Furious World Blog

Join us tonight 7pm PST on The Furious World as Peter hosts the talented singer/songwriter – Trevor Hall.

You’ve seen Trevor touring around the world with wonderful acts such as Steel Pulse, The Wailers, Matisyahu, Stevie Nicks, Ben Harper, Colbie Caillat, Los Lobos, Ziggy Marley, Rusted Root, and many others.

Trevor Hall LIVE on Furious World

Have you ever been on my trampoline?
Bouncing up and down like a jumping bean…

Peter Himmelman Bounces into Fall with a New Release

MY TRAMPOLINE

Grammy Nominee Revs Up New Minivan Productions Label
with Imaginative and Energetic Original Tunes

Venice, CA – Peter Himmelman, the Grammy award nominated, internationally acclaimed artist whom Rolling Stone has lauded for his “sharp-dressed, stiletto-wit pop records,” will release a brand new family music release My Trampoline on August 25th. Himmelman’s new CD is the first from a brand new label, Minivan Productions, distributed by Allegro Media Group (www.allegro-music.com).
With songs about a trampoline, an African leopard tortoise named King Ferdinand, a picky eater named Peter, and the scarcity of kids named Steve, Himmelman mixes his offbeat sense of humor with lush pop stylings and irresistible beats to delight everyone in the minivan.

Himmelman, a Los Angeles based father of four children, writes kid-friendly lyrics that can be hilarious and reflective at the same time. Any kid who has ever pondered the immensity of the universe will love the meditation of “Ten Billion Blades of Grass.” “The idea for the song struck me when staring at our lawn one morning. Each of the blades of grass seemed like a sentient being, with perceptions, however subtle, about the world around them. The thought occurred to me that they get along so well because they’re one big family.” “Statistical Factoids” will delight young brainiacs, “Main Dish” gives the nod to both Julia Child and Charlie Pride and “Workin’, Playin’ and Dreamin’” offers up a bluesy romp with stories about kids who are making their dreams come true, with a little help from mom and dad. The high-energy collection of tunes concludes with a sweet “Lullabye (with Baseball and Trains).”
According to Himmelman, the songs on My Trampoline were inspired by real life. “We’ve had a trampoline in our backyard for the last ten years and our kids have had at least as much fun with it as any $30,000 swimming pool,” he explains. “I figure anything that simple and that much fun must have a lot of special significance. There’s something very metaphoric in a trampoline as well; you’re always striving to gain altitude … and even though you may never quite get aloft, there’s magic in the trying.”

Minivan Productions is the new family music label, based in Venice, CA. Headed by Dan Perloff, Minivan aims to become a brand synonymous with quality artists who are doing some of the most engaging children’s music today. This music will be smart, energetic and parent friendly, with artists of the caliber of premier artist Peter Himmelman. In early 2010, Minivan also plans to reissue CDs from Peter Himmelman’s catalog: My Fabulous Plum, My Best Friend Is a Salamander and My Lemonade Stand, which have been out of print for a while. Like the cover art for My Trampoline, all of the Peter Himmelman CDs will feature cover art by world renowned illustrator, Pete Oswald, who also created the cover for his Grammy nominated CD My Green Kite (Rounder). Next up, Minivan plans a compilation series of kid-friendly songs by well-known artists who don’t usually record children’s music.
Peter Himmelman is an acclaimed creator of children’s music, an Emmy-nominated TV composer and a critically lauded rock troubadour. He hosts a live weekly web broadcast called, “Furious World” www.furiousworld.com and will also be featured soon on “Curious World,” a web broadcast for children produced in conjunction with Hoosick Falls productions and retailer Land of Nod www.landofnod.com. Sample tunes and music videos are available at http://www.peterhimmelman.com/kids.html.

Excited about our Furious World guest this Tuesday! Robert Kenner, director of the hit film, Food, Inc. will be joining us! furiousworld.com 7pm PST

In the midst of the tumult that goes on before a regular show… and I say -regular- to imply that today’s show is anything but. Due not only to our amazing guest, Simon Jacobson of the meaningful life center (and a close friend of mine) but to Marc Jacobs’s (our handsome and wise producer) new baby daughter. Her name is Samantha Rae and she’s amazingly cute, smart, and full of life. I’m in the editing bay doing things that Marc usually does like setting up the films and editing promo pieces. It’s almost too much work but there’s really nothing that can be done. The show must go on. Mazal Tov to Marc and his lovely wife Jen on the birth of their little baby girl. She is the very essence of what blessings are. I’ll see you tonight, after I finish up in here.

www.furiousworld.com
7pm PST LIVE

Peter

In the beginning there was music. It happened all by itself and it went completely unnoticed. The sound of thunder echoing off a distant canyon. A waterfall pouring down into a clear deep pool. Dragonfly’s wings beating the night air. Then early man began banging rocks together and later, he stretched some hides over hollowed out logs. After a while, the gut string harp and a wooden flute came to be.

Those were simple times. The music was there for the hearing and when the hands and the mouths of the players stopped beating and plucking and blowing, everything went quiet. Several thousand years later, -give or take a few- Alexander Graham Bell comes around and decides he’s going to do something that’s never been done; he’s going to trap a moment in time and preserve it as though it were a fly in amber. Invisible sound waves that for years had existed in the domain of the mystical could now be preserved forever in wax. Thus began more than a hundred years of begging a question that up until that time had never been asked, namely, who owns these captured sounds? Sounds that exist long after the music stops; oftentimes long after the musician who created them ceased to breathe.

Those who’s job it was to preserve the sounds; to copy them, and to exploit them, have had a good long run. They’ve used those captured moments to provide for their children. They’ve fed themselves well and perhaps had occasion to sate every last desire, but now something’s gone wrong. Entropic forces have been unleashed that eroded empires, and swung the hands of the clock backwards as it were, -even as the technology grows wiser and more complex.

You see, it’s hard to trap the sound waves these days, or at least to claim ownership when everything’s been converted into ones and zeros -and everyone has access to them -and the only safeguard that remains, is people’s respect for the sanctity of intellectual copyrights… which is to say no safeguard at all. There are those who resist the shift and long for the days when any person between the ages of twelve and fifty five who isn’t brain dead couldn’t figure out how to get just about any piece of music for free off the internet. But times have changed and what’s an artist to do about it? Well for one thing, he or she needs to go back and discover what hasn’t changed. People’s love for and need for music. If anything, the ubiquity of music has made it more valuable and more essential to people’s lives. It’s an axiom (at least I think it is) that the more valuable a thing is, the more of it there is and the less it costs…start with air and water for example. Perhaps by stripping music away from it’s embodiment in wax, or vinyl, or plastic and letting it revert to it’s spiritual essence (which in a sense is what the ones and zeros really are), listeners might develop a new respect for the artists who create it. Now I’m no utopian and I’ll admit I’m mostly pretty cynical, but when all the protections are lost, and the way technology is progressing, it seems likely they soon will be, it’s still possible that people might continue to pay something for music they love if they feel a connection to the one who created it. It’s possible that by building a real sense of trust and community, an artist may still ask for some form of patronage for their recorded music from fans -and receive it. Patronage!? Isn’t that the same as begging money? Not quite, but if access to free music gets easier and even more unpoliceable -as I think it will, those artists who develop this deep and lasting connection with their audience may be the only ones still able to make a living. Wait, I think I hear the dragonflies…