Exhausted...

Happy beyond belief.

So grateful for others.

Over the coming days I'll post my remembrances of out little trip into outer space.

I'm going to close this thread until after I post thoughts and pictures.

With best regards,

Ken

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Ken-at-Bose,

OK. Here goes with the first batch...

Cliff, Evie Wonder (not shown), Gary (bass, right) and Tommy (guitar, center) travelled together.

There was much hilarity, mainly focused on Cliff and I teaching Gary all about our highly developed phonetic dictionary for a broad (broo-wad) Boston (boo-wah-stun) accent.

The inventor of the L1 system.

Also, a killer songwriter, arranger, bandleader, singer, piano and B3 player.

Sometimes we are accused of having too much fun. The line from The Grateful Dead's song Truckin' comes to mind: "The heat come by and busts us for smiling on a cloudy day."

We are happy because our work and our lives are full and interesting. These L1 conferences are high points for both Cliff and me.

I'm not sure for sure what Cliff is cracking up about but I'm pretty sure it's because Gary is doing an Ethel Merman (sp?) impression, singing "There's no business like show business..." is super high falsetto.

Here's PmP and Ray up at Little Switzerland. They drove the RV in the background up a very steep and winding road. They're in a band together.

Ray is a great singer, something we found out on Monday night at about midnight. PmP sang an amazing rockin blues tune about a Granny on the loose.

More later...

BabyBlueEyes at dinner on Saturday.

Even though the conference didn't start until Sunday afternoon, lots of people arrived early to take advantage of the BEAUTIFUL surroundings (I'm hoping that JohnNell will share some of his outdoors photos with us).

Lots of folks rehearsed songs on Saturday night in the Geneva Hall, which turned out to be a very warm and inviting place. It was a little loud acoustically at first but as we filled the room with gear and people the acoustics became good.

We woke to a glorious Sunday morning. Several folks organized an outdoor chapel service. Others sat and looked out at the 50 mile view to the East.

Tommy who is an accomplished Kung Fu expert, practiced on the shuffle board court. It was lovely to watch.

Wiek-at-Bose-Europe joined us along with his colleague Guy, our business manager from Europe.

Wiechert blew everybody away with his alto sax playing.

Hideki and two of his colleagues came all the way from Japan to be with us.

On Sunday night, he and Hiroki floored everybody by playing solo pieces in front of everybody. Hiroki (picture later) played and sang a beautiful traditional Japanese song and Hideki played a very intricate and difficult piece on the guitar.

The both brought the house down. None of us could believe the courage and skill needed to pull this off. Any ice was instantly melted and all three became part of our big family.

On Sunday afternoon the agenda kicked off with a wonderful presentation by Steve-at-Bose on getting great electric guitar tone into the L1 system.

Steve brought all kinds of gear to demonstrate.

TomB, Guy, Gary, Hiroki all listen to Steve's presentation.

Neil-at-Bose gave a talk and showed a video on the recent work we did with Ovation and Takamine to develop ToneMatch presets for some of their best and most popular guitars.

I'm hoping Neil will get the video over to the wiki because it shows a lot about how these instrument manufacturers "get it".

Tom Munch reprised his excellent "tone" presentation from Cuchara. This presentation when given at Cuchara can be seen at the L1 wiki.

One of the things that blew us all away again was how popping noise on a microphone, from "P's" for example, gets much BETTER as you get closer to the windscreen, and worse as you move away. Totally unintuitive and must be remembered.

Let me also say that Tom was just unbelievable the whole time. He was up to 3 and 4 in the morning playing, then gave a great lecture, and was always asking me if there was anything he could do to help. Amazing.

Guy, Oldghm, TomB listen to Tom's talk.

Gitarzan rode into town with Tom Munch and was a great help with setup. His organization was amazing and he saved me several times with his excellent selection of cables (everybody: you know what I mean).

Later, gitarzan strapped on an acoustic for a singer-songwriter round robin with Oldghm and Troisnoir and played beautifully, including some impromptu and very tasteful accompaniment.

On Monday night for the final jam-jam, he provide very tasteful electric guitar, never showboating, never stepping on toes. He is an excellent player and a very sensitive guy.

Mike Z.

If you stare into those eyes, you will be hypnotized. Watch out.

On Monday, Mike led a fantastic workshop on "ensemble playing". He used Cliff's band to demonstrate a number of key ideas. During this presentation I actually had a totally new and unexpected experience with L1 technology.

Mike invited us up on stage during one of the songs to experience what the musicians hear. I have done this many, many times, so this was not new.

What was different was that the night before, Cliff's band had played a smashingly good performance. One of the most wonderful things about his quartet is that they've worked out four male vocal parts. And when they sing together it is very unusual. It's like all the Beatles singing at once. Glorious.

Anyway, one particular tune, Life Of Crime (the opener) was stuck in my head all day. And then they used that tune during Mike's workshop.

Without premeditation, and only out of joy, during the workshop when invited on stage, I sang the first chorus with Gary. Then, on the next chorus with Tommy (Too-wah-mee), then with Cliff, and finally with TomB, the drummer.

It was an epiphany for me. I finally got to hear what it is like to PERFORM on an L1 system in ensemble. It was a total blast. I could clearly hear my part and yet the rest of the band was right there too: everything else was audible while I sang. This makes me even more certain that if I play things out right in this life, I'll be reincarnated as a musician.

More later...

Evie Wonder, Stevie Wonder (coffee mug), Guy, Kensuke.

We were so happy and so lucky to have Steve. He is one of the founding members of the live music group at Bose.

Many do not know this but he is also the person who KNEW to have a message board, long before this writer even knew what such a thing was.

Chris-at-Bose gave an incredible presentation on psychoacoustics for musicians.

We shot this and once we edit we'll put it up on the wiki.

The stunning conclusion to the presentation was a demonstration of "binaural unmasking" and an accompanying display that had everyone's head spinning with ideas.

Much more on this subject as we unfold things here.