Tuli takapihalla

Bonfire from my backyard. - I made a video. Sini sang the melody and I did the rest. It  can be seen here. It's sort of a  Christmas movie. (Juha H.)

Rush

Sini and I watched a BluRayMovie - Rush Beyond the lighted stage. Impressive, very much so. Wonderful music with something to say - Neil Peart is a great poet and the band is musically very, very interesting. Well, well actually the band is very much fantastic.

Juha H.

Talvimaisema

Winter scene. - Yesterday Sini and I were in Tampere. Very nice place to visit every now and then. This time we went to an Art Exhibition( Anne Tuori), saw a movie (The King's Speech), met friends and with them we went to a Blues Concert. All was very nice and uplifting. (Juha H.)

Takaisin Tallinnasta

Back from Tallinn, Estonia. We - Sini and I - quite much like to visit there. Concert of Beethoven's music was the main reason to travel there this time. Above view from our hotel room's window.

Today is Frank Zappa's 70th birthday - well at least it would be if he'd be alive. He passed away all too early - as French composer Pierre Boulez said earlier this year. For some weeks while walking I've been listening to Zappa's orchestral works. Wonderful experience.

We just came back from the movies - Rare Exports. Excellent film about the original and real (!?) Santa Claus.

Juha H.

Sateista

Rainy day. - Finally Sini and I watched Avatar. I'm impressed. (Juha H.)

Illalla elokuvaa

I watched a movie - District 9. I'm quite impressed. The story is a bit comic, a bit sad, quite violent and intense. I liked the whole a lot. Well, I'm a Science Fiction fan.

Earlier today I did some more recording of woodwinds, bass and percussion.

Sini and I got our H1N1 vaccination. I'm very ok. My arm is not at all sore, not a bit.

Juha H.

Takapiha 104

Backyard today. And there was some Sun, too. This was so nice. There have been so many cloudy days... - Sini and I just finished watching Slumdog Millionare. The film and its story is absolutely fantastic! And as it is conducted and written more or less by Westerners, who do know India, it is more understandable for us Scandinavians who've never been to India... (Juha H.)

Lauantai

J-V has been in the studio for two weeks with Dead Cult Diaries. Some videos can be seen here. Music is propably some sort of punk-metal... Anyways some day soon I'll hear what the band sounds.

Lazy day - some music, some reading. And in the evening Yes Man.

Juha H.

Pihalla

View from my backyard at sunset today. - Now Sini and I are going to watch a movie, Sword of Hounour this time. (JuhaH.)

Rannalla

Hay on the beach. - And now a movie, No Country for Old Men. (Juha H.)

Valoa

More sunlight. - Long walks outside, playing flute and alto sax and then some movies: Cloverfield, Beowulf and Sleepy Hollow... (Juha H.)

Ilman lepoa 2

Mixed the backing track of my composition Ilman lepoa (= Without any rest). It's a happy, happy song about the beauty of this world we live in. It's so good to see the good things every now and then. All is not wrong, all is not gone bad. Beauty and good things help us to get by and to get over with the evil... - Now only Sini's singing and a guitar solo are missing.

Now's the time to watch a movie - Troy this time. And some Stratocaster playing to go with the film.

Juha H.

Raja

Sini and I watched a Finish movie - Raja (= Border). Finland decleared its independence in the 6th of December 1917. After that there was a pretty bloody civil war - brother against brother, white against red, socialist against non-socialist... The movie is a story of an important part of the aftermath of Finish Civil War of the year 1918 - of the time to create the border against Russia - against the birthing of the Soviet Union, against the communism... The whole is somehow a multidimensional love triangle of two men and one woman, men are politically on different sides... two or three ideologies get more or less intermingled, three countries - Russia, Finland and Germany - are parts in the story... and of course it the whole is a part of the aftermath of the First World War... Exceptionally fine movie.

Music continues as normal.

Juha H.

Musaa ja lehvaa

Much of the day - just playing and writing music... In the evening I recorded my parts for a Mep/JoukoT-song - three, four tracks of percussion, bass and woodwinds are done. Now only singing is missing. (Earlier, some weeks ago, Jouko did his acoustic guitar...) - There is a date set for vocals to come true...

Later in the evening - a movie. Sini and I watched 300 ... The whole was an ugly bloodshed and - I'd say irrevalent, non-historical - legend, sort of...

Juha H.

Kuvaa ja musaa

Right now - Jordan Rudess is playing a weird instrument - Continuum on Dream Theater DVD Score. Strangely fantastic! Rudess is possibly the greatest hero of this wonderful band, well at least for me. And Continuum is a very different instrument. So nice. And now Rudess plays table steel guitar...

Earlier this evening Sini and I watched a movie - Flags of our fathers. Thanks once again Clint Eastwood. It was a sadly beautiful story - if a war movie can ever be described with such words. Anyways the whole was much more than mere shooting, killing and dying. - Some weeks ago we watched the story of Iwo Jima from the Japanese side. Then it was the same kind of thanks for Clint Eastwood. Both sides of a hard battle...

Now mister Rudess plays his massive and almost ancient Moog synthesizer.

Juha H.

Sunnuntai

After yesterday's partying with the Machine Men the beginning of the day was a bit slow. But yes fun we did have.

Sini sang a couple of songs into ProTools. And after that I mixed the music. Now one more musical project is done - except the mastering of the whole.

And then - Pirates of the Caribean: At World's end. Imaginary fun for the evening.

Juha H.

PasunaPelimannit

Pasunapelimannit played a nice little consert today. Some half an hour of Finish Folk Music, most of it locally composed. There were two, three hundred people listening to us perform...

Now Sini and I are watching Pan's Labyrinth...

Juha H.

Jadesoturi

Just watched the movie Jade Warrior - joint Finnish-Chinese venture. It took me by surprise. I knew it's a mixture of different times, legends and mythical stories. But the many-dimensionality of the story was a revelation, sort of. The whole can not be taken at face value - there are so many possible ways to inteprete it. It is NOT merely a fantastic adventure movie - with Chinese-Finnish swords and sorcery. It is quite introspective. This feature must come from Finland. The story is a mixture of Finnish legend of Sampo and Pandora's Box etc... The possibility to inteprete a story in myriad ways is always nice. - Music of the movie was written - probably very much of it was improvised - by Kimmo Pohjonen and Samuli Kosminen. Very nice.

Juha H.

Toppatakki ja talvi loppuu...vai...

The weather has chanced alot - right now and in the middle of the night outside - the temperature is + 2 Celcius degrees. This is somewhat strange and not so ordinary... And the weather seems to get warmer and warmer... Well, the climate seems to chance ... I'm waiting for the Spring.

Earlier this evening I mixed and bounced to Disk my compodition Toppatakki (=Parka). Everything is ok... Music goes on.

Earlier this evening Sini and I watched the movie - War of the Worlds.

Juha H.

Tuli hiipuu

All evening I worked with my song Tuli hiipuu (=Fire slowly dies down). It's a happily sad ballad for Sini to sing. The words tell of sitting alone in the still of the night at a dying-down campfire and feeling happy... and all of it fades away... Percussions, bass guitar, keyboards and some woodwinds are done. Only singing and something else - a solo guitar/domra? - is missing.

Now something else. Hanna-Maaria and I are going to watch a movie from DVD - Snakes on a Plane.

Juha H.