Recovery and Relief (Sea Mountains)
Not from where I came
I played banjo more than guitar for a while since I especially enjoyed its mirthful and spontaneous independence. This instrument could provide enlightened commentaries on the most tragic and haunting occurrences of lost love, betrayal, revenge, murder, and perhaps even evoke valor and the emergence of integrity.
This music for guitar with slide and five-string banjo is reminiscent of traditional ballads travelling from place to place like fairy tales with subtly changing variations over a common theme; only to alight into my own imagination as another powerful resource fueling my creativity.
Moon Cats outside my Window
I awoke just after midnight to a most supernatural music outside my window as cats appeared singing under a full moon. That is what I imagined when I listened back to the music I was composing with tracks of guitar, slide guitar and harmonica. The painting of the nocturnal scene was finally realized two and a half months later from drawings in my sketch book. Whereas an irate neighbor may react to this lunar concert by lunging for a garden hose to spray amidst a torrent of profanities, I was drawn deeply into this feline world of sensory agility and mindfulness for which the music was my portal.
“Moon Cats from outside my Window” is composed and performed in three tracks for acoustic guitar, acoustic slide guitar, and harmonica by Sanford Bender.
What Is Sustainability?
Sustainability refers to something lasting or perpetuating into the future. This conscientiousness and accountability for the holistic world can alleviate the threat of a diminished quality of life or even species extinction caused by environmental damage, human exploitation and neglect.
This concept can be turned into action by first understanding the detrimental impact that we make by building without understanding, and then discovering harmony with the natural environment and its complex ecosystems. Being sustainable implies not only changing the way we build, but questioning and altering our lifestyles and monetary values into an alternative that offers better health and well being through coexistence with the natural replenishing world.
From this awareness, we can develop a well thought out methodology of design prerequisites and environmental requirements for factors such as site context, mechanical systems, material resources, and indoor spaces that guides us into a bright future for successive generations of all living things.