#189 - THIS TRAIN GOES TWO WAYS

Musea - THIS TRAIN GOES / ONLY TWO WAYS - issue

-------------------------------------------------------------------

MUSIC HALF: (two articles)

7-th One (CD) : CONTENTS

LESSONS LEARNED IN 50 YEARS OF SINGING

------------------------------------------------------------------

7-TH ONE

My new CD, the 7th in a 10 CD, 120 plus, song cycle, called "7-th One", is now OFFICIALLY out! This is back to basics, voice and standard guitar, music.� I call it "This guitar is as good as a band"- music. You can hear it either by going to the hunkasaurus.com website or by contacting me for a copy. You can trade something for it, or you can get it free, if you help me promote it by telling people about it. This time around I recorded at Crystal Clear Sound Studios, Dallas, in Studio B. That's a new studio and a new audio engineer - Nolan Brett (wonderful to work with).� I hope you will like it.

CONTENTS of " 7-th ONE"

------------------------------------

1 That's Alright Mama:� I like to start off with a good fast one. Here's my version of the Elvis hit.� (composer Crudup)

2 And I Love Her:� This Beatles love song has one of the best lyric lines "Bright are the stars that shine/ Dark is the sky." A perfect quatro. I love it!� (Lennon McCartney)

3 Because: Another hit from the mid 60's. This one made famous by the Dave Clark 5 (Clark)

4 Morning: The first of two short original instrumentals - a great wake up song.

5 Night : The 2nd of two. The music is more dark, like the night.

6 S.Y.W.T.B.A.R.N.R.S. : Stands for, 'So You Want To Be A Rock N Roll Star', a song made popular by the Byrds.� Note the middle lead - I'm proud of it. (McGuinn,Hillman)

7 Dumb Dumb:� Lively original instrumental with a "Hey!" chorus.

8 Tears On My Pillow:� The great ballad made famous by Little Anthony and the Imperials.� This one changes keys from B flat to C. (Bradford, Lewis).

9 Wildwood Flower:� Short Country style instrumental of the Carter Family classic.� Note the 'push the guitar to get the last note' last note.� (Carter).

10 Amy:� My upbeat original love song for all "Amys".

11 Don't Let The Sun:� More from the British Invasion of the 60's. This originally done by Gerry and the Pacemakers. (Marsden, Marsden, Chadwick, Maguire).

12 Cat's Meow #2:� This is my 2nd version of this original. This time around it's a slow and dramatic look at a woman who is "a fashion plate - quite a dish!" - another lead middle I like (and remember this and all leads are just one guitar).

13 Coffee: mini Instrumental built on guitar harmonics. Can you hear the coffee bubbling?

14 God Bless The Child: I like to end my CD's with a "Big" song. That's a song that usually starts out slow and quiet and grows to symphonic levels of emotion! This Billy Holiday song fits the bill! Note the final looooooooooong note.� (Holiday, Herzong Jr.).

***

LESSONS LEARNED IN 50 YEARS OF SINGING

------------------------------------------------------------------

Singing is fun. Here's some tips that I've learned over the decades that will help singers sound better. I wish someone had told me these 'singing secrets' when I started out. (Though being headstrong I don't know if I would have listened!) Anyway, I can't change my history, but I can pass along what may help others. Here goes.�

TO SING BETTER:

1. Learn how to breathe.� Breathing for singing isn't natural, so you have to learn it. But once you do you will notice that more air, gives you a stronger voice that helps keep you on pitch and hit lower low notes and higher high notes without strain. This takes a bit of learning and practice. Consult those who know how, for more.

2. The major scale has half steps. That means you have to raise your voice, not one note but one half note.� Many singers don't get the difference, and once they come to one of these notes, it upsets the pitch of the rest of the line. Watch the half steps!

3. Don't force low notes or high notes. Practice and good breathing will help expand your range. Don't force them. A soft approach on a very low or high note is the best way to go.� Yes it's true, some of us don't have the range that others do. Some were born with the gift of range - lucky folks. The rest of us have to compensate!

4. Open mouth. This helps with both very low and very high notes. Got this from someone talking about THEIR voice coaching. Tried it and it works. Open your mouth wide (without looking goofy on camera). It really helps.

5. Stand up straight young man!� Standing is better than sitting, And standing straight is better than not. This helps your body get the best your voice can deliver.

6. Speak clearly when you sing. Pronunciation does matter. Don't overdue it - that'll sound phony. But even in the most dramatic delivery, a good lyric needs to be discerned by listeners. And remember a good songwriter worked hard on those lyrics for a reason.

7. Sing don't yell.� There is a difference. You can convey any emotion in singing that you can in yelling. And you should take care of your voice - specially professional singers.� When you yell in your early career, you won't be able to sing well in your later one.

8. Learn how to cheat. One trick I've learned is to substitute a higher note for a too low note (or lower note for a too high one). It's amazing how better a song sounds when you are not struggling to hit a too low or high note. And those hearing it, can seldom tell the difference on most songs.

9. Sing like you talk. Do you like acting that is way too melodramatic? Or is so bland as to be robotic?� Neither do I. But you can be a bad actor in singing too. You can sing way over the top. And you can sing so mechanically that you sound like a machine. That may fit the meaning of a song here and there, but for most of us, most of the time, the most convincing singing is singing like speaking. Sing like you talk. Sing like it's a conversation - albeit a very melodic one - with the audience.

10. Practice singing the melody with a guitar or piano. This helps you to lock in the melody and block out any bad pitch notes, that you may have fallen into. Often when I have trouble with a song not sounding 'right' , it's really a passage where I'm missing the pitch on the line. Find the mistake, and fix it. Because once you have a way of singing a song in your head, it's pretty hard to change it.

11. Warm water. Drink warm water - not hot, not cold. The warn water will relax your vocal chords. It's amazing how well this works to fix a lot of singing problems. And watch what you eat.� Dry food will stick in your throat just when you come to your favorite song!

12. Don't end every note the same. Nothing is as boring as a singer that ends every note the same way. It's like singing the same punch line every time. Show some variety.� Let the way you finish a line fit the lyrics and the song. Give your audience some range of feelings through the way you end a melody line. That includes vibrato (that warble in a voice) sometimes, and no vibrato sometimes.

13. Rush the line, or hold back sometimes.� You can bring some real drama to your song by rushing the line - singing it AHEAD of the music. That suggests you are singing about something you are in a rush to tell me. OR sing BEHIND the line. That suggests you are in a real laid back mood, relaxed and doing some swinging singing. Remember every trick an actor uses to punch up a script, a singer can use to better deliver the message, feeling, and emotion, of a song. And here's a trick on tricky notes. When you hold back on a note you can wait for the music to play and better match that note, instead of singing 'blind' without the music.

14. Choose a good song. Most people are writing their own music now. Sadly they don't do it well. It sounds amateurish.� Something's just not right. No matter where you get the song, get a good one. Even the best singer can't save a no melody, no beat, bad lyric, song. When you choose a bad song, you have lost, before you begin.

15. Singing is not like a machine. You WILL have good days and bad days. Sometimes I sing better on a Wednesday, if I sang on Tuesday!� Don't know why. Remember that all singers, even the best singers have off days. It's like the weather - it just happens. Let it go. The best you can do is do a reasonably professional singing each time. Then on those days when the magic enters - and your voice, song, and music, all come together; well, celebrate the moment and share it with the audience!

MUSIC, 7 full CD's of free WOW Music, http://www.Hunkasaurus.com

Music news and more on the Musea Blog at http://www.Musea.wordpress.com� then click on the music category.

-------------------------------------------

Photo this side: Bruce W. Bailey, La Grange, Illinois.

Musea - THIS TRAIN GOES TWO WAYS - issue

----------------------------------------------

BIO HALF: (one article)

LIST OF IDEAS THAT ARE ORIGINAL BY ME��

"Hypotheses may often be of service to science, when they involve a certain portion of incompleteness, and even of error." - William Whewell.

Reader, these very speculative, biological ideas are my own as far as I know.� Time will tell which if any will be proven correct.

1. Life can be defined as the most stable chemical response to the Sun cycle, specifically the Sun/UV/hot then night/cool daily cycle at the time of life's origin.

2. Catabolic and anabolic chemical processes evolved, but did not blend.

3. There is a direction in evolution toward better catabolic and anabolic processes.

4. When there is a mutation on either catabolic or anabolic processes, there may be selection pressure on the other to match the good mutation, or mitigate the bad one.

5. Catabolic and anabolic processes started as a reflection of the day/night, Sun cycle:

Catabolic - day - dry - hydrophobic. // Anabolic - night - wet - hydrophilic.

6. During the origin of life, there may have been� different selection pressure on each set of bases due to the fact that A-T pairing has 2 hydrogen bonds and C-G pairing has 3 hydrogen bonds.� There is quicker denaturing in higher heat in� A-T bonds (more activity in heat), then in G-C bonds (more stability in heat).

7. The reason for 3 bases in a codon may be because the middle base pair is better protected.

8. Selection Pressure Model:

The greater the selection pressure - directional or diversifying selection - the greater the speed of evolution in the area of the selection pressure, AND

the lower the selection pressure - stabilizing selection - the lower the speed of evolution in the area of the selected pressure.� Or, nothing changes until it's forced to.

9. Four Directions in Life Processes:

Take in / Build up (both anabolic); and, Tear down / Excrete out (both catabolic).

10. SETI should consider looking for alien life in the electromagnetic spectrum at 260 nm instead of just the 'water hole'.� DNA bases have an average UV absorbance maximum around 260 nm.

***

1. Breast feeding sets up both the digestion system of food in and waste out. It should be continued for longer than 6 months. It is the closest thing to a magic elixir ever made.

2. Weaning is a major biological event in the infant's life, and it sets up how that child will process liquids and solids that are not breast milk, excrete out wastes, and deal with pathogens.

3. Six months after birth� the infant's immune system starts to set up, as the mother's milk antibodies, begins to decline. This immune development period, that lasts about 2 years, may be a key period of the infants health and well being.

3. Separation anxiety or stranger anxiety, may be the reflection of the biological loss of breast milk in the infant. Separation anxiety may be� the infant's separation from breast milk to 'stranger' first foods and liquids. Stranger anxiety may be the reflection of the infants immune system's response to first solids or first infection.

4. Conglomerate brain idea. The nervous system is a composite of different nervous systems. My suggestion is for these 3 main ones:

the ENS or enteric nervous system or gut brain, that controls food in, waste out and immune systems; the R-complex, that controls other inside body processes; and the neocortex� that controls the senses, and higher thinking processes.

5. These 3 nervous systems seem to have evolved from the inside out. First the digestive tract and the Enteric Nervous System(ENS);� then the R-complex brain for circulating and regulating those nutrients, temperature control, and other inner body processes; and finally the Neo-Cortex for sense perception and higher thinking.

6. The different parts of the nervous system may work somewhat independently. There may be conscious or repressed trauma between the somewhat independent and separate parts of the conglomerate brain. This may lead to auto immune problems.

7. There may be selection pressure within the body itself. Kwashiorkor, a disease caused by lack of protein, where the body competes for what protein is left, seems to support this.

8. The bulk of immunity is in the colon - 70%. That suggests that the biggest biological threat to humans is pathogens in the colon.�

9. Memory may have evolved from adaptive immunity.

10. The most severe biological trauma, may be in pre puberty and puberty.

11. Replication may have begun as an evolved waste out strategy. Dividing a cell in half not only allows the cell's genes to continue in the daughter cell, but it allows the father cell, now half as large, to continue to grow .

12. Liver circadian rhythm may be a key clue to understanding why we sleep. The liver switches at night from bile production for fat digestion, to synthesizing chemicals and processing toxins. This may be a major clue to the biological changes in sleep.

13. Your body has a wake up clock at 6-8AM. That's when cortisol, the wake up hormone, is at it's highest level of the day's cycle.

14 The two diseases connected to cortisol (Cushing's Disease and Addison's Disease)� may be giving clues that tie in weight problems with the type of stress we faced in infancy.� Overweight - too much cortisol, as a response to outside the body stress. Underweight - too little cortisol, as a response to an infection inside the body.

15. Two major traumas in human health:� HUNGER, not enough nurturing-in trauma, or INFECTION, not enough waste-out trauma. These� may be in some way connected to the gut biota set up during infancy.�

16. The biological fight and flight may be:� fight - attack and break down pathogens, flight - separate from and excrete out pathogens.

17. Why do we sleep? We may sleep to 1. stop eating and stop digestion. 2. make the necessary hormones to fight pathogens and support the body (GH, Testosterone, etc.). 3. prepare to excrete out waste.

***

1. There is a danger of human selection that restricts what species exist to only those that support humans. This is short sighted and reduces needed biodiversity.

2. The reason for our sweet tooth may be connected to the fact that sugar brings quick energy, and it is the easiest and fastest food to digest.

3. During sleep, specially REM sleep, the colon may be important as a water processing tank that supplies healthy water, as needed for the next day's digestion, and to regulate water levels.

4. Life can also be catalogued by dividing all processes into either catabolic or anabolic processes.

5. The suggestion that scenarios for the origin of life that depend on "X" Steps of a chemical wand, depend on too many fluke events to work.

6. Genetic coding was first for " Double Stability". That is stability that keeps what works, and adjusts what needs work in that environment. That is the main reason for coding and for our genomes.

------------------------------

Contact me for more information or supporting documents on all the above AND see:

BIOLOGY HYPOTHESIS� http://wp.me/p5S9X-eO

BIOLOGICAL SPECULATIONS Through The Years http://wp.me/P5S9X-Pp

UV PAPER http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/U/UV_origin_of_life.html

Catabolic and Anabolic evolved, but they did not blend.

--------------------

Musea is

Tom Hendricks

4000 Hawthorne #5

Dallas Texas 75219

tom-hendricks@att.net

Musea.us

hunkasaurus.com

musea.wordpress.com

AACA Member #1

This Train Goes Two Ways - Issue (Remember those sci-fi books that had two novels in them. Each read from one cover to the middle. This 'train' issue is a tribute to them.

Photo this side: Photographer unknown. Note on back says "Cheyenne Wyoming 11/20/60, Coaling Tower, Now Gone."

Musea #189 Aug/Sep/Oct