Alison (aka AIM) and I have been talking on the phone a number of times since last spring from what started as two OSers who had both lived in the Upper West Side in the late '80s and have ties to the part of Scotland called Ayrshire. The phone calls were a wonderful and friendly dimension to Open Salon that I would advise others to engage in if they are not already. Naturally, along the same lines are the fun meet-ups over the past three years I have been a participant in and those were really great opportunities to talk face to face with other OS bloggers that I like a lot.

In a recent call Alison offered to sing "My Funny Valentine" and I said that would be fantastic to have as a joint Alison/Open Salon Rock Group song. I came up with a plan right away to make it work and the result was to have the instrumental recording in digital form and then record Alison singing as she listened. That would ensure the lyrics would sync with the music. 

Hearing that she would be in the city enroute to Costa Rica starting on January 29th we arranged a block of time which turned out to be Monday, the 30th. At 11 AM she met me in the lobby of the Chrysler Building and we walked uptown from there.

At this point I will turn the post into a photo essay to show our path through the city and where I recorded her singing the song. I will add here that Monday was an exceptionally clear, blue sky type of day in the metro area.

Walking up Lexington Avenue to 53rd Street we made a left turn and headed west. (The building to the right, 599 Lexington Avenue, is where I had my office ten years ago prior to switching to the Chrysler Building.)

Crossing Park Avenue...

First stop, St. Thomas Church where Alison's brothers had been in the church school and choir a few years back. Her brother, Alan, was the organist in 1987, the same year that my wife and I were married at the church, but did not have a ceremony that included any music.

A few shots of the interior...

 This is the chapel where my wedding was held 25 years ago this month.

A view of the beautiful stained glass windows.

After hearing each other's stories about the church that we had not already told each other before, we headed north to Central Park...

Above and below: views of Central Park South as seen from the park.

While a sunny day, the temperature was in the upper '30s and once out of the sun one could feel chilly.

A little farther north and we were at The Mall...

Robert Burns, who was also from Ayrshire (the town of Alloway to be exact)...

After passing the Naumburg Bandshell we walked up a small hill to the grape arbor just behind the bandshell and set up the equipment for recording.

If one considers NYC to be the center of the world, then the spot we picked on the map is basically the center of Manhattan, so I felt we were truly at the center of the entire world! What a perfect place to record a song!

Just to the right of the red "A" balloon is where we set up for recording Alison:

Here's a shot of the two digital recorders I brought along. One had the instrumental version of the song on it for playback and the other machine would record Alison singing. Alison is reading the lyrics to the left of the photo...

A view looking north of the arbor we were sitting under. On the other side of the bandshell was a sax player and somewhere west of him was a jack hammer that never stopped. Fortunately, the stereo microphones did not pick up the sound of either one, but we did have problems with occasional gusts of wind...

We did several recordings with the idea that I would edit them together and that's exactly what I did yesterday. 

After moving to a sunnier spot to listen to the recordings we headed east out of the park with the plan of finding a place to eat lunch.

Walking back towards Fifth Avenue and Central Park South...

Now farther downtown around 60th Street and Park Avenue...

57th Street and Lexington Avenue...

Walking downtown towards 53rd Street...

As we neared the Citicorp building I suggested we check the multilevel shopping area inside for a restaurant as I used to eat there some years back...

That turned out to be the perfect place to have lunch and we both had similar dishes that included chicken, cous cous, and hummus...

Sitting down for almost an hour with food gave us another enjoyable time of trading stories...

After leaving Citicorp we caught the subway for Grand Central as Alison had to head over to Queens to meet up with her friend. We parted company on the platform near the stairway for the number 7 subway and I headed off to Grand Central Station upstairs.

Here you have it! My Funny Valentine performed by Alison and OSRG! I told her it had a wonderful Jazzy quality to it and what a story behind its recording!

 Photos and text are © 2012 by B+Co., Inc.