MELODY OF PHI ... COMING RIGHT UP ... THE QUEST BEGINS

For now I'm just pleased as punch to have gotten myself a little toy keyboard ... what I wouldn't give to have that old piano back that I had so very long ago!

Even so, just getting the melody planted into my head, at least the order of the notes, is a step in the right direction.

It's been a long time since I've done anything musical (it's not my forte) except sing along when there's a song playing that I know and like, so it's a change of pace for me. Will I even remember full, half, quarter, eighth notes? Hopefully it will all come back to me as I go along.

At any rate, lest I lose my train of thought, and the sequence of the notes, here are the introductory 'notes' of PHI, with 1 being middle C just because it's easiest for me ... they're also arranged, for the moment, into sets of four, for the same reason.

1618

0339 8874

9894

8482 0458

6834

3656 3811

*laughing* 

I found a site and copied the sequence as far as said site took it - 37 pages solid of random numbers, barely a drop in the bucket of the infinity of PHI.

I'll be doing good just to get these first 36 memorized, along with the notes I've assigned to them. 

Then will come the fun part - arranging them in a melody with variations in tempo and note lengths and all that stuff I don't have the right language for but will recognize the combination/s when I hear it/them.

Trust me on that.

Rather, trust our Characters because this after all THEIR SONG. They might be MY song, but even that isn't a given as the Mother has first claim always. Either way, the Song of PHI is the Song of our Characters, and of our world  when it comes right down to it.

My sister reminded me that according to archaeological and historic records the musical instruments of 'back in the day' would not have had our eight note musical scale ... but for our purposes that doesn't matter. For one thing it's fiction and our Characters are clever souls. Plus the only instrument we ever have involved in the Song is the Queen Harp whose strings can produce any sound she wants. And vocals have always had a huge range. So there you have it. The Song of Phi is timeless.

We're going to do our best to weave it into something that's hauntingly beautiful, and dangerous.

The only thing that's not negotiable is the order of the notes - because that's like the most immutable Law of our world.

For the rest, we shall see what we shall see.

For the SONG itself, the arrangement has to lend itself to being a repeated melody suitable for being sung in rounds by eight different Voices.

Mamm's Voice begins with her Song of Choice. She is a soprano.

Next comes Danann with the Spiral. He is a bass.

Sidhelagh Sings of Peace. Her Voice is second soprano.

Alianora and Drustann Sing of Faith - first soprano and tenor.

Sass Sings of Healing - she is a contralto. When Thann comes into the Story Line, he's a bass.

Caileen and Talorc Sing of Hope - alto and whatever's between tenor and bass.

Aine and Kalann sing of Love - they are second soprano and tenor.

Ullin of Iona Sings of Unity with the Queen Harp - his Voice is bass; hers is whatever she wants it to be.

So we've got all these Voices coming into the round as the SONG progresses.

That there are no words helps. All we have to do is make sure the notes don't clash.

AND we can range the Voices per part by octave. Mamm will go an octave above middle C while Danann will be an octave below. Hypothetically. Once I get my hands on a full piano keyboard I can at least do some fiddling and see if it's going to even be possible. Because the notes repeat randomly, it might be *difficult* to find a place for the Voices to come into the melody without causing discord.

Ah well. 

The quest is on for a Theme Song for SONG.

Since I'm In 'Artist' Mode ... Uffda ...

Over a year ago my sister suggested I try a painting that would look something like the one in the post this LINK will take you to.

Well, what with one thing and another, it completely flew out of my mind ... until recently.

I've been looking on line at relevant photos, found some rather impressive ones of both outer space and geologic formations that would be awesome to use.

I'm NOT going to even try to shoot for anything even close to the photo created by the person who created the beauty you'll see in the photo the link will take you to, and have serious doubts whether or not I'll be able to even come close to getting the general concept put together, but the thought intrigues me so I'll likely give it a try anyway. We shall see what we shall see when the time comes.

If you click on the link, you'll read that I thought 'PHI in the Sky!' when I saw the photo - that's because in HELL AND HIGH WATER (it's fiction, in case you're not familiar with the SONG series) there are references to relatives back in the far ancient days (think mammoth and saber cat) who went 'Hiving' in the stars, up there out there, before the advanced civilization of Phi got wiped out by the Extinction Level Event which triggered what we call the Younger Dryas. It took the mammoth, the saber cat, and many other species, that ELE did, and it annihilated a mighty big hunk of Earth in general.

Some of our Characters are separated from family members when they are caught on Earth away from those who are up there out there among the stars. Communications, let alone access, between Earth and the Star Folk are severed irreparably, one more loss to bear when the ELE and its aftereffects are already too much for people to cope with.

At any rate, I have no idea if I'll ever be able to portray what one of the 'hives' of the Star Folk might have looked like, but it's going to be fun just going through the photos of the Universe, and whatever I can find that might be used to represent the settlements up there out there. They're not going to be Space Station things, though. That much I can tell you!

I'm daunted, and I don't daunt easy.

Still gonna be fun though!! Pop that image, or one along the same lines, up to a four foot by six foot canvas and see what you think ... me, I'm thinking 'Challenge!' and I'm thinking 'Oh boy what am I getting myself into?' and I'm thinking 'My sister is either a genius or she hates me.' She wants it in high relief sculpted form no less. 

Uffda.

How about I just paint one and display it on a frame at a 45 degree angle or some such?

Heh.

I can make it the cover of a big triangular box and store stuff in there. It'll have to go out in my lean-to since this little house I'm living in now ain't got space for no such thing. 

Lord have mercy.

Like I don't have enough to do. I'm supposed to be rewriting the first book of SONG, making new book covers, concocting trailers, updating ALL of the books, yada yada and MORE yada. Do I have time to ding around with a huge painting? Well, maybe. Procrastination is my middle name. One of my middle names. I'm going to try to shoot for Spring Equinox to have this stuff all done, but it's not like there's any real 'deadline' for which I'm eternally grateful. Summer Solstice would be just as good a time, right?

I'll say it again, with emphasis.

UFFDA! 

Danann's Song

Spirals interlocked dimension upon dimension

Colors upon colors

Notes upon notes

Throughout the entirety of the world

Throughout the eternity of the universe

Never ending

Never beginning

Round and round and round

Spinning web after web after web

Blending and twining

Inseparable

What has been

Will again become

What now is

Has before been

What will  become

Has been already

Again

Again

Again

Turning

Changing

Ever eternally the same

Yet forever changing

Locking colors

Locking notes

Locking circles

Spirals upon spirals within spirals

Listen

The music of the universe

Watches

Becomes

Becomes else

Again

Again

Again

What has been

Will again become

What now is

Has before been

What is to become

Has already been

Again

Again

Again

What has been

Will again become

What now is

Has before been

What will  become

Has been already

Locked

Bound

Inseparable

A web woven

Bright colors

Intricately locked

Twined

Symphony of the universe

Repeated melody

Grist For The Mill

The mills of the gods grind slowly, but they grind exceeding fine

A guy back in second or third century Greece named Sextus Empiricus, a physician and philosopher, is the first we know of to have used this phrase.

All it means is that things often take a long time to come to pass.

For today's post I'm focusing on a different, although related, phrase.

The meaning of this one is also pretty well understood, although literary connotations are prevalent in its interpretation as a general rule.

This one refers to the fact that everything any of our senses has ever encountered is on the table for use in any way we see fit to use it. 

Every experience of which we have been a participant, in particular. 

Every word spoken to us. 

Every look directed at us and intercepted by our own eyes. 

Every time we have been touched. 

Every step we have taken. 

Every thought in our minds. 

Every feeling we have had.

All of the above and then some ... it all belongs to us ... it is all fair game. We own it and can do as we please with it.

As writers/artists, we can come up with all kinds of ways to present our interpretations. Interpretations always and only. We cannot interpret or present anything that has never touched our lives in any way, shape, or form. So every word that we write, every piece of art we generate, is an interpretation of something that belongs to us by dint of having at one time been in some way a part of our relationship with our world.

We can 'make stuff up' in terms of putting different concepts, experiences, interpretations together into different patterns, but it's all based on what our senses have gathered and stored in our minds over the course of our life.

Having said that, every day provides plenty of grist for the mill of any author or artist. Every person we meet and interact with in any way is a potential character or part of a painting. Everything we witness might turn up in one of our works in some way or other.

I was recently reminded that everything and everyone I've ever known is indeed grist for my mill. 

I own the experiences of my life, all of them.

Not all of those experiences have been perfectly positive.

Those are the ones I hesitate to 'bring to life again' by using them in writing or artwork.

Yet there they are.

They are the balance.

Life is not solely good.

The reminder included a thought which often escapes our attention: 

If they wanted you to write warmly about them they should have behaved better.

That made me smile.

If ever anyone wanted to write bad things about me, they'd have a tough time sifting through them all - there are plenty and plenty, believe me.

Me, I don't have to write any such things. I can be the hero of my life, not the bad guy. 

And wouldn't that make for a boring Character!

At any rate, the current project I'm working on is going to take a good while to get written as it's literally a work in progress.

It's also a project that I'm somewhat ambivalent about.

However, it's only just begun and has a long way to go.

Meanwhile, along this same line, I've been writing some SNARK pieces - to balance out the Mamm Books' generally positive attitude.

Almost exclusively I've tended to focus on the good, and that's fine and dandy, but it leaves a person without the balance that blending in the bad brings. Sad but true, there's plenty of bad that's got to start showing up in the next books of SONG - so I have to begin wrapping my head around the need to be able to write them.

Happy endings are all the more poignant if you go through the nasty stuff in order to get there.

So.

It's going to be SNARK time for a while here I think.

Luckily for me, the Younglings can run into lots of Snarky stuff on their adventures, and prevail, so those little stories might be what gets me through the writing of this other project. The same goes for the rest of our Characters. As I'm writing the SNARK things, the Characters of SONG will have the task of keeping me balanced by winning out over the Snarky things they run into on the Spiral. Thank God for Warriors.

When it comes to Fiction, remember that it is entirely based on Fact. The 'fact' part of the 'fiction' is likely to be woven all but invisibly into the fabric of the piece, but it is the foundation of the whole thing. 

Our senses have provided us with enough material, enough grist for our mills, to write for a very long time, believe me. Fictionalizing people, places, events, experiences, encounters, reactions ... it's only changing bits and pieces of the facts as we know them.

Just sayin'.

The good guys and the bad guys might not exactly be precisely as a person expects. 

If you're looking at my books wondering whether or not you are in them, chances are that if you've interacted with me in the course of my life YES you will be represented in some way. It can hardly be otherwise, can it?

I based the main Characters of SONG loosely on people who are dear to me, and they're good strong Characters on whom I can depend always.

Not everyone with whom I've interacted in my life has that same distinction; that's a fact it would be senseless to deny.

We've got the good guys defined.

Now it's time for some of the bad guys to start showing up. They'll NOT be based on specific individuals as are the SONG Characters. 

Bad guys are bad guys, remember. 

By definition they are not nice. They will bite you if you let them.

There have been more than enough in my experience to not have to be any too specific; their characteristics will blend and morph and reverse to the point that no individual will be identified as such. 

So if you've done me wrong, or anyone I've had contact with, don't worry. You'll most likely be the only one able to recognize yourself in the pages of the books. If by chance you do, GOOD. 

You'll probably be wrong and that character is more likely to be a mix of good old-fashioned historic bad guys, but hey - if you think that's your shoe, go ahead and put it on!

Has America Found Her Voice?

I seem to hear the stirring of an echo in the air. 

Could it be a refrain from an old song we had long forgotten?

I hope so.

I really really hope so, because the melody is lovely in my ears.

It is the sound of many many Voices Singing.

It is the Song of America and We The People of the United States of America have begun to Sing it.

We are many.

We are diverse.

Our Voices rise in distinctly differing ranges, each and all separately beautiful; when they join it is a Symphony of Unity.

And so I say: 

SING together, People of the United States - please please don't stop Singing. 

Your Song is strong, and proud, and so beautiful, so very beautiful.