Piano and Apples

It's been a few days since I've updated my blog. Last Saturday, I was able to attend my nephew's football game. Jeremiah is a Nose Tackle and looks so much bigger than the other kids on the team, it's almost unfair.


He's turning 9 at the end of this month, but he's weighed more than I do for nearly 2 years. His arms are already bigger than mine! Now, at my size, that doesn't mean much (lol), but he's my "baby"!! It's continually amazing to me how fast he's growing up.



On Sunday, we had a more subdued piano party. There were only 4 of us present, but it was fun to at long last gather with the intention of musical feasting. Amy hosted again, and Maya, Ruslan and I showed up, played but mostly talked. I love piano parties (summits, when they’re more intense), sharing ideas with people as passionate (or moreso) as myself about the art, gaining insight from their experiences and discoveries. Hopefully, we can get them going on a more regular basis.

After the piano party, a few of us went to hear Ruslan play with Eric Benet. What a great show! I’d never seen Eric sing live, and was completely blown away by his voice, energy, rapport and charm with the audience (and…er…he ain’t hard to look at!). He and the band sounded incredible. Unfortunately, the sound engineer had Ruslan’s keys far too low, and the track (background vocals, sound effects, etc) far too loud, but what little we could hear of Ruslan was hot!







On Monday, my Mother showed her country-girl side! My apple tree has been bearing delicious fruit, but I failed to trim it last season, so the apples had been appearing far up in the tree, inaccessible by bare hand even with a step-stool. Mom devised a bucket on a stick contraption, and started climbing and grabbing fruit! She retrieved about 20 good, and 10 passable apples from the upper regions of the tree. She was born and raised in rural Mississippi, and despite having lived in California since she was 16 years old, I suppose the country never leaves! Mom was also kind enough to turn the passable fruit into a yummy (meaning not too sweet) apple pie for me! She’s just the best : >

Last night my cousins Tony and Dawn invited me at the last minute to go see Patrice Rushen playing with Brian Bromberg at Yoshi's. Patrice is so awesome. She has such a wonderful sense of groove and bridges the gap between funk, R&B and jazz perfectly! Dawn and Tony were both thrilled to meet her.