Random Youtube Video of the Day

The video of the day is a song that has been covered almost millions of times since it's creation by Leonard Cohen in 1984. It's the very famous Hallelujah NOT written by a man named Handel. After spending the past hour on Youtube trying to find my favorite version of it.(trust me just about every famous artist in the past 20 years has done a cover from Willie Nelson to Rufus Wainwright to Imogen Heap and every artist in between) I'm going to put my list of top 5 versions of this song before posting it and if you ever have the time, do listen to the different versions because the top 5 are all good. I'll also include a few honorable mentions as most of the artists who did it have voices worthy of this song. It's a marvelous song about love and faith with a few  biblical references thrown in for good measure. One of them being the story of Samson and Delilah when she cuts his hair. The other being the story of King David and Bathsheba when he sees her bathing.

1.Espen Lind- Four Norwegian guys, one on guitar and all singing throughout the song as solos and harmony. They also clearly love the song and really give the song everything. The last guy to sing a solo is my favorite and has a pretty neat voice.
2.Kate Voegele- No one knows who she is but I first heard hers a few years ago and it's great. It's now a studio record on youtube that has a million hits. The one she had a few years ago had less than a 1,000 views and some strange picture when I found it.
3.Rufus Wainwright- This is the one that is in the movie Shrek, pretty normal version of it.
4.Imogen Heap- The most bare of any covers but it's very beautiful and soulful as typical of her singing.
5.Allison Crowe- Her at a piano, singing..what more to say?

Honorable Mentions
KD Lang- Solid woman vocals, piano and light synthesized orchestral background.
Jeff Buckley- Probably the most famous version..I find it too self-indulgent and lacks soul.
Willie Nelson- Just cause it's Willie you should listen to it.

After all that here's Espen Lind's incredible and Art of Choice blog winning version of Hallelujah. Enjoy.

Random Youtube Video of the Day

Today's video is dedicated to a great new bluegrass band that was formed a few years ago. They are called the Punch Brothers and have opened for Dave Matthews, played with Steve Martin and performed on David Letterman as well as touring all over the US of A. My buddy Paul Kowert is the bass player for them, a former Curtis Institute of Music student as well he joined the band in 2008. Chris Thile is the lead vocalist and mandolin player, formerly of the band Nickel Creek. Gabe Witcher on the fiddle, Noam Pikelny on the banjo and Chris Eldridge on guitar. They have a really incredible album called antifogmatic that you can purchase on iTunes. My favorite song of theirs is Rye Whiskey..so here it is in a live radio recording of it. Enjoy.

Random Youtube Video of the Day

Today's video is yet another opera video dedicated to the incredible Jussi Bjorling(there's an umlaut on that o but I am not sufficiently skilled enough to put it in there) It's the aria Che Gelida Manina-What a cold little hand- from Puccini's La Boheme. Hands down my favorite aria of all time and possibly my favorite 15 minutes of opera comes from this segment of La Boheme leading from Rodolfo's aria into her aria(Si, Mi chiamano Mimi-Yes, they call me Mimi) and then finally into their duet O soave fanciulla-O gentle maiden- 


Jussi Bjorling lived from 1911-1960 and was widely acclaimed for very good reason to be the greatest living tenor. Jussi is of Swedish descent and sang in major opera houses all over the world in just about every repertoire imaginable. He inspires singers to this day and was one of Pavarotti's favorite singers if that gives any more credibility to this guy's copious amounts of opera street cred.


The basis of the aria is Rodolfo explaining to Mimi who he is and what he does. He's essentially a very simple and poor poet and artist. I advise following along with this rough translation while listening..It's truly stunning stuff..I guess Puccini knew what he was doing. Translation. Enjoy the video and incredible singing by the great Jussi.

How to Pick a Table at a Self-seating Restaurant

After many weeks of not writing a new blog devoted to the art of choosing I chose to finally write my next blog. Due to considerable amounts of coaxing from several sources I decided to devote it to one of my families most discussed subjects..Picking a table at a restaurant. It is a very complicated subject and the amount of times I've gotten up and moved locations that lesser educated people on the subject had chosen is a number too large to be worth mentioning. No I'm not rude(Unless I haven't eaten..in which case, avoid at all costs). I merely have a higher level of care for a humans wellbeing and I believe strongly in the degree of happiness derived from sitting and eating in comfort.

I spend a considerable amount of time in restaurants. Among my favorite quick-eat places are Qdoba, Chipotle and Jack in the Box. I have refined taste buds that have been developed over years to appreciate the simple things in life. One of those things is cheap food. Enjoy your 15 dollar salad. I'll take my processed meats and over-salted fries to the bank someday for that Aston-Martin in the last Bond flick. One of the things that enables me too eat less than healthy foods with the same level of enjoyment is my good choice of locale. With that being said here are my tips to getting the most out of any dining experience.


Avoid People
The only way I can see this rule ever being broken is if you seriously think your ability to laugh and talk loudly is really going to get that cute girls attention in the table next to you. As a fellow loud laugher and talker let me tell you..It never works so just keep walking and hit that table in the back corner where you won't have to deal with her potentially annoying voice and even more annoying talking-on-the-phone-while-I-eat habit. The more people you are near the more likely someone else is to sit near you. It's like that parking spot 10 cars from any other car that you so wisely take that by the time you get back to your car from shopping at World Market has been beset on both sides by Hummers(Maybe I'll cover parking spots in a future post.) People will also bump into you, drop food on you, ask you for a chair or loudly interrupt your conversation for any number of likely unreasonable and useless reasons.


Face the Entrance
Who wants to face a wall? All you have to look at then in your frequent moments of utter panic that you have no idea what the person across from you is saying is the oddly spackled patterns of flowers on the wall which..really..truly..honestly do look better from fifty feet away. If you face the entrance you can assess any potential dangers as soon as they enter. You can instantly get a feeling for what you might have to deal with should someone decide to sit next to you(heaven forbid) and also judge the level of noise that that party of twelve that just entered might bring to your conversation.


Avoid Entrances, Exits, Soda Machines and Bathrooms
Foot Traffic. It's all about foot traffic. If you are by any of these you are increasing the number of people who will go by you exponentially. If I were to create a priority list it would go in the exact order I just put it as. Everyone enters the restaurant plus the x amount of people who come in and leave. Everyone who eats has to exit. Most people who eat have a soda and then last of all a few people use the bathroom. If possible avoid these situations.


Do not sit in the aisle
The last rule I wish to give unto you is that of not sitting in an aisle. If you can sit in a booth or table against a wall you're much more likely to enjoy your stay. You have a wall to put your bags against where people will not be kicking it. You won't have people walking behind you and beside you the entire time. I trust you to make good judgment on choosing the best aisle seat after reading this article if you have no choice.


If you haven't sensed my theme yet...I'll make it clear.. Watch out for people.. They want to make life as easy for themselves as possible. If we lived in a world full of considerate people who cared about not banging doors and noisily opening wrappers during a movie we wouldn't have any of these problems. My job is to make your life as easy as possible in a world that is only concerned with itself. In turn you will succeed in making everyones life better without them knowing it. I cannot think of a much more noble thing to do than that. I hope you can all choose not only the best train seats but now the best tables at a restaurant. Here's the quote I will leave you with and thank you for reading.

"Constantly choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil."

Jerry Garcia

Random Youtube Video of the Day

It's been far too long since I have gifted you dear reader, follower and/or stalker with a video. I assure you that it's due to matters of utmost importance such as eating, sleeping, praying or brushing my fangs and combing my fur. I also promise you I have a new life-changing choice blog half done. Now to today's video. It's a cover of Outkast's Hey Ya done with an acoustic guitar and piano by Obadiah Parker. It makes the unbelievably catchy song very Elton John-esque..Or Phil Collins. Enjoy and stay tuned for new posts in the near future.

Random Youtube Video of the Day

Today's video is the epitome of nerdy-ness in music. Some creative music student who had time(or a class assignment) created a counterpoint fugue based off of Lady Gaga's hit Bad Romance. It's a very creative idea to make a Bach like fugue based off of a pop song seeing as all of their music is essentially stolen from the greats anyways. Here's the original Bad Romance and then the fugue. Enjoy.

Lady Gaga Fugue

Random Youtube Video of the Day

I promise a real post about life choices is coming soon. The life of an opera singer is frequently fraught with all day rehearsals followed by another day of all day rehearsals. Successive days of this can cause ones brain to not be suitable for choosing anything but sleep. Today's video is dedicated to a very intelligent young music producer named Bruno Mars who has been the mastermind behind many of todays pop hits. This is sort of dorky but an average day in heaven for me would involve not showering and "not doing anything and laying in my bed."Enjoy the catchy tune and kind of strange monkey dance.