My first goal with this challenge was to get better with  a  lot of the webalizing. I can now Tweet,Reverb with the Nation,post YouTube videos and thanks to Bandzoogle have started to  create a website to replace the one I currently have. These are all works in progress but  progress it is . I’ve texted more in the last nine weeks that I ever have,and I’m happy to say that at this juncture I’m still shite at it but enjoy it more. My hat is off to all of you who are total wizzes at all of this and have incorporated it effectively into your career path.

My biggest new found joy from all of this has been blogging. I tend towards brevity as a songwriter so to stretch it out a bit has been tremendously satisfying. Yesterday I actually created a Blog series for myself “My First 12 Seconds with the Beatles” It incorporates 3 of the pieces that I wrote during the challenge and will regularly include more memories of some of my indelible musical experiences. It’s at www.rossdouglasblogs.blogspot.com. and I hope it spurs you to share some of yours- be they sublime or ridiculous..

I know we have been asked to provide the URLs for all of our past weekly reports. The trouble for me is that I sent almost all of them to the Facebook page rather than the SAC site-So sorry Ariel and Lily – the best I can do is refer you to www.rossdouglas.com/blog and you can scroll back through them there.

The real action I’ll be taking as a result of the week 9 challenge will to be tighten up all the stuff that became right for me from the first 8. To continue to fully integrate myself as an artist and a business.My main concern is to write music that I feel proud to promote and play it as often as possible. I’m 2 songs into a new album right now and want to crack off a few  more before the summer. So Newsletters and the special Ross Douglas Snow Globe of Love will have to wait for a while.Right now it’s time to create product.

I take away from this course tremendous respect and affection for my fellow SACCERS. I have looked forward every day to seeing your comments on how you have been doing. To those of you who have met with various musical successes during the past 9 weeks once again my heartiest congratulations. To all of you who have shared words with me about what I do and you do – thank you so much for it. Thank you to the perfectly imperfect Lily for keeping us informed as to what was next and where to send it. And to Ariel thank you for being the force that brought all of us together. I’m so much richer for it.

To all of you -  Bon Chance and Much Love.

She’d been told that by one of the bosses in her real estate business when she was down about not having sold a house in a while. She passed it on to me years ago when I was living in Toronto and moaning and groaning about my lack of work as as actor.

It’s a wonderfully flexible phrase. Over the years depending upon my mood it has meant “You gotta keep hustling.”   “Keep your eye on the prize” and my personal favorite when I’m feeling particularly mournful  “Get the lead out dumb ass!”.

That has been my continuum plan credo over the years. Keep shaking the tree.  In my case it’s 3  trees- I juggle voice work,acting,and various areas of music. They all take my attention – as these days none of them are a constant source of income. I do the daily scavenge and cobble together a living out of the various bits and pieces.

   A specific continuum plan for my music is somewhat in place. I put a few bucks each month into Jango and get my music played alongside,The Beatles,Tom Petty ,The Dixie Chicks and basically whoever I want to be heard with. Response has been excellent -I’ve had people become “fans” from all over the world -114 countries at last count -even had some guys serving in Iraq contact me which is very gratifying. Bit by bit small amounts of money come in.
My intention for the year is to play live as much as possible. That’s where the real good things happen. That’s what feels the best and generally tends to lead to more gigs. I’m part of the SAC songwriters circle in Vancouver. I’ve met good people there who have turned me on to various opportunities and helped me expand my horizons. I’m doing this course as a result of it and have been inspired by all of you.

I cannot possibly master all of the aspects of this course. But I do intend to continue blogging about the various pivotal musical experiences in my life. That has been terrific fun.I intend to up my You tube presence. A mini house concert  from Punto Roberto  I also intend to re-up my product to include download cards and remind all good souls how and where to get them.

 I forget who said it but it was pointed out that in musical theatre the songs are there because what needs to be said at that point cannot be said by words alone.

  So true.  I want to write songs I’m proud of that  do a lot of my talking for me. I shake the tree in my various ways to support that.

Finally I think Kat Leonard nailed it. To belly laugh. I love her for saying that. May all of my planning and shaking and playing and multinational intersocial webalizing take me there.

My blog has basically been my newsletter. And so it shall continue that way for the time being.

This week I  want to share one of my absolute favorite childhood musical memories. At about age 10 or so I played the trumpet as did my brother. We’d practice in the mornings before going to school. We had 2 dogs at the time – Flash- a German Shepherd who was dumb as topsoil and Charlie a little mutt spaniel who was a tough little SOB. They began to take keen interest in our playing. One day they started howling along with our practice and from then on not a session went by without Flash and Charlie launching into their version of the Hallelujah chorus as soon as the first trumpet tones reached their ears.

It got downright Pavlovian- to the point that as soon as they saw our trumpet cases come out they’d let out a few practice yips and do a bit of warming up with a few half moans just to loosen the tonsils. And then when we started playing they would really let er rip. To them it was the morning singalong and it was great.

So Christmas rolls around and the dogs and I are in the car at the little shopping complex near our home. My dad is in the hardware store getting some Christmas lights or something-the snow is lightly falling and it’s really feels quite seasonal. Down the walkway comes a makeshift brass band made up of various students and parents who have been traveling to the various small shopping places in the area and spreading festive cheer with a bit of music. They park themselves in front of the hardware store –right in front of our car.  They begin  O Come all ye Faithful

Flash and Charlie, who’d been snoozing in the back seat, spring to life! “Can it be? Bonus singalong time?”  Tilting their heads back and in sheer joy they launch (with now magnificent well practiced doggie voices) into  brilliant  canine accompaniment! In the distance, another dog, not to be outdone chimes in as well.

And so it was that  3 dogs did an absolutely rousing version of O Howl all ye Faithful with brass band accompaniment – only to be disappointed when the band decided to quickly relocate to a less Fido populated area.

But it was magic -they were dogs and they were singing. Bravo!

I come from a different place and have had a bit of a time finding music blogs I’d contribute to. There have been a few-but I found that  I’m actually helping things in reverse-that in my searching I’ve discovered a couple of great artists and a wonderful website  and want to give them more exposure.

So this may well be the beginning of The Goofy Uncle Blog series.  Nah-I’m too handsome.

Here are a couple of blogs/contributor sites

http://www.blogcritics.org/music

http://www.folkalley.com

And here are 3 things you must check out

http://www.aurgasm.us

http://www.toddburge.com

http://www.robertethington.com

it was not first love -it was not getting religion-it was not first obsession. I had become, within the course of  a single inventive triplet ending, embedded with an art form.

From those moments onward I’ve wanted to buy music and write songs.  I still have the first 3 singles I ever bought  All My Loving,She Loves you and I Wanna Hold your Hand and the first album Beatlemania 3 days later. I still have some of the shite young ripoffs of She Loves You somewhere. I wore out about a hundred batteries in my parents portable radio playing it under my pillow at night scanning every radio station within range for music(reception was better after 10 pm). And there were great and varied songs  to be heard -stuff from the Kinks,Dusty Springfield,The Stones,Millie Small,The Animals -and of course the Beach Boys The Lovin Spoonful and the Byrds. But only one group was best of the best.And I got them in one -hell less than one  - a tenth. They were first in and nobody else came close.

I can still remember defending them and scoffing at those who preferred The Dave Clark Five and other one or two  hit wonders who had British accents and knew 3 chords. Publishers seeing a quick buck even put put out a magazine -The Dave Clark Five versus the Beatles-  claiming that the DC Five were more popular. I was incensed -murderous!.

Over the next few years the need to sound as Liverpudlian as possible faded from my list of priorities. But the grand anticipation of a each new single or release grew and grew.  A Hard Days night -8 Days a Week, Yesterday,  Eleanore Rigby,  Nowhere Man, Yellow Submarine.  There it was-wit silliness,tragedy,love and angst all wonderfully produced and rendered each in less than 3 minutes.

Of course I went on to other things and have grown to deeply appreciate music and artists of every style. But nothing sits deeper in me than those 12 seconds or so.

Several years after the Beatles broke up another group came along to ignite me. One that anchored my 20′s and one I still admire today. But that’s another story.

I was a bartender in Vieques -a little island off the coast of Puerto Rico, for 6 months in 1990. At the time two thirds of it was used as a military base for all kinds of training and maneuvers. On weekends the soldiers were allowed to come into Esperanza and many of them hit the bars to get royally blitzed. I got to know quite a few of them -they were kids 19 20-I think the oldest of them were no more than 25. They’d get zonked on Mind Erasers and get picked up by a transport vehicle that would take them back to the base. They were respectful,fun and I liked them a lot.

A year later I’m back in Vieques at the bar just after the outbreak of the Gulf War. I’d been told that a lot of the guys from the Vieques base  were now there on the ground and I was thinking of them. The Super Bowl .was about to start and Miss Houston sang the National Anthem.

For those moments her voice touched the ears of God. For those moments every parent of an enlisted child sent their own soul to protect their loved ones. For those moments I thought of every one of the kids I’d met the year previous and prayed for their safe return.

In the midst of a massive production with jets flying overhead hers was the magnificent voice of humanity and it could not have been more perfect. I’ll remember her for that. She was never better.

Saturday was the day I slotted for cleaning up our property and I busted my ass at that for several hours. I loved the fresh air and a chance to build a fire and burn things . There’s a very basic contentment that settles in when you build and tend a fire over a number of hours .  But by about 4pm I was tired, smoky and ready to deal with my little music room that was a complete mess as I was rearranging things .

But Shite!  I realized earlier that I too had received the non updated version of the Challenge book.  Coming up with a YouTube video was the task at hand.   So here is one recorded on Saturday amongst the rubble of my room, bagged after a long week  and smelling like burnt alder.  All I had in me was goofiness so here’s a uke tune.-Kokanee Canary Canoe

http://www.youtube.com/rossd1785

So the week 4 challenge was approached with that attitude.

I confess to a jaundiced view of Twitter. I’ve seen too many self absorbed statements from some hyped up reality star being treated as hard news.

As I said in response to watching the Twitter in Plain English video.  I do not believe that life is what happens between blogs and that that is the reason you should Twitter.  Life is what happens when you’re not constantly writing about it .

Life needs it sweet mysteries. Life needs surprise .  I do not feel the need to be a 24 hour news cycle of myself.

But launching my opinions about Twitter without trying it would be wrong so I signed up .  I’m rossdouglas2u if anyone is interested and right now I ‘m patting my 3 legged cat named Mama.

I share pictures on Facebook- I don’t have thousands of pictures so Flickr’ is not yet something I need.  And most of the pictures are not of me –Mama features prominently.

I’m more drawn to the music sharing areas –so this week I created a Facebook band site and put some stuff up on Music Alley. I now for some reason have two Facebook band sites  and have not yet figured how to delete one of them so my technical brilliance continues.

When I get around to employing it I think the widget idea is a great one –updating everything in one fell swoop is very appealing.

But the fact is – I don’t have the time to make effective use of all this stuff.

To pursue all of it right now would be to create a clutter of things I may never get to.

So I’m picking one or two apples off the tree and leaving the others to bonk me on the head when I can make the best use of them.

I’m recording some new songs right now and that’s exciting  – working with new musicians, crafting tunes.   I’ll be sharing them in due course -in fact, if you’re reading this-send me your email address and I’ll send you a new tune.

And since I mentioned her a couple of times –Here’s a link to  Mama

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150249470887750&set=a.10150249470882750.328142.611482749&type=3

I’ve never been a blogger .My tendency has always been towards brevity-I privately kick myself in the ass about my inadequacies and scratch down song ideas in various  journals. So I’m greatly enjoying reading all of the entries from you seasoned blog practitioners. Jah love!

Folk,Celtic,Vaudeville,Showtunes and songs of murder all vying for equal time in a large voiced Beatles freak.  And then- there’s the Jazzy Elvis guy.

You can hear some complete tunes at www.soundcloud.com/rossdouglas

You can sample bits of all of my songs at www.rossdouglas.com.

Thanks for any and all feedback.

Cheers,

Ross