Instrumental Invasion, 4/27/22 April 28, 2022
Posted by Mike C. in Airchecks, Audio, Comics, Film, Internet, Jazz, Media, Music, Personal, Radio, Video.add a comment
The April 27 Instrumental Invasion on WCWP was recorded on March 8 (two segments) and 9 (four segments). A pickup was recorded on the 11th.
The playlist was created on March 5 and annotated on the 7th. The talk break script was drafted on the 8th, but I recorded the first segment after scripting its talk breaks.
The second and third talk breaks of the first segment were speed compressed, one more talk break than last February 3. I didn’t want to withhold anymore tidbits that I removed and wasn’t up to rerecording the breaks faster. I moved some of those tidbits to the first talk break of the second segment. The third and fourth segments had the opposite problem, which meant padding with extra liners and not having songs start underneath the talk-up.
The adamantium claws reference (with sound effect) after “Get Out Claws” by Oli SIlk was a nod to Wolverine from the X-Men.
This is the last show with the “no relation to” running gag. I employed it in some upcoming shows, but edited out all instances.
Here’s the Bob James Trio performance of “Feel Like Making Love/Night Crawler” that was extracted for use in Feel Like Making LIVE!:
If you want to see Scott Wilkie‘s “live” band perform “Fruit Sandwich,” you’ll have to buy the DVD.
As for last night’s show, click to download the aircheck MP3 or listen below:
April 22 parkway photos April 26, 2022
Posted by Mike C. in Aviation, Personal, Photography, Travel.add a comment
This post contains photos taken along Veterans Memorial Highway (Vets Highway) and four New York State Parkways while returning from a trip to St. James last Friday.
First, a photo of Breeze Airways flight MXY427 seconds after takeoff from Long Island MacArthur Airport (ISP) bound for Norfolk International Airport (ORF) in Virginia:
Now for the photos on the road, starting on NY 347 just before its concurrence with Vets Highway (NY 454):
…which quickly transitioned to the Sagtikos State Parkway:
And finally, the Southern State Parkway from exit 41S to 30S:
I’ll have a longer trip to and from Milford, Connecticut, Friday and Sunday as Smooth Jazz for Scholars returns Friday and Saturday nights. The next blog post will be the weekly Instrumental Invasion recap and the posts after that will recap SJFS.
Instrumental Invasion, 4/20/22 April 21, 2022
Posted by Mike C. in Airchecks, Audio, Comedy, Internet, Jazz, Media, Music, Personal, Photography, Radio, Travel, TV, Video.add a comment
The April 20 Instrumental Invasion on WCWP was recorded on March 1 (four segments) and 2 (two segments), the latter occurring before my guest reading stint. Pickups were recorded on the 4th, 8th, and 24th.
The playlist was created on February 26, but not annotated until the 28th, after which the talk break script was drafted.
I forgot to plug the video of “Angela” by the Bob James Trio that was recorded as they recorded:
The session was recorded as video and the Dolby Atmos audio from it was extracted for MQA-CD players. The version of “Angela” you heard on the show was ripped from the CD with regular audio, which is good enough for me.
Coincidentally, the day I started recording this show, Ken Levine (“la-vyne”) wrote a remembrance of Taxi, the series for which Bob wrote the theme. Ken and his writing partner David Isaacs went on to work with some of the Taxi staff – such as the Charles Brothers and Jim Burrows – on Cheers and its spin-off Frasier.
The Shilts anecdote after playing “All Grown Up” referred to his May 2012 show at Houndstooth Pub. Last night was the first time I mentioned the prank.
A few days before the show aired, I finally learned how to properly say Maynard Ferguson‘s first name: “may-nard,” not “-nerd” like for football players Brad and Don. Unfortunately, it was too late to correct the mistake, but rest assured it won’t happen again.
Click here to download the aircheck MP3 or listen below:
Instrumental Invasion, 4/13/22 April 14, 2022
Posted by Mike C. in Airchecks, Audio, Internet, Jazz, Media, Music, New Age, Personal, Radio.add a comment
The April 13 Instrumental Invasion on WCWP was recorded one hour per day on February 19 and 20, with pickups recorded before and after the second hour sessions. It was the first show recorded entirely at home with the Kaotica Eyeball shield.
The playlist was created on February 17 with annotations starting that day and continuing into the 18th. The talk break script was drafted on the 19th, before and after my friends’ daughter’s first birthday party.
I may have played six covers on a show prior to this week, but I didn’t notice until this time. My favorite has to be Maynard Ferguson‘s cover of “Eli’s Comin’” (from M.F. Horn) that led off the show, though I don’t like the beginning and end.
“Valley in the Clouds” and “Jamaican Nights” were staples of The Weather Channel’s local forecasts in their day, but I wasn’t aware of the latter song until it played on CD 101.9 in November 1998. I played it in the premiere of the original The Instrumental Invasion on WGBB on July 13, 2004.
The last song of the show, “Summer Smiles” by Ken Navarro, was first heard last August 25, but this time, I said Tyler Mire‘s last name correctly: “meer.”
Click here to download the aircheck MP3 or listen below:
11:40 AM UPDATE: From time to time, I miss things when making annotations and they don’t end up in the script. I missed that David Charles played percussion on “360” by Chuck Loeb, leading me to incorrectly call it a trio song. I didn’t notice the percussion – chimes, in particular – until just now while listening to the unscoped aircheck. To compensate, I’ll play it again in an upcoming show. Listen for it in June.
Instrumental Invasion, 4/6/22 April 7, 2022
Posted by Mike C. in Airchecks, Audio, Baseball, Internet, Jazz, Media, Music, News, Personal, Radio, Sports, Technology, Travel, TV, Video, Weather.add a comment
The April 6 Instrumental Invasion on WCWP was recorded over three days in mid-February: the first hour on the 14th (Valentine’s Day), one second hour segment on the 15th, and the last two on the 16th when a pickup was also recorded.
The playlist was created on February 12 and annotated on the 13th. The talk break script was drafted before recording on the 14th.
A few days before work on this show began, I finally took the plunge and bought the Kaotica Eyeball microphone isolation shield. Since my remote location has minimal room echo, the Eyeball is for home recordings. It only took two days to ship from Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Here’s how it looks from my chair:
It’s as big as my head, a challenge for Zoom meetings and for reading text on the right side of my monitor, but it works! Room echo was practically gone from any talk breaks I recorded at home. You will have to lower the pot (potentiometer) on your mixer. The Eyeball isolates background audio so well that more of the mic is picked up.
Thank you to actor and impressionist Jim Meskimen (son of Marion Ross) for recommending the Kaotica Eyeball in one of Mark Evanier‘s 2020 voice-over panel livestreams (cued to the relevant portion) and then jogging my memory about it in an Instagram post a few days before my purchase.
This wasn’t the first show with talk breaks recorded through the Eyeball, due to pickups I recorded for March 16.
After acquiring new music releases in the weeks leading up to this show, and the Friday after, I re-instituted two 2017 to present segments for the second hour. I included “Feet First” by Rick Braun unaware that it was the first single off his eponymous album. I did know that “Sun Princess” by the Jeff Lorber Fusion and “Out to Lunch” by Oli Silk were on the smooth jazz radio charts. So, I worked them in. Due to time constraints in the last segment, I couldn’t remind listeners about the accelerando at the end of the Bob James Trio arrangement of “Westchester Lady.” That same arrangement was part of their Blue Note set in November 2018, a month after Feel Like Making LIVE! was recorded. I said of the Blue Note performance:
This song had a call and response between the trio and ended with an accelerando that led me to polka dance [in my seat].
“The Big Windy Cat” by Nick Colionne was played 52 weeks after the previous cut from No Limits, “Headin’ Wes Before Dawn.” “Rippin’ n Runnin'” by Gordon Goodwin’s Big Phat Band, from That’s How We Roll, was played exactly six months after “Howdiz Songo?” We also went exactly six months between tracks from the Jeff Lorber Fusion’s Space-Time – “Louisiana” and “Sun Princess” – and between the last track to date from the previous Bob James Trio album, Espresso, and the first off Feel Like Making LIVE! The Espresso track was “Mister Magic,” which was also recorded for the new album.
Little did I know my inclusion of “Swingin’ for the Fence” by Nelson Rangell, and addressing personnel as “heavy hitters,” would coincide with the delayed start to the 2022 Major League Baseball Season, and appear in a show preceded by the baseball edition of The Rock Show. And it slipped my mind that an unusually late blizzard affected the New York metro area 40 years ago: April 6, 1982. You can watch WABC-TV‘s Eyewitness News coverage of that storm here.
Click here to download the aircheck MP3 or listen below:
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