Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Holiday in Grobania

Today the state of Grobania celebrates an official holiday, the birthdays of Josh & Chris Groban.


To those of you not participating:

As you were.







Sunday, February 17, 2013

Kimmel Appearance

Excuse me everyone.  I just listened last night to that Kimmel interview for a second time.

I am about to scream.

plug your ears.

JOSH 
GROBAN
R
U
NUTZ
?

STEVIE WONDER WANTS TO WRITE A SONG WITH YOU?

YOUR SELF ESTEEM IS TOO LOW TO CALL HIM?


Hello?


WHEN DID WE HEAR THIS BEFORE?


Um...  Let me think.  There was this guy named David Foster.  He wanted you to sing at the  rehearsal for the grammies?  You thought  your voice wasn't high enough.  You thought you weren't ready?  You were scared of Celine Dion and Andrea Bocelli.  

DOES THIS RING A BELL?

"Wake up, wake up, the sun will not wait for long."

This man is not getting any younger.  

He is overweight.

Unfortunately, for various reasons, black people in the USA do not live as long as white people.

We do not have 25 years for you to get over this complex.

MAKE THAT CALL
!

BLANKITY
BLANKITY
BLANK
[EXPLETIVES DELETED]


********

Oh, and by the way, do you see that lady in the chorus just to your left?  Do you recognize her beautiful face?  

That's Judith Hill.  She is THE woman who sang THE song -- "Heal the World" at the Staples Center in front of a TV audience of 1 billion people at the memorial service of Michael Jackson.

Another self-effacing person.

She gave away her runaway worldwide hit "I Will Always Be Missing You," because she did not want to make money off Michael Jackson's death.

She has toured extensively all over the world, where people find her fascinating, beautiful talented.  

Yet she never tweets her amazing journey.

Talk about someone who does not know how to toot her own horn.

She has been featured especially on Asian TV, like Japan and China, because Asians are fascinated with mixed race people.

She's been to all kinds of countries you haven't gotten to yet.  

She's an international star.

YET

You only have her in the chorus?  

You should be doing a duet with her.  You should be using her as a ticket into an Asian tour.

She's just in the chorus?

Auggh.

----------------

Addendum.

Judith Hill was the last person to sing a duet with Michael Jackson -- in his rehearsals for "This Is It" -- the day of his death.

She was to be a featured performer in that stationary tour and she's in the movie.

Do you know who the other two women were who were supposed to be featured singers in "This Is It?"

Charice (later famously picked up by David Foster at Oprah's insistence)

and

Lady Gaga.

Michael Jackson regarded her as a similar level of talent with those power houses.

Not you?




Saturday, February 16, 2013

singing for world peace

Josh thinks he's joking.  He thinks he can't call North Korea and arrange peace.

He's wrong.

Do you know that the wives of the leaders of both North Korea and China are pop singers?

Do you understand what that means?

That means that their husbands can be seduced with music.

There *is* an opportunity here, Josh.  It's not unrealistic to think that the right concert could do it.  The right concert *could* bring us away from the threat of nuclear confrontation with North Korea.  It really could.

Music is the universal language.

I mean you don't want to make these men jealous by making their wives completely fall in love with you, though I'm sure you could do; but carefully thought out, carefully thought out, you do have the power to do this.

Really.

Don't know about Iran, but North Korea is a proven possibility.

Groban/Patinkin 2016

You think it's a joke.

No.

Wednesday, February 6, 2013

report on visit to GMA 2/6/13




I am assuming people actually saw this show on the Internet or on TV, so I'm not going to go over the details of what Josh did on camera -- some of which I could not see anyway.  I am only going to talk about my experiences.

I was pleased to meet @123francaisF and @FeelingCloser in person there, along with many other Grobies, such as Suzie, Lily, and @KLinGeorgia  .

It was a cold morning, so I did not show up early, as I figured there would not be many there.  This turned out to be accurate.  There were only 20 or 30 of us there.  

The GMA people were scrambling to get us to pose over near the island in the street & make us look like a bigger crowd.  They were also begging us to come back the next day, as they have some kind of an event where there are going to be prizes for people who show up, but most of us were going to Kelly & Michael, so I don't suppose there is much likelihood that we would be good candidates.

GMA does not have a true studio audience any more.  They have the audience out on the street looking in the window.  Most of the time there is audio feed out to the street, but the audio cut out during the weather report, leaving us in the dark about the upcoming blizzard -- very frustrating.  A few lucky individuals got to stand inside & take pictures with the hosts afterwards.  I have no clue who they were or how they got in.

Also, over on the island in Times Square there was no audio or video feed at all, only text.  I wasn't very inclined to go over there and pose for them as it would mean missing Josh when he was on.

I could not really see him from the window when he was co-hosting at the first desk.  There were cameras in the way.  I could only see him on the monitor.  

Later when he moved to the second desk, we could see him more clearly.  

We were behind the musicians when they performed.  I rather liked that.  We don't normally get to watch them from behind.  When they were sitting at their instruments and not performing, they smiled and waved at us.  The sound was fairly muffled for the music, but we heard most of it.  

At one point the musicians were jamming together, without Josh, and we could not hear that at all, though we could see Ruslan getting an almost demonic grin on his face while playing.  I have no clue whether that jam went out over the air.

Josh did his internet interview immediately after 9 and we were able to see that fairly clearly as it was at the second desk, which faces the window, while the first one faces perpendicularly to the window.

The setup was sort of like this:




We waited for a while before Josh came out.  We saw the other musicians come out the regular stage door, while Josh was expected out of a larger door.

Josh took out his contacts before he came out.  

Darren had those of who were left by then, probably only about 10 of us, marshaled behind a barricade with strict instructions not to hug or kiss Josh and not to do posed pictures with him.  

I was right next to the door when he came out.  He had some time to talk.  I tried to say something to him, but he looked me in the eyes and I was struck dumb.   He looks so great in person!

He signed my fan edition album.

He expressed gratitude for us being there to support him.  I kind of think he hoped there would be more people.  

There was one lady there amongst us who he apparently knew, because he gave her a hug.  I don't know who she was at all.

====

Addendum

This is me on GMA, thanks to JGCornerPub -- right behind Tariqh's guitar.



Monday, February 4, 2013

Concert report: Allen room 2/4/13


OMG!

I thought that c109 would be third row and way off to the side.  I never thought I would be front row center directly in front of Josh's mike.  

I knew I had been on the website, signed in, waiting at 11 am & took the first tix available -- and this time the website did not freeze or fail -- but front row center?  Wow, just wow.

OK, now I know you all saw this concert in the movie theaters, so I'll try to focus on the parts you didn't see.  I think I was too freaked out by being straight in front of Josh to actually hear much anyway, though my impression was that the show went well -- very smoothly & very polished.

First of all, the Allen Room is not really at Lincoln Center.  This was said to be broadcast from Lincoln Center, and technically I guess this room is part of that, but really it's at Columbus Circle, a good six blocks away.

Another peculiar thing about the Allen room is that it's in a shopping mall, a place called Shops at Columbus Circle -- a very high end mall, which has several floors below ground and 4 floors above ground, and the Allen Room up on the fifth floor.  The box office is on the ground floor, and the elevator up to the Allen Room is only operational when the concert is in session.  Apparently it is mostly used for jazz, as it's labelled with "Jazz" everywhere.

All of the mall, and the Allen Room, have huge picture windows onto Columbus Circle and Central Park South beyond.  My friends and I spent the hour before the show at a really cool lounge on the 4th floor of the mall, which has lovely couches.  They only charge $4 for a sparkling water, but a champagne cocktail was like $16 -- still it was an incredibly nice place to wait.  

Walking into the Allen room we were greeted with a couple of things that made me nervous.  One was that we were told that if we left to go to the bathroom we would not be allowed back in.

I find this really annoying.  I belong to several handicapped groups.  One of them is those of weak bladder.  This is a very large and seldom discussed group, which includes everyone under 5, almost everyone over 60, and all women who have borne children.  Handicap accessibility for this huge group is routinely ignored, with lack of public restroom facilities in many places.  I find this policy, which is not just for televised concerts, BTW, but for all concerts I've been to at Lincoln Center, is an example of lack of handicap accessibility.

In any case, I was expecting this, so I dehydrated myself before the concert -- and fortunately did not get light headed.  I had just that one glass of water at the lounge between about 1:30 p.m. and 9 p.m.

The other thing that worried me a bit was the lighting, which was a strange bluish or greenish color and made me slightly queasy.  Fortunately, it was turned off during the concert.

Some of the musicians started wandering in before the concert.  Ruslan Sirota created an especial stir, because he's been so assiduous about corresponding with Grobies on twitter.  He seemed a bit surprised at the reaction.  

They told us, of course, that photos and recording would not be allowed.  I did have a recording device with me, but I decided not to even try to use it, since, being front row center I was sure to be spotted if I did something like that.  One of my friends suggested that I should put it on in my purse or under my clothes, but I don't think that would have worked from a sound point of view. 

I normally like to make my own recordings, as they have larger frequency range than the ones in CDs, so they can preserve overtones, but I don't think that would have made that much difference at this particular concert.  The sound did not seem that distinct to me, at least where I was sitting.

In fact, it was way too loud for me in the beginning.  I quickly realized that for a concert being broadcast to movie theaters having the slightly autistic woman with the auditory sensitivities front row center was not too cool.  I plugged my ears for Brave.  I hoped the later songs would be softer, but they weren't, so I put in ear plugs.

Ear plugs have the advantage that my ears don't hurt and the sound seems clearer to me -- but they also clip overtones.  When I had the ear plugs in, the live concert sounded to me like the video recording of the Times Center one.  If you've been reading my blog, you will notice that I commented that the video recording, which I viewed later, did not sound anything like the live one.  The Times Center was loud, but not nearly so loud as the Allen Room was at the beginning.

Josh apparently noticed my distress and commented on the volume.  They turned it down after that and I was able to take out the ear plugs.  He gets to wear ear plugs throughout the whole concert, so presumably he hears whatever he wants to hear in there.

I was very relieved that the volume was turned down, and hope others were too.   I hope that I'm like a canary in a mine that gives warning when the atmosphere is going toxic.   I know some people like to have their ears blown out at live concerts.  I have always supposed that that was not the case with Josh's fans, since I don't think of his music as being of that kind, but I don't know.  

For me, given the kinds of sensitivities that I have, Josh has been one of the few musicians I could stand to listen to at all, so I would hate to think he was going in the direction of becoming like the others.  I know the new album is supposed to be a bit more rock-like.  I hope I don't have to give up on him.

Not being able to take pictures is not a hardship for me.  I don't like taking pictures. I'm a lousy photographer and my cell phone is not the sort that takes good pictures. 

Here is me trying to photograph myself with a flash in the mirror so you can see the colors in my outfit.



Right.  I pose no threat to these venues.  They should laugh at the idea of me taking pictures.  Or maybe they think I would make the concert look bad if let people see these kind of pictures.

Still, I know some fans are actually great photographers, though I don't understand what's wrong with their taking photos.  They make the concert look good.  They make Josh look good.  

I definitely prefer when only the piano and the guitar are playing, because it's quieter and I can hear the music more distinctly.   I feel that the amplification blurs the orchestra so it's hard to distinguish the instruments in it, but maybe my auditory sensitivities are causing my ears to play tricks on me.

I wonder if the whole thing would have sounded better if I were in the movie theaters.

Still, it was great to watch Josh up close and really focus on him.  I was so close that I could actually see circular light reflections from his contact lenses at times.  That was weird, when the light hit the contact lenses just right.

He does look thinner in person than he looks in photos.  Photos flatten out the person, taking away the depth, so that parts of the body that are actually on the person's sides look like they're in front.  That fattens a person.  He's really quite thin.  Some fans have been concerned that he's too thin.  Well, he's not as thin as Ruslan Sirota, who is really, really thin.  I wouldn't say that Josh looks like he's starving or anything.

I was pleased to see that his hair looked really good.  It looked rather atrocious when I saw him up close at Live with Kelly and at the Americans for the Arts Awards.  It makes a huge difference when he has a professional attending to it.

Another thing I could see was Josh's hands trembling.  That could have been nerves.  I could see that the time that he used both hands on the mike was when he couldn't hold the mike steady with the right hand.

Of course, I've been worried about Josh's hands as long as I've been watching him.  He doesn't have good positioning when he plays the piano.  He takes voice lessons three times a week.  The voice teacher teaches him how to protect his voice.  He doesn't take piano lessons, as far as I know, so presumably there's no one to teach him how to protect his hands.  

I personally got carpal tunnel syndrome in my left hand from typing with poor positioning.  I always use wrist braces or typing gloves when typing, playing the piano, sleeping, or driving a car, which keeps things under control.  

Looking at Josh's hands up close I was even more worried than I have ever been before.  I had an acquaintance who got really severe repetitive stress injuries from doing too much origami and essentially lost control of his hands.  Josh's hands reminded me a of the way that guy's hands looked, though not quite as bad.  His left thumb especially concerned me.    I hope he has a neurologist looking at them.

After the broadcast show was ended he did do an encore of "Play Me," but after that one they turned the sickening lights back on, so we knew we weren't going to be able to get him do another encore.

I did not dare go to the bathroom before going to the stage door, because that was part of how I missed Josh on the way out after the Marvin Hamlisch concert.  I needn't have worried.  He took his time coming out.  I guess that's what he does when he means to do autographs.

Everyone else came out first.  Ruslan & Andre hugged some of the Grobies.  Andre was particularly fearless venturing out amongst us before Darren got us behind barricades.  

We cheered the chorus members as they came out and they looked pleasantly surprised.  I realized that we never found out who they were.   

Some of us even cheered for the building guards.  I figure guards could use the occasional cheer,  as well.

Darren came out and joked with us that Josh had decided to spend the night in the building, because he was scared of us.  I had cased the joint before.  I knew there were plenty of other doors he could have gotten out of if he had really wanted to.

After Darren got us behind the barricades, Tariqh and Christian came out.  Some Grobies got them to do autographs also.  I should get their autographs. They gave lots of people hugs and took photos with Grobies.  They're both bigger than Josh and perhaps not so easily knocked over.  

Darren made clear that we were not to take any posed photos with Josh.

There was some trouble while we were waiting for Josh to come out, because we were blocking the sidewalk.  I don't think there were more than 30 of us, but the sidewalk wasn't all that big, so it was easy to block.  

Some of the passers by decided to wait with us so they could see Josh also.  At least one passer by seemed not to have heard of him.   I was distressed that the Grobies seemed not too interested in educating him, but people were more focused on that door, knowing that Josh really was about to come out.

Josh was good about signing everyone's stuff and he was very kind and gracious as usual.  He had taken off the hated contacts and was wearing glasses.  I personally prefer him in glasses.  He looks so much more relaxed wearing them -- and I worry about the contacts bothering him.  His smile is so much more genuine when his eyes don't hurt.  Also he gives better eye contact.

Darren agreed to take the present for Josh that I failed to give Josh on New Year's eve.  I hope he really gives it to him and doesn't just throw it out.  I suppose Josh gets too many presents, but I did put a lot of thought into that one.  Sigh.  It's hard being one of so many fans.  At least I don't have it sitting around at home reminding me of my foolish failure to get out promptly after the Marvin Hamlisch concert.

Still, I find that I am recognizing more and more faces at these New York events, people who I have met before.  

Deb, who won the Manhattan coffee with Josh, and who was the other fan outside the stage door at New Year's eve, told me she still has not gotten her coffee date, but she did not expect it before the album release.

Addendum:

I don't know if you could hear in theaters, but the crowd cheered when DJ Nicoletti's question was answered.  We were mostly Grobies & we all know her.

2d addendum:

Josh said on the way out that the movie tix had sold well, so he might do it again this way.

3rd addendum

That mall has great restrooms.  This is going to be an important resource for me, if I'm in that area and need one.  Just a tip, though, the flushing mechanisms are overactive.  I found I had to get my hose down first and then put the paper on the seat and then sit down very quickly, else the toilet would flush & take the paper with it.

4th addendum

I suspect that this time the movie goers had the better acoustics.  I think that in the small venue the sound of the live instruments so close interfered with the sound from the amplifiers, making the whole thing more blurry.

 A violin or a trumpet is quite different from an electric guitar.  The live sound of an electric guitar cannot be heard over the sound of the amplifier.  A violin or a trumpet is designed to fill a large concert hall without amplification.  In a small hall, that makes for a confusing sound.


Friday, February 1, 2013

Josh at Times Center

Everyone presumably already saw this event.  If not you can see it here

http://new.livestream.com/nytimes/joshgroban

This was the first time I ever paid to go to an interview.  It was a long one and very nice.  Josh really held his own well for all that time, as I'm sure everyone saw.

I think that was the smallest venue I've heard him sing in -- about 200 people, I think.  I am a real stickler for overtones and I was very happy to be able to hear them.  The dynamic range of Josh's voice was very dramatic, especially because when he went full volume he seemed to overwhelm the sound system, and there were weird reverberations in the room.  Still, it was great to hear him so close.

I was struck at the difference in piano playing style between Ruslan and Mark Stephens.  Mark was typically more the sort to blend in, while Ruslan is more the sort to stand out.  Mark always sat very still, also, while Ruslan moves around a lot.  On the whole, I enjoyed the change and the dynamic flourishes that Ruslan added.

I got to meet @imzadi4ever from twitter.  She showed me pictures of her Irish wolfhounds, which were impressive.  Also, I was impressed that, despite it being really cold and windy, she wore no coat or gloves outside.  She is really toughened up from living in Vermont.  We also went out for coffee afterwards.  I can gradually see where going to Josh events could become more about seeing other Grobies than about seeing Josh.  Not quite there yet, but I can see where it might happen.

I also saw several other Grobies who I knew, like @jennr473, @dodoNYC, Lily, Stacey, @prgt, @feb27song, and Night Owl.  Some of them have twitter handles, which I may fill in when I'm less tired & have time to find them.  

I read on the Marquis that the Times Center space that was used for this event is available for weddings and bar mitzvahs and the like, which surprised me.  It was an attractive space, with a huge lobby, very nice restrooms, and a great courtyard.  The chairs in the theater are comfortable, and there is a lot of attractive wood paneling around.

Some of us waited outside for Josh to come out, but he came out on the other side of the building.

I was really happy to see Josh wearing boots.  I did not like those sneakers he wore on the last tour.

I think Josh may have gotten some more kinks out of his voice recently.  Some of his loud notes were particularly spectacular.

Also, some of us have been thinking that he looked too thin recently, but I thought he looked ok at this event.

--------------

Went back & watched online today.

He looked much thinner in person, than he looks on the video.

Maybe I need new speakers for my computer, I don't know, but what I'm hearing on the video just does not sound at all like what i heard in person.  The overtones are gone -- clipped.  The dynamic range is much reduced, so the loud notes are not even close to being as loud as they were in person.

You also can't hear the weird reverbs that I heard in the venue.

You can hear, though, how much more prominent Ruslan's style is than Tariqh's