ACT I, SCENE I.
Dark, cunning, spacey overture wraps up. Johnathon and Raechel Heiloc are aboard the solar cruise ship CASSIRIC IV, orbiting the Sun. They head down to the main observation deck to witness the next wave of solar flares, making their way through the crowd in order to get a view.

It’s short but it gives you an idea of what to expect, music-wise. None of the other songs will be anywhere near this happy sounding, so I have to make sure this one stays bright and optimistic. Contrast is more important than balance. One star against the black night sky can inspire the world. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. Opportunity is not a lengthy visitor. STARTING NOW I BAT A THOUSAND.

-Travis Conrad

P.S. Working 40 hours a week makes you view your free time COMPLETELY different. Also; I can now identify geraniums, impatients, begonias, salvia, phlox, thyme, sage, oregano, mint, rosemary, hostas, clematises, lilies, blue spruce, mugo pines, boxwood, forsythia, rhododendrons, hydrangeas, lilacs, spirea, japanese maples (common and dragon variety), ivy, saxifrage, coleus etc. etc.

-Travis Conrad

Test one.
Vibraphone, cellos and steel string acoustic guitar.

-Travis Conrad

The Beautiful Mean – Opening
Seventh Chord Opening

Motif for a Letter I – Charlie receives the first letter from Erin.
Motif I

Motif for a Letter II – Charlie and Erin’s correspondence / Erin stands him up.
Motif II

Motif for a Letter III – Conclusion
Motif III

-Travis Conrad

1. It’s sung by a girl, Charlotte. Relatively quiet, passive, scholarly Charlotte.
2. She’s just been asked on out a real date from a guy, Cameron, whom she’s met twice now: once in his office, once at a business meeting over dinner.
3. She doesn’t have a wide account of experience in the world of dating. And nearly not as much as, say, Kim (in fact I doubt there are many people alive that have as much experience as Kim, porn stars omitted).
4. This is song takes place in her head. It’s an internal debate.

Below the song I’ve posted the first couple lines so you can read along with the synth vocal notes if you like (also will help give you an idea of the rhyme scheme). The lyrics are broken up into syl-ab-les to aid in following the vocals correctly if’n you so choose. I’d include all the lyrics but I really don’t want to give it all away like your girlfriend on the first date OH BURN!

Charlotte’s Decision

Damn-it Came-ron why would you,
ask me that,
for-cing me to pick an an-swer, when there are few op-tions on de-mand.

Things were go-ing pret-ty well.
Now this chat
has gone to hell. It’s a can-cer when you can’t dwell on the stakes at hand.

Peo-ple can’t leave things a-lone,
when they’re fine.
If I had known this was com-ing, I’d have post-poned walk-ing home with him.

But it’s too late to go back,
so de-cline,
or stay on track with this hum-ming train down tar-mac. Both op-tions seem dim.

On the one hand we have yes.
Rush-ing in’s
not bad I guess if you’re cau-tious and you a-ssess the sit-u-a-tion.

On the o-ther we have no.
It be-gins,
when I say so, and this nau-seous feel-ing is grow- ing. I want to run.

</lyrics>
<continue reading without lyrics for the remaining 55 seconds of the song :] >

I know what you’re about to say. “But Travis, that last chord sounds all wrong. What kind of second rate Vaudeville composer are you?” Fear not! There is reason. That chord was Charlotte’s clarity. She’s made her decision, her thoughts are clear. That final chord is meant to up-lift and remove the gloom and disorder that’s been building up over the course of the song. It ushers the way into the song following immediately after. hu-ZAH!

Next up I am pleased to announce a new, much more realistic rendering of the Festal Waltz that I posted just over a month ago. I convert it from midi to mp3 using a site called HamieNET. It gets the job done but it’s certainly nothing near commercial quality. Using a friend’s copy of Garageband, I converted my sheet music to mp3 once again. The results are unparalleled. UN-FREAKING-PARALELLED. It’s fantastic, I’m so pleased. I can’t wait to acquire my own mac so I’ll have this incredibly tool at my disposal 24/7/365/152 (I think 152 more years is pretty reasonable when you take into consideration the advances that are going on with stem cell research).

Feast upon the new and improved rendition. I cannot wait til I’m in a position to hear it being played for realsies.

Festal Waltz

*note: the celesta’s been replaced by a glockenspiel as was the original intention. I apologize for any sleep you might lose/any grief this decision has caused you.

*also note: just a reminder that all mp3 files and images are on this website are Copyright © 2008-2009 Travis Conrad Reichstein

-Travis Conrad PEACIN’ OUT!

Mandelbrot, the fractal teddybear

In other news, I finished up Charlotte’s Inner Monologue today. Very pleased with the music for it, I’ll post it up once I’m done polishing it (everything needs a good polish). I still need to fiddle around with the key it’s in so it flows well from After Dinner with Cam right before it. Which reminds me, I recently stumbled upon GarageBand and I’ve gotta say, it’s an incredibly useful program that I wish was available on PC. But since it’s not, my next big purchase evidently is gonna be a Mac Mini. The left hemisphere of my brain salivates in sweet, untangible, anticipation.

-Travis Conrad