Greg Mein

Hasn't music actually always been a hobby? I'm pretty certain the vast majority of people who take a guitar to open mics or campfires don't make any money at it while in many homes there sit pianos that someone enjoys playing for themselves or other family members. My wife was one of the latter until I came along and turned her into a gig monster! If you're not driven by the sheer joy of playing then you're in it for all the wrong reasons. I had some neighbors once, young people (early 20's while I was in my late 30's) who had a band that practiced every night in the basement playing fairly typical blues/rock type stuff. The lead guitarist had decided one day that he was going to be a rock star, bought a guitar and practiced his ass off. The lead guitarist's dad came over to chat with me once knowing that I'd spent many years in bands and asked me what I thought their chances were. I basically told him the chances of even making a living with their music were slim and they should just have fun and enjoy it. They played gigs around town, moved out of that house and were later out on the road. I hadn't thought about them for quite some time but recently a friend of ours who owns and runs a mid sized manufacturing company inadvertently gave me an update. He was telling me the story of one of his employees (who as it turned out was the aforementioned lead guitarist) who'd decided to quit one day and become a rock star. The guy was gone for a few years following that dream but eventually after suffering enough "casualties of the road" reached a breaking point when the van they were traveling in broke down in Minneapolis. He called our friend, got his old job back and apparently put the guitar away. I'm certain that some of the most talented people will still be able to rise to a high level and be very successful financially but the margins will be slimmer than they used to be. Opportunity will continue to exist in academia for those willing to achieve the credentials and other positions of musical influence such as yours Craig. Otherwise, I say, keep playing and having fun. My favorite mantra is the old, "we play for free but want paid for setup/teardown/transport etc.".

Hey, they closed it anyway, even though they said they'd stay in Memphis. So how about a picture of you gigging, or with your bike, and an MPN T-shirt? Now, THAT would be cool! I feel my knees beginning to bend to the pressure We've picked up another gig for this Friday but it will likely be sleeveless weather. I like the idea with the bike and I think I'll go with that although it's kind of trapped in the garage stall at the moment, we're redoing the back deck and stuff is sitting in front of that garage door! I just remembered another "fun" anecdote. Last year on our MC trip to Niagara Falls we stayed the first night in Kalamazoo, MI. I'd taken an old Gibson T shirt I had and ceremoniously dumped it in the trash while we were there.

The only live stream we tried really sucked since we just put my wife's MBP on a folding table out in front of us while we played to neighbors from the front porch. I didn't bother to check levels and we slammed it a bit hard even though I thought it was plenty far enough away. We had a friend bring a fancy new camera to our last gig a couple weeks ago and he caught some great video I've only seen some snippets of so far. I'm not up to speed on modern photography gear but it captures a sort of 360 degree image you can pan around. The audio sounded quite satisfactory also but we need to get it all on a flash drive because it's too much to transfer online. It will be great stuff for us to post on our FB page for promo!

We anxiously await your new avatar photo! I've got to find the right backdrop, the Memphis Gibson factory store I'm using will be hard to beat!

Mine arrived a week ago. I haven't tried it on yet but it looks real nice!

I think I understand the premise. My main instruments are keys and guitar. On many Bob Seger songs I typically found the keys to be more fun, interesting and essential overall and sometimes it's the same for Rolling Stones songs to the extent that in the past while playing in three piece groups I'll set the guitar down and switch to piano for songs I feel benefit more from that. Those artists have huge catalogs obviously so it really has to narrow down to specific tunes and I have similar feelings about other songs. A really good example is Superstition where I find a guitar to be useless and the clav sound to be essential and what's Desperado without the piano? In my current duo however I've mostly relinquished keyboard duties to my wife while I play the guitar on all but a few tunes. Keyboards is her specialty, she doesn't play guitar but is proficient on flute, continues to learn to operate the EWI-5000 and has also taken up mandolin. We incorporate all these instruments into our act. I do have a keyboard I play at gigs however and it's also been enlisted to play midi backing tracks I've been creating. Backing tracks allow me to "cherry pick" the parts I want to play and, of course, for both of us we live play any signature or important lead sections.

But is that due to COVID-19, or lawyers and insurance companies? If all of a sudden you had a meatpacking-type situation where hundreds of people were testing positive and getting sick, how many lawyers - seeing a huge company with deep pockets - would turn into ambulance-chasing attack dogs? I'm still thinking there is no good solution, only less bad ones. I"m certain that is correct, the state legislature have quickly passed a law whereby people won"t be able to sue random businesses claiming they picked up the 'rona at your restaurant or shop. The wife and I are currently with some friends who have a home on the Lake of the Ozarks where we"ll be spending the weekend. Simple precautions, or what I like to call normal common sense behavior, will keep us healthy just as it has all along as we go out and mingle.

Therein lies the problem because due to my, and others I trust, observations over these many months I refuse to accept that the majority of people can't get on with their lives. Note that it doesn't bother me in the least that others remain frightened or concerned but now that it affects my life even more I'm troubled and upset. I can't force myself to just go along with what makes no sense to me, I'm not built that way.

My wife is very much of the same opinion, she's recently returned to the clinic for in person appointments where she's a psychiatrist specializing in geriatric patients. When she goes in she must wear a mask as well as a face shield and be temp screened, patients wear a mask and are temp screened. She tells me the first thing they ask when they get in her office is if they can remove the mask and they conduct the appointment as normal human beings. I finally got in to have a chipped tooth repaired myself recently. They had me text when I arrived and then notified me when it was time to come in. I needed a mask and they temp screened me. When I got to the chair though it was just like old times. At the huge avionics/aerospace company where I work there must be at least 2000 people a day in and out of these buildings. This whole time they've had three confirmed cases yet the requirement here since some time in May is that everyone wears a face covering. It's like we're all living in some kind of weird Twilight Zone episode where no one wants to admit how ridiculous this whole thing is.

My wife and I got the "covid card" as she dubbed it a couple weeks ago which came as a total surprise. It was in the neighborhood of $1100 so we took it out to dine and party it up while tipping like drunken sailors. We wiped it out in no time!

That's particularly good since many hospitals are facing bankruptcy and up to 50% of staff have been furloughed while remaining staff is forced to take pay cuts but hey, we're really nipping this thing in the bud!

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I'd totally agree, for line level outputs single space line mixers are the way to go!

It doesn't explain where he's coming up with 5%? "Right now, about 5% of the US population has been infected; although it"s higher in places like New York City and some urban areas, across the world it"s about 5%.". "When you think about only 5% of this country"s been infected to date, and you understand the pain, the suffering, the death, and economic disruption that"s occurred with just 5%, then you can imagine what it"s going to take for us to get to 60 or 70%.". "Well, I think you can do your own math in the sense that if 5% of the population has been infected to date and we have 100,000 deaths, it"s a 12-fold increase to get to 60 or 70%.". "So it would not be unreasonable to say based on what I just shared with you with 100,000 deaths for 5% of the population infected" Any data on how he arrived at that number or did I miss it?

So my wife got tested on Wednesday and she learned her result was negative earlier today, by association it's safe to assume I don't have it either. Although no one has a clue what's right it's with absolute certainty that I've gone out of my way to do it all wrong. Of course that's just the test to determine if one currently has it and I'm not sure when we might be able to get the test for whether she or I had already had it.

I did get an email on the 9th and it should arrive Monday, looking forward to it thanks!

Nice! Congrats..I couldn't imagine having a Steinway in my house, mostly because one wouldn't fit. But I do plan on having at least a 5'8" grand at some point, probably an older Baldwin or Yamaha. Until then I am enjoying a freebie Kimball upright, retired church piano. Nothing like the real deal! The piano was willed to my wife years ago from an "aunt" in California. It's had some typical work done and gets regular servicing. She was required to have it appraised recently when we switched to a different insurance company, it wasn't easy to find someone who could do that in this area. Until she met me (we've been married just under four years) she primarily played classical music and is an excellent sight reader. Now, of course, she's "expanded" into a more pop oriented direction and I've been teaching her more about theory and improv. Up until a year and a half ago I was still working as the keyboard player in a popular local band and I often used the piano to work up and practice new songs. Now when I sit down at it I'm not very focused and just improv chord progressions or noodle away at blues and boogie patterns.

If I'm implying anything, it's not that.

So while we're running around mumbling at each other through masks a huge European PCB manufacturer has built a new plant for expansion.......in China.... European PCB Manufacturer Schweizer Electronic Makes Strategic Move With China Expansion

If I was just going to throw some money around I'd probably get a UAD Apollo 8 or 16 interface so I could get rid of this older gadget and hardware and still have my UAD plugins. For real though I'm trying to figure out how to upgrade our live sound output in the most efficient and cost effective way since our shows will likely be outdoors for the foreseeable future.

The piano sounds amazing, wish I was more worthy! The folks here remain feisty indeed and I've really become addicted to the great conversations and discussions!

The 1920 Steinway in the front room is celebrating a 100th birthday!

I often seem to find myself buying upgrades/plugins for no particular reason other than I like the software and want to help support their ability to stay in business. Propellerhead is a good example where I was floored by the program way back when I first discovered it, really got involved and used it a lot......for a while. I haven't had the time or call to be using it much for the last few years but I sure would be upset if it wasn't there when I was ready to get back to it. I recently bought/updated a huge package of Arturia synth/keyboard emulations. So far I've spend all of 15 minutes checking some of them out but I'm real happy to have them there!

I remember finding it quite funny when I first saw it and totally get the joke, however, I've found that music can actually be a sustainable, or even profitable, hobby if you're willing to do some actual associated work to make it happen. Few hobbies can boast that!

Fortunately the season has arrived for outdoor shows in this area, I'm not aware of any indoor ones; not banned per se but capacities are ostensibly limited to 50%. I'd pointed out before but perhaps it's worth mentioning again that in the upper midwest, where winters are cold and often harsh, there's not much chance of keeping people pinned down inside when the weather gets milder.