How many of us have experienced abandonment or major stress in our early lives?  I bet a high proportion of us have?  New Science has shown through experiments on mice, that stress in early life of mice (who seem to have a common link with Humans!) results in the ‘tweaking’ of DNA, and results in the release of a stress hormones in later life. This results in depression and behavioral difficulties.

This may help lay to rest in the mind of those troubled by stress and depression the self criticism that often accompanies these difficulties?  May be we can understand ourselves more with this sort of information, and start the road of change.

The final launch success of the Ares-1-X  is a cause for success for NASA attaining it’s stage separation. However the project is in jeopardy from Obama’s presidency.  Possibly this is because he feels there are greater needs back here on Earth.  Wouldn’t it be good to solve the major obstacles that plague this planet than invest in Space Technology?  This would be a good course in my mind however as a scientifically trained person, I know that there are enormous positive repercussions for science and technology that benefits the planet!   Many areas of technology are ‘grown’ that have a direct benefit for us from Power Stations/Electronics to food and Computers!  it would be difficult quantify that improvement in the quality of our lives.  Do we just cut the project without thought. That in my mind would be a catastrophe as we do not the long benefits and it’s consequences in a real way.  I would call for a major research study into the benefits for the human race, with the thought tucked away that to explore is an inbuilt mechanism of the human race.  Life is still to do with enjoyment and curiosity!

Hear my Christmas song ‘Christmas in Narnia’on www.itunes/paulstokes

Hi,

Here swine flu doubled in a week-actually I’m developing a snout but wife says it’s ok! LOL I think you have to look on the +ve side of life in all things….here in the UK we’ve had it and out of thousands only 1 or 2 deaths!  I’m 54, so my time might come with the flu or not…?

There seems to be a general national negativity here in the Uk about most things along with Political Correctness which I just think is totally overboard!

It’s seems that serious thinkers are carried  along with it, and cant see the wood for the trees.  Some religious groups are also use Political Correctness for their own ends in sinister ways to achieve their own agenda in national life.  Lets do away with political correctness-it dosnt allow people to think or act for themselves!

I Think, I Move!

Pete Waterman of stock/Aitken/Waterman fame made £11.00 Royalties from 100 Million downloads of a Rick Astley track-what chance do mere mortals like musicians/Composers etc like us have? The music industry is dead! Everybody wants everything for free……

I keep being encouraged to ‘keep going’ the yet figures like this can make me despondent!  Will it lead to the fall of the Music era-or does it lead to true creativity being seen for what it is?

Dont forget, though you can help by downloading my music at itunes/musiczeit etc….see my links…

Hi All,

I’d like to introduce you to Musiczeit.com who are purveyors of Hi Quality downloadable music.  I now have posted 4 albums Cosmic Renditions, Storm, Chthonic Netherworld, and Easy Street up for download.  The site claim to be the only one worldwide where you can download albums at full CD Lossless quality and 256K mp3 quality-here’s what they have to say:

“We all jumped for joy when CD came along, right? Great sound quality, no scratches, no messing about. So now what’s happening? Download music is everywhere, and CD is being put out to pasture. But wait, there’s a catch. Most download music is “lossy”. And this means inferior sound quality to CD. MP3, AAC, WMA. It’s all lossy.

We at MusicZeit.com believe you should have the best of both worlds. Instant download access to the music you want, but no loss of quality. That’s why all our albums are available in lossless CD quality as well as top-notch 256K MP3 if you want to listen to things “on the move”. And we don’t do individual tracks. Like you, we feel the music needs to be heard in context, as part of a full album or EP.

You don’t have to compromise in the digital download era. Let your kids get their “quick track fix” on other sites, while you download the full album, full artwork, in full CD quality, from MusicZeit.com

Full albums. Full artwork. Full CD quality. The only way.”

Perhaps they have a persuasive  argument?  As a composer of music and not spending a lot of hours listening, I’m not sure whether I can comment authoritatively .  I swing between the thought that mp3 at the low end sample rate, is all that most people are interested in, and, that maybe those who can be bothered to buy music are more discerning than I think.  Speaking personally, I was always interested in as high a quality of sound that I could get.  This has carried over to my compositional side where I follow the ‘holy grail’ of top recording quality  as standard.  Does that make me a an audiophile?-I don’t think so in that I am thinking of the people that would be listening, and hoping that the high end quality that is available relatively easily makes the listening experience a joy-drawing scenes and pictures that only a few decades ago were unheard of.

Returning to musiczeit-good on you and I am sure that the idea will catch-on.  You get full CD quality, artwork and at good rates…there is a market here!

Paul Stokes

Hi Muso’s,

I recently read that spotify has not made up its sales targets with revenue as expected from its income streams, but are keeping a lid on it.  If spotify isn’t going be a working model, where does that leave Musicians and composers?  Firstly for me-an uniformed sigh of relief!  can anyone confirm wether this is true-short lived-or just a glitch?  Implications if true, I think is that the ‘Royalty free Music’ concept takes a blow again.  See previous articles of mine.  I don’t think that the ‘work for nothing’ concept for Musicians/Composers etc is a viable concept.  To get anywhere in that concept you have to be a solo marketing company/composer/computer technician/social networker/have infinite time etc type person.  These are death blows for the creative who needs to spend his time thinking-and creating and hence in the decline of ‘good’ music.  Multi Media/Royalty Free/Music download sites/Production Music sites can take over the ‘wage’ creation for music producers generally still leaving them with less than the 50% Royalties after ‘production’ costs-and that royalty collected is well less than generally than providing any sort of living wage because of the sheers numbers of Musicians/Composers etc out there.  I heard a well know composer say (Zimmer or Williams ilk) say “there are plenty of people out there who are better than me-I was just in the right place at the right time”………this could be expanded but says it all I think….??

Cheers

Paul

Hi All,

The LHC comes online to search the infinitely small (well Nearly!) particle Universe down to unheard of levels.  This will reveal secrets about the construction of the sub atomic strata of the ‘ether’.  When I use construction, I mean it in the sense of order and pattern.  To me the deeper I go into this Universe, the more I find it difficult to engage with the thinking of just chance.  The strange construction and order at these levels, and their almost unbelievable  stability lead me further into the belief of a hand at work way beyond the scope of our understanding.  I would one day love to investigate musically the idea’s that man is discovering holds the Universe together with such force so that Earth’s inhabitants are ’safe’.  I know composer’s of past, have tried, and come up with interesting idea’s.

Are there any other musicians/composers etc who are interested in similar ventures out there?

I wonder how the ‘God Particle’ came to be so named-was it only the slim connection that it might hold things together i.e.. Gravity-It’s a loose connection I think?  However it will be interesting to see whether the gravity particle can be found?

Here’s looking forward…..

See/hear also album ‘Cosmic Renditions’ at myspace.com/paulstokes for a more musical investigation of  other worlds etc……

Does Nature flow along with the creative and in harmony with our inward creative energies?  I often go for walks in a nearby forest called Pinchintorpe Forest looking for inward inspiration.  Over the years I can count on one hand that I have seen deer.  On every occasion I have seen one, I had an inner sense-quite clear, that I would see deer.  Brilliant!  These occasions lead to creativity in me, and I wrote the track-Pinchinthrope Forest-a Piano work from these inner leadings.  I would call it God leading me-He’s part of Life, you may call it something else.

It is a Classical piece, piano only with a beautiful melody-give it a listen on itunes….

Just a reminder that I have 12 Albums for sale on itunes!  These are historical multi-genre works that range from Classical/Ambient/Electronic and all contemporary in nature in their own right.   Please comment on what you find…..

No-if you saw a painting in a shop window, you wouldn’t expect the artist to walk up to you and give it to you free-he has spent many hours crafting it, thinking about it, putting it on canvass-work done. Why  is the shop window of the Internet any different? I can see no argument that works-do you?  Yes there me ‘tasters’ as when people give away samples of cake in a cake shop, but the bulk of the work is paid for-you wouldn’t expect the whole cake as a taster!

Nature expects a return-even bacteria have a symbiotic relationship with a fungus they live inside of-the fungus gets something, and the bacteria also gets something-mutually helpful!  Life isn’t free!

79 pence for a track as on itunes is also up for grabs-I personally think it is on the low side but that is not for this blog today.