Commentary & Pubs

I’m done with the rage merchants

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By Ande Jacobson

2024 is shaping up to be a year to remember. Watching the chaos swirl across the country with respect to our upcoming election in combination with the extraordinary legal proceedings in play is at times maddening, and at other times hopeful. One way to stop being affected by the highs and lows is to disengage from the rage merchants. That means ignoring pretty much every news show – be it on cable, broadcast television, streaming video, or radio. In most cases, the news isn’t actually news but is instead a compendium of rage mongers trying to outdo one another to gain audience. The hosts are performing for their audiences, intentionally angering them because high emotion sells and keeps people coming back for more. Continue reading →

2024 – A Leap Year to remember

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By Ande Jacobson

29 February only occurs in years divisible by 4, and for centennial years, only those divisible by 400. This little oddity has been written about in verse in that famous poem that has become a favorite mnemonic for remembering how many days each month contains:

Thirty days hath September,
April, June, and November;
All the rest have thirty-one,
Excepting February alone,
And that has twenty-eight days clear
And twenty-nine in each leap year.

Growing up, leap years were exciting in a good way. We had the Olympics, both winter and summer in leap years. Because of a decision made by the Olympic committee in 1986, starting in 1994, the summer and winter games alternated in even years. That means that now only the summer games are held in leap years. In the summer of 2024, that extravaganza will take place in Paris, France.

U.S. presidential elections are held in leap years (barring the non-leap year centennials of course). While presidential elections always have the potential to be a little dicey, until relatively recently, the differences meant some potential policy shifts, but it didn’t really seem as if democracy itself was on the line. This leap year just like the last one, democracy’s fate is as yet undetermined. Continue reading →

2024 is going to be a long year

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By Ande Jacobson

Here we are almost a month into a new year, and it’s been eventful so far. 2024 is a consequential presidential election year with democracy on the line, something that’s fast becoming a mainstay of our political process. It wasn’t always this way. There was a time when the two major parties may have preferred different approaches to solving the nation’s problems, but they worked together to try to make things better for everyone. FDR’s New Deal and Eisenhower’s Middle Way were two sides of the same coin from a Democratic and a Republican president respectively. Both held that the government had a role in regulating business, providing a basic social safety net, and aiding in making the U.S. a more fair and equal society. Continue reading →

Books matter

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By Ande Jacobson

Something unexpected happened recently.

Almost a year ago, I wrote an essay about a controversial post I made on Facebook with a simple thesis. Reading and listening are not the same thing. In the course of my background reading for that piece, I dug into some of the research surrounding the differences between reading and listening as it pertained to absorbing and processing written material. One interesting note came to light during that investigation, that being that there’s also a difference in comprehension and retention based on how you read printed material. There was some study evidence that reading an e-book isn’t quite as good for comprehension as reading a physical book. Given that wasn’t the focus of my previous essay, I noted it, mentioned it in passing in the essay, and set it aside. Continue reading →

2023 is finally ending

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By Ande Jacobson

So many things happened in 2023 that were unforgettable, many of them things that we wish weren’t happening. By the same token, there has also been some good to come out of 2023, though sometimes it seems harder to find the good given the preponderance of bad news filling the airwaves and the internet on a daily basis.

So what good has happened? Locally, the arts have been recovering and in some respects have just about reached their pre-pandemic levels. San Jose’s Saxophone Christmas had 190 saxophone players making lovely holiday music for those willing to venture out into the uncertain world despite the risks of infection swarming around us. Theater has also returned locally with many lively productions, and music is in the air all around even beyond the return of the saxophones to San Jose. Continue reading →

The 29th Annual San Jose SaXmas recap

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Dad’s sop sax

By Ande Jacobson

On Saturday, 16 December 2023, the 29th Annual San Jose Saxophone Christmas (or SaXmas for short) happened. Sax players of all levels got together as they do each year (except in 2020 for obvious reasons) and made holiday music together on saxes of all shapes and sizes. For some players, this is the only time they bring out their saxophones, while for others, it’s one of dozens (or possibly even hundreds) of gigs they play each year.

First, the ensemble rehearsed for a couple of hours down in South San Jose playing through this year’s concert selections. Then they broke for lunch and reconvened in downtown San Jose to play their first concert at Christmas in the Park. They then moseyed over to Eastridge Shopping Mall for their final concert of the day. Continue reading →

Come hear (or play) SaXmas this December

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By Ande Jacobson

Over the years, I’ve written several articles promoting the annual holiday tradition – San Jose’s Saxophone Christmas (or SaXmas for short). Saxophone Christmas is the brainchild of founder Ray Bernd, a man who is a walking saxophone encyclopedia and strives to bring saxophonists together to share their love of this unique and often misunderstood family of instruments. While not exactly a flash mob in the traditional sense, SaXmas is a one day festival of holiday music to brighten the season. The players gather in the morning to renew old friendships and spend a couple of hours together playing through a set of holiday tunes, most of which are arranged for this momentous ensemble by Ray himself. After a short break, the group then plays two free concerts in the local area that afternoon. Ray always tries to schedule the earlier concert at an outdoor venue, and the second concert at an indoor location. That way even if the weather doesn’t cooperate, there will be at least one concert, and with any luck, two. The San Jose SaXmas is always on the third Saturday of December. This year that puts the 29th annual event on 16 December 2023. The San Jose SaXmas concerts will take place as follows:

  • San Jose’s Christmas in the Park from 2-3pm, weather permitting
  • Eastridge Mall from 5-6pm no matter the weather

For those in the Sacramento area, there’s a SaXmas for you as well! The 11th annual Sacramento SaXmas concerts (both inside) will take place on 2 December 2023 as follows:

  • KP International Market – Rancho Cordova (inside the market – by the food court) 2-3pm
  • Sunrise Mall – (inside mall – near entrance of Macy’s south) 5-6pm

Continue reading →

Make your appointment with ‘Sweeney Todd’

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Alea Selburn as Mrs. Lovett and Steve Allhoff as Sweeney Todd (Photo Credit: SCP)

By Ande Jacobson

‘Appointments’ are going fast for Sunnyvale Community Player’s (SCP) production of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street this fall. This is a show that should not be missed. I was fortunate to be granted an early appointment to catch a little more behind the scenes at the first full dress rehearsal with all of the elements in play. As a music director and player, it’s not often that I have been able to observe this part of the process from quite this vantage point, i.e., from the house without a musical score in front of me, though I had to take a quick peek backstage before the run-through started to see the pit setup (with permission of course). That said, this is not a review. This is partially a continuation of my earlier orchestra chronicle expanded to the production overall. Continue reading →

Remembering the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake

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SJSU Engineering By John Pozniak from Wikimedia Commons

By Ande Jacobson

34 years ago at the time of this writing on 17 October at 5:04 p.m. (or as I thought of it, at 1740 L), I was in class in grad school at San Jose State University. I was an engineering student working on my master’s degree and was listening to a lecture in my digital data transmissions class. When the shaking started, one student in the back made a beeline for the door jamb while the rest of us dove under the tables. We were in the new wing of the engineering building in a sort of small, tiered lecture hall that seated 30-40 and had long tables with comfy rolling chairs along the tiers. The professor was still lecturing when he noticed us all under the tables and mentioned that he should probably get under a table or something. He was originally from Switzerland, but this was his first earthquake here, so he wasn’t quite as well-versed as the majority of the class in our earthquake protocols. Continue reading →

The Sweeney Todd orchestra adventure

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By Ande Jacobson

While I have no plans to return to performance myself, I recently had the privilege of attending the first orchestra rehearsal for Sunnyvale Community Players’ (SCP) upcoming production of Sweeney Todd, not as a player, not as the music director, but as a very interested observer. I arrived early as the orchestra members trickled into the lobby of the theater to assemble the ensemble. Once everyone was in place, some of the players were noodling a bit or practicing some of the challenging sections of their parts while others were talking quietly. Eventually, the music director arrived carrying an amp for one of the keyboard players. He set up the amp, handed out a revised cut sheet, and then took his place in front of his orchestra to begin the rehearsal at the top of the score. Music director Val Zvinyatskovsky was the youngest person present at the tender age of 17, and yet he had the attention and command of the room. While it was the first time they had come together in this particular ensemble, everyone was ready to work. Continue reading →