Facebook: When the Invited Guests Bring a Soapbox
Wednesday, January 20, 2010 at 8:04PM 
I KNOW THE EVENTS IN MASSACHUSETTS yesterday were significant. And I know that that was good news for some and bad news for others. … But the past couple of days I’ve been inundated with intensely political Facebook posts that either assume I agree with them or don’t care if I don’t — which is thoughtless at best and callous at worst. This isn’t the first time it’s happened. Depending on the news of the day or the events in someone’s personal life, we’ve all seen spikes of this sort of thing on our walls. This time is was political. Another time it might have been religious. Yet another time, cultural, racial, sexual, who knows. I like all of my friends and respect their many, many differences. And I’m happy to entertain a point of view other than my own. But when occasional sharing turns into tedious proselytizing, it ceases to be an exchange of ideas and instead becomes a sort of intellectual harassment.
Preparing for constraints was part of recording jazz CD
Saturday, January 16, 2010 at 11:34AM 
“CLAUDETTE” BY WONDERFUL JAZZ SINGER CLAUDETTE STONE is now available on CD Baby. If you like jazz standards, light Latin, and ballads, you should like this very much. Click over to CD Baby to preview. While you’re there, read the liner notes for an interesting story about how the recording grew. Unlike most recordings, drums (yours truly) were added last. Matching tempos was a challenge, but I’m pleased with the result. In fact, it was a real-life example of something I’ve written about frequently on this blog: creative constraints.
Creativity, Music, Time | tagged Claudette Stone, Jazz, Time, click track, creative process, drums, jazz singer, john armato, music, recording, temp, think inside the box Answer: These are things that lead us to meaning. Question: What are questions?
Wednesday, December 30, 2009 at 11:58AM 
SECOND IN A SERIES
A Guest Essay by Jerry LaMartina, Freelance Journalist and Editor
DR. WALTER MURRISH WAS A KIND AND INSIGHTFUL SOUL. I owe my choice of a major in college in large part to him.
He taught the introductory class in Communication Studies at the University of Missouri-Kansas City the summer I took it. I’d been searching for a major — English? Psychology? Philosophy? — I didn’t know. I was interested in them all but fully seized by none of them.
Dr. Murrish was at the time an emeritus professor of Communication Studies at UMKC. … He cited a scholar in the field who’d said: We know ourselves to the degree we disclose ourselves to others.” … I knew instantly that this was my chosen major.