Greg Murat (mur-rah)
Singer-Songwriter Guitarist
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Journal February 2007
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Sunday, February 22, 2007
We have a wealth of experiences to
call upon, which ones we choose and how we view them will effect the
impact they have on our lives.
It is snowing like crazy outside. Snow
Movie
I am so ready for warm. It is beautiful though if you don't have to
go out and drive in it. Andie is supposed to get her cast off today.
My thought is that it wouldn't do to need two or three more after
driving out in this stuff. But Hey. I think she is faltering in her
determination as it continues to dump. Might be a day to sit back
and watch the Emperor's New Groove.
Sunday, February 22, 2007
Love heals.
I am awake first this morning and the coffee is brewing. Got a note
from Chani saying she listened to Is This Love and was happy by the
simple version. I had such a good day on Thursday and it was so very
long over due. All these things had been breaking for months and months,
recording gear, guitars, on and on. I got a piece of midi gear fixed
on the counter at the Electronics place. I had put a part in backwards.
Oops. I had just shouted out to the universe that if I am causing
all these hassles I want to stop. It listened. Next I hooked up with
someone to fix my Takamine. The electronics went out in that too.
When I got home my daughter Chani had come over to visit. I mentioned
I had broken a solder in a Motu audio digital converter and jokingly
asked if she knew how to solder. She laughed and said "Dad, I
am a tattoo artist. I've only soldered every needle I have used. "
She fixed my boo boo and hence I was in the vocal booth that night
picking and grinning very very big. There was one other electronic
issue I had caused. I use Nuendo to record and it would not start.
It would open and then disappear into cyberspace. I did the thing
that guys who don't know what they are doing when a car breaks down.
Open the hood, look around and poke at a few things. Get back in and
turn the key. Voila. Nothing happens. In this case however after poking
around I started the computer and and Nuendo opened up fine. It is
amazing the power of thought has. We can unleash gales on ourselves
and then wonder where they came from afterwards. I am calling in sunshine
showers and love rainbows, bare feet and grass. Let's run and play.
Sunday, February 18, 2007
Plant your own garden and decorate your own
soul, instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers
Time is a racing thing. Day into
day into day. There is so much going on in our corner of the world.
Friends going through different kinds of hardships, our own challenges,
illnesses of friends in family all serve to remind us of how fickle
life can be. I always sometimes :) think that life is about balance
so when we are really down someone is just as far up on the teeter
totter of life. 100% of the time once in awhile that really helps.
Sarah Maria Murat reminded me last Friday that the reason I am feeling
in a funk is that I haven't been playing very much. I was managing
6 Scuba Diving shops once upon a time and working 50 to 60 hours a
week but I still played every Monday night at a little club in Edmonds
for decades. It kept me from losing my mind.
The reason I have felt a little crazy is that all the regular gigs
I have had for years are gone. I need a catapult from complacency
anyway. When I talked about feeling really blue she reminded me that
we lost a grand daughter not 4 months ago to mention only a few of
the bumps in our road of life. Sarah has always been wise beyond her
years. Taking to heart her musings I , Jimmy Culler on bass, Mike
Daily on drums and John Matthews on percussion gathered at Studio
04 on Friday night for 5 hours of Murat songs. I felt like I had been
to a Spa or gone to a retreat. Music is so healing and if you are
given the gift of music it comes with a heavy responsibility to share
it, to release it, to make it happen. There we were in Mike's beautiful
studio pouring our hearts and souls into playing, no record button
was pushed, no technical endeavors just magic happening and then floating
away into the ether. A time or two I thought that it was too bad we
didn't have an audience but we played and played purely for the joy
of playing. Thanks to Mike for making it happen.
Sunday, February 14, 2007
Let me be a friend that you can turn to and
Let the love we share be love we can learn
through cause if you're feeling empty down deep in your soul
Love's the kind of feeling that can just take hold
Keep
it in mind. Love is kind.
Happy late in the Valentine's day. Love to all.
Weary this evening so I am just inhaling deep and sending a big love
breeze out to the world.
Love is real.
Sunday, February 13, 2007
Love is the joy in the song my heart sings.
Seems I don't have the time or energy to write
these days. I told Freedom on the phone yesterday that I feel like
I am in that movie Jumangi and those vines are wrapped all around
me and I cannot move. I need to change my mental picture and maybe
I will feel differently. That brings up the question: where do those
helpless feelings originate? Is it from thoughts of being trapped
or feeling trapped and then picturing it? It is the age old question
of which came first the chicken or the egg? I don't know, do you?
Lovely Andie is exhausted from taking care of Kayden. He is sick with
a virus and he is very vocal about not feeling good. Last night she
only got up twice to rock him back to sleep. The night before she
was up all night. I am an early riser and a heavy sleeper I guess.
My ears may be getting old too because I cannot hear him crying. That
is not like me in the past but apparently is true for me of the present.
I am a slow adjuster to change. For 5 years we looked forward hard
to our romantic times when the nest emptied and we would do more traveling
and music. Becoming parental figures again is very rewarding and very
hard. I don't know how to keep the other dreams from fading into dusk.
I just don't know how.
I picture us flying freely through the air in wingless flight with
bright sunshine on our backs and sand and sea below. Flying freely.
Flying.
Sunday, February 10, 2007
We all need a sense of continued emotional and spiritual growth.
It is the food on which our souls thrive. Tony Robbins
Growth. It is essential. I remember my dad saying
that you had to continuously improve as a musician or you would get
worse over time. You stay on a level for awhile but eventually you
start to slip backwards. That is true in life as well. If we aren't
moving like water we will stagnate. Yet I continuously fight the feeling
of immobility. Too much to do and so little time. Those kinds of thoughts
don't really contribute to flourishing. I look around me and I am
surrounded by an amazing array of ways in which my wife, my love,
my best friend Andie has tried to help me overcome my own attitude.
Giant Steps by Tony Robbins, BE HAPPY DAMMIT and many other books.
Loop pedals and Line 6 Pod and this recording studio I am sitting
quietly in while the rest of the house sleeps.
It is difficult to tell what feelings I have are left over from Viet
Nam and child hood and what are valid feelings and intuition that
apply to the present. There is so much to be thankful for and still
it is difficult to see. But I am grateful for the love of my family
and friends, for this home which is the only one I have ever truly
had. Although I am early on in grieving the loss of Cheyanna we are
blessed with the fact that Natalie and Freedom are going to have another
baby. I love being a grandfather and I want to shout for joy. And
I do. Being inclined, in the past, to the half empty glass perspective
I have now associated a great deal of pain with being a grand papa.
Each moment is meant to be and part of the whole learning process
we call life. We all owe a death for our time here. It is a choice
to live while we have the time. Wake up and live!
Sunday, February 09, 2007
Time keeps on slipping, slipping away. Don't trade tomorrow for today.
Papa
.fffff.
Sunday,
February 06, 2007
You are what you repeatedly do. Excellence is not an event, it is
a habit. Aristotle
Well I am one who is slow to change. I love adventures
but could easily remain seated on the sofa or in the studio before
I would go out and do something. I love it when I get there but the
journey is hard for me to start. Yet I feel the cosmic pull to get
off my butt. We are going to go to Sedona. Too much is happening to
do otherwise. Natalie and Freedom called on Andie's birthday with
the news that they are going to have a baby. I am riding a roller
coaster of emotion. Life is a miracle and the only thing that is certain
is that it goes on. Not for all but always for some one some where.
Freedom's friend and brother in Spirit Andy called to offer me a job.
Andie has a broken arm and can't work at the Barber Shop, things are
flaking out where I am at the moment, our house says it has been an
adventure but please knock me down and start over. What can one do?
I have a lot going on here with long established friendships and musical
ties. There is Faith who spends a lot of time with us and who loves
Kayden to pieces. He runs to her with arms outstretched every time
she comes over to visit. There is Chani who is mobile again and comes
to visit and play guitar once a week. Sarah Maria came over for Andie's
birthday and brought cake and ice-cream. She got me Agavera Tequila
and French made guitar strings I love, Saverez for my birthday. She
got Andie an aroma therapy wrap for her neck. She is very very thoughtful.
Liz is busy but stops by once in a while for a brief pass through
and a hug.
Freedom says he wants to be near his Papa. What do you say to that?
There is Mike Daily and Jimmy Culler and John Matthews and so many
others that I would miss dreadfully. Time for a change though. I know
that much is true. So we have spun the wheel of fortune and the change
is in the works.
I spoke to my Uncle John and Aunt Leta last
night. It was so great to hear their voices. We have to make it back
for a visit and sooner than later. Leta has been having health concerns
and it has just been too long since we have seen them. It would be
good to visit Florida family.
Last night Andie and I began the cleansing process of
20 years of accumulated junk. We started with the bathroom and that
took a few hours. At least that is what it felt like to me. I managed
to clean a corner of the counter. She did the closet and the cupboard
and her side of the counter. She says I am going to have to pick up
the pace. I explained that I am on the last Steven King's Dark Tower
book and Eddie just got killed. "Who the hell is Eddie?"
she asked. "The junkie from New York who has been in the last
six books. Please! Give me a minute." This the part that husbands
often see if they can keep their wife for many years. Her eyes roll
up in her head and that is followed with a very heavy sigh. That is
usually motivation enough to spring into action if not speed. So we
won't say much to the inner child about moving (me). I am just going
to let this all sink in nice and slowly. Nice and slowly.
Sunday,
February 04, 2007
Don't let your doubts stand in the way of your
dreams. Chris Bramble
It is the day we celebrate Andie's arrival
on the planet. What a good day that was. We celebrated on Friday night.
Recovered on Saturday. Now we are in the twilight. Kayden is attempting
to take a little nap now. Sarah Maria said she is coming over later
so we are looking out the window and waiting. Faith is on her way
too.
Another rainy day in Washington but it is sunny behind the clouds
and it is warm inside. It is Andie's birthday and although she can't
do cartwheels with her arm in a cast up to her shoulder we can still
have fun. Kayden is walking around playing wooden flutes and climbing
all the furniture. I told him I could bring my guitar in and play
for him and he shook his no emphatically. Andie is working on her MySpace.
She has me playing guitar on Siempre for her music but you can hear
her sing by downloading a song I wrote called Far
Cry From Love. Andie is entertaining Kayden now. She has stickers
for him, coloring books and our living room looks like Toyland with
a sofa in the middle. Andie got Kayden a playhouse, a slide, a rocking
horse, a cooler full of Legos, a Lego building table that Andie plays
with as much as Kayden. He has his own Roland E7 electric piano and
more cars than GMC or Toyota. He is building a library too. He loves
to sit in the rocking chair and look at books and Andie loves to rock
and read to him. She has always been a bit of a rocker. She glows
when she is playing with the boy. I asked her if she would like a
baby boy for her birthday. She looked at me like I was crazy until
I pointed out that I was talking about Kayden. Now we are talking
about going to the Children's Museum. We know how to party. Freedom's
wife, Natalie, wrote her a lovely birthday wish. And it is off to
celebrate we go.
Saturday, February 03, 2007
Argue for your limitations and they are yours. Richard Bach
The world grows in my vision as I reach out and make new friends around
the world. I find more and more gracious talented artists. It changes
the perspective of the day to day life. Work, eat, sleep, make music,
work, eat sleep, make life... make love...
To a child the life is eternal and all possibilities are open and
limitless... as they should be. I have forgotten the face of my father
when it comes to art. Shine. Shine. I have never claimed credit for
the gift of music. I have always felt gratitude but on the other hand
I have not striven to put it out there. It is time. I love the sharing.
It is so inspiring to have limitless people and music to reach out
to and listen and to be heard. I have been held spellbound by so many
fine artists. I am excited by my friendship with Ofri Ben-David and
talk of writing together over the Internet. She is an amazing artist.
There are so many. I had forgotten there is even a world out there.
I remember now and I look forward to going out and seeing it. To playing
music in different parts of the world. To sharing that with Andie
and Kayden. I want him to have a world view and not the limited perspective
we can be encouraged to have here. He is the reflection of the white
rhythmic wizard that I am. I love him heart and soul as I do all the
souls who share my family. We are reflectors of life and love through
art, music and film. It is an honor to be among them. So I will shake
off the dust of my perceived limitations and run the race of the peaceful
warrior. As I acknowledge the gifts I have been given I will take
up the torch of sharing those gifts with the world and helping others
to do the same. Namaste.
February 1, 2007
Pay no attention
to what the critics say, there has never been set up a statue in honor
of a critic. Jean Sibelius
I have always been of the
opinion that if critics had talent they would create art themselves
instead of criticizing the work of others. I am a baby to the MySpace
experience but I have found that there is a great deal of very talented
and supportive artists out there. It is time consuming to work on
however. I am soon to build a new website for another person and I
use Dreamweaver. Navigating and creating layouts in MySpace is hard
for me. Anyway I have been remiss in my journaling; a combination
of being tired by worry (we draw to us what we think about, oops),
working and more worrying. Mike Daily and I agreed that to finish
my CD's it will take mini sessions. An hour here and an hour there.
Having a 19 month old baby has pretty much changed our lives. Just
when you thought it was safe to go back into the water. dah nah dah
nah dah nah (theme from Jaws plays). I put the first ruff mix of 911
on MySpace. As a writer and musician it is always interesting to see
what kind of response your art receives. This is especially true if
you have some diversity in your music. I never really considered myself
much of a guitarist, more a guitar player. There fore I find it fascinating
that the responses are overwhelmingly positive regarding my instrumental
work on the guitar. It makes me want to learn to play. I think what
I lack in technical ability is off set by the purity of intent and
joy I feel when playing. You can record a smile. When I am playing
I am smiling.
Andie's birthday in just a few days and then Josh and Christina have
their birthdays in just over a week. Valentine's day jumps in. Man,
I tell you what February is a busy month. Hope I can post some gigs
before too long. Welcome to winter winding down I hope. Take a peak
at MySpace (Greg
Murat).
Just a little tip. Be sure to dump your cookies (from your browser
that is) after going there and maybe clear your cache too. MySpace
really loads you up with cookies.
Chani and Knuck came over last night and we sat in the studio on the floor and listened to Knuck's new CD. It really rocks. Good hooks, fun and catchy melodies, good beat and you can dance to it. I give it a 9. Knuck was freaking out a little bit watching Kayden tweak knobs on my compressors and preamps. He has his own settings I explained. Kayden also tweaked the dial on the CD player and skipped a bunch of the songs. He did find one he liked the beat too and he began to dance. He bobs his head up and down, stops his right foot, and he has a new move. He goes down on his stomach and holds one leg up in the air and pumps it up and down. Chani and I were laughing so hard I thought we would burst. It was a good night.
Have fun, and be well.
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Greg Murat (mur-rah)
Singer-Songwriter Guitarist