Creative Inspiration and The Hoff!

My contribution to Music Monday on Twitter, This is the funniest song that I've heard in a long, long time! Enjoy!

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Music. My Best Source of Inspiration

Music is my best source of inspiration, always has been. The songs I've loved since the 60s have laid the foundation for many of my drawings and paintings. The song I'm sharing with you all today is one that has provided the foundation for many of my paintings over the years. Listen to it and read along...you'll see what I mean. ;) Enjoy!

"A Whiter Shade Of Pale" - Procol Harum

We skipped the light fandango
Turned cartwheels cross the floor
I was feeling kinda seasick
But the crowd called out for more
The room was humming harder
As the ceiling flew away
When we called out for another drink
The waiter brought a tray

And so it was that later
As the miller told his tale
That her face, at first just ghostly,
Turned a whiter shade of pale
She said, there is no reason
And the truth is plain to see.
But I wandered through my playing cards
And would not let her be
One of sixteen vestal virgins
Who were leaving for the coast
And although my eyes were open
They might have just as wellve been closed
She said, Im home on shore leave,
Though in truth we were at sea
So I took her by the looking glass
And forced her to agree
Saying, you must be the mermaid
Who took neptune for a ride.
But she smiled at me so sadly
That my anger straightway died

If music be the food of love
Then laughter is its queen
And likewise if behind is in front
Then dirt in truth is clean
My mouth by then like cardboard
Seemed to slip straight through my head
So we crash-dived straightway quickly
And attacked the ocean bed

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Despite the Warnings...

Here are the lyrics of this song:


What about sunrise
What about rain
What about all the things
That you said we were to gain.. .
What about killing fields
Is there a time
What about all the things
That you said was yours and mine...
Did you ever stop to notice
All the blood we've shed before
Did you ever stop to notice
The crying Earth the weeping shores?

Aaaaaaaaaah Aaaaaaaaaah

What have we done to the world
Look what we've done
What about all the peace
That you pledge your only son...
What about flowering fields
Is there a time
What about all the dreams
That you said was yours and mine...
Did you ever stop to notice
All the children dead from war
Did you ever stop to notice
The crying Earth the weeping shores

Aaaaaaaaaaah Aaaaaaaaaaah

I used to dream
I used to glance beyond the stars
Now I don't know where we are
Although I know we've drifted far

Aaaaaaaaaaah Aaaaaaaaaaaah
Aaaaaaaaaaah Aaaaaaaaaaaah

Hey, what about yesterday
(What about us)
What about the seas
(What about us)
The heavens are falling down
(What about us)
I can't even breathe
(What about us)
What about the bleeding Earth
(What about us)
Can't we feel its wounds
(What about us)
What about nature's worth
(ooo,ooo)
It's our planet's womb
(What about us)
What about animals
(What about it)
We've turned kingdoms to dust
(What about us)
What about elephants
(What about us)
Have we lost their trust
(What about us)
What about crying whales
(What about us)
We're ravaging the seas
(What about us)
What about forest trails
(ooo, ooo)
Burnt despite our pleas
(What about us)
What about the holy land
(What about it)
Torn apart by creed
(What about us)
What about the common man
(What about us)
Can't we set him free
(What about us)
What about children dying
(What about us)
Can't you hear them cry
(What about us)
Where did we go wrong
(ooo, ooo)
Someone tell me why
(What about us)
What about babies
(What about it)
What about the days
(What about us)
What about all their joy
(What about us)
What about the man
(What about us)
What about the crying man
(What about us)
What about Abraham
(What was us)
What about death again
(ooo, ooo)
Do we give a damn
************************

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Freeze Frame!

Here are two more of my dance paintings, also of Michael Jackson. The first one, above, is my absolute favorite so far.

I love the way they all turned out so far. These too, are both from the video "Smooth Criminal (live)" which I have included in this post. :)

I love the stick figures because, first of all you can tell it is Michael, and secondly, because they show the energy behind the dance.

These canvas boards will be mounted on blocks of wood, and not framed, so that when they are hung, they will appear to be floating on the wall.
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It's the usual Sunday routine so far, plus I hope to be spiffing up my studio a bit later. It has to have it's picture taken this week and no way will I take pictures of it in its current state. lol ;) I know a lot of you have a studio like mine and understand what I'm talking about.

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Music + Dance = Color

It's Thursday and that means it is time to share what I created for the "Dreaming in Color" challenge put out by "Thursday Sweet Treat"!

This is the first time I've taken part in one of Natasha's challenges and I had a blast!

I entered two of the four paintings that I created for this challenge. This first one (above) is an abstract/line drawing of Michael Jackson caught in one of his steps in "Smooth Criminal".

Here's a video of "Smooth Criminal" (Incidently, the photo of MJ at top of the page is from a different video than the one I used.)

[note: when I made my submission, I had put that it was from "Dangerous", it should have been from "Smooth Criminal"] I created three of these types of paintings of him, all in different poses from 3 of his songs. I am only showing the one here for now. I have three more in progress. :)

The second submission I call "Musical Dreams". This symphony of color is in constant motion. Listen to it, enjoy the dance. :)

These paintings were done with acrylics on canvas board.

All for now! Have a great day!

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Video Sunday - Signature

Use Firefox browser to view the videos in my blog. In IE-based browsers, you may get an error box and the webpage will disappear when you click "OK".


Hope you enjoyed today's video. :)

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Interesting, IE Errors

Earlier today I had a post called "Video Sunday: The Soggy Bottom Boys", which had two YouTube videos -- one from the movie "O Brother, Where Art Thou", and one of the real Soggy Bottom Boys performing in Union Square. Every time my blog tried to load, an IE error popped up saying that it had to abort my page. Very frustrating, to say the least!

So, I finally deleted the post to see if that error box would still pop up. As luck would have it, the error box vanished when I deleted it. So now, I am sad and wondering if I will ever be able to embed YouTube videos on this blog again. I can't tell you how angry I was getting over those errors. I will try again probably next week. Hopefully it was just a bug that landed in my blog today and wont return.

Hope your weekend was a nice one!

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Remembering

Today is a very cold, grey, and gloomy day. Days like this always bring me down a lot. It is one of the reasons we are moving south to a much sunnier, and warmer, climate.

Anyway, while I was sitting here this morning I played some of my old favorites on YouTube and came across Peter Gabriel singing with Sinead O'connor, which then lead me to find one of my favorite songs by Sinead: "Nothing Compares to You".

This song is SO powerful and her voice is amazing. No matter how often I listen to this song, it still brings tears to my eyes. If you have ever lost someone you love it really hits home.

For some reason, most of the videos of her song on YouTube have been muted. I also have a video of her singing this live (also on YouTube).

Hope you enjoy this song today.

I'll be posting a bit later, the progress on my Steampunk Gourd that I wrote about in my last post.

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Gimme Steam (80s Flashback)

I've been so into listening to Peter Gabriel and watching his videos again. Boy, it's been awhile! I would love to meet the art director behind his videos someday, they are fabulous!

Anyway, on the subject of Steam...

Day 2 Steampunk gourd, originally uploaded by avision4.

I will be picking up where I left off on this gourd over the weekend. In my flickr album, you can see the progress shots up to this point here. After Sunday, I will post a couple more to show how much I got done this weekend.

Hope you enjoy the video as much as I do :)

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Reviving the Soul

In order to be truly happy, I need to express myself artistically. This is what I've found over the years. Art is theraputic, it is passion. But...

Music is another passion of mine, one that walks hand-in-hand with my art and one that has nearly dissappeared completely from my life. Music is what feeds my soul and I have been literally starving for the past few years.

I was a professional bassoonist for many years. Music and my bassoon is/was my first love. I started on a B flat clarinet and eventually had played all of the woodwinds thruout school, but the bassoon was my absolute favorite! It has been years since I've played now, but the music lives on inside of me.

When I am creating my art, I always had music playing in my studio, a mixture of symphonies and rock. It all varied, depending what I was working on, my mood, or a specific effect I was trying to achieve...until about five years ago.

My studio is in my basement...directly beneath our bedroom. He is dissabled and sleeps quite a bit during the day and also night. Yup, my music not only keeps him awake, it irritates him. :( Today, I think I've come to realize that I have been strangling myself, in a sense. I have been going thru so many creative blocks in the past few years and this latest one is the worst. So, now....*sigh*...what to do?

Headphones might work sometimes, but only when I am not wearing my respirator/mask (which I wear quite often). The problem with the headphones is while wearing them, I will not hear the phone, the door, or my daughter. They will also keep me tied to one small area. Bleh!

I do know that I NEED to get my music playing again and SOON or I will completely lose it!

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The gourd that I show in this post is entitled "Symphony".

The ribbon that travels thruout the piece is representative of the flow of the music. The symbols represent the intensity, and the cross-hatching that is evident around the entire piece represents the beat. As with a symphony, there are four movements to this particular piece.

I think that when I created this piece, it was my soul letting me know how much I miss and need music in my life. What do you think?
Have a creative day!

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