From the category archives:
After a week of crafting possible cuts to our department’s budget, I drove up to the beautiful Lake Arrowhead area to attend an annual meeting, whose sole purpose is to give seed money to innovative curricular ideas. We arrived on Friday night; had cocktails and a lovely dinner, followed by a short meeting, and then [...]
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On Sunday night we decided to have a party for Matias and Jenny. But Julia died and things changed; so we invited friends of Julia — her husband, Tiko, his parents, and other close friends of theirs — to our Matias-and-Jenny party.
One of the great things I discovered at the evening party/wake for my brother, [...]
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As I mentioned below, it’s been a busy time — what with the end of the term and other pressing deadlines. Here’s a picture of one of them:
Matias and Jenny are staying with us for a while with little Katy (9 mos) who is just learning to crawl. [Daniel is her Godfather; I'm the Dogfather.] [...]
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I’ve always been torn, and erred towards the side of abstaining from socializing with students; although many of my fond memories in college were hanging out with my profs.
Last night, one of our students, who has tremendous herding abilities, got a bunch of our class to go to an Italian restaurant in Sherman Oaks [...]
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What a year!
The highlight of my year had to be the premiere of HOMER IN CYBERSPACE, my new musical written with Mel Shapiro. I don’t have the interest or connections to try to send it to Broadway, but am certain it could have a huge audience if put in the right hands.
A trip to Hawaii [...]
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Part of my job as Chair of the UCLA Music Department is to know about all of our large and small performing ensembles. One group that is probably what most of the world thinks when it thinks music and UCLA is our marching band.
Yesterday Daniel and I spent from dawn to dark at the Rose [...]
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After an intense year being chair of the music department and writing a musical, it seemed like an easy transition: just chair? no problem! All of a sudden, my TO DO list has become formidable. And having this list just sit there is very stressful knowing that I am going to have to do most [...]
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Today we’re hosting a party for faculty, staff and families from the departments of Music, Musicology and Ethnomusicology. We’re anticipating around 80 people. Not everyone can make it but those that will be here should have a good time. A warm day is in store and there is enough shade in our backyard to keep [...]
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The Tiki Home
Transition back to LA has been difficult, mostly because Delta has planes with cool monitors in the seat in front of you. But if you have a long torso, as I do, your head flops over the “headrest” and sleeping is impossible, even with a Nyquil swig. So I only had a half [...]
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Yesterday in my duties as a chairman, I attended several meetings where we discussed and invented jobs for graduate students who in turn oversee other students whose duties we also defined. I couldn’t help but feel like a member of “the gods” who set cosmic parameters in motion and watch them play out.
At UCLA, each [...]
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