From Brooks' website:
GUITAR DAY with Brooks Williams
27 SEPTEMBER 2008
@ Artspace 15 Mill St. Greenfield, MA 01301
Teens & Adults - Intermediate to Advanced
10 am - 5 pm Fee: $25
Phone: 413-772-6811 Email: acfc@rcn.com
(Space Is Limited So Reserve Your Spot Early!)
Calling all guitarists! Fingerstyle, bluegrass, blues, rock, jazz, folk.
Come celebrate the guitar by spending a day playing together and making connections with other guitar enthusiasts from around New England. Guitar Day is a daylong guitar workshop that features technique building sessions in fingerstyle guitar, flatpicking guitar, chord wizardry and blues licks and tricks, as well as a duos and trios session where attendees collaborate on a piece of music together. This is a hand's-on workshop with lots of playing and jamming!
Workshops offered:
1. Bach's Cello Suite #1 in DADGAD: presented by Tony Astolfi. Explore an open tuning and try your hand at Tony's sublime fingerstyle arrangement of this beautiful piece!
2. Red-Haired Boy: presented by Gail Wade. Flatpick this traditional fiddle tune in standard tuning, learning both the melody and the bluegrass style chord backup.
3. Key To The Highway: presented by Brooks Williams. Rock out on this classic blues tune, learning bluesy riffs & licks.
4. St. Louis Blues: presented by Brooks Williams. Learn some new jazzy chords and swingin' rhythm to play this well-known W.C. Handy song.
5. Duos and Trios: workshop attendees will divide into groups of two or three and work on a tune together. Bring a favorite tune - or choose a tune from Brooks' extensive library of songs. This Guitar Lab will culminate in a showcase at the end of the afternoon.
Friday, September 05, 2008
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Monday, June 23, 2008
When Less is More
A killer version of Merrily Kissed the Quaker:
I found this whilst seeking inspiration for the "groove" on this tune (I know the Pierre Bensusan solo guitar arrangement, with Cunla stuck on at the end). These guys rock it way harder than I have been. Why? Well, being a whole rock band helps, but there is another reason. In the Bensusan version (at least the very rigid version I've been rendering), the rhythm is totally straight:
ONE-and-a-TWO-and-a-ONE-and-a-TWO-and-a...
Your basic 6/8 Jig rhythm. But the Brandos put a little twist on it:
ONE-and-a-two-and-a-one-and-a-TWO-and-a-ONE-and-a-two-and-a-ONE-and-a-TWO-and-a-ONE...
And many variations. The 'AHA!' for me is that they get more with less by being more sparing with the rhythmic emphases. And they are always changing it up in suble ways.
Actually, Pierre puts tons of little variations in his rhythm, as well as bass line, harmonies, and ornaments:
I found this whilst seeking inspiration for the "groove" on this tune (I know the Pierre Bensusan solo guitar arrangement, with Cunla stuck on at the end). These guys rock it way harder than I have been. Why? Well, being a whole rock band helps, but there is another reason. In the Bensusan version (at least the very rigid version I've been rendering), the rhythm is totally straight:
ONE-and-a-TWO-and-a-ONE-and-a-TWO-and-a...
Your basic 6/8 Jig rhythm. But the Brandos put a little twist on it:
ONE-and-a-two-and-a-one-and-a-TWO-and-a-ONE-and-a-two-and-a-ONE-and-a-TWO-and-a-ONE...
And many variations. The 'AHA!' for me is that they get more with less by being more sparing with the rhythmic emphases. And they are always changing it up in suble ways.
Actually, Pierre puts tons of little variations in his rhythm, as well as bass line, harmonies, and ornaments:
Saturday, June 21, 2008
Thursday, June 19, 2008
From the Amazing Things show
A photo kindly emailed to me from Al Cath:
Sheesh -- I look so serious! Despite appearances, I really had a lot of fun playing last Saturday. Al also captured an AVI from the show... it is a very big file so I am still downloading it, but maybe it will be of sufficient quality to post here (via YouTube?)
Sheesh -- I look so serious! Despite appearances, I really had a lot of fun playing last Saturday. Al also captured an AVI from the show... it is a very big file so I am still downloading it, but maybe it will be of sufficient quality to post here (via YouTube?)
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
One more chance to see the guitarist this month
I am going to be playing at a music festival in Fall River, MA called "Dark Side of the June". The date is June 28, and my set will be early to mid afternoon. More details to follow... for now, just mark your calenders!
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Manicure virgin no more!
"Guitar: An American Life" by Tim Brookes contains a hilarious-because-its-true quip about how guys start playing guitar in their teens to be cool and impress girls, and they end up in their 40s with expensive guitars, discussing nail care with other middle-aged men. Let's just say that yesterday afternoon, I took the next step towards this inspiring scenario.
Many very accomplished and respectable guitarists (including Pierre Bensusan, Tony McManus, and Martin Simpson to name a few) use some kind of fake nails on their right (picking) hand. Pierre tells the story, on his instructional videos, of how he went to see a manicurist in Paris after years of messing around with broken nails, superglue, finger picks and other re-inforcement strategies. So I am in good company. Really.
Yesterday I sheepishly walked into a little nail salon not too far from my apartment and explained how I wanted acrylic nails, not too long, no color, oh, and by the way, only on my right hand. Add to this story a very well meaning but heavily-accented non-native-English speaking Asian woman with a wide assortment of tools and chemicals. So, I sat while she filed (quite vigorously at times: "Gentle! It's my first time!"), treated, sculpted, dremeled, trimmed, ... you get the idea. The result afterwards was an odd exhilaration (ha! I finally did it! I feel so alive!), and a sensation not entirely unlike the one you get after visiting the dentist (this part of my body feels sore and oddly foreign to me).
I came home fearing the worst and was pleasantly surprised that my playing was only minimally affected (perhaps even improved -- I feel it is much easier now to play loudly). After sleeping on it (well, not on it...) it is beginning to feel a bit less sore and weird. Overall, I think this experiment is a success... so far.
Oh, yeah and it only cost me $30. And I have to go back in 2-3 weeks from now to have my nails maintained to the tune of who knows how much.
Things are going well for the concert this weekend. I am practicing around 2 hours every day, each song for about 20 minutes. And I am re-reading "The Perfect Wrong Note" by William Westney. Anyone who is serious about advancing on their instrument needs to read this book.
Sunday, June 08, 2008
Who is this Tony guy anyhow?
I started making music late in high school, using the family computer (a Commodore Amiga 500) to compose electronic music in the mold of NiN, Filter, and Tool. My interest in the guitar was sparked by the desire to use higher fidelity samples than the ones I was able to find and rip out of other songs. Around this time I made a new friend, Dave Cox, an extremely talented drummer who had recently picked up guitar. He turned me on to the Allman Brothers, Phish, and Dave Matthews Band. When I went to UMass Amherst, I began to play guitar more and more, first on a Harmony hollow-body borrowed from my father, then on a cheap dreadnought borrowed from a friend. Eventually I bought my own guitar and began to learn more Dave Mathews tunes, as well as songs to play at the Christian fellowship meetings I was attending. My junior year, I upgraded to my first "good" guitar, a Larrivee D03. I was getting into Phil Keaggy (I knew about Phil because my parents listened to him a lot when I was little), and read an interview where Phil credited Michael Hedges as a major inspiration for his (then) recent direction on acoustic guitar.
So I went down to Newbury Comics and picked up two Hedges CDs: Oracle and Live on the Double Planet. I picked Oracle to listen to first. By the time the first track had finished, my mind was completely blown. My entire musical journey up until that point had been a search for a kind of emotional intensity, a deep expression where you could lose yourself in the music. The loudness of rock and metal/industrial music tickled that intensity for me; the freedom of jam bands approached the aspect of being wonderfully lost in sound. But here was one guy with an acoustic guitar doing exactly what I wanted to do. I was floored. I was enraptured. I had to play this music.
I signed up for a classical guitar class at the university, because I read that Hedges was classically trained, and I figured I needed some kind of grounding in a tradition (so many of the artists I admired seemed to follow the pattern of starting in a tradition and innovating from there). My encounters with the world of classical music education have been a mixed blessing. On the one hand, I have benefitted tremendously from the rigor and depth of classical technique and method. On the other, I have found it to be a very stuffy, arrogant, snobby, and restrictive culture. What else can I say? This is true. I dropped the class after a few weeks and continued to meander towards Hedges' oracle.
Around the end of my time at university, I met and began to study with a local guitarist of international renown, Brooks Williams. The time I spent learning from him got me unstuck from where I was and opened huge new avenues of playing for me. He is an extremely gracious and humble teacher, and his playing has this silky smooth, virtuosic, contageous quality to it. He is the sort of guy that makes you a better player just by watching him play!
I got married in 2003, and two years later moved from the Pioneer Valley to eastern Massachusetts, where I began to focus more on solo instrumental performing. I began to go to the local folk open mics (not an exact match for acoustic fingerstyle instrumentals, but my music has been well-received nonetheless). Out of this came my first open mic feature, my first opportunity to open for Brooks (at the Amazing Things Arts Center in Framingham, June 2006), and many ongoing friendships and musical collaborations.
My current focus is on arranging and recording Bach and traditional Irish fiddle music for solo guitar, as well as playing and singing at the local Vineyard Fellowship. I continue to be inspired by sacred and secular music alike, from Bach and O'Carolan to Bensusan and Keaggy. Even though my full-time "day job" is being a software developer at the MathWorks, music remains one of my primary passions.
So I went down to Newbury Comics and picked up two Hedges CDs: Oracle and Live on the Double Planet. I picked Oracle to listen to first. By the time the first track had finished, my mind was completely blown. My entire musical journey up until that point had been a search for a kind of emotional intensity, a deep expression where you could lose yourself in the music. The loudness of rock and metal/industrial music tickled that intensity for me; the freedom of jam bands approached the aspect of being wonderfully lost in sound. But here was one guy with an acoustic guitar doing exactly what I wanted to do. I was floored. I was enraptured. I had to play this music.
I signed up for a classical guitar class at the university, because I read that Hedges was classically trained, and I figured I needed some kind of grounding in a tradition (so many of the artists I admired seemed to follow the pattern of starting in a tradition and innovating from there). My encounters with the world of classical music education have been a mixed blessing. On the one hand, I have benefitted tremendously from the rigor and depth of classical technique and method. On the other, I have found it to be a very stuffy, arrogant, snobby, and restrictive culture. What else can I say? This is true. I dropped the class after a few weeks and continued to meander towards Hedges' oracle.
Around the end of my time at university, I met and began to study with a local guitarist of international renown, Brooks Williams. The time I spent learning from him got me unstuck from where I was and opened huge new avenues of playing for me. He is an extremely gracious and humble teacher, and his playing has this silky smooth, virtuosic, contageous quality to it. He is the sort of guy that makes you a better player just by watching him play!
I got married in 2003, and two years later moved from the Pioneer Valley to eastern Massachusetts, where I began to focus more on solo instrumental performing. I began to go to the local folk open mics (not an exact match for acoustic fingerstyle instrumentals, but my music has been well-received nonetheless). Out of this came my first open mic feature, my first opportunity to open for Brooks (at the Amazing Things Arts Center in Framingham, June 2006), and many ongoing friendships and musical collaborations.
My current focus is on arranging and recording Bach and traditional Irish fiddle music for solo guitar, as well as playing and singing at the local Vineyard Fellowship. I continue to be inspired by sacred and secular music alike, from Bach and O'Carolan to Bensusan and Keaggy. Even though my full-time "day job" is being a software developer at the MathWorks, music remains one of my primary passions.
Sunday, May 25, 2008
The guitarist playing at Birthday Bash. Shannon came up with the idea of an open mic to help celebrate my turning 30. So we posted a sign-up and told everyone to bring songs and instruments. We had six acts, three of which were duos (for at least some part of their set). I played right about in the middle. Matt A. recorded the performances on a digital recorder set up on a tripod across the room. He has sent me the portion of the recording that contains my playing, and I am debating whether to edit and post here.My impressions on the performance: it was surprising to me how nervous I managed to feel playing for friends in my own living room! I say managed to feel because it was clearly a fair bit of effort put forth to work myself into a state where playing guitar was barely possible. Nonetheless, I managed to get through County Down and the 2nd Law. There is a terrible meme/spirit/dysfunction/sickness lurking about in my brain that comes to the front every once and a while to say: "Ok, now you're on and the stakes are high. Screw this up and you're finished. What people think about you, what you're worth as a person, the validity of all the work you've put in up to now all depend on your performance in this moment. It'd better be good." Imagine for one second that it is my birthday party, and that there were two Tonys up there on the chair at the end of my living room, and one is saying such things to the other. What would any stranger think (much less a friend of Tony)? What a jerk! That guy putting all the pressure on is telling lies, doing something really terrible. Get out of there! Shut up! Take your pressure and your guilt and your high-stakes non-sense and LEAVE.
If only it were that easy. I borrow this little thought experiment from a very good book, "The Inner Game of Tennis" by W. Timothy Gallwey. It is full of insight for anyone engaged in any sort of real-time physical activity that requires technique, creativity, and is subject to performance critiques.
Thanks to everyone who came out and played; please come to see me on Saturday June 14 at Amazing Things in Framingham (www.amazingthings.org). Also, come out to the Atwood's Dark Side of the June music festival at their home in Fall River, MA (post here if you need more info).
Monday, March 24, 2008
My home recording setup has a new component:
shiney new iMac! This was a very good idea, for the following reasons:
The 2nd Law by Michael Hedges
The quality I'm getting off the pair of SM81's going directly into the Saffire and then into GarageBand is quite good, I think. The whirring noise in the background is the humidifier in my music room.
shiney new iMac! This was a very good idea, for the following reasons:
- The iMac is a really, really nice machine - quiet, fast, compact
- GarageBand is way easier (though probably not nearly as powerful) as Cubase, the package that came with my audio interface (a Focusrite Saffire)
- The value of being able to leave the whole setup, well, set up and just sit down to use it whenever is hard to exaggerate.
The 2nd Law by Michael Hedges
The quality I'm getting off the pair of SM81's going directly into the Saffire and then into GarageBand is quite good, I think. The whirring noise in the background is the humidifier in my music room.
Monday, March 17, 2008
Sunday, 3/16/2008
Practiced ~1 hr, Fare thee well (I have been playing this one long enough to know how to play around with it expressively, so that was a lot of fun), Cello suite 1 prelude, Slipper Hornpipe in DADGAD, Merrily/Cunla, and Murtach MacKhan. Overall, very fun, inspired playing, if not technically air-tight.
From working in the software industry, for a rapidly growing company that supplies software to Toyota/Denso, I've been learning in the past year about process-orientation and the "Toyota Way" (often called "Lean" in this country). Standards are used heavily at Toyota, but not in the way one might think: a standard in the Toyota culture is merely a statement of an existing process. It is a snapshot of where you are at a moment. Standards exist to be improved upon. It's viewed as a thought-trap to think of a standard as the right or perfect way to do something. Instead, middle and lower management are expected to constantly improve upon existing standards. This is change-for-the-better or kai-zen.
I read "The Perfect Wrong Note" late last year, and it has greatly influenced my thinking about practice and getting better at playing. The connection I see between this book and the Toyota view of kai-zen and standards, is that both advocate the capture of the current state of affairs into a snapshot or a standard. This is not a judgement nor does it have to be perfect (as if it could be!). It just provides a platform to figure out what needs work and how you can improve.
The problem with practicing a piece of music, mistakes and all, over many months to try to polish it up for performance is that most of the time you are addressing bits that don't require your attention, and the bits that do require attention only get hit once every 4 minutes or so. This makes my old method of learning music extremely inefficient in its use of time. There is no quick and easy way to get better, but in fact there is a quick and very very hard way to get better. The difficulty involves the concentrated application of attention towards solving very specific, scoped technical and musical problems. This requires a lot of energy and discipline. So the problem is not only knowing what to do but having available energy to spend and the will to spend it. One reason this is hard is because you have to say "no" to the fun of playing those parts you don't need to be practicing. Ouch. Practice time is work time. Play time is necessary too, but the two are very very different.
The problem always seems like time, but it most cases, it really isn't. We all have time, and you can't obliterate or create it. It's constant, always there: "what next?" The ability to decisively answer this question is an incredible asset.
Practiced ~1 hr, Fare thee well (I have been playing this one long enough to know how to play around with it expressively, so that was a lot of fun), Cello suite 1 prelude, Slipper Hornpipe in DADGAD, Merrily/Cunla, and Murtach MacKhan. Overall, very fun, inspired playing, if not technically air-tight.
From working in the software industry, for a rapidly growing company that supplies software to Toyota/Denso, I've been learning in the past year about process-orientation and the "Toyota Way" (often called "Lean" in this country). Standards are used heavily at Toyota, but not in the way one might think: a standard in the Toyota culture is merely a statement of an existing process. It is a snapshot of where you are at a moment. Standards exist to be improved upon. It's viewed as a thought-trap to think of a standard as the right or perfect way to do something. Instead, middle and lower management are expected to constantly improve upon existing standards. This is change-for-the-better or kai-zen.
I read "The Perfect Wrong Note" late last year, and it has greatly influenced my thinking about practice and getting better at playing. The connection I see between this book and the Toyota view of kai-zen and standards, is that both advocate the capture of the current state of affairs into a snapshot or a standard. This is not a judgement nor does it have to be perfect (as if it could be!). It just provides a platform to figure out what needs work and how you can improve.
The problem with practicing a piece of music, mistakes and all, over many months to try to polish it up for performance is that most of the time you are addressing bits that don't require your attention, and the bits that do require attention only get hit once every 4 minutes or so. This makes my old method of learning music extremely inefficient in its use of time. There is no quick and easy way to get better, but in fact there is a quick and very very hard way to get better. The difficulty involves the concentrated application of attention towards solving very specific, scoped technical and musical problems. This requires a lot of energy and discipline. So the problem is not only knowing what to do but having available energy to spend and the will to spend it. One reason this is hard is because you have to say "no" to the fun of playing those parts you don't need to be practicing. Ouch. Practice time is work time. Play time is necessary too, but the two are very very different.
The problem always seems like time, but it most cases, it really isn't. We all have time, and you can't obliterate or create it. It's constant, always there: "what next?" The ability to decisively answer this question is an incredible asset.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Check out the Guitar Chords Blog: http://ecovers2u.com/guitar-chords/2007/12/
This post is about CAGED, which is a very good paradigm for understanding standard tuning.
Its been a long while since I've posted or played out. I have my recording setup now, and am continuing to work on making a demo.
Last night practiced all in DADGAD on the Froggy (new strings needed!):
Q: "What is your name in the system?"
A: "Joe Customer"
Q: "Um, Customer... ok... you don't want to be in the system?"
A: "I was told if I did not want to give my real name I could say 'Joe Customer'"
Q: "Right..."
And this is when I am paying in cash, for a few picks! On previous visits, a plain response such as "I don't want to be in your data base, thank you very much" have been unacceptable! They refuse to sell you anything unless you:
A. Divulge personal information that is irrelevant to the sale (I am trying to give you money for goodness sake! Just take it!)
or
B. Lie about your identity.
Maybe some day they will get a clue.
This post is about CAGED, which is a very good paradigm for understanding standard tuning.
Its been a long while since I've posted or played out. I have my recording setup now, and am continuing to work on making a demo.
Last night practiced all in DADGAD on the Froggy (new strings needed!):
- Toy for two lutes
- Invention 4
- The Day after the Feast
- Voyage to Ireland/The Orphan Jig
- Prelude, Cello Suite 1
- Great is Thy Faithfulness
Q: "What is your name in the system?"
A: "Joe Customer"
Q: "Um, Customer... ok... you don't want to be in the system?"
A: "I was told if I did not want to give my real name I could say 'Joe Customer'"
Q: "Right..."
And this is when I am paying in cash, for a few picks! On previous visits, a plain response such as "I don't want to be in your data base, thank you very much" have been unacceptable! They refuse to sell you anything unless you:
A. Divulge personal information that is irrelevant to the sale (I am trying to give you money for goodness sake! Just take it!)
or
B. Lie about your identity.
Maybe some day they will get a clue.
Saturday, October 06, 2007
How I Practice Scales
2:12 pm - practiced scales, C major in DADGAD. The value of practicing scales, as far as I can tell, comes only as you practice them enough so that they are totally automatic - no thinking at all about what note is next. I have the following method for scale practice, keeping this in mind:
Once I've got one octave down, say at 4 notes per beat, I go to a different octave in the same key and practice it using the same technique. Then I will practice both octaves together. Then I may learn another octave, only adding it to the first two once I've got it down by itself.
The keys that are best for the second two techniques in DADGAD are: Bflat, F, C, G, and D.
Still good but not ideal are: A, E, and Eflat.
- Start with 1 octave, and practice ascending and descending that octave, using one of the following techniques:
- All fretted strings (good for learning patterns that can move up and down the neck)
- Conventional pattern using open & fretted strings (for this technique you are learning a pattern that is specific to a particular key, but it is good to practice this way)
- Harp technique (play adjacent notes across different string, letting notes ring out as much as possible)
- At first, start with a steady beat and subdivide into two notes: 1 and 1 and 1 and ...
- Once you are no longer thinking about what string comes next, and your body is relaxed, then divide that same beat into three: 1 and a 1 and a ...
- Once this is comfortable, divide by 4, then 5, then 6, then (if you can) 7, 8...
Once I've got one octave down, say at 4 notes per beat, I go to a different octave in the same key and practice it using the same technique. Then I will practice both octaves together. Then I may learn another octave, only adding it to the first two once I've got it down by itself.
The keys that are best for the second two techniques in DADGAD are: Bflat, F, C, G, and D.
Still good but not ideal are: A, E, and Eflat.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Up at 3:30am (ouch), left at 4:30 to carpool with a co-worker to Logan Airport, where we caught a 6am shuttle flight to Planet New York. Did some work, then caught a return shuttle at 11am, home by 2pm. Slept for about an hour, then read while listening to Rachmoninov's Vespers (The Robert Shaw Festival Singers recording -- absolutely sublime).
7:49 pm - have practiced one hour: harp-style scales in D minor/F major, G minor/Bb major. Have found a tune from the Real Book in Bb to play during my final 1/2 hour of practicing. Also played Cello Suite 1 Prelude (Bach) for about 2o minutes, then practiced my new arrangement of Father Fielding's Favorite (out of O'Neils).
I have discovered a music notation program that is far superior in terms of output quality, to any other software (certainly free software) I have thus far used. It is called LilyPond, and it works by reading text files in its own text-based markup format and producing PDF, PNG, even MIDI files.
Here is an example of my DADGAD Cello Suite 1 Prelude transcription rendered in LilyPond:
Just gorgeous. The source for this part looks like:
Go download it and play around with it!
In my (non-)abundant spare time, I have created a simple web-based front end for LilyPond which I hope to expand upon in the future. I am working with a friend to get that online - I'll repost here when/if that happens.
7:49 pm - have practiced one hour: harp-style scales in D minor/F major, G minor/Bb major. Have found a tune from the Real Book in Bb to play during my final 1/2 hour of practicing. Also played Cello Suite 1 Prelude (Bach) for about 2o minutes, then practiced my new arrangement of Father Fielding's Favorite (out of O'Neils).
I have discovered a music notation program that is far superior in terms of output quality, to any other software (certainly free software) I have thus far used. It is called LilyPond, and it works by reading text files in its own text-based markup format and producing PDF, PNG, even MIDI files.
Here is an example of my DADGAD Cello Suite 1 Prelude transcription rendered in LilyPond:
Just gorgeous. The source for this part looks like:
\version "2.10.29"
\header {
title = "Cello Suite no. 1 - Prelude"
composer = "J.S. Bach (Arr. Astolfi)"
}
notes = {
% uncomment the temp indication when layout engine is fixed
% \tempo 4=80
\key d \major
\relative c' { d16 a'\3 fis' e fis a,\3 fis' a,\3 }
\relative c' { d16 a'\3 fis' e fis a,\3 fis' a,\3 }
\relative c' { d16 b'\3 g' fis g b,\3 g' b,\3 }
\relative c' { d16 b'\3 g' fis g b,\3 g' b,\3 }
\relative c' { d16 cis'\3 g' fis g cis,\3 g' cis,\3 }
\relative c' { d16 cis'\3 g' fis g cis,\3 g' cis,\3 }
\relative c' { d16 d'\2 fis e fis d\2 fis d\2 }
\relative c' { d16 d'\2 fis e fis d\2 fis cis }
\relative c' { d16 b'\3 fis' e fis d cis d }
\relative c' { b'16\3 d cis d fis, a gis\4 fis\5 }
\relative c' { gis'16\4 d' e\3 d e\3 d e\3 d }
\relative c' { gis'16\4 d' e\3 d e\3 d e\3 d }
\relative c' { cis'16\3 e\2 a gis a e\2 d e\2 cis\3 e\2 d e\2 a,\4 cis\3 b\4 a }
\relative c' { b16\5 fis'\4 d' cis d fis,\4 d' fis,\4 }
\relative c' { b16\5 fis'\4 d' cis d fis,\4 d' fis,\4 }
\relative c' { b16\5 gis' a b\3 a gis fis e d' cis b\3 a' gis fis e\2 d\2 }
\relative c' { cis'16\3 b\3 a a' e\2 a cis,\3 e\2 a,\4 b\4 cis\3 e\2 d cis\3 b\4 a }
}
\score {
\new StaffGroup << \new Staff << \override Staff.VerticalAxisGroup #'minimum-Y-extent = #'(-10 . 10) { \notes } >>
\new TabStaff << \set TabStaff.stringTunings = #'(+14 +9 +7 +2 -3 -10) { \notes } >>
>>
\layout {}
\midi {}
}
Go download it and play around with it!
In my (non-)abundant spare time, I have created a simple web-based front end for LilyPond which I hope to expand upon in the future. I am working with a friend to get that online - I'll repost here when/if that happens.
Monday, July 16, 2007
Two friends' wedding (part I)
Just got back from Amherst last night after spending the weekend with friends in a frenzy of activities around the wedding of Gary & Elise B. For this joyous event, the bride and groom assembled the old IVCF worship team:
(navigating the chaos of setup and rehearsal -- this really took us back -- notice the Rao's coffee cup in the hand of the guitarist on the left)
(practicing with Sarah)
(during the processional: Come thou fount of every blessing, with Matt)
(The guitars, happily back home!)
The songs:
Prelude - County Down, slow
Processional - Be thou my vision - a new arrangement (as of the Thursday before the wedding) in key of C, played on the DADGAD guitar
Bride's march - Come thou fount of every blessing - I played melody in DADGAD, while Matt strummed chords. Key of D
Special music during ceremony:
Blessed be the name of the Lord (key of A, strumming & singing, standard tuning)
How deep the Father's love for us (key of G, I just soloed tastefully in the background)
Recessional - instrumental reprise of Blessed be
The music went quite well - sound was a bit spotty, but our audience was not picky about this. Now I am looking ahead to the next friends' wedding later this summer.
(navigating the chaos of setup and rehearsal -- this really took us back -- notice the Rao's coffee cup in the hand of the guitarist on the left)
(practicing with Sarah)
(during the processional: Come thou fount of every blessing, with Matt)
(The guitars, happily back home!)
The songs:
Prelude - County Down, slow
Processional - Be thou my vision - a new arrangement (as of the Thursday before the wedding) in key of C, played on the DADGAD guitar
Bride's march - Come thou fount of every blessing - I played melody in DADGAD, while Matt strummed chords. Key of D
Special music during ceremony:
Blessed be the name of the Lord (key of A, strumming & singing, standard tuning)
How deep the Father's love for us (key of G, I just soloed tastefully in the background)
Recessional - instrumental reprise of Blessed be
The music went quite well - sound was a bit spotty, but our audience was not picky about this. Now I am looking ahead to the next friends' wedding later this summer.
Saturday, July 07, 2007
Saturday A.M., 10:10 - Practiced a little over an hour: cello prelude, a little Sonata VI, the 2nd Law, and some Merrily Kissed the Quaker. Very unfocused - I am quite sleepy still from this week (and last night - it was another ~midnight bedtime). Hands felt moderately achy and swollen this morning when I woke up. I should ice them again today (I also iced them last night).
The cello suite prelude, like many of Bach's compositions, provides a great way to strengthen scales and arpeggios in a very musical way. In DADGAD particularly, it affords an opportunity, mostly towards the end, to practice the harp-style scales that give this tuning its distinctive, piano-like quality.
The cello suite prelude, like many of Bach's compositions, provides a great way to strengthen scales and arpeggios in a very musical way. In DADGAD particularly, it affords an opportunity, mostly towards the end, to practice the harp-style scales that give this tuning its distinctive, piano-like quality.
Thursday, July 05, 2007
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
We are in our new apartment in Framingham! It is a very open, benevolent space. It welcomes us; more generally, God has gone before us and welcomes us into his world.
My practice space is now set up:
(Enticement:)
(Prospect & Refuge:)
(The Muse:)
Practiced for about an hour yesterday - unfocused. DADGAD - Toy for Two Lutes, Invention #4, County Down, Dance of the Capricorn, Rakkish Paddy, Merrily/Cunla, & a new Jig out of O'Neils. Spontaneously played the first few bars from the Prelude to Bach's first cello suite. DADGAD triumphs again! It is obscenely right for this piece - transposed, of course, so that the first note becomes a D. I am looking forward to adapting the rest of this beautiful piece to DADGAD steel string.
Need to pick up new nylon strings today to begin practicing for weddings. I am going to take at least two days off from playing to let my body recover from the move, all that lifting and such. This is a good (and necessary) discipline, I've found. About a week is the peak interval - after one week of inactivity, I long so much to play music again and the relaxation produces an incredible freshness and energy, so that picking up the guitar at the end becomes a celebration!
My practice space is now set up:
(Enticement:)
(Prospect & Refuge:)
(The Muse:)
Practiced for about an hour yesterday - unfocused. DADGAD - Toy for Two Lutes, Invention #4, County Down, Dance of the Capricorn, Rakkish Paddy, Merrily/Cunla, & a new Jig out of O'Neils. Spontaneously played the first few bars from the Prelude to Bach's first cello suite. DADGAD triumphs again! It is obscenely right for this piece - transposed, of course, so that the first note becomes a D. I am looking forward to adapting the rest of this beautiful piece to DADGAD steel string.
Need to pick up new nylon strings today to begin practicing for weddings. I am going to take at least two days off from playing to let my body recover from the move, all that lifting and such. This is a good (and necessary) discipline, I've found. About a week is the peak interval - after one week of inactivity, I long so much to play music again and the relaxation produces an incredible freshness and energy, so that picking up the guitar at the end becomes a celebration!
Friday, June 29, 2007
Practiced ~1hr in the morning. Our apartment is a chaotic maze of half-packed boxes. The depression associated with moving makes it hard for me to concentrate. Worked on Sonata VI briefly, practiced Toy for Two Lutes, Invention in Dmin, Kadourimdou, a little Last Pint.
Discussion last night about authenticity. What does it mean for a person to be authentic? A: an absence of deceit. In other words, to be authentic is to be neither deceived nor deceiving. What is the way out of the trap of self-deception? There is no internal solution - there must be some external Truth that comes in to the picture and awakens you. So what can one do? Expect a poke or a gentle hand on shoulder: "thou art deceived."
Also talked about hero worship and identity theft. How to be yourself? What does this mean?
God has created each person. We do not know our true Name, but we stumble about trying to live up to the one we give ourselves (or that we are given). Or we try to live up to someone else's name. Of course the person in your head you are trying to be is not even close to the person in reality that you think you are trying to be. Uck. What a mess.
Best to focus on music, not on personality. Our art is not who we imitate - it is the Work to which we are called.
Discussion last night about authenticity. What does it mean for a person to be authentic? A: an absence of deceit. In other words, to be authentic is to be neither deceived nor deceiving. What is the way out of the trap of self-deception? There is no internal solution - there must be some external Truth that comes in to the picture and awakens you. So what can one do? Expect a poke or a gentle hand on shoulder: "thou art deceived."
Also talked about hero worship and identity theft. How to be yourself? What does this mean?
God has created each person. We do not know our true Name, but we stumble about trying to live up to the one we give ourselves (or that we are given). Or we try to live up to someone else's name. Of course the person in your head you are trying to be is not even close to the person in reality that you think you are trying to be. Uck. What a mess.
Best to focus on music, not on personality. Our art is not who we imitate - it is the Work to which we are called.
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