Todays

Tuesday we visited the wonderful Rodney A. Briggs Library and got some great tips and pointers on how to use all of the great resources that we have. My favorite item is Electronic Reserves, which is if you didnt know a way to access books and other clippings from many different library items. The really nice thing is if you have a computer and internet you can access it right from your dorm room. So with this great resource at our hands we should all be getting A's. Haha
So today in class we went over chapter two in Deep Purple. We also went over possible ideas for me to do on our music project and i wanted to say thanks for the great ideas. The discussion got pretty funny when it started to relate to babies, boogers, and killing in the book. Oh yeah almost forgot about a funny comment about muddy water and how he got his name.Then it got even more interesting jumping from murder to Davinci and then to Necrophilia. Just a reminder that some of the music performances start on Tuesday. So if you have anymore ideas for me on the project i would love to hear them. Have a good weekend.
Adam

Class Summary

Hey I've Posted a blog on the class discussion from last week check them out. The link is http://dano1421.blogspot.com/

Problems accepting course blog invites

Several people have had problems accepting their invitations to be posters here on the course blog. Based on a couple of examples, I'm guessing that the problem in many cases is that your e-mail client is breaking the (fairly long) URL that Google/Blogger is mailing to you.

As an example, one person passed along their invitation e-mail and it had a link that looked something like (I've changed some of the numbers):

http://beta.blogger.com/i.g?inviteID=4622562676191033393&blogID=89562679374
14
940892

Notice how the "14" and "940892" ended up on the following lines? There are part of the "blogID" field in that URL and need to be added (without any spaces) to the end of the URL for it to work. (Thus the end of the URL should be "...37414940892".) Many mail clients break up long lines, even when they're URLs, leading to links that in fact don't work (like the one above). If your mail client is doing that I would (a) fuss about it and/or change to a different client for reading your mail and (b) type in the URL by hand, putting together the broken pieces. That should work, allowing you to accept the invitation.

If you can't seem to get the darn thing to work, please swing by the office some time and we can go through it together. Thanks!

Reminder: Class tomorrow is in the library!

A reminder that tomorrow's class is in the computer lab on the third floor of the library instead of our regular classroom. We will meet in the library, so head straight there. I happily see that several of you have posted a flurry of ideas on the song you might do your report on. Bring questions you have about information you might need and how you might find it -- the library staff are there to help!

Blogger Summary

hey, i am giong post the wonderful summary on my blog.... come see it if u wish!!! Its pretty amazing.. no kidding.... kelseyjowheaton10.blogspot.com

Charley Patton makes an appearance at UMM's open mic night!

In and amongst all the cool performances last night (and I saw quite a few of you there, which was excellent!), there was a pair of (new?) students that did a fine guitar and bass blues jam. The fact that two college students would choose that format for a public performance is a nice testament to the power of the blues as a form. As the pedantic old-fart teacher, though, my bells all started to go off when they introduced their improvisation as being based on "Spoonful" which they said was written by Cream. (Cream was a short lived but highly influential British "super-group" in the 60's which, among other things, led to Eric Clapton becoming a major international star.) of

But wait, hadn't we just listened in class to Charley Patton doing "A spoonful blues"? A relationship, perhaps? Yes, but indirectly. It turns out that Cream never claimed to write "Spoonful"; they recorded it, and definitely gave it their own twist, but gave the writing credit to Willie Dixon. Dixon was a major figure of the Chicago blues scene in the 50's and 60's, and comes up quite a bit in Palmer's Deep blues. While an accomplished singer and bassist, he's probably best known as a song writer, having penned all manner of Chicago classics, many of which went on to be major British Invasion hits. This included "Spoonful", which Dixon clearly based on Patton's much earlier version, but made major revisions to both the lyrics and the musical structure, creating a song that was arguably much more amenable to covers and jamming. Dixon's "Spoonful" was first recorded by, and become a signature song for, Howlin' Wolf, and it was that version that was heard (and covered) by numerous rock bands, particularly in the UK.

So we have an old blues from Patton being transformed into an electric blues by Dixon and Howlin' Wolf, picked up by Cream as part of the British Invasion, to be covered by a pair of UMM students at open mic night in 2006. Pretty cool, eh?

BTW, I'm definitely not trying to bash the students who played it last night. They were there to perform, not give a history lesson. They did a really nice job, and I definitely hope to hear them again.

We now have a list of recent student blog posts

I was finding it pretty difficult to wade through checking all your blogs one at a time for new posts, so I figured out how to get the lists of new posts, merge them, and post them over on the left in the beige box just under the banjo picture. As people add posts to their personal blogs, their titles will automagically appear in that box, so people can more easily keep an eye on what's happening on the various blogs.

Remember that this blog exists to serve you and the class, so definitely let me know if you have problems with it, or ideas for how to make it more useful.

We can leave the classroom for your performances

Many people have been posting about their performances as requested (thanks!), and it's been fun to see what sorts of ideas people have had. One question that's come up is whether we can leave the classroom for the performance, and the answer is absolutely yes. Each year we almost always make one trip to HFA to use the pianos in the practice rooms (we had a cool duet of "Frankie and Johnny" a while back, complete with plastic egg shaker percussion), and one year we went to the dance space in HFA for a solo dance performance. So be creative and think outside the box of Sci 3665!

Also, many people have talked in vague terms of how they would perform (I'll play this instrument, etc.), but very few people have said anything about what they'll perform. I realize that when faced this this assignment there's a natural tendency to focus on "What skill/instrument/etc. am I least likely to embarrass myself with", but I really want you to think seriously about a specific piece of roots music, which requires that you think of a song to perform as well.

Saturday's Concert

I personally have been REALLY disappointed about the general lack of posters and "wordspreading" about the upcoming concert. If you want some more info on the artists that are coming here as part of homecoming, I've written about two of the three rap groups for a website I write for, DUnation.com.

Prof & Rahzwell (http://www.dunation.com/pages/news/profrahzwell.shtml)

Ernie Rhodes (http://www.dunation.com/pages/news/ernierhodes.shtml)

Also, a slightly older article (not written by me) about Golden:
(http://www.dunation.com/pages/news/golden.shtml)

I think the concert will be worth the 5 bucks and the walk to off-campus, but that's just me.

-Brady

Open mic Thurs; KUMM concert Sat

In the shameless event plug department, we have at least two cool music events coming up in connection with homecoming. Thursday at 9pm in Oyate is the first open mic night of the year. These are buckets of fun, and it's a cool chance to see some of your very talented fellow students in action. If you'd like to perform, they'd like you to show up around 8:45pm to sign up for a slot.

Then Saturday night is the KUMM homecoming concert featuring three cool regional hip-hop acts: Ernie Rhodes, Golden, and Prof & Rahzwell. It'll be cheap and fun, so come bounce! (This is an 18+ gig.)

Also, folks should (once you've accepted your invitation to join this blog as an author) feel free to post event plugs here. Events that are related to the course are prefered to some degree, but don't worry too much about that. If we seem to get too many plugs then we can deal with it, but at the moment we don't seem to be having problems with too much traffic :-).

Taking notes in class

Reading through the blog posts and thinking about a conversation I had after the noon class today, I'd like people to (re)consider whether you're taking notes in class. So far most people are clearly not doing so (they don't even have paper out), which is fine if that's what works for you. But it's also clear that, for example, the people that did take notes in anticipation of writing discussion summaries got quite a bit more detail and depth out of the discussion in part because of their notes.

I've also had conversations with a few people that haven't been speaking up much in class, and a common thread was "By the time there's some space in the conversation, I forget what I was going to say". Taking some (brief) notes on questions/comments/ideas you'd like to share can help ensure that you're ready with an idea when there is some dead space (which always happens now and then) and it tends to make you look more organized and focussed. And if you don't actually get to bring it up in class, then you can always use it as the basis for a blog post when you're next at a computer.

First blog and discussion summaries

We now have all four blog/discussion summaries posted, with some perceptive observations and pointers to some of the very nice writing that you folks have been doing, so definitely go check them out!

• Culture Jammer's discussion summary
  
• The Little Rabbit's discussion summary
  
• Kat's blog summary
• Steph's blog summary

Thanks to these four for getting us off to a good start!

Also, the question came up of how to post notices of these summaries. I'd like everyone who writes a summary to post it here, and I've sent everyone an invitation that (when you accept it) will allow you to post here. The invitation takes the form of an e-mail from Blogger/Google, so check your mail spool for that.

Reminders that the next blog summarizers (the whole list is here) are Kelsey and Adrienne, and the next discussion summarizers are Dan and Jennifer L.

Schedules for performances, blog and discussion summaries

My apologies for not getting this up last week, but life interfered as it often does. The schedules for everyone's performances and when it's your turn to do blog or discussion summaries are now available on this page: http://tinyurl.com/lsprz

You should go there ASAP, look up your dates, and mark them in whatever thing you use to keep track of your calendar. I'll try to remember to announcing upcoming assignments in class, but I'm sure I'll forget now and then and you are responsible regardless.

Putting together three interacting schedules like this is complex, and the results are never perfect. Someone has to go first. Someone has to go last. There are always a few people with two of their events a week apart. Someone will no doubt need to perform on the same day as their team/band is playing in some far off distant land.

So, you're welcome to swap, but obviously both/all involved parties must agree and I must be notified so I can update the list!

Thanks!

Everybody blog about possible performance ideas

Now that we've all had a little time to think about what they might do for their performance, I'd like everyone to write a post on their blog about what they might do for their performance. If you have a pretty well-formed idea, let us know what that is. If you've got several ideas and can't make up your mind, list them and see what sort of feedback you get.

As a rule the important thing is to choose to do something, and then start working on that. In retrospect it may not have been the "perfect" choice (whatever that might have been), but the act of choosing and making progress is far more important than any misguided notion of perfection.

If you're really struggling and just can't think of anything, you should get in touch ASAP so we can help get you unstuck.

Remember - this should be fun!

discussion summary

http://www.culturejammer210.blogspot.com/

I posted my summary of recent discussions

-Christina

Some thoughts on our discussion of Gov. Blanco's speech

First, let me say that I'm generally very pleased with the level of in-class discussion. Almost everyone has contributed in both sections, and we've gotten into some significant and interesting issues. If we keep that up, we'll be in great shape for the rest of the semester. (I am, however, less impressed with the blogging. While there have been a few people that have done some nice writing, in general there's been very little beyond the initial assignment.)

So, all that said, I keep thinking about our discussions Thursday of Gov. Blanco's speech. It was, again, a good discussion with broad participation, but the discussion in both sections ended up being (to my ears) much more about her presentation style and general choice of topic than about the actual content of her speech. We can debate all day whether she should have said more or less or whatever about Katrina, her life, blah, blah, but the fact is that she gave that speech and said those things, and our discussion (and the few blog posts on the subject) didn't really address her statements with much depth.

There were quite a few things that I thought might warrant discussion, most of which never came up. At the very beginning, for example, she said "Life is simply not fair". Is everyone comfortable/happy with that sort of blanket assertion? If so, do we just accept it, or do we work to change it? You were told to "Put yourself in a position to make a difference... No one is going to do this for you.". Do you agree with this exhortation? Why is this important (or not)? What are you doing (or not) to put yourself in such a position, and why?

Some other lines I found noteworthy:

• "Don't let stereotypes shut you out of any career."
• "You don't have to know everything, but you have to be willing to learn."
• "Ignore the false prophets - be true to yourself."
• "Stereotypes can be broken if we all work to defy expectations."
• "Focus on the value of diversity."

Lastly, what did she mean by "Be open to committed living"? What does that imply for you here at UMM? For you in this class?

Thoughts?

Thanks for coming over last night

I'd like to thank the 10 or so FYS students that came over for the movie night last night. It was a nice excuse to watch O brother, where art thou? again, and you folks were wonderful guests. Thanks for making the time to join us!

John Hanson (the former FYS student that came a bit late and sat towards the back) stayed for quite a while after the movie while we listened to music and chatted. One of the things we talked about was the way they set up the two gubernatorial candidates. Pappy (the incumbent) might not be the "bad guy" at the beginning, but he's hardly the "good guy" and the reform candidate comes across pretty well (esp. if you ignore the slightly disturbing bit with the midget). Yet by the end we learn that the reform candidate is clearly major creepy bad news and that Pappy, while perhaps more opportunist than idealist, is a whole row better than his opponent. (I still remember how surprised I was when I first saw it and got to the part where we discover how awful the reform candidate truly is.)

One of the things I really love about that movie is the amazing breadth of the music they've included. There are lots of movies featuring lost of blues, or country, or gospel, etc., but the Coen brothers and T-Bone Burnett pulled together a really wonderfully broad collection of great music here. Great stuff!

It's also worth pointing out that the places they mention in the movie are real, and many of those cities/towns will pass by in our readings now and then. Tommy Johnson (the name of the African-American guitarist) was a real blues guitarist who (along with people like Robert Johnson) did claim some sort of deal with the devil. And watching Pappy dancing and then leading everyone in song at the end may have seemed far-fetched, but there were in fact more than one southern governor that had a significant music career either before or after being governor.

Reminder: First readings from Deep blues

A reminder that for Tuesday morning we have our first reading from Palmer's Deep blues, namely the Prologue ("It wasn't no big money, but we's doin' it") and Chapter 1 ("Beginnings").

There's a lot of great and important stuff in these two sections, so give them the time they deserve. Take some notes, blog a little about what you think are some of the most important (or confusing) points, and be prepared to discuss them in class next week. Some of the material in the Prologue is as good an argument for why I care about roots music as any I've read.

Its story...is an epic as noble and as essentially American as any in our history. It's the story of a small and deprived group of people who created, against tremendous odds, something that has enriched us all.

He also helps lay out some of the things we need to be paying attention to:

And we need to understand the people who made and listened to blues, not just as blacks or oppressed Americans or romantic archetypes or clever technicians or successful entertainers but as particular people who made particular personal and artistic choices in a particular place at a particular time.

Chapter 1 has some vital history, and nicely summarizes some of our sense of the important but complex and subtle role of Africa in all this. The idea of vocal masking and the "African fondness for muddying perfectly clean sounds" is crucial to making sense of the early recordings of people like Charley Patton and Blind Willie Johnson (not to mention the wonderful music of Jimi Hendrix).

P.S. I heard today that I will not be doing jury service next week, so I'll definitely be there Tuesday.

P.P.S. See you Sunday!

A welcoming carnival

Most people have posted their responses to the Initial blog assignment, so let's take a spin through it all and see what we find! The intent here is to replicate the idea of "blog carnivals", where different people take turns generating posts that pull together some of the cool stuff that people are writing on their blogs. I'll start this week, and then you folks get to start up next week.

I would point out that almost no one has actually posted anything to their blog other than this one assigned posting (and not everyone's done that yet). (Big thanks to the few people that have made an effort and used the tools a bit!) I can assign more work if you want me too, but I'd rather leave you to find your own way. If people don't post or discuss, though, I'm happy to start handing out writing assignments instead...

Perhaps the biggest surprise for me in your initial posts was a whole raft of important questions the national anthem question raised that, honestly, I hadn't really thought of when I asked it. A lot of people were pretty stumped by the question, but those that did dig into it some raised some really interesting questions about what the role and function of an anthem is. Lots of people used the word "patriotic" in their discussion without trying to define the term or explain what it meant in the context of an anthem. Other people saw the anthem as a chance to make a point about what American was or could be; from Kat: "mine would have to be on how we, as a society, have become disillusioned by what we are, and not turning thoughts towards what we could be.". Others focused on the idea of the anthem as representing the people in some sense. Me thinks that there's much more to be said on this subject :-), maybe in class, maybe in the comments to this point, or maybe back on people's individual blogs.

I could also lay a lot about things like layout and formatting. For the moment, though, I'll simply suggest that you check out some of the other blogs and think about what you find readable and helpful...

Why did you sign up for a roots music FYS section?

Most people signed up for this section because of some general interest in
music ("I love music"). A few were quite specifically interested in roots music. Magic Flying Toad (what a great name!) had a cool story:

Hmm... at my high school senior prom they played a polka as a joke. Only two people danced to it- me and my date. Oh yeah, I'm that big of a nerd. 'Nuff said.

Several other people mentioned some sort of family connection like this from Adr:

When I was younger, my family danced to waltz and polka music at gatherings. That connection to music most likely fueled my interest in roots music, particularily bluegrass

Culture Jammer's grandpa "plays accordian and the saw"! That's rockin', and I'd love to see that going down.

Dano felt that the material was important because "I think music in America is the boiling water that helps mix our melting pot.". Setting aside for the moment the complex debates about "melting pot" versus "salad bowl", I thought this was a really cool analogy.

Perhaps my all-time favorite answer to this question was from Laura: "I've been told it was one of the least tacky FYS classes, and I really like music." I may just have to add that to the syllabus somewhere :-).

If you could take 5 pieces of music with you to a desert isle, what would they be?

Our desert island disco is definitely going to be a wonderfully odd place. Smatterings of Red Hot Chili Peppers, Radiohead, Led Zepplin, Nickleback and Nickle Creek (two very different bands whose names I constantly mix up), Beatles, and Dave Matthews, plus lots of acts that were only mentioned once (or maybe twice). I was slightly surprised by the amount of "classic rock". I didn't expect that much Simon and Garfunkel, for example, and there were also (a few) more mentions of Bob Dylan than I would have expected, which was cool.

Some people listed some roots music but not much, but that's not surprising or a bad thing in any way. Several people included some music related to faith in some fashion. Classical pieces showed up quite a few times.

Most people simply listed five songs without any discussion or context, while a few of you provided some really nice insight into your choices. I am cool Dooner got into some interesting questions of whether he was just picking for himself, or saving the only pieces of (human) music that would survive (his blog also plays music at you, which was slightly surprising). Some people found it easy, but many did not. To quote I've got nothing to do today but smile: "This was difficult. I need to stop thinking about it now." :-)

What's a piece of music you associate with a parent, grandparent, or someone you know well that's at least a generation older than you.

I really enjoyed the responses to the question about music that you associate with parents or grandparents, and there were some great little stories. Adr, for example, said "My grandma used to play 'On Top of Old Smoky' on the concertina.", and Megan shared "One song that reminds me of my grandpa is Fishing in the Dark. He loved that song and whenever it would come on he would get up and dance!". Both really great images. Many people had strong associations of music with various relatives; Adam J chose a song that "really hits home now especially because my dad is currently in Iraq serving with the National Guard".

Keli's response was a nice example of coming to appreciate something through both exposure and other people's interest:

I was never really a fan of country music until I spent a summer with my grandmother and had no other choice but to listen to it. My grandparents' interest in country music has helped develop my newly found respect and love for it.

I would encourage everyone to be this open to new experiences (and not just in music!). Fancy Feet has a similar, but longer story - go check it out.

Sorting out music for road trips in Liz's house must be fun :-). "My dad enjoys listening [to] Led Zeppelin. My mom listens to a lot of modern Christian music."

It was interesting that Frank Sinatra came up quite a few times. Sometimes this was a concrete way, but often it seemed that Frank was standing in as sort of generic "old music guy".

If we all decided to replace the national anthem with a new song, and everyone agreed that you got to choose, what would you recommend?

It's probably a good thing you're not responsible for a new national anthem, 'cause a lot of you were pretty baffled by this ("I seriously have no idea for a replacement for the national anthem."). In fairness, though, it was a tough question (as Ashley correctly put it "Oh boy, that's kind of a loaded question!").

There were, however, several thought provoking responses, including this from Steph:

I would choose, "Save a Horse Ride a Cowboy" just because I have to choose a song, and everybody calls us western and that we are "cowboys".

I'd never really thought about using a western/cowboy song for the national anthem, but whole frontier mythos is pretty key to a lot of our national identity. Could be pretty unpopular with some segments of the population (the Native Americans come to mind), which raises the point made nicely by Laura about the difficulty of finding any song that meaningfully represents the diversity of the U.S; she dealt with this by suggesting using "themes from several different songs about, for or written by the people of our nation". Nonsensical Ramblings independently suggested John Lennon's "Imagine", which has a wonderful inclusiveness to it.

I'm not sure where to do with FYS Blog Dog's suggestion of the theme from "Team America: World Police" :-).

The only songs with multiple votes were (I think) Woody Guthrie's "This land is your land" (which has been seriously suggested as an alternative over the years, and also received the only negative vote), Radiohead's "National anthem", and "American idiot" by Green Day. The last two are obviously quite pointed statements, but what may be less clear is that Guthrie's song was intended as a pointed statement (and an angry response to "God bless America"). It's been so edited and re-/over-/mis-used that most of that edge has been completely washed out for most of us.

Several people wanted to leave the current anthem alone, including I am cool Dooner:

You can't argue with a old English bar song put together with the first verse to a peom written about the war of 1812 and not established as the National Anthem untill the early 1900's.

What kinds of music related performance stuff (if any) do you do? I interpret this pretty broadly so it can be playing one or more instruments, singing, dance, DJing (dance or radio), etc.

While many people play instruments and/or sing, there are many who don't or haven't done so in quite a while (there are lots of shower singers), and that's all cool. Keli nicely sums up all you really need for this class: "I play my radio. And I know how to work Itunes."

I liked Kat's creative take on the question:

Also, I was a painter for 13 theatre shows at anoka. that could be perceived as non musical, but once your surrounded by music for one month and at least two of those weeks are 18 hour days of painting, then everyone is singing.

We often downplay the value of informal community singing like this, but it's much closer to the kinds of experiences that people like the Carter Family grew up with than playing in a school orchestra or singing along to the radio on a road trip. As Bucky said quite nicely "I play guitar, drums, and sing. I create music. You dont need an instrument."

Another creative take was from Brady who writes "(CD reviews and features) on Minnesota music for both a website and a magazine". Cool.

Given the readings and what (little) you know about Governor Blanco, if you had a chance to ask her one question, what would it be?

There were some pretty predictable questions for Governor Blanco (lots of the "What did you learn from all this?" variety), but there were some nicely thought provoking ones in there as well. A pretty vital one (from Magic Flying Toad again) was

Why is it important to rebuild New Orleans, especially if it is only to be rebuilt in a place that is also open to future disasters? I believe that there must be good reasons, but I don't think I've really heard a definitive answer for this one.

Another that got me thinking was from The Little Rabbit:

Knowing what you know now, if you could go back in time to a month before Katrina, what would you do differently?

I thought the idea of stepping back a month and thinking about what would be different at that time was interesting.

I quite liked Nieve Bloggin's preface: "I would confess to being unfamiliar with her background...". Being honest about what you don't know is often crucial to learning new things.

Jacknife's Jottings had a question that has a lot of important issues tucked inside it: "When will New Orleans be 'New Orleans' again?". In particular, this raises what I consider the really important issue of what makes New Orleans special, and whether that being preserved in the rebuilding process.

There were lots of questions regarding the Governor's role as the first female governor of Louisiana; one I particularly liked was from Brady: "Being the first female governor of Louisiana, do you feel your approach to the office is (or should be) radically different from your predecessors?".

Some lost blogs

There are a few blogs where I don't actually know how to connect the blog to a person on my class list. If any of these blogs is yours, please get in touch to claim your blog!

• Random nonsense - There's a first name on the blog, but there are at least two people that name could attach to.
• Hockey44
  

There are probably others that I overlooked while I was trying to get through them all.

Oh, and people really like the polka dots theme...

Songs for our initial Pandora radio playlist

Tomorrow in class we'll go over how to set up an account on Pandora and create "radio stations" based on a set of seed music. For our first such radio station, I would like everyone to create a station containing the following songs:

• "Got my mojo working" by Muddy Waters
• "Death letter blues" by Son House
• "Lord, I just can't keep from crying" by Blind Willie Johnson
  
• "Wreck of the Old 97" by Pink Anderson
• "Death cell blues" by Blind Willie McTell
• "Sitting on top of the world" by Mississippi Shieks
• "My Oklahoma blowed away" by Pete Seeger
• "Stand by me" by Sister Matthews
• "Jesus is a mighty good leader" by Skip James
• "Feather bed" by Memphis Jug Band
• "Worried man blues" by The Original Carter Family
• "Midnight special" by Leadbelly
• "Parchman Farm blues" by Bukka White
• "Jump the boogie" by Boozoo Chavis
• "Wabash cannonball" by Roy Acuff
• "A spoonful blues" by Charlie Patton
• "This land is your land" by Woody Guthrie
• "Oh happy day" by The Edwin Hawkins Singers
• "Move on up a little higher" by Mahalia Jackson
• "Cross road blues" by Robert Johnson
• "Cold, cold heart" by Hank Williams
• "Uncle Pen" by Bill Monroe
• "Wildwood flower" by The Carter Family
• "Waiting for a train" by Jimmie Rodgers
  

You should then listen to this station. I don't know for sure what will come up. If you keep listening, you'll get eventually get quite a few of these to come up, but there are no guarantees as to what will play and when. I would encourage at least two kinds of listening. First, do some background listening just to run through a lot of different songs and get a sense of the breadth and range of these many types of music. Second, do some more detailed listening where you really paying attention to all the songs, taking some notes, marking what you like, and writing some remarks on your blog about things that particular struck you (good, bad, confusing, amazing). And bring some of these things up in class!

I'm hopeful that this use of Pandora will be both cool and convenient. You'll have to let me know how it works for you. Thanks!

It would be good to post about Blanco on your blog

I would encourage everyone to post some sort of (thoughtful) response on their blog to Blanco's presentation last night.

Note that I didn't say "I require everyone...". You are adults, and ultimately you have to make your own decisions about how to get the most of your life here at UMM. I can make suggestions, but I can't (and won't and shouldn't) follow you around making sure you do everything I suggest. I think you ought to attend events, take notes, reflect and discuss things with the people around you, and post to your blog as part of a larger discussion. What you do, however, is ultimately up to you :-).

Reminder: Blanco chats today

A reminder that Governor Blanco is available to talk with FYS students (you!) today from 10-noon in the Science Atrium and 2-4pm in the LaFave house. For those who don't know where the LaFave house is (which is probably most everybody), it's the building marked 65 on the bottom left of this map. To get there go out the main entrance (4th Street), hang a left on College Avenue (the first street), and go about one block down. It's the house with all the U of M colored flags out front. (It looks just like a normal house, because that's what it was until a few years ago. Don't get confused - you are in the right place.)

I hope to see you there!

What movie would you like to watch at our house?

So the movie night at our house is a week from today, and we need to start doing some planning. Questions that need answering include:

1. Are you planning on coming? (So we can plan appropriate amounts of pizza.)
2. What are your pizza preferences? Veggie? Carnivore? Can't stand olives?
3. What movie (related to the class in some way) would you like to watch?

As I mentioned in class, we've watched O Brother, where art thou? in the past to great success. I'm very fond of Schultze gets the blues and it fits really nicely with Governor Blanco's visit and the cajun music we've been listening to. Our son really wants to (re)watch Dave Chappelle's Block Party, which one can certainly connect to the course if one twists things a bit (I do really like the way he connects hip-hop to jazz and blues); we don't own a copy of that, though, so it we'd have to do a bit of scrambling to ensure that we have one here if that's what people want to watch. And I have a ton of documentaries on different genres of roots music, including a pretty amazing film made about music in South Africa under apartheid.

Also, feel free to throw other suggestions into the mix (our son certainly did!). I'll (mostly) let you folks decide as long as there's some connection to the course.

Also, a reminder that two cats lived here with us up until recently, so people with allergies should take appropriate steps.

Use the comments for this post to discuss away! Also, feel free to contact me directly (e.g., office or e-mail) if you don't feel like posting your preferences here.

What did folks think of today's hip-hop show?

It was very cool to see several of you at today's hip-hop show (featuring Me and U Crew, Kanser, and The Crest). What did people think of the show?

People sometimes whine that there's nothing happening in Morris, but that's really just a sign that they're not paying attention. There's actually way more events going on in town that we ever have time for, and the pile of stuff organized for this weekend is a good example. (I don't know how I'm going to get any of my stuff done in and amongst all these events :->!)

But these things only happen if people show up, so I strongly encourage you to try to attend at least a few campus events a week. Feel free to use this blog (which you now have permission to post to) to plug or discuss events, especially if they're related to the course in some way. You're also encouraged to then use your personal blog to reflect on events that you've attended.

People sometimes worry that they're going to "abuse" the system in some way, but my experience is that people are too cautious rather than too aggressive. I promise I'll tell you if I think that you're overusing the blog (or hear from others that they feel that way). One way to think of it is "Does this post only really work/make sense if most of the class sees it?". If the answer to that is "Yes", then post it here. If the answer is "No", then you might want to think about posting it on your blog.

Some places to find out about events include the UMM events page (which, sadly, is ugly and awkward, but does work and contains lots of good information), the whiteboard in the Student Center by the Info Desk, and the events e-mails that they send everyone each week. Find something you like, grab a friend, and go!

I've posted my answers to the set of questions

I finally finished up my (overly long) answers to the first blogging assignment and got it posted.

On a totally unrelated note, I'll plug tomorrow's hip-hop concert on the mall at 2pm. Sounds like a fun deal, and it's apparently solar-powered which is pretty amazing :-).