First, I wish you a happy New Year! Yesterday, New Year’s Eve, we made a classic good-luck meal with leftovers for today (Jan. 1). I made traditional Southern cornbread with buttermilk, collard greens, and black-eyed peas (the last two both cooked with a smoked ham hock). The main course was regular ham, and Crystal made mac and cheese. Yum. Apologies to this adorable smiling piggy, who took no part in the feast.

Backing up a bit, we enjoyed a quiet Christmas with our cats. Crystal made her delicious tortellini soup for Christmas Eve, and on Christmas morning we opened our gifts to each other and some that others had been sent to us, and we made all the usual phone calls to family and friends around the country. In the afternoon, we went over to some friends’ house for a buffet and Christmas movies. To add to the pot luck, I made crab cakes from fresh crab with the fewest possible bread crumbs (I use panko), homemade remoulade sauce made with no recipe, after much tasting and tinkering on it like a mad scientist or potion-master, and Buffalo chicken wings; and Crystal made a delicious gingerbread Bundt cake.

Crystal and I kept our gifts simple and modest this year. I found her main gift at an antique store, a beautifully refurbished round-top, large oak chest, which she had been looking a long time for but had never found one in a good enough condition worth buying. This one also had the inside shelf with compartments in perfect condition. She gave me a self-stirring electric corn popper and the newly issued “Sinatra Platinum” double CD, 44 songs from his Capitol recordings in the 1950’s – two gifts I really loved.

Since Christmas was on a Monday, we went twice to church on Sunday. The first Mass in the morning was for Sunday itself, and the second Mass was for Christmas, being the “Vigil Mass,” on Sunday early evening. When I was a kid, we always went to midnight Mass on Christmas Eve. Afterwards, at home my dad always made waffles for the family, and we didn’t get to bed till around 2 a.m. But that never stopped us four kids from waking up our poor parents early to open presents. I started a new tradition this year, an afternoon snack of real English Stilton cheese (a strong blue cheese) with port wine.

I have managed to keep on composing my ballet, making revisions requested by the choreographer to better match her newly-revised ballet story line. Two days from now I will travel to the site of the June ballet premiere, the lavish, historic Morris Center in South Bend, Indiana, to video-record a 3-minute promotional video for the ballet along with our producer, choreographer and others. If it comes out well, I will post it here. Then, back in the Nashville area on Sunday night Jan. 7, I will attend our first regular rehearsal of my musical, Dear Miss Barrett, with the cast. The show is set to run March 1 – 10. 

Out of the frying pan and into the fire! The time has come to begin planning recording sessions for my next two albums, one album of the new ballet music (70 minutes of music) and one of the new 3^rd Symphony (55 minutes of music). We will record both albums with the same orchestra in the same studio over several days, hopefully fall 2024. Last week I nailed down some of the details of the plan to release both new albums (separately) with my record company.

Meanwhile I sent to the orchestra manager a proposal for how many musicians are needed and how many 3-hour recording sessions to book in the fabulous Radio Bulgaria Studio No. 1 with the European Recording Orchestra, who recorded my Symphony No. 2 there in 2022. From these sources (the recording company, the orchestra, and travel expenses) I will develop a budget for the whole project and begin the fund-raising process. It won’t be cheap, and the money may or may not be forthcoming, but I go on faith at this stage. After all, it definitely won’t happen if I don’t believe it can and don’t even try, right? Hey, might this be true of something you are hoping to do in 2024? Believe! Try!

This afternoon we will go with friends downtown to the historic Nashville train station, which was made into a very posh hotel some years ago. They are hosting a “pop-up” bar based on the Harry Potter books, called “Platform 9 ¾” with theme cocktails and hors d’ouevres. Later: On the left in the photo below, we are toasting our little “butter beer” shots, and on on the table are the cocktails they call “Those of Wit” (a saying from the Ravenclaw House in Harry Potter) and on the right “Polyjuice Potion.” In the photo on the right, we bar-hopped over to Nashville’s “Sinatra Bar and Lounge” for more libations and a wonderful Italian dinner.

Last week, Crystal and I drove down to Tullahoma for a special “Victorian Christmas Tea” at a place called “The Celtic Cup.” We had some UK goodies, tea, Christmas crackers, and a flaming Christmas pudding.

I have made my 2024 resolutions, and perhaps you have, too. One of mine will be to try a new “popcorn diet” of my own invention. I hope to substitute a bowl of popcorn (made with my new popper, see above) for one meal each day, which is filling and only has about 100 to 200 calories. I’m curious how much weight I can lose before I get utterly sick of popcorn and never want to eat it again. My other resolutions have to do with renewing spiritual activities that have languished in 2023. The great English author G. K. Chesterton said, “The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul.” (I assume he meant a “renewed” soul.) Let’s all make a go for it, especially so if you happen to be discouraged about something at this time.