When I was sixteen, I bought the sheet music to Jack Fina’s “Bumble Boogie,” a jazzed up boogie-woogie version of Rimsky- Korsakov’s “Flight of the Bumble Bee.” At that time, all of my piano training was strict, by the book, classical instruction and I chafed under the rigid, stiff, and what I perceived as boring, musical genre into which I was thrust. By the time I got to high school, my mother had released me from my that regimen and once I was free to play what I liked, jazz, pop, and boogie became my passion. The day I bought this music, I visited my muscially talented high school friend Linda Moore and handed her the eight page score. She sat down to her grand piano and played it through without, as I recall, one missed note. I struggled with the piece and learned only three of the eight pages before I gave up playing when I went off to college. When I finally got a real piano about twenty years ago, I started playing again, even revisiting some of the old classical songs that I’d hated when I was learning. But learning “Bumble Boogie” all the way through was always a goal. And, after some practice, I did learn it. Boogie is so much fun to play; almost as much fun a playing ragtime. I’ve gotten a bit rusty in the past few years so I’m going to have to dust off that keyboard and get back to it. I miss that toe tapping boogie bass line that permeates the song.
Today’s challenge theme is “song” and since this is one of my favorites, I chose it for the challenge. I used my 24-70mm lens on a tripod. ISO 100, f/2.8, 1/30, WB Fair Weather. The first adjustment I had to make was to white balance. It was set to fine weather and once again, the camera’s LCD showed the same as I could see, yellowish brown, aged paper. But when I downloaded the shots, the white balance was completely out of whack on the computer screen, making the sheet music look almost orange. This has happened twice now so I guess it’s something I need to investigate. I have never noticed this happening prior to two days ago, and it is a bit disconcerting. To make it presentable, I used Lightroom’s Preset light antique and added a vignette as well as changing the white balance and making a few other tweaks.
I remember hearing you talk about Bumble Boogie way back when- and I’m impressed you finally mastered it! Lovely shot- I love the depth of field you got with that wonderful lens- beautiful! I’ve used that same LR preset at least once- it’s a good one. Great shot- great story!