MC's Circle Glenn Call ~ Rochester, New York "A legend in his own mind!"	Hi Friends! Here I am as I picture myself. It's actually from 1996 in Busan Korea where I was teaching, at Tong Myeong Institute of Technology. It was late in the evening on "Teacher's Day" and I was in a fine mood. Miss my Korean friends and students! It looks like I'm fall dressed up to roar up and down the hiways and byways on my beastly ol' Valkyrie, "Freia," so it's one of my favorite pix of me. "Freia," the Valkyrie is a relatively new addition. Before that I had a veritable "herd" of old Kawasaki KZ 1300's. In 1999 I logged some 15,000 miles in and around central Europe. Let me tell you what a trip it is winding this ol' beast all the way out (140+ mph!) on the German Autobahn, lacing up over the Alps or wandering lazily through the gorgeous countryside on centuries-old roads! Summer 2000, right after getting grades in, I blasted down to Key West and back in four days -- 3,600 miles round trip, but what a trip! The big trip in 2001 was to see just how far north I could get. The planned 3-day trip ended up being 11 days -- click here to find out why!
The KZ1300 was one fine machine -- with six cylinders in-line and 120 horses of brawn, it just sailed down the big road, but the Valkyrie, with 1520cc does the job just as well, with a pretty classy look to boot! I've done some serious miles:  1997 included an early Spring  run from Rochester, New York to Springfield, Missouri, returning back over the Smokies and up the coast. 1998 saw Frau Call and me cruising from Portland Washington through the deserts, over the Rockies and through Canada to Portland Maine.

Everything in moderation -- ( even moderation . . . !) Although I've studied and practiced Zen in one form or another for as long as I can remember, it wasn't until I spent some serious time in Korea that I became formally involved in Zen Buddhism. After some intense studies at  Tong Myeong Bul-weon Temple in Pusan I was formallygiven the Dharma name Seo Re ("Travels from the West") and the title Geo Sa-nim ("Resident Scholar"). Here's a picture of my name-sake, Bodhidharma, who brought Buddhism from India -- travelling from the west -- into China. (I think the resemblance is striking, don't you?) My particular temple in Korea is connected with the  Jo-gye order.  This is the the largest and oldest order in Korea and probably the closest in practice these days to that of those quirky old Chinese Zen Masters you read about in that Survey of World Religions way back in school!

Closely related to my music career has been my interest in German language and literature.
It's the language of Bach, Beethoven and Brahms -- so what do you expect from a musician?

I spent most of 1999 teaching in Dresden, Germany

Dresden is one of Europe's most stunningly beautiful cities.
This is a snapshot of downtown Dresden I took from a bridge just down from my apartment.
 

My window on the corner of Käthe-Kollwitz-Ufer and Thomas Münzer Platz looked out on the Elbe River -- the picture above is pretty much what you could have seen leaning out my bedroom window on a summer's eve. Sorry the picture's so "big" and takes so long to download -- lesser resolutions just don't convey the grandeur of it all!

Called the "Florence of the Elbe", Dresden is the home of the world-famous Semper Opera, some major art museums and scads of gorgeous Baroque buildings -- not to mention some particularly wonderful hiking! In Dresden, I did some serious touring on my motorcycle and taught English at  Inlingua Sprachschule Dresden.

Summer 2001 was spent in Leipzig, Germany at the University of Leipzig's Herder Institute.

I enjoy getting out to talk to folks about things that interest me.  This is a shot of me giving an Alphorn
demonstration at the Rochester Institute of Technology --

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In 2006, I ignored Joe Baker's admonition never to pet a burning dog and began an intensive three year journey as Musical Director of the German American Musicians Association. This venerable group dates back to 1933. I reworked it into a high-energy traditional Blaskapelle and a classy Konzert-Kapelle - both specializing in German music. I left the GAM in 2009, after some serious disagreements as to the direction of the band.

Interested in things Germanic?

Music!

Here's a short sketch of some of the highlights of my classical music career.

 

I'm still honkin' these days. As a Yamaha Performing Artist I'm very pleased to have had a hand in the design of their professional Euphonium, the model "YEP 642."

Five years in the fantastic "President's Own"  US Marine Band at the White House gave me a real jump-start into the world of professional music. I left the Marine Band in 1981, and moved to Rochester to teach at the  Eastman School of Music. Around this same time, I also directed the wind ensemble at  Nazareth College. I got my NY State teaching certificate in 1985 and had a couple of very fine award-winning high school bands in Rochester and in Alden, New York. As the last conductor of the Monroe County Parks Band, I led the band on a series of broadcasts on National Public Radio and a grand tour or Germany before Monroe County abruptly cut off funding in 1993. I was on the faculty of the Roberts Wesleyan College and the   State University of New York at Fredonia until 1999 when I moved to Dresden, Germany. These days, I teach Euphonium and Tuba at my studio in Rochester, New York and until recently I conducted the Greece Concert Band. You'll also find me conducting the enormous annual  Rochester Tuba Christmas in early December each year. Click on Rochester TX for links to Tuba Christmas as well as a bunch of interesting links to other aspects of the Tuba and the Euphonium.

I love the water and have been an avid recreational diver (i.e., SCUBA) for some years now. I've collected a mess of dive certifications and am currently a PADI Instructor. This is me doing something I really enjoy: ice diving, up on the St. Lawrence River. It's not all cold diving, tho ... for the past six years or so, my favorite dive-buddy, my wife Eileen and I have gone to Grand Cayman! Now that's some fine diving!

In 2005, I found myself with a little time on my hands and money in my pockets, so I went after a life-long dream, enrolled in the Minnesota Commercial Diver Training Center and am now certified as a commercial diver -- you know, "Hard hat" diving: underwater welding, oil-rigs and that sort or stuff. The day I graduated, Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans and a week later or so, Hurricane Rita finished what Katrina started. An urgent call went out for commercial divers and I felt oblilged to go try to help so I asked for some unpaid time off teaching. With a blunt "no" for an answer, I decided it was important enough to retire for-- so here's what I did in the Gulf of Mexico.

These days, I'm a "ReadyFit" coach at the local YMCA.

A word or two about my roots

My parents were both professional pilots . . .