I'm ba-a-ack!

Okay. Reunion. Check. Thanksgiving. Check. Life's million distractions. Check.

Studio: FINALLY next on the list. Come hell or high water, see you tomorrow! If I'm NOT blogging tomorrow, I've been abducted by aliens. Seriously.

Zzzzzz...

Well this week is turning into a dud, studio-wise. A friend is moving, I am going to Washington state for a reunion/birthday party, and I just got back from an overnight vacation to Borrego Springs with my hubby, it was so relaxing!!

Next week I'll get back in the saddle!

Mechanical Music

Okay, I did it!! I now have mechanical licensing for "I Put a Spell on You" and "If He Walked into my Life," AND I just signed up for Nimbit, which is a kind of pay pal account for downloading music. Now for the first time I can actually market and sell my tunes, whether originals or cover tunes. I'm signed up and paid up, now all I have to do is download (I think I mean upload) the songs to my "store." I haven't figured that part out yet, that's my homework for today. Its cool, I can have a Nimbit "store" on my website, facebook, Itunes, and Amazon (I think!) Cool, huh?? I'll keep you posted! Maybe I can have it on this blog too, I don't know! Heck, I'll just get a billboard and be done with it! And I'll be on every McDonalds french fry box! The world is my oyster!! Bwahaha!!! Actually, I think web and itunes will suffice, I just have to figure it out.

I... am on a Fact Finding Mission. Where's my safari hat?

If anyone is remotely interested in the $$ of it all, it cost me $25 a song for mechanical royalties per song (to sell up to a hundred, then it goes up.) Then its $10 a month for the store, plus Itunes and Amazon take a percentage of retail per song. I think the going rate for me to charge is 99 cents per song download. What do you think-- does that sound fair?

Oh, and I recorded the tracks to "The Thrill is Gone" this morning. Vocals tomorrow! I think I need to do at least a few blues tunes in a row next, and with live players (not dead ones, that's for my Halloween album.) I could potentially be in a Blues festival in the Spring and I need some recordings to audition with. And a band with blistering chops. Yay, an excuse to get cracking! I always work best under pressure and with a deadline. I'm thinking a very small band. Drums, maybe an upright bass, and guitar. One more, for solos. Hmm. Sax? Very bluesy. I like fiddles too, they're cool! Oh heck, bring on the Philharmonic! (I have a very vivid imagination!)

This one's for you, sis!

Well, I started this blog a week ago, and now I have two songs. Two songs a week? That's a hundred songs in a year. I think I'll call that my goal. I notice that I can only put one song on this blog, so I'll always put the newest song on, and the other song(s) you'll be able to find on You Tube, under rosewinters4.

I am so glad my sis asked for this song, "If He Walked into my Life," I had forgotten how pretty that song is. And since it was featured in the musical Mame, I now have a new category: Showtunes! That's two categories, the other being Halloween. First category to hit ten tunes gets a CD printed!

Oh, and you know something funny? I got another request! Wouldnt it be funny if my blog turned into a request blog?! That's what I do at my gigs!!

To hear "If He Walked into My Life" just click on my profile and check the audio clip towards the top.

I have a little red notebook I call my bible, where every time I run into a problem in my studio, and SOLVE it, the answer goes in that red book. That way if the same glitch happens again a month later (which it will) I can remember what the heck I did to fix the problem! And I am LOVING my red book! It's saving my bootie time and again, and every day I add something new to it. I appreciate my past self for writing my fix-its and saving my present self all that grief! "Thank you, past self!" ...Hey, if I write something to my future self now, and tomorrow I read it, wouldn't that be like time travel, soft of? Here goes: "Future self, you are really dumb, you never remember what I write in the red book!"

By the way, me and my husband laughed all night and couldn't sleep, because of the question I am about to pose. Here's the situation:

I used that expression, "I laughed so hard I peed my pants." (I didn't really, it was just an expression... no... really...)

Anyway, he said, "You can't pee your pants, you pee in your pants."

The debate began and lasted two hours, and we laughed so hard that... well you get the picture. So which one is it?? (I know I'm right, it's baby talk for goodness' sake!)

Ouch!

My head hurts! My head gasket blew so I have to figure out if I'm getting a new car or fixing the old one. (Worry worry, fret fret.) Then I decided to switch my website to a more web-builder friendly version (mine is too javascriptish programmy.) so I spent hours with tech support TRYING to get past the pop-up/java/security settings/google chrome/firefox/explorer compatibility problems. Enough is enough. Forget webwork, I am supposed to be on a mission!!

So I tossed it all aside and walked into my studio.

You know how when you get really, truly frustrated with life, and then you suddenly get to do something nice for someone you love, (and/or vice versa) and suddenly everything is all better?

Well my sis did something really nice. She read my blog! She was the first one, I'm sure! And she wrote me back with a song request. So thats what I recorded today. I just finished the instrument tracks, and back in the studio I go for the vocals! I'll see if I can get it up and posted by tomorrow.

P.S. I'm working on the mechanical royalties thing.

I know I said no work on Sunday, but I have fine Italian wine and Italian friends over speaking, what else, Hindi. Just kidding, Italian I mean!

Which made me want to blog, because last night the songs that stuck to my ribs were Besame Mucho (Spanish,) La Vie en Rose and Je ne Regrette Rien (French) and Mas que Nada (Portuguese.) I will put together an international "album." But what I'll really do is just individual songs, in all categories. The first category to reach ten produced songs gets the first CD. We'll just throw that pasta on the wall and see what sticks! I wonder which category will win? What do you think?

Okay okay, Thomas Edison invented the modern day light bulb. Silly me, we all know what Ben Franklin invented. It was the hundred dollar bill.

Time Keeps on Slippin' Slippin' Slippin'...

No, I didn't record that Steve Miller song, but I did just spend 4 hours solid trying to get "I Put a Spell on You" on the blog! Yes, thats 4 hours! Sheesh! But I love to learn and now I know what NOT to do!! AND... success! Benjamin Franklin had a hundred failures before he got the light bulb to work, so I'm in good company. To listen, go to my profile, and click on the audio clip that's towards the top.

Oh, and if I'm going to keep doing this, I realize now that I have to do the mechanical royalties thing so I can be on the up and up! For you musicians out there, check out HFA songfile for the scoop. So, though I was intending to just be a studio geek/artist, writing and playing to my hearts content, I'm ending up (today) doing computer geek stuff and (Monday) researching and paperworking legalities. Oh goody! Maybe I'll be back in the saddle by Tuesday. Sunday is sacred hubby territory, no music/work/geek stuff allowed. Just wonderful mushy stuff like sleeping in, making breakfast together, tending our (totally cool!!) garden and sitting on the deck watching the dolphins go by.

I'll get "Spell" polished up and re-posted, then on to my second song! What should it be?? Hmm. Last night I performed at Albies in Mission Valley, and a few songs really stuck to my ribs. "Some Enchanted Evening" has got to be the sweetest song on the planet. I like that Kid Rock/Sheryl Crowe song "Picture," it's really good for my voice. Even that old Sherell's song (how the heck do you spell Sherell?) "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow" is fun! Those stuck out last night. We'll see! What crazy impetuous thoughts stir in the subconscious of Rose? Mwa ha ha! We'll soon find out!

For Tech geeks only:

For all you tech geeks snickering at me, here's what took me 4 hours. I had my .wav file on a mac, I converted it using audacity to mp3 on my PC, then tried to make a URL out of it, first using my website builder Intuit program. No luck. So I tried to put it on my actual website. No go. So I tried to put it on You Tube, and FINALLY discovered you cant convert mp3 to URL, it has to be mpeg. I tried to convert using my Adobe Premiere Elements, only to find you HAVE to have a video, not just music, to convert to You Tube. So I got a still picture, but then I had to learn how to make a still picture last 4 1/2 minutes for a video. Out came the tech manual. Got it to work, dragged the wav file over, converted it, sent it to You Tube, copied and pasted the file to Blogspot and there you are. Now I know what to do next time and it will take me about 5 minutes. (Stop snickering already!)

Take One: I Put a Spell on You

Hi again!

Well, life keeps getting in the way, but by golly (I'm the only one left in the world who still says "By golly") I did it! Its not done yet but I was too excited, so here's the first take of "I put a Spell on You." I'll add some cool chains and creaks and maybe an Adam's family harpsicord (or a good old Hammond B 3) but for now you get the raw meat. I'll cook it later. Gotta go have a hot date with the hubby first, then to a gig. I'm at Albie's in Mission Valley tonight. Come on down, its a hoot! Hoot. I feel so foolish. I meant, of course, It's a hoot, by golly!

Oh, and check out my witchy photo! My friend Angelika did it, her web site is

www. photoimaginationart.com

She's amazing! (And she has one of those really cool Austrian accents.)

Oh, and for you tech geeks, I recorded everything with my Yamaha PSR 900 keyboard, and my Protools M Box II.

How many songs can I record in one year?

I'm a musician, and I've been in a slump for several years. I perform four nights a week, its what I do for a living. But I used to be a songwriter, I used to practically live in my studio. I know a thousand songs, literally, of other people's music.

But today, I decided to be "Un-slumpable." Or "Un-slumped." Hmm. Unslumpable sounds superhero-ish, I'll go with that one. (I'm the dork standing with my hands on my hips and the kitchen towel around my neck billowing in the wind.)

I think my breakthrough was simply to get rid of every single negative thought, emotion, fear, and worry. Strip it all away and what do you get? NOTHING TO LOSE!!! Yay for me!!

Since it was Halloween I learned a dozen new songs for my gig; Monster Mash, Witchy Woman, Witchcraft, etc. The song that really fit me though, was "I Put a Spell on You." I could really wail on that one, and I love the blues. I have that raspy blues thing going on.

So anyway, I had a revelation. WHY NOT just record MUSIC?? ANY music?? It will get my sea legs back in the studio. The writing will follow! Nowadays you don't even have to print CDs, you can just do the download thing. So instead of obsessing about "Should I write a blues album? Alternative? Punk? Acid? Country?" Instead of that, I'm just going to pick a song that sticks out when I'm singing it at a gig, and I'll march into my studio and record it. And instead of obsessing about "But I don't have a band! OMG!" I'll just record it myself, I'm a one man band anyway. And the musicians will come later, I have lots of extraordinarily talented friends.

Okay, I'm blathering now. So I'll get to the point. Today was the day, and I did it. I recorded "I Put a Spell on You." When I get it mixed down I'll see if I can figure out how to attach it to this blog. And then I'll pick the next song. Wish me luck!!