This fan-made artwork was one of many tributes to Harry Kalas left outside Citizens Bank Park
I, along with many Phillies fans, paid their final respects and said goodbye to longtime broadcaster Harry Kalas at a memorial service held this afternoon at Citizens Bank Park in South Philadelphia.
My fiancee and I got on line at 8:30 a.m. and entered the third-base gate about 40 minutes later. Once through the turnstiles, I saw a table with free coffee set up on it. As a huge fan of coffee, especially a little after 9 a.m. on a Saturday morning, I was excited. However, I caught a glimpse of two people standing a bit beyond the coffee station…and I was floored.
I whispered to my fiancee, “Oh, wow! Bill Giles and David Montgomery are up there greeting everybody.”
Now, Bill Giles is one of the Phillies’ owners and is the team’s chairman. David Montgomery is president and chief executive officer of the Phillies. And they were personally shaking hands with every single person walking into the ballpark and thanking them for being there.
During the late 1990s and the early part of this decade when the Phils were pretty much dreadful, both of these men took a lot of heat from some of the very fans they were now shaking hands with on a very emotional day.
Seconds after I noticed them, a few other people on line in front of us did too…and had pretty much the same reaction as I did (“Oh, wow!”). I said to a guy in front of us, “That is real class. They did not have to do that.” He agreed.
It was the first of many first-class touches the Phillies displayed during the day. And that’s one thing I want to bring up in this post…for all-non Phillies fans out there, say what you want about Philly fans and the teams, but anytime the Phillies hold a ceremony, they always do a top-notch job with it. Some of the so-called “upper crust” teams in baseball might want to take a lesson from the Phillies on how to stage a special event.
OK…so, anyway…I was going to write a lot more, but it really comes down to this: The Phillies did a great job this week with honoring the legacy and memory of Harry Kalas. And they capped it off with an outstanding memorial service and final goodbye to an icon whose voice will echo around my mind for the rest of my life.
This is a song I wrote over the days following Harry Kalas’ death. I used some radio calls, which are likely not covered by fair use, but I felt they added to the song and were an appropriate tribute. I’ll remove them if asked.
I became a Phillies fan in April 1979 and Harry’s voice is practically embedded in my brain — something I am sure I have in common with many other die-hard Phillies fans.
I convinced my family to make the trek up to Cooperstown, N.Y., in 2002 to see Harry enter the National Baseball Hall of Fame’s broadcasting wing as that year’s Frick Award winner. I even shook Harry’s hand a couple of times in my life, both coming while getting his autograph. However, the second time features a pretty cool Harry the K story.
My friend, Cliff, and I were at Jack Russell Memorial Stadium to see the Phillies play in a spring exhibition game. After the game, we went up to the window of the broadcast booth to get Harry’s autograph. However, Cliff saw the people in front of us give Harry a cell phone and he was either recording a message or talking to somebody. So Cliff decides to call our friend Jimmy — a huge Phillies fan — with the hope that Harry would talk to him for a few seconds.
So we finally approach Harry. After Harry talked to us for a few seconds and signed our programs, my friend handed Harry the phone and asked him if he could just talk to our friend for a bit. Harry says, “Sure, what’s your friend’s name?” We tell him that it’s Jim…Harry takes the phone and all we hear is something like this:
“Hey, Jim, this is Harry Kalas. How are you?…Watching the NCAA Tournament, eh?…Well, take care, Jim. It’s getting late so I am outta heerrrrre!”
We again shook Harry’s hand and thanked him. Cliff puts his phone back up to his ear and hears Jimmy say this: “That was awesome. I gotta call my dad.”
Earlier today, I sent Jimmy a text message saying that I was thinking about that time. In his reply, he said “…that’s how cool Harry was. It’s like a small piece of my life is gone.”
A lot of Phillies fans feel the same way.
RIP, Harry the K…Phillies baseball will never be the same.
Christian Beach CD Release Party - Click for PDF Flyer
As mentioned earlier on this blog, I will be part of the backing band for my good friend, singer-songwriter Christian Beach, when he takes to the stage at The Saint (601 Main St.) in Asbury Park, NJ, this Friday night as he celebrates the recent release of his self-titled, solo CD.
Joining in the festivities will be Arlan Feiles and The Lone Howdys, as well as The Sunday Blues. Doors open at 8 p.m. and tickets are just $10.
Christian’s band this time out includes John Pfeiffer (Well of Souls, In Between Dreams) on electric guitars, Michael Scotto (Agency) on drums and percussion, Gorgo (Private Sector) on mandolin and bass, Keith McCarthy (The Works, The Sunday Blues) on bass, and yours truly on organ, accordion and tambourine.
If you are in the area and are available that night, please feel free to come to the show. If you want to get a taste of Christian’s music, visit his new web site at ChristianBeach.net, or visit him on MySpace at http://www.myspace.com/christianbeach. Plus, he is now on Facebook and Twitter.
…well, I didn’t run an official 5K…but I did just run 3.1 miles since it’s so freakin’ warm out and I wanted to take advantage of it.
March is the best…spring training, college basketball tournaments and you can have about six inches of snow and 73 degrees in the same week (which is, in fact, what just happened).
Anyway, back to the run…I have never been much of a jogger or runner since cycling is more my thing. However, in August 2006, my bike sustained a flat tire that I was too lazy to get fixed for a few weeks. But instead of doing nothing, I went out to the track behind the school next to where I lived at the time and started running.
And, as fate would have it, our division at Rider University (where I was working at the time) signed up for the Mercer County Heart Walk/5K Run. Nearly everybody signed up for the walk, but I figured I might as well challenge myself and do the 5K.
My goals for that event were to a) not have a heart attack, and b) assuming “a” didn’t happen, finish in under 30 minutes.
I crossed the finish line at 27 minutes, 54 seconds.
After I did the one 5K, I planned to do at least three a year. I was pumped!
Of course, I haven’t done one since. And, worse, I haven’t even done much running in the duration.
But with today’s nice weather, I decided to run for the first time since maybe early last summer. Considering all of that, I didn’t do too badly…29 minutes, 54 seconds. So maybe I’ll give this running thing a try again.
Another reason to start running again? Back when I was running quite regularly in 2006, it was part of a personal weight-loss initiative — prompted by a heart disease scare that turned out to be false — that resulted in my losing 35 pounds. Unfortunately, I needed to lose five more pounds to reach my target weight, which would have put me at “normal” weight based on BMI (body mass index). For the first time in forever, I would have officially been “not overweight.”
But I never made it to that point. Once the weather turned colder, I stopped running and started gaining weight again. The good thing was that I didn’t gain it all back, but I did put back on about 20 pounds or so.
Well, now that I live with my girlfriend, who is very health-conscious (at least 90 percent of the time), I have managed to lose 10 of those pounds without really even trying. So, at this point, I’m about 15 pounds away from hitting that BMI-based weight target.
I might as well go for it.
Although I am really craving pizza and wings right now. Mmm…pizza and wings.
Mark your calendars for April 10…not only is it my wonderful girlfriend’s birthday, but my friend Christian Beach will be celebrating the recent release of his self-titled CD with a show at The Saint in Asbury Park, NJ.
I will once again be part of Christian’s backing band, helping out on organ and accordion, as he performs the entire 12-song CD in tracklist order. Christian will be hitting the stage around 10 p.m. and tickets are just $10.
If you are in the area and are available that night, please feel free to come to the show. If you want to get a taste of Christian’s music, visit his new web site at ChristianBeach.net, or visit him on MySpace at http://www.myspace.com/christianbeach.
As most people on the Interwebs know by now, social networking giant Facebook made a slight change to its terms of service (TOS) recently that had a big impact on what the site could do with your content.
You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof subject only to your privacy settings or (ii) enable a user to Post, including by offering a Share Link on your website and (b) to use your name, likeness and image for any purpose, including commercial or advertising, each of (a) and (b) on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof.
The original TOS, however, included this passage at the end of the section quoted above:
You may remove your User Content from the Site at any time. If you choose to remove your User Content, the license granted above will automatically expire, however you acknowledge that the Company may retain archived copies of your User Content.
Basically, Facebook’s tweaking of the TOS meant that it had rights to your content forever — even if you cancel your Facebook account!
The uproar caused by The Consumerist post eventually led Facebook to revert back to its old TOS early Wednesday morning — a temporary move by Facebook as it reviews language to create revised TOS that will address the fears and concerns of the site’s users.
However, during all this, I discovered something a bit odd while using FriendFeed, a link-sharing service that has the ability to feed content into my Facebook profile’s “wall.” During the Facebook firestorm over the past few days, I posted two articles about Facebook to my FriendFeed account.
Neither made it onto my Facebook wall.
Every other article and link I shared with FriendFeed made it onto my Facebook wall…but not the two stories I shared that were about Facebook itself. If you happen to be a friend of mine on Facebook, go to my profile and click on the FriendFeed tab. You will see all the links I shared with FriendFeed are there, including the two Facebook-related items.
But go back to my wall…and the two stories are not there. And I did not delete them, that’s for sure.
So this blog post will be another test to see if there is some kind of filtering going on over at Facebook. This blog feeds into my FriendFeed account so it should technically wind up on my Facebook wall.
If it doesn’t, I think Facebook needs to answer why this is happening…because it would look a lot like censorship to me.
And, just to be fair, I will update this post to let any readers down the road know what happened.
Stay tuned!
UPDATE…OK, so this post appeared on my Facebook wall, but there is still something troubling me about why the Facebook news links I shared via FriendFeed did not make it there.
Ben Folds performs “Fair” in Dallas, Texas, during an October 2008 performance (link).
Because Ben Folds was playing at the Electric Factory in Philadelphia last night, my girlfriend, Alison, and I basically celebrated Valentine’s Day on Friday night. We exchanged gifts, she made me dinner and I gave her flowers…you know…all that stuff.
But we had made reservations for an early evening dinner Saturday at Copper Bistro in the Northern Liberties section of Philly since it is close to where the Electric Factory is. We get to the front door of the restaurant and there is a greeter outside…and nobody in the restaurant. After asking if we had reservations, he informs us that a problem with the restaurant’s oven hood meant the place was full of smoke. However, the owner was good friends with the owner of a small art gallery across the street, so the Copper Bistro staff moved all the tables and chairs over to the gallery, which served as dining room for the night. It was very resourceful and it was nice to see area businesses working together, especially in these times.
And the food was pretty good overall. The desserts were a bit of a let down, but the coffee was good and that’s all that matters to me after a meal.
Anyway, after dinner, we headed to the Electric Factory. Now, I am not one of those people at concerts who are constantly taking pictures — mostly because my photos usually turn out awful. But I like to take a few just to post on the ol’ blog. You may notice, however, that there is no photo to go along with this blog entry. I will explain that in a bit.
Knowing that I have received some pretty serious pat-downs upon entering the Electric Factory, I gave Alison my camera and my Flip camcorder to put in the bottom of her purse. In the past, it always seemed that women breezed through the security check while I was getting scrutinized for the various contact lens solutions I always carry around with me. This time, it was different…they didn’t even touch me, but they were going through all the women’s bags. Fortunately, Alison got through without the staff confiscating either camera.
However, they must have confiscated a lot because an announcement was made just before the night’s opening act, Miniature Tigers, took the stage that told people where to pick up their cameras before leaving.
So I wasn’t even going to attempt to take out my digital camera or the Flip. But I figured it wouldn’t hurt if I attempted to get one or two pics of Ben with my Blackberry.
Ben Folds and his band — now a five-musician unit — hit the stage around 10 p.m. and opened with “Fair” (see video of October 2008 performance above) from the Ben Folds Five CD “Whatever and Ever Amen”…a song I love that I haven’t heard Ben play live in quite some time. About a minute into the song, I noticed that everybody around me had their camera out taking pictures, including a few who were using flashes. Because I know any pic I take with the Blackberry is going to be crappy without using the flash, I figured I would try to take the photo and try to blend in with the 50 people or so around me who are taking pictures.
I take the pic and almost immediately, an Electric Factory staff member comes up behind me and tells me to delete the photo and to put the phone away…and that I would be thrown out if caught taking another photo.
So that was the end of my picture taking. But what bothered me was that, for the remainder of the night, there were people in my immediate vicinity who were obviously raising their cameras up to take photos and video. BUT NOTHING WAS SAID TO THEM. And since the LCD screens on these cameras were so freakin’ noticeable, I could see these photos and videos were coming out 50 times better than the piece of crap blurry pic that existed on my Blackberry for about 15 seconds. AGAIN, NOTHING WAS SAID TO ANY OF THESE PEOPLE. I think the “camera police” guy busted me and, possibly, the guy to my left, and that was it.
Hopefully, I will eventually find these better pics somewhere on the Interwebs and I will, as Mike Doughty says, gank one to accompany this blog post.
OK…so now that my rant is over about that, how was the show?
First, Miniature Tigers opened with a pretty decent set. I had listened to a couple of their songs on their MySpace page to familiarize myself a bit with them and didn’t really like what I had heard. But they sound much better live. And, even though Miniature Tigers are apparently gaining popularity among the young folks (they will be at South By Southwest next month), I don’t think I’ll be jumping on the bandwagon any time soon…just not my cup of tea.
In between Miniature Tigers and Ben Folds, the all-female Gracenotes a cappella group from West Chester University performed two original songs and then a version of “Fred Jones, Part 2” from Ben’s “Rockin’ the Suburbs” CD, which the group recorded with Ben for an upcoming disc featuring 18 a cappella groups from various colleges, universities and high schools performing songs from both Ben’s solo catalog and those from the Ben Folds Five days.
And, like I said, Ben Folds and his four fellow musicians hit the stage around 10 p.m. and knocked it out of the freakin’ park. Aside from nearly getting tossed out for taking a blurry picture with my Blackberry, this may have been the best show I have seen Ben play…especially with a band. He did an incredible solo show a few years ago in Princeton, N.J., that I hold in high regard. But last night’s show may have topped it.
By my count, he played 26 songs that covered a lot of musical territory. I don’t remember the setlist in sequential order, although I am trying to find an accurate setlist on a couple of the Ben Folds-dedicated forums that are out there. In the meantime, I have put together this list of songs based on what CDs they appeared and which were from the Ben Folds Five days:
BEN FOLDS – WAY TO NORMAL ( 2008 )
Effington
Brainwascht
You Don’t Know Me
Hiroshima
Before Cologne/Cologne
Free Coffee
Kylie From Connecticut
Dr. Yang
Dr. Yang (from the “fake leak” version of the CD)
Bitch Went Nuts (from the “fake leak” version of the CD)
Way to Normal (from the “fake leak” version of the CD)
BEN FOLDS – SONGS FOR SILVERMAN (2005)
Bastard
Landed
BEN FOLDS – ROCKIN THE SUBURBS (2001)
Annie Waits
Zak and Sara
The Luckiest (which he dedicated to his wife…contradicting an article published online just two days earlier stating that his fourth marriage, to Fleur, had recently ended)
Not the Same
BEN FOLDS FIVE (in order I remembered what songs were performed):
Fair
Alice Childress (with a credit to WXPN for making it an early “hit” for BF5)
Eddie Walker
Army
Lullabye
Underground
Philosophy (including Misirilou and a bit of Theme from Dr. Pyser at the end)
Kate
Emaline
Any Ben Folds show that features “Army,” “Emaline,” “Philosophy,” “Underground” and “Alice Childress” are considered freakin’ sweet by default. “Fair” and “Kate” made it that much better.
1. Fair
2. Effington
3. Brainwascht
4. You Don’t Know Me
5. Annie Waits
6. Alice Childress
7. Way To Normal
8. Lovesick Diagnostician (fake Dr. Yang)
9. Dr. Yang
10. Hiroshima
11. Bastard
12. Landed
13. Free Coffee
14. Eddie Walker
15. Lullabye
16. Emaline
17. The Luckiest
18. Kylie From Connecticut
19. Army
20. Underground
21. Not The Same
22. Cologne
23. Bitch Went Nutz
Christian Beach’s self-titled CD is now available on iTunes, so if that is your preferred online music retailer, you may sample Christian’s music and buy it there.
Here is the YouTube playlist of Christian Beach’s complete set at the Strand Theater gallery on Feb. 7, 2009, as part of the CD release party for “A Few Uneven Rhymes – A Tribute to Winter Hours.” Enjoy!
(And thanks to Alison for capturing the video with my Flip mino!)
Brian Kelley 