Remembrance

Here's a piece I arranged for Male voice Choir. It's a setting of John McCrae's "In Flanders Fields" by David Pendrill.

TX list...

Here are a few TV shows that my music has been used on recently... Wallander

Shell International Petroleum

Craving  The (Soft)

Manhunters

Greek

Lost Girl

Overhaulin'

Fifty Fifty Iii

Wildest Dreams

Timewatch

Atlantis

Atlantis The Evidence

Day Break

Gmtv With Lorraine (Gmtv)

Operation Repo

Lemon Tree

Pharaohs Who Built Egypt

Boys Weekend

Intrepid Journeys NEW ZEALAND TV1

Angelos Epithemiou

Teen Cribs

Malcolm In The Middle 3E TV GENERAL

Lonesome George And The Battle For The Galapagos

Flash Prank

How Stuffs Made

Kings Of Crash

My Cat From Hell

Extreme Makeover

Gardeners World

Game One (Mtv)

Made

Geordie Shore

Imani

Mother Of All Professions

Coast

The Dales

Navy

Wheeler Dealers

Lui Na Talun

Downsize Me

Hale And Pace Serie Ii

New Home Diy

Flog It

Sjukhuset

Comeback

A To Z Of TV Gardening

Observe And Report

Redningskvinder

Amadeus

Burn Notice

Biography: Kevin Costner

Deadly Snakes

My Super Sweet World Class

Victoria Wood

Come Dine With Me South Africa

The Lost World Of Communism

Pit Bulls And Parolees

Ideal

Doctors

Sommer In Sunny Beach

My Greek Kitchen

Better Homes And Gardens

Helicopter Heroes Down Under

Planet Cake

How Its Made

Meat & Potatoes

Four Weddings Us

Country File

Isle Of Mtv

Teen Mom

Top Billing

Lonely Planet

Living Land V

Pasella Xx

Play Your Part

Tatoo Salonen

Country Tracks

Real Emergency Calls

Suite Life On Deck

Bargain Hunt

Sun  Sea And A&E: South Africa

Thrillseekers 2012

Airline

Emergency Animal Rescue

Four Weddings Us S01

Luton Airport

WWE Smackdown

Living Land

Pasella

Four Weddings

Four Weddings Australia

Mission Implausible

Hardcore Pawn

Lumber yard

We're hoping to be self-sufficient in logs this winter at Tumbledown, so we recently took delivery of a chainsaw, a saw bench, a log-splitting maul and all the relevant safety equipment. We've got plenty of raw material stored up due to a couple of tree fellings and the damage caused by the storm a few weeks ago.

While I'm on the subject of the storm, we also got hold of some kit which will help if ever we're out of power for a few days. We got a portable gas ring and a generator which is powerful enough to run the studio and domestic electrics as well as providing power for the septic tank air and water pump should we need it again.

Anyway, we had a logging session last weekend and managed to get a good stock of wood prepared. Splitting logs with the maul is very satisfying!!! :-) A fair bit is ready for use now, but we'll have a lot for seasoning which should be ready for next winter. Lovely!!!

I'm editing my next album for Artful, Smooth Minimals 2 and have just completed something I thought I'd never get to do...Arrange a piece for male voice choir. It's been a fantastic experience and a great brush up exercise on my four part harmony skills.

My albums, The Age Of Steam and The Book Of Knowledge as well as the I Am Forecasting Sun EP by The Essence (me!!!) are queued up for release in the iTunes store...More news soon.

TX dates...

Airline USA is all over the Sky Living schedule at the moment.

Last quarter TX list

Here's a list of some of the recently broadcast TV shows my music has been used on, plus a few of the broadcasters...

Tomb Of 1000 Roman Skeletons

Pharaohs Who Built Egypt

Wild Japan

Mutual Of Omaha S Wild Kingdom

Airline USA

Airline USA LIFETIME REAL W

Various

Platinum Weddings

Trinny And Susannah Undress LIFESTYLE YOU (

Mission Implausible

Manhunters Fugitive Task Force

Things We Do For Love LIFETIME REAL W

Playschool (Abc) ABC2

Real Emergency Calls

How Not To Die NZ SKY TV - BBC

Britains Hardest

Pharaohs Who Built Egypt DR K DENMARK

Parcours Reussi

Biography CABLE TV

Decoding The Past

Call 911

Heli-Loggers

Heritage & Enigmas Of The Marine World TV PUBLIC

Grands Mythes Pirates 1c

Lonesome George And Battle Galapagos

Death Machines

Maschinen Des Todes - Erfindungen Fuer D

Machines Of Malice

Manhunters Fugitive Task Force TV2 ZEBRA NORWA

Manhunters Fugitive Task Force XPLORA

Clean House

Strangers In Danger

Tajemstvi Olympijskych Vitezu TV COMMERCIAL

How Stuffs Made

Factory Made

Ray Mears Country Tracks

Four Weddings

Four Weddings USA NEW ZEALAND TV1

True Hollywood Stories YES SATELLITE

Akvariet TV2 NORWAY

Don T Tell The Bride RTE PLAYER

Don T Tell The Bride RTE2 TV GENERAL

Manhunters: Fugitive Task Force

Buy Me

Money Programme

Money Programme:The World According To Google

Call 911 DISCOVERY HOME

Call 911 NEW ZEALAND TV1

New Home Diy

Airline

True Crime With Aphrodite Jone

Unique Whips

Coast

Doctors

Clean House STYLE. NETWORK

It's Good To Be YES SATELLITE

Ricardo And Friends

Ricardo And Friends 2 TV COMMERCIAL

Jesus: The Missing Years

Ben Cao Yao Wang SH09-TVBXH

Superhuman - World's Tallest Children TV COMMERCIAL

Superhuman

Fierce Earth

Cnn Presents

It S Me Or The Dog

Its Me Or The Dog TV2 NATIONAL DE

Lost Jfk Tapes: The Assassination

Emergency Animal Rescue

Lost Jfk Tapes The Assassinati

Flog It

Mountain With Griff Rhys Jones

Country Tracks

Stuffocating

Smithsonian Spotlight

So You Think You Can Dance Sca

Cougar

Heli Loggers NRK3 NORWAY

Panorama

U.C.O. Unidad Central Operativa DR2 DENMARK

Better Homes And Gardens (Local) LIFESTYLE (FOXT

The One Show

Sun Sex And Suspicious Parents

Navajo Cops

On The Fly TV3 TV GENERAL

On The Fly

Rocket City Rednecks

Dara O'Briain's Science Club

Call 911 (Season 2)

True Crime With Aphrodite Jones

How Its Made

How Stuff's Made

Flystyrt I Ishavet TV2 NORWAY

Ching's Kitchen

Location Location Location

Comeback Iii TV COMMERCIAL

Unforgiven

Michaela Mo Dheirfiur TG4 TV GENERAL

Hottest Place On Earth NZ SKY TV - BBC

Hottest Place On Earth The VELOCITY

Highland Emergency

Emergency

Helicopter Heroes Down Under

Wildest Dreams

My Greek Kitchen CANAL-33

Totally Australia ACTV - NETWORK

Hale And Pace 7TWO (NETWORK 7

Dalziel And Pascoe

Chong Shang Yun Xiao SH09-TVBJ

Royally Astounding: 30 Days That Rocked The Monarc

Royally Astounding 30 Defining

Alien Invasion

Four Weddings USA LIFESTYLE YOU (

Four Weddings Us

Four Weddings Clip Show Wt

Kingdom Of The Forest

Mythos Wald DR2 DENMARK

Kingdom Of The Forest FRANCE 5

Marry Me In Nyc

Jonathan Ross Show ABC TV PROGS

Live 'n' Deadly

Manhunters Fugitive Task Force FUENTE HOTEL  M

Fyi 3E TV GENERAL

Man Vs Wild

Man Vs. Wild TV COMMERCIAL

Doctors To Be

Daria

A Wang Xin Chuan SH09-TVBXH

Mon Premier Emploi

My Cypriot Kitchen CANAL-33

My Greek Kitchen

Rubble Trouble

Anderne Vender Tilbage

Octopus Volcano DR HD DENMARK

Four Weddings Wt

Going Green

Going Green - Business Of Green

Citizen Duane

Tough Love 3

Tough Love

Confessions Of A Teen Idol

True Hollywood Story

Chic Choc

Me Too

Four Weddings Holiday Showdown

Mossy Oaks S Hunting The Count

Nbc Today ACTV - NETWORK

Fake Britain

Robbie Coltrane: B-Road Britain

Minute To Win It

Minute To Win It TCS-05

Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations

Hotel Caesar TV2 NORWAY

TV2 NORWAY

Search For The Giant Octopus

Wild Croatia TV12-OKTO

Chaser Cnnnn 7MATE (NETWORK

Zeit.Geschichte Tage  Die Die Welt Bewegten: Die Hindenburg

Days That Shook The World

Comeback TV COMMERCIAL

Monkey Business

Miao Shou Ren Xin SH09-TVBXH

Star Gazing

Balamory

Secretos Nucleares TE

Nuclear Secrets ETB 1

Renovation Game

Australian Story BIOGRAPHY CHANN

Et Lite Stykke Thailand (Thaifjord) TV NORGE NORWAY

Tmz

Trinny And Susannah Undress The Nation LIFESTYLE YOU (

When Blood Runs Cold

Heli Loggers A&E HD (AKA H2)

Natural World BBC KNOWLEDGE (

Extreme Animals

3sat Trailer 2008-02

Cats

 

It's been a lovely extended Summer here, but Autumn is now in the air and the leaves are beginning to fall. We've got a decent crop of apples and we've already made some blackberry vodka from berries at the bottom of the garden. Winter crops coming along are parsnips, leeks, winter cabbage and spinach.

The papier maché 'logs' we made have been a great success and we'll be doing more next year...Just need to think of a less messy way of doing them.

We've got two new kittens...Hat and Erik. They were found under different bushes on the same day. Hat is about a month older than Erik, but they were put together at the rescue place and became great pals. They're shooting around the house causing havoc as I write this!!!

I'm working on a new album for Artful and will soon be starting on a series of short films.

TX Dates...

Signs Of Life - http://www.bbc.co.uk/signsoflife/

Memories and vegetables

Been going through a few things recently (the reasons for which will become apparent soon!!!) and I found Wilfred Joseph's card. I met Wilf  at a PRS AGM and got chatting. I remember visiting his flat in Mornington Crescent which was quite something. It was split level and filled with pictures of him with famous people...He was a very accomplished classical and film composer...I remember one photo of him with Laurence Olivier.

Funnily enough I was thinking of Wilf recently when passing through Witney in Oxfordshire, where he had a cottage which he would retire to when writing.

I also found some of my earliest digital recordings which I've restored and added to...They'll be on iTunes soon together with The Essence: I Am Forecasting Sun EP.

In the garden, the veg plot has been cropping well, especially considering that it was planted so late. There are also lots of apples coming, but only one pear. There are some blackberries ripening in the field over the back and we've got the ingredients ready for blackcurrent vodka. This was the best fruit liqueur we made last year, so we're hoping to do as well this year. I might have another go at marrow wine, but definitely will try elderberry again. We've got plenty of fruit coming along in the garden, so I might try a couple of gallons.

There is some sort of bird of prey nesting nearby...It's been spotted taking a moorhen chick and its cries can be heard all the time. We've not been able to spot it yet, but we're keeping an eye out!!!

TX Dates...

Airline USA is continuing a monster run on Sky 1.

Haymaking and noise reduction

Lovely warm (actually HOT) weather here at Tumbledown. The veg garden has been cropping very well (pic above)...Potatoes, courgettes, garlic, lettuce, radish and broad beans have made an appearance and the herb garden has made them even tastier with marjoram, basil, rosemary, mint, chervil, sage and chives. Tomatoes, chili, spinach, cabbage, cucumber and runner beans to come. We've also got some green peppers which are getting visibly bigger every day...Not had much luck with those in the past, but the lovely weather must have helped them along.

We've also been taking advantage of the hot weather by using it to dry out newspaper 'logs' which are made by pressing newspaper pulp into a gadget which forms the pulp into bricks. It's a pretty messy job, but each 'log' is meant to burn for an hour...I'll report back on how they do and if they're worth the bother when we have to have the fire on next!!!

The weather has been fantastic...We've had about a week of beautiful Sun. As often happens, it's ended (hopefully, just punctuated) with massive thunderstorms and torrential rain which have tested the new drainage system. It's held up very well, with all the water being taken away from the house and collected by an Aco drain and then piped into the severely depleted pond.

There has been a lot of haymaking going on in the area because the sun swiftly dried the mown grass. The farmer who has the meadow behind Tumbledown played the weather perfectly...No sooner had the bails (about 500) been taken away, the heavens opened!!!

I've now started on a new project for Artful and have also been doing some new tracks for other publishers. I also contributed some tracks for the new Toolboxx album, Dreamcruiser which can be found on iTunes via the following link https://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/dreamcruiser-songs-for-travel/id664945938 .

The Izotope RX2 noise reducing software has well and truly paid for its keep now. I recently finished removing unwanted noises from a couple of our new releases which were recorded live and was very pleased with that. However, yesterday my French publisher emailed to say that he had a client who wanted to use one of my pieces urgently, but there was something that they didn't want in the final production. I listened to the piece and realised that the sound they meant was a quiet vinyl crackle that was part of a sample I used in the music. Rather than going back into the mix and removing the sound that way, I fired up the RX2 and within a few seconds, 22,000 crackles had been automatically erased from the piece. This made my friends in Paris very happy and the music is now in place!!!

TX dates...

Highland Emergency is now on Channel 5 and Channel 5 HD at 7.30pm on Tuesdays and on +1.
Airline USA continues a massive run on Sky 1, Sky 2 and Sky1 HD, most days.

Pots and scary music

I've been composing some scary music for TV this week. It's always good to do something with out and out extreme emotions now and again!!! Book two of Multiple Field Sketches is coming along nicely too. I still have the last piece of book one to finish...This was the one that I recorded for the village show but haven't finished the written version. Bit of a strange way to go about it...I just need to put down the version for small orchestra and it'll be finished. Here's a link to the recorded version of the last piece (named The Beer Festival (P.O.W.P.H) in Multiple Field Sketches, named Bumblebees for the standalone (village show))...

https://soundcloud.com/garry-judd/bumblebees

I occasionally post experiments and work in progress to Soundcloud...My account is at https://soundcloud.com/garry-judd .

Other than making scary music, I've been preparing for the big secret Artful event (news soon) and meeting with an independent production company about an interesting project which should be starting soon.

We took delivery of the gert big pot above this week...It makes a lovely range of sounds when tapped. The garden is really taking shape now with the new piece of land now really looking like it belongs to the rest of the garden. There's a fair bit of grass sowing to do...Standard lawn for most of it, but we have some special clay soil meadow grass for the projected wildflower meadow. We're now eating our own potatoes, lettuce and radishes...Not bad considering what a late start we had with the weather and getting the beds in place.

TX Dates...

Airline USA is showing on Sky1, Sky1+1, Sky Living and Sky Living HD.

Highland Emergency is showing on Channel 5, Channel 5+1 and Channel 5 HD.

Izotope RX2, USA and Moorhens

 

 

Here's a pic of the Tumbledown herb bed!!!

 

What an amazingly busy few weeks...

Workwise, some Arabian music and an Italian piece for broadcast and news of some of my tracks going on another compilation, finishing the editing and de-noising of a classical piano album I produced as well as releasing two whole albums of my music.

I'm currently in Dublin for music meetings and also went to Taste of Dublin yesterday...Fantastic evening!!! It's also good to hear that I've had a lot of music used here on RTÉ and TV3 and TG4 shows including Fair City, Nationwide and Siar Ó Thuaidh.

Good to see a lot of repeats with my music now showing in the UK, particularly Giant Octopus which was on Nat Geo Wild and Nat Geo Wild HD last week.

Also, there will be some interesting Artful news in the next few weeks!!!

I've been using Izotope RX2 for the de-noising...What an amazing piece of software!!! I've been using it in stand alone mode and soon got to recognise wisps of shadows in the spectra as birds tweeting, chairs squeaking or mechanical taps. I was particularly impressed with the Spectral Repair tool to smooth these artifacts away...The Noise Reduction tool was good for spot noises like pedal thumps which could have an effect on the lower end of the piano notes that you don't want to interfere with. I can't wait to play with it as a creative tool...More news soon.

We had a nestful of moorhen eggs on the pond, but sadly they were sniffed out by a magpie. They seem to be trying again but we can't find where the nest is...Hopefully, the magpie won't either. Also on the pond, we spotted a pair of mandarin ducks on a shord visit a few weeks ago. They were a very feisty pair and terrorised the local mallards, although a regular visitor male pheasant wasn't impressed and refused to be bossed about!!!

The veg area is taking shape. The new shed is up and the greenhouse is full of lovely veg and other stuff for the garden. The rabbits have discovered the plants and we've had to put up some temporary chicken wire protection around the beds. When the fence around the veg plot is completed, the idea is to put the chicken wire around it and bury it so that the little critters can't get in to the entire area and eat the whole lot!!!

 

TX dates...

Highland Emergency is on C5 today at 12.10pm and next Tuesday at 7.30pm (also C5HD and C5+1 an hour later)

Airline USA has begun a run from 4.20pm to 5.45 on Sky Living, Sky Living HD and Sky Living +1.

Promo for Friends Of Cyprus

Here's a video with music by me featuring Tonia Buxton...

 

Greenhouse and TV shows

Here's the new greenhouse installed at Tumbledown. On either side of the path are two 'emergency' beds which have just started sprouting with veg!!!

Here's a list of some of theTV shows I've either written for or have had music on over the past few months...

Analogy 
Pharaohs Who Built Egypt 
1800 Secondes D Extase 
Byggfallan I 
Mutual Of Omaha S Wild Kingdom 
Airline USA 
Bergkvist Harliga Hem 
Platinum Weddings 
Mission Implausible 
Manhunters Fugitive Task Force 
Navajo Cops 
Playschool (Abc) ABC2
Real Emergency Calls 
Call 911 
Britains Hardest 
Cutting Edge 
Parcours Reussi 
Mountain 
Heli-Loggers 
Young Sexy And.... 
Death Machines 
How Not To Die
Machines Of Malice
Kaldt Kapplop 
Clean House 
Live Fire 
Factory Made 
How Stuffs Made 
Mountain With Griff Rhys Jones 
Manhunters: Fugitive Task Force 
Central Steam 
Britain Then And Now 
Pharaohs Who Built Egypt
Engineering Ancient Egypt (Parts 1 & 2) 
Child Of Our Time 
Four Weddings 
Close Up 
Child Of Our Time NZ SKY TV - BBC
Four Weddings (USA) NEW ZEALAND TV1
Croisee Des Chemins 
At The Doctors 
True Hollywood Stories
Akvariet
Auction Squad
Rollin With Zach 
Strangers In Danger 
True Crime With Aphrodite Jone 
Krasy Slovenska
Money Programme 
Money Programme:The World According To Google 
Fryslan Dok 
Change The Day You Die 
New Home Diy 
Airline 
E! Entertainment: E! Investigates 
Coast 
My Cypriot Kitchen 
Model Gardens 
Doctors 
Ricardo And Friends 
Wanna Come In : Ep 109 
Jesus: The Missing Years 
World S Tallest Children 
Superhuman 
It's Me Or The Dog 
Gardeners World 
Lost Jfk Tapes: The Assassination 
Lost Jfk Tapes CANVAS
Emergency Animal Rescue 
Escape From Scorpion Island 
The One Show 
Smithsonian Spotlight 
Body And Brain 
Plane Crash In The Arctic Sea
Better Homes And Gardens
Diet Tribe 
Seaside Rescue 
Machines Of Malice 
Scandal
Biography 
Ren Jian Zheng Fa
Freemasons On Trial 
Kwela
House Hunters 
Dan Patrick Show 
Four Weddings - USA 
Fifth Gear DISCOVERY TURBO
Ching's Kitchen 
Location Location Location 
Matched In Manhattan
Unforgiven 
Paradise Or Bust
Hottest Place On Earth 
Hell On Earth 
Highland Emergency 
Emergency 
Ambush Cook 
Luton Airport 
Totally Australia
Show Me The Funny 
Dalziel And Pascoe 
Osobnosti STV
Royally Astounding: 30 Days That Rocked The Monarc 
Alien Invasion 
When Aliens Attack 
Room Raiders 
Cops With Cameras 
Knut And His Friends 
Yukon Adventure 
Kingdom Of The Forest 
Top Gear 
Country Tracks 
Lost Tribe Of Palau 
The Jonathan Ross Show 
Flog It 
Top Star
Fear Factor
Daria 
A Wang Xin Chuan
Yummy Yummy
Wild About Prince Harry 
From The Ground Up Get Rich
Playschool
My Greek Kitchen 
Rubble Trouble 
Mossy Oaks S Hunting The Count 
Mission Africa 
Tuine En Tossels
Gold Plated 
Octopus Volcano
Going Green 
Citizen Duane 
Confessions Of A Teen Idol
Hidden Kingdoms 
Chic Choc 
Me Too 
Escape Form Scorpion Island 
Hobby TV
I Believe In Ghost: Joe Swash 
How Do I Look 
Minute To Win It
Anthony Bourdain No Reservation
Jaakko Ja Maailmanvalloittajat 
Sea Eagle 
Search For The Giant Octopus 
So You Think You're Royal 
Studio 53
Days That Shook The World 
Monkey Business 
Shi Nai Bing Tuan
Hablock
Renovation Game 
Et Lite Stykke Thailand 
Born Survivor : Bear Grylls 
Wildest Dreams 
I Know My Kid's A Star 
I Know My Kid S A Star TV JOJ
Heli Loggers 
Snow Monkeys
Extreme Animals 
Here's Looking At You 
Scotland's Clans 
Brilliant Creatures

TX dates

Airline Emergency still showing on 5*.

San Diego

Had a fantastic trip to the US to attend NAB in Las Vegas. We met many of our publishers from all
over the world...Great to catch up and renew some old friendships.

We then went to San Diego and Los Angeles for more music meetings...Here's the view from our room overlooking San Diego bay. It's a lovely city which has a lush park (Balboa) with plentiful museums and attractions and beautiful beaches within a mile or two of each other.

TXdates... 

Highland Emergency is showing weekdays on 5* at 2pm. Two back to back episodes which are repeated on 5*+1 an hour later.

Charlie Kunz and Vegas...

I've been very quiet on here and Facebook etc... recently as I've been very busy. Apart from musical work (editing and polishing a piano album, writing two albums for Artful, an EP for Chillville, tracks for Gold Leaf and two TV shows), there have been a few things in 'real' life that have taken up a lot of time.

The Charlie Kunz clip above is a tribute to my Father-In-Law who died in February after a long illness. He introduced me to Charlie Kunz's music many years ago and I've loved his playing ever since. Charlie was so popular during World War 2, that it was suspected that the order of the songs he played on the radio during his medleys were some sort of secret code for spies operating behind enemy lines!!!

We are going to NAB in Las Vegas at the beginning of April. This is an audio/visual show/convention and we will be meeting many of our sub-publishers who promote my music overseas. Then it's on to Los Angeles via San Diego for more music meetings.

My take on Cubase 7

I've had a bit of time to experiment with Cubase 7 and I have to say that I'm very pleased with it.
I mentioned before that I had some problems directly after the installation, but solved these by starting Cubase in 'safe mode' and resetting my preferences.

After that little hiccup, I got stuck in to the program itself. The soundcard loaded up with no problem and my stereo and 5.1 output mapping remained intact, as did the inputs. The only thing I had to reinstall was the Mackie MCU midi controller, and this happened without incident. Projects made with Cubase 5 and 6 load without problem and work as intended...Nice!!!

The 5.1 outs worked without any tweaking and the new interface is clear and intuitive. Video handling works nicely, with the (very slight) niggle that Quicktime is the only supported format. As I mentioned before, I've not been given anything other than a QT to work on for ages anyway.
The new channel strip seems to be the big news in this version and it's a vast improvement on the previous version. Limiting/Gate etc... appear in line, complete with controls, just as in a physical mixer and inserts can be seen in line too.

Now, the Chord Channel. I've got quite robust feelings about this...Many years ago, I suggested that Cubase could be made to recognise chords in order to make parts out with chord symbols quickly and easily. The Chord Channel now seems to be tailored to tell people what chords they are playing and will even suggest what chord would be nice to go to next. In my mind, it's no business of any computer to tell a composer what to write. It's the very opposite of creativity and the Chord Channel will not be turned on, even out of curiosity, on my machine. Maybe it could be used as a teaching tool, but only with the accompaniment of a music theory book and study, which, if fuelled by a true fascination and love of music, will happen naturally.

The only problem I've found with Cubase 7 is that Omnisphere and Kontakt don't like being in a project together. This has been a problem in previous versions for me...If anyone knows of what to do about this, I'd be very grateful.

In Tumbledown news, I think I've mentioned that we recently removed some boxing around some hot water pipes in the dining room and found some skirting board and a quarry tile floor. Well, we completely removed the boxing and the wooden laminate floor to reveal them and have restored the floor using the traditional method of polishing it with a half and half mixture of boiled linseed oil and white spirit. The tiles now have a lovely warm red glow which really suits the room.

Finally, we've had to say a very sad goodbye to Buz The Cat. We'll miss him.

TX dates...

Highland Emergency is playing on C5 quite regularly in the UK.

Drains and Cubase 7

2012 had its good points...Some interesting projects to work on including a feature and a couple of short films amongst the TV and radio work...Some good progress with the house and gardens, including some big earthworks which have solved our drainage and septic tank problems and the adding on of the new piece of land. However, the illness of a family member and the resultant stresses and strains made for a bit of an annus horribilis, as Her Majesty would say...So we are thrusting ourselves into 2013 with a new sense of blind optimism!!!

The new vegetable patch area is coming along nicely. Two slightly raised beds have been constructed and a picket fence will surround them soon (if the snow allows). Then the greenhouse can be put up along with another large shed and compost bins. We had a successful bonfire yesterday because the wind direction was perfect and took the smoke away from our nearest neighbours and the fellow thatched cottage across the field. The embers glowed and gave out a nice heat until sunset. I went out to check it was safe and watched the stars come out by the warmth of the fire and the internal warmth provided by some 12 year old Bowmore from my hip flask. Lovely!!!

Another thing to make life easier is a system for checking the level of heating oil in the tank from indoors via a radio sensor which communicates with a meter indoors. This saves going out in all weathers and peering into the tank armed with a stick. We're still testing it, but it does seem to be working reliably.

I've installed Cubase 7 on my music computer. I had a problem with crashes when trying to connect up a soft synth, but solved it by starting Cubase in safe mode (press control+shift+alt just after launching the program) and resetting preferences in the pop-up that appears. I reckon that this is a good thing to do anyway, especially if you've been through a few different versions with the same preferences.

I then managed to solve a video problem I was having with Cubase 6.5. It was telling me to update my graphics card or driver. Video handling was fine in Cubase 5 and the computer was telling me that I had the newest driver installed. However, a visit to GeForce (the maker of my Nvidea graphics card) and running their online driver detect feature found that I did need to upgrade the drivers. So, now I have a fully functioning Cubase 7.

One disappointment is that Omnisphere doesn't like working in the same set up as Kontakt 5. I've always had problems with this, but I found out a setting change which might make a difference...Will report back soon.

Another niggle is that the only video files that can be played are Quicktimes. This is only a minor point though because video conversion can be done very quickly these days and also I don't think I've been sent anything other than a Quicktime for quite a while.

I'll post more detals in general as I get to grips with it, but it seems to be very stable and I like the look of the new mixer with the inline gate and limiters.