Summer is gone. (Juha H.) 

Armahan kulku

Recorded bass for two Jouko Takala's compositions - Mummo ja ikoni (= Grandma and the Icon) and Armahan kulku (=The walk of my dearest). Words to the latter song are from Kanteletar - an old Finish collection of mostly female poetry. Both stories are musically peaceful ballads.

And the day was grey. The first snow has melted away. The world outside looks quite bleak.

Juha H.

Sideways

One more movie we watched, Sini and I. Story - a bit tragic comedy Sideways. They do make really good, meaningful and remarkable films in America. Everything is NOT Hollywood kind of commercially flashy and big-in-scope superficiality. So often American films look very good but feel more or less empty inside... Though Sideways is actually more or less a Hollywood-made movie, it is so much different when compared to ordinary commercialism of American films - NO big and flashy effects, NO dangerous stunts. Just a good story well told. Thank you very much.

Juha H.

Taivasten valtakunta

Watched a movie with Sini, again. (DVD is a nice invention) This time Kingdom of Heaven. Swords ringing and gore flying. Older military action this time. Christian Crusaders and Muslim Moors fighting for the possession of Jerusalem. Lots of people dying. But there were some beautiful and peaceful thoughts and scenes. It just might be that the Kingdom of Heaven does not reside in the killing fields but in some other more peaceful and beautiful place - within your heart or mind... And back to this day - why can't these two great religions Christianity and Islam live peacefully side by side?

Juha H.

Musaa

Jouko Takala visited. I recorded a couple of guitar tracks he played. Later I'll add the rest of the instruments to these Jouko's compositions and Eeva-Liisa Hovi-Saari will come to sing them. Peaceful music.

Added again some photos here.

Juha H.

Kadonnut pataljoona

We, Sini and I, watched a movie. The Lost Battalion - a story based on what really happened in the Great War just a few weeks before the fighting ended in November 1918. Mighty military action - generals commanding and the footmen dying in mud, blood and misery. Infantry takes pretty much always the cruelest brunt of the war. There were alot of close ups of soldiers killing each other and dying in the movie. Cameras following closely the action reveal better what utter foolishness war mostly is. And after stubborn fighting of the lone surrounded battalion the American divisions could march through the German defences... But anyways a good movie - a story of the survival of the few.

Now there are eleven compositions of Jouko Takala recorded and mixed. Three more to go...

Juha H.

First snow. (Juha H.) 

Valkoinen on maa

The ground is all covered in white. But the snow is very, very wet. You get your feet damp if you don't use wellingtons...

Recorded and mixed JoukoTakala's music. Tivolissa (=In The Fair) is pretty much ready. Intohimo (=Passion) is waiting to be mixed. Hopefully I can finish it tomorrow.

And again - added some photos here.

Juha H.

Sadepaivan musiikkia

Recorded percussions to Jouko Takala's songs Intohimo (=Passion) and Tivolissa (=In the Fair). And also added a couple of clarinets to the latter composition. Clarinets somehow sound like a carousel.

Added some photos in here.

It rained all day. Later in the evening it changed to snow. Now the night outside is white - the ground is covered with snow.

Juha H.

Bassoa

Recorded bass to two compositions of Jouko Takala - Intohimo (=Passion) and Tivolissa (=In the Fair). Tomorrow I can hopefully add rest of the instruments. At the moment all is fine.

We, Sini and I, watched a Russian movie - Red Serpent. It was definately NOT the best film I've ever seen. But it was so much different from what they do in America. And that's why it was worth seeing. Relatively slow camera movement - at least mostly so - and the views of the city were so much something else...

Juha H.

Eipa kummempaa

I've Been working with my photos. Added some here. Nothing special.

Not much music today - three, four hours of playing flute and guitar. Nothing special.

Began reading Ben Bova's book Mercury. Hard science-fiction.

So - nothing special.

Juha H.

Ja tilaa on

Yep. Got some sort of preliminary Web Pages ready and published. You can find them here. Though it might well be that I don't make them Pages any more complicated. Simplicity shall rule this time. The music is compressed to FM radio quality - so it won't sound very good. But one can get the idea how it sounds for real, I hope. The pictures, photos are behind the Pics-link. And they can be viewed with quite good resolution. Nice!

Juha H.

Nettitilaa

Bought one giga of netspace for the stuff that I do - for the bands and projects I'm involved with. Now I should have ample space to show what I, Improvisages, Perakamari, Hoikkaset etc... do. Got just a couple of pics sent. Hope I can ftp some more tomorrow.

Juha H.

After sunset (Juha H.) 

No more shit

It took time and a lots of work to figure how to get out and away from the difficulties I met yesterday. Woah!! Luckily I have many computers and two different software/hardware ProTools-machines. Why didn I think it right away!! So I recorded from one machine to another and sent the result via WLAN to the computer residing next to the First One. Pro Tools has got so very good AD/DA converters. Who can hear the slightly lessened audio quality? So pretty much everything is quite well.

Mastering went ok. Music sounds good.

Juha H.

Shit happens!!

Well. Listened them fourteen songs - compositions of mine - I've recorded this Autumn. Some of them needed some fixes to be done. Well, well. So be it - I thought. I loaded those pieces of music that needed something to fix into Pro Tools. Everything went ok. BUT then something happened to Wakaza. Very hard I've worked with it - with them somehow hellish problems. But to this moment I haven't been able to solve the SHIT...

So - shit happens.

Juha H.

Miksaamista ja filosofiaa

Mixed my song Kaunis Typertyma (= Beautifully Stupifying). Now I have fourteen compositions of mine recorded, mixed and ready to be mastered. Hopefully I can do it tomorrow. I write mostly instrumental music, but this time half of the collection of my compositions have got words - sung or spoken.

To write something - poetry or stories - with any depth and meaning you have to have something to say. But to have met an impasse with words - like I had so long ago - and the realization that you cannot grasp - write down - all that is for real or at least you cannot express very accurately those things and experiences that interested me in those days long ago... Words can only get closer and closer the reality but they can never reach, express, be it totally. Words are at best an approximation of the real thing. Poems can get close... For me Music is the closest thing to try to reach that something beyond verbal expressions and written acrobatics. This seems to be one thing that I've found on this quite likely One Way Trip To Oblivion - or to Where?

But never mind. I can try to write Lame Poetry. Maybe later I'll get interested in Philosophy again.

Juha H.

Intohimoa tivolissa

Nice to hear about you, Jori. Should we make music for real next weekend? Jamming over the Internet is not yet so good as we've seen...

Eeva-Liisa Hovi-Saari and Jouko Takala visited once again. We recorded two Jouko's compositions - Intohimo (=Passion) and Tivolissa (= In the Fair). Quite superb singing - two very nice songs. Next week I'll add the rest of the instruments.

Juha H.

mei�n dogi 

Surprise, its me writing a post

Its been for a while since I´ve written post to our impro blog. Its nice that Juha is active on that level. Beautiful pictures and even me and Eija in one of them. It was accidental that we were at the forest last sunday in warm weather thus its october in North. Usual Sunday I should practice with Juha in that day. Its my only vacation day nowdays so I must rest and spend time also with my lovely dear wife Eija.
Im still working as a DJ at weekends and I also have two choir to direct in Äänekoski. Same time im practising to be a teacher in "lower" level and "higher" level in music and studying education witch is not easy cause of lot of demo things. And some of the demos are stupido. Lets see if I can stand it for 2-3 years and manage what I have chosen. Anyway, theaching is fun. Finnish pupils are clever and have good sense of humour. Didactical teachers are also great person in Jyväskylä Normal School (Norssi http://www.norssi.jyu.fi/, if You interested) I think.
Last time I was affraid of cancer comeback when I blogged but now it feel healthy and doctor is not worried. So im quite a happy person now.

Colours of Autumn - just before they fade away. (Juha H.) 

Easy to trek forest. (Juha H.) 

More trekking today. And while in the forest we - Sini and I - saw Jori M. of the Improvisages with his wife Eija. (Juha H.)

We've been trekking in the forests a lot lately - Sini and I. This is one photo taken today. Syvalahti, Finland. (Juha H.) 

Musiikkia

I've been listening to some music today - Trio Toykeat , Dream Theater , Frank Zappa , Bela Fleck , Trio Niskalaukaus , Toto... Wovv!! Thank you very much for all them musicians.

And before listening to Music Sini and I watched a movie - Brotherhood of War. It may well be that I've never seen anything so hard-to-understand a military movie - so very true a war story. So utterly futile it is to kill, kill, kill your brother - your own brother... Every man and sister is your close relative. Shouldn't we take care of each other? I really hope so. Anyways thank you very much for the makers of the movie.

Juha H.

Kuvia, kuvia

I've been taking quite a lots of pictures lately - hundreds and hundreds. Many photos I've printed, some sent into this Blog for all to see. But now the colours of Autumn are fading away. Much of the leaves have already fallen. Into the dark times we go. Later the light will come back with snow...

Yesterday I began working with a song of mine. Kaunis typertyma (= Stupefying beautifully or something in those lines in English). There are no words for the song. I hope Sini sings it one day. Guitar, bass and a couple of woodwind lines are waiting for the mixing... and the rest of the instruments.

Juha H.

Kirppuvuoressa. (Juha H.) 

Yellow Fall. Again a photo I've worked with lately. (Juha H.) 

Sirkkalampi, Finland. (Juha H.) 

Ei erikoisempaa

Edited some 20 - 30 of my photos and printed some of them. Most pics were so much ok that there was quite little needed to be done with them. Above is one small and packed version of a photo that I took last weekend.

Played flute - improvised with it - some 4 -5 hours plus some guitar. So - nothing much.

Juha H.

Dirt on the water - blue-green algae... (Juha H.) 

Fall 2005 (Juha H.)