The Ebb and Flow

I have always found it to be true that as the bad happens, the good also counters in some form. This is especially true in my musical life. As some may know, the vocal icon of Robert Goulet left this world Tuesday while waiting for a lung transplant. Goulet was a fabulous singer who got his lucky break from a very tragic happening in this country. Goulet was becoming a vocal sensation on Broadway in the musical "Camelot" in the early 1960's. When President Kennedy was assassinated, Jackie Kennedy was quoted saying how much Mr Kennedy was a fan of the score and the famous line, "Don't let it be forgot, that once there was a spot, for one brief shining moment that was known as Camelot." At that point Kennedy's administration was associated with Camelot, which was associated with Goulet's voice, and copies of "If Ever I Should Leave You" flew off the shelves.

I was a fan of his role in "Man of La Mancha" singing "The Impossible Dream". For some reason that song always gets to me. Its not just the words of Dream the Impossible dream, but the optimism and the flow of the melody just suck me right in. Quick side note, Maynard Ferguson made a wicked good recording of this song as well. Goulet's smooth voice though always charmed my ear and listening to the Standards station on Sirius radio, without looking I could pick his voice out with just one word. I will truly miss Robert Goulet.

And on this theme, with the loss of Robert Goulet and the quintet frustrations, I have found myself another band to that of which I will be a "fanboi". This band is called "Dragonforce" They have a modern progressive metal sound, but very classic, mythical, triumphant lyrical pattern, with that great open 4 part vocal sound that "Queen" used to great fame with "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "Princes of the Universe". Their lyrics remind me very much of "Princes of the Universe", and "Who Wants to Live Forever", the later "Queen" hits. The "Dragonforce" hit "Fury of the Storm" has been made popular on youtube via "Guitar Hero" custom songs. "Through the Fire and Flames" is also featured in the recently released "Guitar Hero 3" (another positive).

This band uses a someone rare set up, of two lead guitarists, both of them solo, and both of them are pretty cool. Heres their music video for "Through the Fire and Flames".

One of their guitarist has a cool little trademark of his solos: he mimics 8-bit video game sounds.

Well my friends, may your hammer-ons and pull-offs be even, and your strings strong. I wish you peace, and another fond farewell to Robert Goulet.

An Oasis amongst the sand

As some of my loyal readers know, I took a little vacation a week or so ago to get my head back together, collect my thoughts and come back swinging. Due to poor preparation, I found myself musically isolated for a week. I was trapped in Ocean City, MD with nothing of quality on the radio, no CDs and my iPod left comfortably on my computer desk. There wasn't even VH1 on the hotel tv system, and the hotel restaurant during breakfast played nothing but canned jazz. I struggled to find any source of rewarding sound, not even expecting music. I cruised every ad I could for hopes of a local bar having a band, an outdoor festival, anything. I found none of these, for i was in a resort city off season.

The sound of the ocean, calming, rewarding, at night with a slight wind almost sang like a soprano to me and charmed me. It relaxed me to the point of my insomnia almost was cured. Coming home and back into the stressful environment of my life, dragging me away from the cliched siren song of the sea, sent my sleep back into peril. It threatened the existance of this blog even. But I am back to writing and I apologize for the delay.

This has been an interesting weekend. I went to a house warming party and was re-united with one Nate Knauer. He was a someone who I kind of looked to for inspiration early in my college music career. He was one of the first people that made actually feel like I belonged with the musicians and that I had ability. One of my first recitals was actually performing a piece of his on his junior composition recital. I had not seen this guy in about 5 years. He immediately remembered that he still had two CDs of mine and the demo recording of my old brass quintet. We talked for a good hour getting caught up on each others musical activities. It was refreshing to know I still had a connection there and someone was genuinely glad to know I was still involved in music.

My quintet has me a bit nervous and concerned. They seem to not be paying attention to the calendar. Acting kind of lax about a gig being in 2 weeks and we have no set list, and a gig in 6 weeks, 4 actual rehearsals before it, that we haven't read any of the music for yet. Today we did read through the new Christmas carols and they really liked them, but again, we were short a member and rehearsal started 2 hours late. It was incredibly frustrating. I tried to delivery my worry and urgency without being a jerk. I don't want to cause the group to break up, which it felt like it could be close to doing.

This past week, the moment I got home, I banged out two new arrangements, when idea of doing Beatles songs came to me. So Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds and When I'm 64 will be added to our catalog.

Peace and even triplets to you all.

Pumped

Good evening and thanks for tuning back into my little page where my word goes. Theres been a couple things that I have been wrapping my mind around. Now I think its a general consensus that attending live performances are key to developing musicianship. My question is though, does it matter what type of concert? Does the performer need to be further along in their path of musicianhood? (I made that word up) I ask because as you readers have read, I have been mainly exploring the world of rock, mainly acid rock and metal. I have found this has changed my approach to performance. I wanted to be a front man for today's concert for our quintet. They let me, and I tried to be charismatic and really bring out the uniqueness of our group. I think the gig went well. I was excited to take the stage and I energized. I psyched up and ready to go. The feeling of exhaustion didn't hit until I got home, when the adrenaline wore off. I haven't had that much of an adrenaline charge to perform ever.

Anyways, I have never been to an opera. I have caught a decent amount of flak over that because being a classical musician, I've been to a metal concert before an opera. Just operas are expensive, and really, I love opera, and appreciate the art, I fear my attention span causing an issue, and the opera house here is very uncomfortable if you're taller than 5 ft tall. I am not sure if I'm supposed to be upset about this, if it makes me a crap musician, a phony even. As always. I don't think it does, but thats my own ego, and I'm sure other musicians around me don't like me because of some reason, but is it because I've never been to an opera, or is it because I like Dreamtheater and been listening to a Best of album of William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy?

On that note, I strike a chord with you and must settle into the coda of this entry. Good night, peace, and I will write again when I return from my trip. Peace to you, and you.

Shining On

I apologize for not having blogged in a few days. The music has been hectic and is dictating my time these days. A quick synopsis of what is going on though. I have began work on a third polka for my quintet, "The Chicken Dance". No matter your opinion, every band must have a version of it to play. Kids love it, and I love it, so yeah, I'm a kid. I also have began work on "I Saw Three Ships". This is yet another challenging christmas carol due to its lack of substance. It was hard to come up with 4 part harmony, yet we're a 5 part ensemble. So I need to put the nose to the keyboard and come up with some interesting counter melody, maybe a descant of another christmas carol.

The problem of "I Saw Three Ships" was solved thanks to a little Jack n Coke. There is a British dance from about the same time period as this folk song called the Dargason. The Dargason is in 6/8 time and has identical chord progression to "I Saw Three Ships". Fellow band geeks would recognize the melody as the 6/8 melody from the Fantasia on Dargason, which is the final movement of both "Second Suite in F for Military Band" and "St Paul's Suite" by Gustav Holst. Holst loved to spread English folk melodies through his pieces, and since Holst was pivotal to the acceptance of Brass instruments in a classical setting, why not pay homage to his style by offsetting the traditional Christmas song with the Dargason melody.

So the subject line of this entry is referring to "Shine On You Crazy Diamond" by Pink Floyd. I have come into possession of "The Wall" and "Wish You Were Here". Both albums are amazing. I've always liked "The Wall" with its storytelling of rebellion to English Society. The improvisational and composition skills of this group truly is mind blowing.

I have come into a rut with the brass quintet. We are all so busy and we have a gig coming up this weekend, that I am nervous about. I think we're all nervous about it, and its straining the group some I think. Its time for another group get together probably, to just try and chill. After this gig we need to immediately start work on the Christmas gig. I have a ton of new carols for the group to read through. It should be exciting. I think we all need to take a deep breath and realize this concert on the 14th isn't the best situation for us. We were hired only three weeks ago and asked to prepare a 45 minute set. Thats a good challenge! We'll hit it though and we'll have fun and that will reflect on the audience. Hopefully we'll get a good review.

Peace to my readers, and may your chords be major. I leave you with these words of wisdom: "We're starting at D, as in Don't Screw Up" - Dr E. Michael Richards

Piano: Social Drug

I don't know what it is, but new musical instruments excite me more than any other material object in this world. Even if its an instrument I really can't play, I love them. I mention this because my good friend Melanie purchased a new piano this week and on Sunday invited me over to "jam" with it. Now I must tell you I am no pianist, but again I love new instruments, so how could I resist. It is danger though to put me in the same room as a piano. I will either figure out songs that are stuck in my head to share the torture with the others, or I will make up silly little songs about the people there or n my head. This was no different. I rolled up on her piano and her and I laid down a track, titled "Stefanie's Song".

Needless to say, WOW! The good news is Stef really liked the song as she was feeling bad.

I find myself doing stupid things like this all the time with my friends piano's or pump organs (My good friend Ted has a peddling pump organ, its circus music with a good cardio workout).

I will just say the wekeend contained the piano work and a lot of polka. Very crazy. I hope this blog finds my loyal listeners in tune and in time. Peace

Evolution...?

On my way to work today I was listening to a brand new recording of Anton Bruckner's 4th symphony. I was able to hear the first movement before having to shuffle my way into the branch. The first movement is filled with lovely Austrian undertones and ethnic melodies, with deep Romantic themes. After all, it was premiered in 1881 in Vienna and was Bruckner's first taste of success and placed him on the symphonist map. His first three symphonies apparently were flops and he took 7 years and three revisions before he allowed this one to be performed. If you ignored that this was an orchestral piece, you would think I was discussing a great film and its director. Its hard to imagine people back then actually keeping tabs on composers and looking forward to premieres of pieces. That kind of thing is unheard of in music these days. The closest to it that we have is with movies. The closest draw to the Bruckner story I can think would maybe be Peter Jackson. Peter Jackson spent much of his early directing years making pretty crappy horror movies. Then suddenly word gets out hes making an epic film based on "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy. I mean I remember watching "making of" trailers my freshman year of college in 1998. The first of the series came out in 2001. People back then just got into it, symphonies were the movies of their day. According to legend, Stravinsky's debut of the ballet "Rite of Spring" caused violent outbursts by the audience, including keeping time on someones head. That had to hurt, with how rhythmic Stravinsky is. His primitivism was able to bring out the primal beast in man. Amazing. Similarly, some of you might remember when "New Jack City" came out. This movie caused fights and rioting to break out in urban areas that it was shown. I just find it interesting how over time, our main stimulus for emotion has changed from audio to visual. Music can still make us cry and laugh, but its not an immediate reaction like a photo, not to mention a lot more people are going to find humor in an Adam Sandler movie these days than a PDQ Bach audio CD. Sad, but our society has "evolved".

On a little side topic, have you ever popped in a CD you hadn't listened to in a long time, and just thought to yourself "Why do I not listen to this every day?" This happened to me the other day when I decided to put in "Sam's Town" by The Killers. I am definitely a fan of the Killers and I loved this album, the newer of the two. But it had been maybe 2 months since I listened to it, after listening to it every day, singing along to it loudly, and then I decided I should be sick of it and stopped. But I put it back in and I immediately was grabbed by their sound again. Just hooked, reeled me right back in. This CD has a little gem in it that is titled simply "Enterlude". The song is repeated and developed some for "Exitlude". The songs lyrics sound like a simple child's poem, but are incredibly optimistic and are placed with simple straight piano chords that can't help but to make you smile. I can't help but to get excited about the Killers almost every day. I like them, can't help it. A lot of people didn't like the Sam's Town album, but they are the ones that thought Hot Fuss was nothing but a pop album, and not one telling a story. Sam's Town continues in telling a new story.

Peace and good intonation to you all

Back To The Future

I must preface this blog entry by letting you know that this will be an entry primarily about about CDs and the Renaissance Festival. It will be very scattered as the pickings of CDs this past week or so has been very diverse.

First off the Renaissance Festival here in Baltimore never falls short of providing me with entertainment and music issues, whether good or bad. Lets start with the bad. Pyrates Royal, one of the most unprofessional group I've seen perform for money, still didn't fix their problems. Talking to each other out of character during songs, loud enough to be picked up on mic's, inconsistent performance standards, and a flare of arrogance that makes you want to cut the brake lines on their car, continue to stagger me with this group. During a song last year, mid verse in fact, stopped to tell someone to get their kid away from the stage and vamped the one bar over and over until the mother came up to get the child. Thats right, the kid wasn't on the stage with them, just was dancing near it.

So I saw the Pyrates Royale twice on Saturday. The first show they were pretty sober, somewhat tight, but as usual can't hear the singing at all. The sound system on this stage is horrible, but you see, every other act pretty much brings its own body microphones and plugs into the system. They do not. In a way I'm glad they don't. The women have voices that are like cats birthing. Now before you start in with well they're supposed to be pirates. I know that, but see they present themselves as an actual band. They sell CDs while they play. One of the women prides them self as a dulcimer player. Remember this is a Renn Fest, theres dulcimers everywhere. She really should be embarrassed for bringing it with her and taking it out. Her hammering was inconsistent, and it was out of tune. In fact, everyones instruments were out of tune. No joke, they took their guitars out of the cases and just started playing. Never mind the humidity and heat, and the rapid temperature change that took place during the day. This is not how you operate as a musical group. I was embarrassed as usual seeing this group. Next year, I do not plan to attend one of their performances.

Now for a good thing out of the Renn Fest; the duo of Jenny O'Connor and Mark Varelas. They presented a very professional appearance, and highlighted their strengths. Mark was very skilled on various lutes, particularly the Bouzouki. His tremolo strumming was accurate and tastefully done. They did two amazingly well done covers. One was The Victor by Dick Dale, who Mark admits to being an influence in his playing. Rare to hear a folk musician say they were inspired by a rocker. The other, along those lines, was Kashmir by Led Zeppelin. This was also amazingly done. Jenny was very skilled on the violin and her extended techniques and pitch bends were done quite well. This was the first group I had ever seen get a standing ovation at the festival. I had to purchase their CD. I had to have it. We even listened to it in the car on the way home. It helped us all relax after a hard day at the fair(e).

This week I made some interesting selections from the library on CD. The Pixies "Doolittle", the Clash's "London Calling", Ozzy Ozbourne's "Black Rain", and Within Temptation's "The Heart of Everything". Not many people know that punk music holds a special place in my heart, because of its free spirited-ness and its ability to just destroy music's conventions. You don't need to have a good singing voice, virtuoso on guitar, or a great lyricist. You are doing it because it feels good. This past week I spent some intimate time with "London Calling" by The Clash. Its an amazing composition. Its three chords and the same melody over and over again. and the melody doesn't even cause tension with the chords. Its just E minor and A minor back and forth, the bridge is in B, then its right back. The "guitar solo" is nothing but a distorted E. Yet this song is one of the most beloved in the world of rock. On the same level, this is why The Pixies appeal to me. I can't stand their sound, but I can't stop listening at the same time. Its just so different my ear falls in love with it. Ozzy, he just flippin' rocks. On "Black Rain" Ozzy seems to to go back to the raw power and sound of 70's metal. A clean, dry sound on bass, and little guitar distortion, and Ozzy's nasal voice just culminate into an amazing sound that no other band in rock can bring. The tight solos by Mr Zakk Wylde are amazing. This weeks wildcard was the band "Within Temptation". I had only heard them mentioned by the lead vocalist of the band Nightwish, which is another great metal band that of which I am fond. I was not familiar with them, but a symphonic metal band with a female vocalist, just couldn't miss. I did like this band, but I am a big fan of guitar solos and transition sections, of which there weren't many. The band has a good power sound and her voice is clear and ethnic sounding. Of all the prog/symphonic metal bands I've heard, they do the best in solving the problem of getting the vocals to fit the heavy style of the music, but they did that by making the styles so far opposite of each other, it is a refreshing sound. I do love this album, and added to my iPod, like everything I mentioned above, but I will not be purchasing my own copy of the CD. I think they have a lot of room to grow and the next album, if they keep with it, will be the polished gem they need.

I hope this blog finds you having a great musical experience and peace.