Pitch Perfect (c) by Michael Casey

Perfect Pitch ©

By

Michael Casey

In music perfect pitch is where you sing really well, hitting the notes exactly as they should be, or if you play an instrument you play perfectly well. I believe John and Yoko’s son has perfect pitch, I heard it said on the radio.

Behind me is the piano where my girls practice and where they have their music lessons. Some of the tunes they play take me back to my childhood, the girls are surprised I know the tune, I even sing the song to them. In our house Music is important.

The girls joined a church choir after their primary school took them to visit the church. So that has been a great thing these past  few years. The lady from the choir is the same lady who comes to our house to teach them piano.

Pianos make a lot of noise, they resonate throughout the house, our piano, an electronic one also has pedals, and the girls know how to use them. One pedal extends the sound, the other pedal cuts it short. If I have explained this wrong, then forgive me.

Piano lessons,  mean practice.  You have to make sure or even force the student to practice. It all depends on your student. For me sitting four feet away from the piano as I talk to you, it can be very noisy with a daughter behind me practicing.  A little boring too as they repeat five times over the practice piece.

Now for me  the best bit is when they improvise after the practice piece. My smallest daughter is very good at improv. This is where the Vangelis in her comes to the fore, and where the electronic sounds can be used on the piano. I have in fact just switched Vangelis on as I talk to you, I hope he doesn’t drown out my words.

Music is freedom, as I’ve said before Jazz is smoke turned into music, so listening to my daughter improvise is a great thing. Finally when they are  finished the house slumbers again. But not for long, as I have my music on the computer, and on a usb  stick in my cheap but great sounding hifi behind me on the bookcase.

So are we noisy neighbours? You’ll have to ask the neighbours, but our neighbour is a musician, and teaches violin, so I think she’ll never complain.

Now Pitch Perfect the title of today’s piece was going to talk about pitching an idea, and  pitch perfect was the title as it could have a double meaning. But I’ve led myself astray a little, just a little.

I had to pitch an idea, a script to be honest, only the other day. It’s a hard thing to do, especially if you have to do it in one page. So what did I do? I cheated,  I chose a small font size so I could fit in more words. Ask a writer to say less is almost impossible, it’s like asking an alcoholic to stop drinking. And I know all about alcoholics, we had lodgers and they were all big drinkers.

So how do you pitch an idea? In the end you cannot, all you can do is be honest and tell the story of your screenplay in as few as words as possible. I imagine the one page pitch is faxed to the backers and if they like it they ask for the full script to be emailed to them.

 Then in a jacuzzi  somewhere a moneyman is reading your script  as he drinks his orange juice or whatever. If he drops it in the water then you have failed, but if he gets out and sits to read your script, then you have a chance. He may even ask his mum or wife or daughter  to have a read too. Then you have a chance.

I am also trying to get my words on the radio, so how do you pitch for that? As I talk to you Vangelis is turning smoke into music, perfect pitch from Vangelis, Love theme from Blade Runner. Music is so great if only I could play or even sing.

Back to pitching for radio, what have I tried? Well I put my best 4 pieces together as well as my poem “Let my Tears be my Words” and with a bit of background and then I’ve sent it off to a radio station. I hope the 4 pieces I’ve pitched touch the radio station’s heart. I’ve also sent some audio and some video, so they can see and hear me as well as my words. It was them who asked for video and audio, so I hope I look and sound ok.

If you go to Amazon Kindle and look  at Michael Casey writer page then you can judge for yourself. 300 and Not OUT is my lead book for radio. The radio idea I’ve called 90 Seconds with Michael, because a short piece can be read in 90seconds. Which may mean I can sneak into radio, because it’s only a short piece. There are longer pieces too, maybe 500 of them.

In a way this pitch perfect piece is two pieces, one about music and one about words. Will my words be music to their ears? I really hope so, this has been 20+25 years in the making. I just hope I’m not tone deaf.