More Music . . . up and runnin'
There is a world of difference between playing at home and playing out with other people. Unless you have some specific artistic goal that casts you as a soloist, that's probably the most important step you can take. My dad wasn't the flashiest musician, but he was a legend because he was musically fearless and could always deliver a performance, and get others to. So much of performing music, as opposed to composing it is to hear changes of tone, timbre, and tempo and respond in miliseconds. (playing with your ears, not your hands!) This can't be taught: you need experience. So round up some cronies. It's a fabulous way to meet girls -ask them to sing along with you. Get some barfly to play the spoons if necessary.
In order to get it on in public, it's important to study arranging - a bit of a lost art these days. Be aware of the Keys your accomplices have available, and their context as well. As an example, the Banjo is a very idiomatic instrument, so a little research into the types of songs you expect [unless you are looking for a Spinal Tapian 'Jazz Odyssey'] to be playing will show you where you need to go in a hurry. If the songs are I , II , V or I , IV , V learn those chords first -don't get into a mentality learn them all at once or try to play every scale, THEN you'll be ready. Put three chords together, and one scale you can do runs out of, then go let it rip.
It can get to be intimidating to try grasp modes - here's an interesting point: to really understand modes, get your hands on a keyboard -go to a store and use a display if you have to. The thing to know is this: Despite their greek names, and despite what you may have been told elswhere, there really isn't any connection to the ancient world's harmonic structure. The names are part of that 'looking back' that was trendy every few hundred years until the 20th century finally put it to sleep. Modes really developed out of early keyboards' lack of black keys [or white, as they were back in the day] .
If you take any given note, and walk it up to the octave, only on the white keys, the 'mode' describes what notes have been left out. It's a subtractive approach to harmony.
It always seems to me you learn more from writing your own songs, so jump on that as fast as possible, with one caveat - punch your weight to start or it will slow you down. Don't try to write Chopin's wormhole your first time out.
The best single advice I've ever heard about music, Via Glenn Schultz of Thin Weasel fame, is: Don't practice your mistakes. It's a huge help to create that space when you're learning via repetition.
II. - One For Robbie
Rythm
Motion is the significance of life,
and the law of motion
is rythm.
Rythm is life
disguised
as motion
And in its every guise attracts the attention of man .
Tone is the mother of Nature
but Rythm
is the Father
-Prof. Tansen Inyat Khan
III.
Mysteries of the universe revealed . . . . . Creeping Charlie.
Actually, this came in the book jackie got me for Xmass. This is from an interview with John Lee Hooker's daughter.
"They really believed in what's called 'HooDoo'. . . He'd tell us a story about this person called Crawlin'Charlie. If you had someone put a hoodoo spell on you, you could go to Crawlin' Charlie and he'd take it off. I used to think this was somebody my daddy just made up. But as I got older I said 'Daddy, why do you keep talking about Crawlin' Charlie? You know he's not real.' And he'd say 'Yes, He is. He lived Down in the bayou and couldn't walk, so all he could do was just crawl around.' He would say people would travel for miles just to get to Crawlin Charlie and Get their hoodoo undone."
It's easy to imagine that by Tom Waits' time, Crawlin' Charlie could become a term for any number of the hexbreakers that used to be so popular in the dimestores here in the D. A slight regional variation to 'Creeping Charlie' is not much of a stretch. If you feel like nit picking, let me point out that of all the soft sciences, eytmology is perhaps the weakest - try investigating the phrase 'freeze the balls off a brass monkey' if you need a lesson in academia unable to get out of its own way.
-Peace and Soul,
-el Pirata
In order to get it on in public, it's important to study arranging - a bit of a lost art these days. Be aware of the Keys your accomplices have available, and their context as well. As an example, the Banjo is a very idiomatic instrument, so a little research into the types of songs you expect [unless you are looking for a Spinal Tapian 'Jazz Odyssey'] to be playing will show you where you need to go in a hurry. If the songs are I , II , V or I , IV , V learn those chords first -don't get into a mentality learn them all at once or try to play every scale, THEN you'll be ready. Put three chords together, and one scale you can do runs out of, then go let it rip.
It can get to be intimidating to try grasp modes - here's an interesting point: to really understand modes, get your hands on a keyboard -go to a store and use a display if you have to. The thing to know is this: Despite their greek names, and despite what you may have been told elswhere, there really isn't any connection to the ancient world's harmonic structure. The names are part of that 'looking back' that was trendy every few hundred years until the 20th century finally put it to sleep. Modes really developed out of early keyboards' lack of black keys [or white, as they were back in the day] .
If you take any given note, and walk it up to the octave, only on the white keys, the 'mode' describes what notes have been left out. It's a subtractive approach to harmony.
It always seems to me you learn more from writing your own songs, so jump on that as fast as possible, with one caveat - punch your weight to start or it will slow you down. Don't try to write Chopin's wormhole your first time out.
The best single advice I've ever heard about music, Via Glenn Schultz of Thin Weasel fame, is: Don't practice your mistakes. It's a huge help to create that space when you're learning via repetition.
II. - One For Robbie
Rythm
Motion is the significance of life,
and the law of motion
is rythm.
Rythm is life
disguised
as motion
And in its every guise attracts the attention of man .
Tone is the mother of Nature
but Rythm
is the Father
-Prof. Tansen Inyat Khan
III.
Mysteries of the universe revealed . . . . . Creeping Charlie.
Actually, this came in the book jackie got me for Xmass. This is from an interview with John Lee Hooker's daughter.
"They really believed in what's called 'HooDoo'. . . He'd tell us a story about this person called Crawlin'Charlie. If you had someone put a hoodoo spell on you, you could go to Crawlin' Charlie and he'd take it off. I used to think this was somebody my daddy just made up. But as I got older I said 'Daddy, why do you keep talking about Crawlin' Charlie? You know he's not real.' And he'd say 'Yes, He is. He lived Down in the bayou and couldn't walk, so all he could do was just crawl around.' He would say people would travel for miles just to get to Crawlin Charlie and Get their hoodoo undone."
It's easy to imagine that by Tom Waits' time, Crawlin' Charlie could become a term for any number of the hexbreakers that used to be so popular in the dimestores here in the D. A slight regional variation to 'Creeping Charlie' is not much of a stretch. If you feel like nit picking, let me point out that of all the soft sciences, eytmology is perhaps the weakest - try investigating the phrase 'freeze the balls off a brass monkey' if you need a lesson in academia unable to get out of its own way.
-Peace and Soul,
-el Pirata
posted by friars | Wednesday, January 25, 2006
3 Comments:
i always thought creeping charlie was plant along the lines of ivy but i like the hoodoo stuff much better
vikingo
pirata- i miss you.
I've been thinking, and interesting you mention etymology- an intellectual history of words, right? Now, I heard this story of this guy who studied old norse; then was told when he was going to do studies in Norway that modern Norse is about the same as the old. So off he went. It didn't work out as he hoped. Old norse never had words for aeroplanes, toasters, post office and such. O.K. so new objects have entered the language--new things, concepts, and new words.
So, what about emotions? What is thier history--or were they always there. I think I need to find some catalog of emotion, and thinking to look to those guys who mapped the face and its expressions, then work backward--the verbal and none verbal.
You may know, one of the values of art for me is the protection of emotional subtlety, the emotional range. And my fear (on an equal hunch) is that through popular medias the emotional range has been shrinking. I wonder really if this is so. And yet, I wonder when was the last time a new emotion was discovered, or created.
I am not sure how to approach this question; but I think to start with the faces for an etymology of emotions, and maybe ask some linguist at the University, some anthropologist--this could even turn into my thesis.
And if emotions are invented, or discovered, then like stars or organisms maybe we could name them after friends and lovers, giving them one's for holidays-ha!
On another note, perhaps others have gone, or are in danger of ixtinction.
Rythm, nice. You are right, so right--just go. Knowledge is the product of problem solving. So its best to go get into lots of problems, play out, play with others, write songs, write the stories, poems, share them--its a different world than the imagined one.
l-a'ro
p.s.
i broke the fat E on the git-fiddle while trying a flamenco explosion with my fingers. i'd never broken that one--makes me sort of proud. also, i ended up with your plecturum from the country music hall of fame-will it return pronto.
Post a Comment
<< Home