took turns yelling back and forth at each other over the music and had a great time.
One of the highlights of the night (then I'll wrap up my post, I promise :)) was getting to actually meet the band. Anybody that knows me, knows that I just don't care... Anna wanted to get a picture of the band behind the stage (aka: behind us), so I went with her and we got to meet them. They all spoke pretty good English and really appreciated our enthusiasm (aka: drunkenness). I commended the drummer on his skills and told them all that I really enjoyed their music. I was also happy to know that they had heard of Gaelic Storm. They asked me how their English accent because they really wanted to make it sound "authentic", to which I (of course) said it was awesome... even though... whatever. Anna's husband took some pictures for us with the entire band (including the sound guy) and I walked away with a night too remember.Well, sorry for the short post!! What else is there to say? Thanks Julia, Anna A., Anna M., Sasha, other Julia, and Nina!! I had a great night!! :)
Russian Words
- Egg = яйцо (pronounced "ij-tso")
- Ham - Окорок (pronounced "o-korok")
- Beans -бобы (pronounced "bop")
- Drum - барабан (pronounced "ba-ra-bahn")
- Shooah - Sure (It's actually English, but all Russians say it with the elongated "oo", including Julia) :)
And... lastly, here's my icestache (it looks like snot, but it'sss not):
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Super Mario Drummer
While digging around for more Wii ideas on YouTube, I found a video that had to be shared. This guy puts funky beats to to old school songs that everybody knows:
He has tons of drumming beats to old school songs (like Simpsons, MacGyver, and more). Pretty cool...
He has tons of drumming beats to old school songs (like Simpsons, MacGyver, and more). Pretty cool...
Saturday, January 12, 2008
CodeMash v2.0.0.8
Well, CodeMash 2008 is over and... Wow, what a great event! I had an absolute blast this year. Last year I took the family and we had a great time, this year I took my other family (aka: James, Pilgrim, and Zach). I learned a lot, drank a lot, did lots of drumming, and I fell "head over heals" in love with RockBand.
Wednesday
We started off from the office around 2:30 and made it to Kalahari Resort by around 5pm or so. By the time we got there and got everything in our rooms (clothes, rock band stuff, and my drumset crap) it was about 6pm, so we went down to the booth and hung out for a while. It was great seeing everybody again and we all stood around and "networked" for a few minutes. Once we got our booth setup, we decided to run to WalMart so I could get a watch and we could get Pilgrim some drugs for his cold... Yeah, I had forgotten my watch at home and I felt completely naked, so I bought a $5 analog watch to tide me over til I got back to my digital running watch. By the time we got back to the Kalahari, the evenings events were done as far as CodeMash went, so we went to the room and began drinking beer and played RockBand... That game ROCKS!! James had some cheat codes to get all possible songs and we ended up playing it til about 1:30am.
Thursday
The next morning, we got down to the booth and the event was in full bloom. Geeks were coming out of the woodwork and I felt right at home. :) We talked to a few people about who we were and met a few of our customers. I quickly found out that the only way to get people to take our books was to jump out in the middle of the mix and force our material into their hands. Once I made eye contact with them, they would ask questions about the company, I would tell them about what we did, showed a couple of demos and told them to download an eval and see for themselves. I was amazed at how many people were from Columbus. It seemed like the most popular place as far as I could tell from all the attendees I talked with.
I saw Scott Hanselman wondering the halls and I approached him with an extended hand. I told him I loved his podcast and we talked about his last show with Rory Blyth / Chris Sells. :) It was hilarious; if you haven't heard it yet, check it out! He actually gave me a "Private Invitation" to his expert panel talk during lunch, but I decided to use that time to iron out my speach for the Vendor Sessions. It payed off too, because I felt very comfortable during my session and people in the audience actually gave me a good review... I know this because they had 'evaluation forms' they had to fill out and I read them. :)
Speaking of RockBand and Scott Hanselman, I got to jam with him and he commended me on my (rather crappy) RockBand drum skills. He played guitar while I played drums, then he sat and watched a couple of songs that I ended up playing with others. It was pretty cool to see him hanging out with all of us and "geeking out" with all of us geeks.
At the end of the day CodeMash had a party and they offered a jam session for all of the musicians that brought their instruments. There were a couple of people that brought guitars and Zach brought his Bass, so we got to jam out for quite a while. It was a lot of fun and I met a lot of cool people that night. Of course the night ended in a drunken haze (long island ice tea is th'shit) and of course it ended with even more RockBand and pizza. We had a blast!
Friday
We all woke up and got out stuff packed and loaded into the cars. By the time we got to the booth, we still had some time for the breakfast and it was soooooo good after the night of drinking (I chowed). We saw a couple of cool sessions and talked to a lot of people in the halls about our products. The ending raffle was a blast. So much stuff was given away at this raffle and it was a lot of fun.
Things I learned:
- Corey Haines has some mad musical talent
- Harmonica + Guitar + Vocals
- F# is fun and very powerful. I'll be learning it this year for sure!
- Silverlight is actually fairly easy to use... once you know a few tips.
- Zach is a guitar whiz and James is a damn good singer in RockBand!
- Bring a gaming console to your booth when you exhibit at CodeMash!
Props to all the organizers that put CodeMash on: Jim Holmes, Brian Prince, Jason Gilmore, Jason Follas, Jeff Blankenburg, Josh Holmes, Dianne Marsh, John Hopkins, Brian Sherwin, and Chris Woodruff.
We'll be seeing you next year! :)
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
CodeMash Theme Song
There has been some discussion on the CodeMash discussion board about a jam session this year: Music at the conference?
After reading the thread, I saw where nobody had voluteered for drum-duty, so I did. I'm pretty excited about this, to say the least. I'm going to try and talk James into either singing or bringing his saxophone. :)
Flashback: Many years ago, Data Dynamics took a trip to San Fransisco and there was a band playing at one of the Microsoft after-hour events (making some pretty good money, I'm sure). We were all mingling about with our drinks in hand, and I went up to meet the band. I was talking to them (in between songs) and asked if I could sit in on the drums for one of their songs... surprisingly they let me! I'll never forget that. They announced my name and stated that I work for Data Dynamics (free publicity) before we played and then we ended up playing "Brown-Eyed Girl" for the crowd. The people I was traveling with (Tim & Ferhat, if I remember correctly) couldn't believe I even asked. :) I think Ferhat even took pictures (?). This was all before I was blogging of course, or this would have DEFINITELY made it on my blog.
Ok, back to present day... I'm hoping somebody will bring a digital camera and we could record the CodeMash theme song. :) If all goes well, we may end up travelling around the world opening for various pop stars... Ok, maybe not. Anyway, Scott is preparing a keynote presentation to tie many things together and he plans to stick around afterwards to talk to people and answer tough questions. This ought to be a great event. :)
After reading the thread, I saw where nobody had voluteered for drum-duty, so I did. I'm pretty excited about this, to say the least. I'm going to try and talk James into either singing or bringing his saxophone. :)
Flashback: Many years ago, Data Dynamics took a trip to San Fransisco and there was a band playing at one of the Microsoft after-hour events (making some pretty good money, I'm sure). We were all mingling about with our drinks in hand, and I went up to meet the band. I was talking to them (in between songs) and asked if I could sit in on the drums for one of their songs... surprisingly they let me! I'll never forget that. They announced my name and stated that I work for Data Dynamics (free publicity) before we played and then we ended up playing "Brown-Eyed Girl" for the crowd. The people I was traveling with (Tim & Ferhat, if I remember correctly) couldn't believe I even asked. :) I think Ferhat even took pictures (?). This was all before I was blogging of course, or this would have DEFINITELY made it on my blog.
Ok, back to present day... I'm hoping somebody will bring a digital camera and we could record the CodeMash theme song. :) If all goes well, we may end up travelling around the world opening for various pop stars... Ok, maybe not. Anyway, Scott is preparing a keynote presentation to tie many things together and he plans to stick around afterwards to talk to people and answer tough questions. This ought to be a great event. :)
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
O Sweet Static - CD's for Sale
The ever famous O Sweet Static CD's are in and available for purchase. :)So if you don't already know, I was in a rock band for a few years and we did a bunch of gigs out at many of the local bar scenes in Columbus. We played at Whiskey Dicks, Little Brothers, Club 202, OldFields on High, just to name a few. We also played some private party's as well that were more low key unless you were in our "groupie" click. :)
Here's to all my peeps: Woody, Steve, Eric, Jay, Pete, Jon Chinn @ Workbook Studio, & Bonnie Young @ BYoungDesigns... It's done!
So basically, if you like rock and roll and you dig funky drumming, buy this CD. I'm trying to get $10 a pop out of them if possible. Of course, I've been selling them pretty cheap to my coworkers and those that were there for me when it was all going down (family & friends). Truth be told though, $10 isn't that bad for the quality of product that you would be buying. It comes shrink wrapped, it's all arted out, and has all the lyrics inside so you can sing along. I'd pay $10 for it... if I hadn't already spent @#$@#% on it already. Let's just say that it cost a hell of a lot more than $10 to make 'em! :)
As the drummer, my favorites are probably Love Drugs & Bombs, Anger Management, Hazy, & Summer Fun. Ok, I guess I forgot Tripping Along, Conversation 29, and Carnival. But then there's also Attitude, Beautiful Thing, Alcohol, & Mild Concussion, oh hell, they're all good! Honestly, they all have their own hook in them. The more you listen to them, the more you'll like them.
When we played at gigs, we did a couple of songs that aren't on the album. Therefore if we ever get together and do another album (very unlikely), you can expect to see songs like SoundCheck, Anthem, Ode to Fans, State Your Claim, and a few others. All of which are very fun songs that didn't make it on the album. I do have some studio clips of them in my iTunes that are un-mastered. If you're interested in these, let me know and I can post them on my site for you to listen to.
Ok, if you're interested in getting your hands on our CD, send me an email. I have tons! I'd be happy to get you hooked up with this disc (lucas (at) hardbarger (dot) com). We put a lot of time and effort into this thing and we are all real happy with how it turned out! Note that if the album artwork looks confusing and "dark", fear not, for it was intended to look this way. Always remember to "never judge a book by it's cover". Most all of our songs are actually bright and fun!!
Check out our GarageBand demos if you don't believe me: http://www.garageband.com/artist/osweetstatic
Friday, November 02, 2007
My Guitar Hero
I know I haven't blogged in a while, and that is about to change, cause I have a backlog of things that need blogged. However, this is very blog worthy post for a comeback.
Tonight, I logged in to do some PCing, and James sent me a link to his buddy's guitar hero video on YouTube. This guy's name is Adam and I've met him before. At that time I had no idea he had mad-jammin-chops. Well... I'll let the video speak for Adam now:
From now on, whenever I'm in the room with this guy, he will be known only as "Mr. Guitar Hero".
Rock on Adam!.. I mean... Mr Guitar Hero, sir.
Tonight, I logged in to do some PCing, and James sent me a link to his buddy's guitar hero video on YouTube. This guy's name is Adam and I've met him before. At that time I had no idea he had mad-jammin-chops. Well... I'll let the video speak for Adam now:
From now on, whenever I'm in the room with this guy, he will be known only as "Mr. Guitar Hero".
Rock on Adam!.. I mean... Mr Guitar Hero, sir.
Monday, June 18, 2007
NPR : Nigerian Artist is a One-Man Body Beating Band
I'm an avid NPR podcast listener. Today they had a story about a One-Man Body Beating Band (~4 minutes). It was about a Nigerian Artist named Jojo Bodybeats who just makes funky beats all day long with his hands, mouth, feet, chest, throat, etc... Here is his website: jojobodybeats.com
WoW!... and I thought I had rhythm.
I beat-box all day, everyday so I could really relate to this guy. I'm not as crazy about it as he is (sneezing to a beat, coughing to a beat, etc...), but I'm always finding myself tapping on stuff and beat-boxing as I walk around the house. I have cooler beats come from my mouth than I do my hands and feet, but I can do some pretty cool things just from being a drummer for so many years. Jennifer has actually started to get some pretty funky rhythms herself, and I (honestly) take all the credit for them. :) She has to listen to me everyday and I can tell that, over the years, she has begun doing it as well. She'll be picking up the kids stuff and she'll break out some funky lisps with her mouth.
Lizzie and Jazzy are always asking me:
Daddy, how you do dat?My response is usually:
Mirrors....they always buy it and just say:
Cool
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