{"id":46640,"date":"2021-01-04T11:06:45","date_gmt":"2021-01-04T01:06:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/billmitchell.org\/blog\/?p=46640"},"modified":"2021-01-04T11:06:45","modified_gmt":"2021-01-04T01:06:45","slug":"my-blog-is-on-its-new-years-holiday-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/billmitchell.org\/blog\/?p=46640","title":{"rendered":"My blog is on its ‘New Year’s Holiday’ today"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

My blog is on its ‘New Year’s Holiday’ today, while I devote more time to other writing commitments. To keep us amused, we have a great song from the 1960s, which might lead you down new musical paths to explore the musician featured. Regular transmission returns tomorrow. The photo is from the beach at Barwon Heads, Victoria, which is around where I was meant to be this week, prior to the border closures and flight cancellations last week due to the new Sydney virus outbreak. It is one of my favourite spots and I go there regularly.
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A little Twitter comment<\/h2>\n

I am thinking of deleting my Twitter account. I only signed up because I used to get a lot of E-mails in the afternoons from people enquiring as to when I would be posting my daily blog update.<\/p>\n

So I thought that if I conditioned readers to wait for my Twitter announcement that would reduce my (ridiculous) E-mail traffic and provide some consistency for those who were interested enough to read my work.<\/p>\n

I think that is a good use of Twitter.<\/p>\n

I think most of the way Twitter is used, however, more generally, is not useful.<\/p>\n

There is a lot of character assassination practiced on a daily basis with misinformation and lies rampant.<\/p>\n

So-called experts are out there every day, waxing lyrical about complex issues, that they have no real knowledge or limited personal experience of, and, have clearly have not taken the time to delve into the sometimes extensive work that those who do specialise in these issues have offered over many years of work.<\/p>\n

Opinion is not knowledge.<\/p>\n

Some views have to be privileged over other views if we are to respect knowledge. Otherwise, there is no progress on a rabble dominated by the loudest and aggressive voices.<\/p>\n

I keep getting copied into interchanges like this and I hate the idea of ‘blocking people’.<\/p>\n

I will never respond to personal attacks on me on Twitter, which seem to occur regularly. So save your time.<\/p>\n

My position is laid out in my work over my career which spans multiple decades.<\/p>\n

I have written millions of words in academic publications, my books, commissioned reports (many of which are publicly available), and, more recently my blog posts (which began in 2004).<\/p>\n

I request that people read that literature before they pontificate as experts on what I think.<\/p>\n

I always prioritise empirically-grounded knowledge over opinion.<\/p>\n

Most of these Twitter-heroes would never say to a person’s face the things they so easily type into the Internet via Twitter. That tells you a lot about their character.<\/p>\n

Music – Song for my Father<\/h2>\n

This is a song that I used to play a lot in one of my bands. Only four chords are involved but the secret is in the feel of the melody interacting with the rhythmic components.<\/p>\n

The song – Song for My Father<\/a> – was first recorded by US pianist – Horace Silver<\/a> – and his quintet during their ‘hard bop’ years.<\/p>\n

It appeared on their 1965 album – Song for My Father<\/a> (Blue Note records) – which features:<\/p>\n

1. Horace Silver – piano.
\n2. Carmell Jones – trumpet.
\n3. Joe Henderson – tenor saxophone.
\n4. Teddy Smith – bass.
\n5. Roger Humphries – drums.<\/p>\n

It combines Brazilian rhythms with folk melodies from Cape Verde (where Horace Silver’s father was born).<\/p>\n

The beauty of this song for an improvising musician is the scope to mix flattened third (minor scales) and modal forms on the Fm chord (key). That might not mean much but translates into considerable scope.<\/p>\n