A Percussionist's Notebook

 One of our very special places is Bandelier National Monument. We backpacked here for the first time in 1974 and returned nearly every year into the late 80's. As I mentioned before, we celebrated our 50th anniversary with a trip to the area in 2019. We also celebrated our 24th one there during one of our backpacking trips. We were joined by another couple during this 7 day trip. I had packed a small bottle of champagne, a checkered table cloth, and a candle (which was not lit because of fire danger).  The guest list included our friends and one passerby. One of the places we visited in the back country was called 'Shrine of the Stone Lions'. Two large boulders in the shape of mountain lions lying together front paws outstretched. A 20 foot circle of upright boulders surrounding them. We had visited this shrine many times on our trips and each time there were always many religious offerings: antlers, feathers, personal items. After so many hundreds of years it was nice to ...

This is not meant to be morbid but rather a reminder of the extremes of danger for those who traveled this desert trail.  What I saw were the historic graves, nothing from the pre-Spanish era. The Sonoran Desert has been inhabited for over 10,000 years and archaeologists have limited knowledge of the first people. What little is known consists of trails, trail shrines, petroglyphs/pictographs, mano and metate sites, sleeping circles and geoglyphs (the Blythe geoglyphs being some of the most famous). Some of these markers were names of people who may have died on their desert crossing or maybe just the fact that they were here. There is little information even for the historic markers. They are marked with rock piles in the form of a cross. Many were just rocks piled over the grave. One documented grave is that of Dave O'Neill, a prospector whose body was found along the trail in 1915.  The irony of the circumstances of his death is that his body was found face down in a puddle...

 There are some issues I've always wanted to address when I played a certain accessory. Of course it happens when I'm playing and usually forgotten when the rehearsal is over. The mount for the ratchet was the longest running issue that I ever had. It was probably when I was a junior in high school that I first thought about it. That was about 1964 and I made the adapter in 2019. That was either the ultimate in procrastination or the lack of memory. And it was only after watching one of the percussionists in Canyon Winds struggling to switch from xylophone to ratchet during a quarter note rest that I decided to do something about it. The tambourine foot rest is a relatively new issue, it started when I was in college (1966). To play fast and articulate passages on a tambourine the player inverts the instrument resting on a knee and uses either both hands or alternating between one hand and the knee to play the passage. The problem arises when looking for something to rest the f...