With the hot summer days winding down it’s still kind of hard to reckon with another year moving well past the midway mark. It’s been of course a very trying year in a lot of aspects and that has affected even recording sessions. One of the most unusual aspects is the need for masks and sanitizing all the common surfaces. So this brings us to a second round of recording a Christmas compilation with Tom Tomoser. Each family member is involved either singing, videoing or overseeing/arranging the music. It began this year with a keyboard recording (and that’s a lot of surface to clean) and then adding sax parts and flute. Vocals will round out this collection of a dozen mostly traditional Christmas tunes – but presented in fresh ways. It won’t be long before we’re wishing all a “Merry Christmas”.

Here we are at the end of July with the season of summer well on its way. We continue to live in a very confused and unusual world, and yet many things continue as they always have. Flowers still bloom, family and friends still stay connected through whatever means they can, and along with other weekly production work is the ongoing attention we’re giving to The Phantom of the Opera. This original musical being produced by One For All Musical Theater is still slated for next spring and we’re busy at work on more of the elements for that show. Much of the time is being spent creating the sound effects that will be heard during the performance. When I can’t find exactly what is needed in my multiple libraries, I resort to the old-fashioned “foley” method and record my own. So it was that we needed some light chain/beads/metal clanking for the final element in the monumental effect of the opera house chandelier crashing to the floor. So a gathering of various necklaces from my wife’s collection were brought into the studio and clinked, clanked and drug across various surfaces to get those sounds. I had to explain to my wife where the rest of her adornments were for a moment, but they’re all back in place and the recorded sounds are as well. There can even be heard the scraunching and squealing of a dry wall lift recorded about 19 years ago in Cleveland when my friend Jon was building his studio. Much more to be done.

Life here (and for most of the world) has had a drastic change forced upon us by a microscopic assailant. The resultant actions (or non-activity) has caused literal walls to be built between persons who normally would freely connect, communicate and hang together. Check-out persons for example are “imprisoned” behind their plexiglass walls while we wait six feet away from the next in line. Family gatherings and life event commemorations (such as graduations) have largely not been happening. The COVID-19 isolation has dramatically highlighted that being kept apart is not how we were designed to be.

Recent events in the US involving police officers and individuals are reminding us that many other long-standing walls are still solidly in place, and in some cases are being fortified. Relationships between persons are certainly not functioning well in many arenas of life.

My neighbor and I were discussing some of these issues this afternoon during a break from trying to catch up with runaway lawn growth. He was probing (as we should) why these things are happening? I was reminded that our Creator designed each of us special and important in His eyes, and desires that we believe and share that perspective with all those around us. This life view pertains to every relationship we are part of whether it be in our families, neighborhoods, communities, employers and employees, companies and their clients, and even the person we randomly meet.

I was facing down our street during this conversation and noticed a couple of police vehicles stopped several doors down on the opposite side. After some conversation with the residents there the officers were preparing to leave, and I then observed something rather remarkable. The neighbor next door to that house went over and after briefly talking with them he locked arms with two of the officers and had his wife take a picture. The photo was inter-racial, and so is the couple. What a beautiful reminder that when we embrace our Creator’s designs, we then have the foundations for His plan in our relationships as well.