Past the equinox and sliding down the slippery slope towards winter… but today was a picture perfect fall day in upstate new york: bright blue sky with the occasional multi-dimensional cloud floating through making nice shadows; the foliage starting to turn so there’s red and green and gold against the blue; and Hamilton is full of beautiful big clapboard houses with wrap-around porches and widows’ walks. There’s so much space… & the campus of Colgate U is full of magnificent trees… it’s a 20 minute walk from where I’m staying to rehearsal, through picture-perfect Americana… But best of all, today was the day of Piano Fixing. The T.D. at the theater gave me two and 1/2 hours of his time, and the shop, and fixed the big toy piano – its structural integrity is once more intact – hallelujah! There was a reason I had Karin schlepp it up here from Rinde’s basement studio. Plus my wonderful Russian piano tuner from Brooklyn called this morning while I was in the shop with Joel – I hooked him up with my wonderful cat-sitter, and Boris went over to W.10 St. this afternoon and tuned my full-size piano – hallelujah again! It’s held its tuning remarkably well (we love Yamaha) but it’s been a year… gotta take care of the things we love…
Work proceeds on The World Is Round. I’ve written 4 more songs in as many days , and am making stabs at the final section… the kids are fun to work with – not professionals, of course, but very game (and some of them with better voices than the real cast, I hate to admit!). It’s good for Karin to have this time away from nyc to work on it, think on it – she’s come up with an overall structure, the narrative arc, which is a big step… and it’s great for us to hang out and brainstorm. Quelle chance… Mum seems to have survived the latest slice-and-dice pretty well, and sis seems to be surviving being there, for the moment… toca madera… 2 more weeks…