Notes_Norton

Station to Station — David Bowie

Quizás, Quizás, Quizás (Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps) — Trio Los Panchos Done by many, I haven't heard this version, I'll listen as soon as I hit Submit — it should be fun.

Call this truck if your car is 'toe-taled' (Totaled)

Ding! DIng! We have a winner. ^^^ In the band biz a trombone is called a bone, and the musician a bone player. Bonehenge it is. Notes ♫

Basketball Jones — Cheech & Chong

Our House - CSNY With lyrics "Is a very very very fine house" L

When we did this on stage, the organ player who also played guitar did that, I moved over to the organ and played. I wasn't very good at the time, but the part was easy. At the psychedelic end, I kicked off my boot and played glissandi the keys with my foot. I remember the fans saying, “He's so good he can play the organ with his feet.” That was a fun band, we goofed off a lot, and they loved it. Notes ♫

I've decided to sell my hoover… it was just collecting dust.

When the then future Mrs. Notes and I founded our duo, “The Sophisticats” we wanted to play blues and jazz. After a while, we decided we would rather go grocery shopping and pay the mortgage, so we decided to play music that makes money. It worked. I avoided becoming a wage slave, and although I never got rich, the mortgage is paid off and I have no debt. Music that makes money is better than waking up with an alarm clock, and heading out somewhere unfulfilling 5 days a week. Insights and incites by Notes ♫

Psychotic Reaction — Count Five

Craig, this might be a repeat… I'm reading a book about antigravity. It's impossible to put down!

One Mint Julep — Ray Charles

Great Latin American sax player.

Glad I'm not the only one

I think you'll like it. Hundreds of new styles have been added, and we've gotten better at making fake disks since the early 1990s. I'll send out e-mails to all the users, and post the message on my site and the BiaB forum when I'm done. It'll probably be a few months away. We're gigging a lot now. It's the Tourist Season, and we're doing 3-6 one-nighters per week. Mostly 4 or 5. Notes ♫

Can Can — Venus Orchestra (J. Offenbach)

Summer Samba — Oscar Peterson (Originally Walter Wanderly, but I like quite a few other versions better than his)

Most of my work involves making music. Learning new songs, making the backing tracks for my duo, making aftermarket style/song software for Band-in-a-Box and gigging. If I'm doing something else that I have to concentrate on, background music is out. Even if it's boring and instrumental. Music just catches my brain and will distract me. If I don't like the music, I'll try to analyze what is wrong with it and how I would try to 'fix' it. I've missed important dialog in movies because something interesting was happening with the background music. Insights and incites by Notes ♫

We're re-doing Disk #2 now (Pop/Rock Fake Book companion). We compiled that one in the early 1990s, it's one of our bestsellers. There have been so many new styles released since then that express the songs better. So we decided to redo it. We've been working on that for about a year. It will be a free update to anyone who has ever purchased it. That just seems like the right way to go. It's how I would appreciate being treated if I was the customer. We won't use micro-chords on that one, because we don't know what version any of BiaB our customers who bought that disk has. Peter Gannon tells me that if the end user doesn't have a newer version of BiaB that supports micro-chords, only the first chord will be played, and that would ruin many of the songs. So we are still going with expanded styles. I do like the micro-chords, but until they are about 10 years old, I'll probably continue to use expanded styles, for back-compatibility. Back-compatibility is also the reason I assign MIDI styles to the fake disk songs. If a MIDI style is assigned, the BiaB 'robot' will suggest a real track style. On the other hand, if a real style is assigned, BiaB will not recommend a MIDI style. So to suggest both, MIDI must be default. Of course, the user can change the style. A few years ago, I did Fake Disk #37, The Real Book Companion with all Real-Track styles, and the feedback from my customers was to stick to MIDI for that very reason. When I made my own styles back in the 1990s, I gave them to a few friends who were using BiaB. They told me they liked my styles better than PG Music's styles (aren't friends wonderful?) and one said that I should sell them. I took out a classified ad in Keyboard Magazine for 3 months. As the 3rd month was approaching, the ad rep called me and asked if I wanted to renew. I hadn't sold any, so I said, “No, Thanks.” About an hour later, I got my first order, so I called the mag and renewed. I wonder if the magazine bought a disk to get me to renew? Anyway, I'm glad I got that order. I've sold to 100 different countries now. I walked into a music store in Bermuda, and another in London, and they both wanted to know if I was the “Real Bob 'Notes' Norton”. That and a couple of bucks will buy a cup of coffee, but it felt good anyway. I don't make much money per disk. By the time I pay the web host, shopping cart, credit card authorization company, credit card merchant's account, business bank account (per deposit), and insurance, there isn't much left over, but enough to keep me from travelling to find work in the slow, Florida summers. After the Pop/Rock redo, we're doing The Real Book volume VI. The last in that series. Mrs. Notes is planning on another Rock/Pop book. Right now it's prime gigging season, and we are doing from 3 to 6 one-nighters per week, so there isn't much progress on the software. Notes ♫