The well's running dry

I admit it: The well's running dry.

I'm running out of material.

I don't know what to say.

I can only be self-depreciative so much.

What next? Me saying something good about myself? Without qualifying it with my fears or the fact that while I'm good at some things, I'm horrible at others?

Hmm...

I have no funny stories to tell, and I guess in the 27 posts thus far, I've said more than enough negative about myself, so here's the goal for the final two posts after this one: No negative things to say about myself.

Will I succeed? Depends on if this entry qualifies with the first 27 or the last 2. If I count it with the first 27, then I'd say that I'm going to fail at this. If I count it with the last two, rather than predicting my own demise, I'd, well...I'd probably just leave the question unanswered and let time determine the future.

That's hard for me, honestly. And to prove this point, I present an anecdote.

My second lesson with Bill Kirchner, a fantastic man with whom I've grown very close and would like to think that he's at least taken me in in ways he hasn't with most other students.

I was working on an arrangement of "In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning" for four horns and rhythm section. I had no ideas, really, beyond anything that I thought to be mundane. So Bill told me all of the great things that are available that are seldom used. We spent nearly 50 minutes of hour lesson (that ran close to 1h15m) listening to recordings and me taking notes.

Finally, Bill looks and says, "Let's see what you've got." So I showed him the first 16 measures of this arrangement. He turned on his keyboard and struck perhaps 6 notes just to get the sounds in his ear of certain chords I had written.

"You have all of what we talked about right here in the first eight measures! What's wrong with you?!"

"Self-hating Jew?"

And Bill, in the sharp, dry way that only he can deliver a line like this, without missing a beat said, "I'll forgive the redundancy."

Incidentally, the arrangement I had written there came out in performance in December as, well, less than stellar. So I re-wrote it completely and it was re-recorded (for the first time...there was technical difficulties the first time, which is why there was the second reading session) in June and it sounded fantastic. Of the original arrangement, I kept 8 measures, and not the ones Bill commented on.

And with that story, I take this pledge right here, to you, the blogstablishment and the blogizens of the blogosphere -- that I, Alexander S. Yellen, the first, will not be my usual self-hating self...

When writing in my blog...

For two days...

I hope...