Musical Updatia

[ellyssian]

Monday night, I relearned two of my own works for guitar: A Rose in Winter Fields (which has a vocal component) and the short little instrumental with the long title: Anansi's Song: A Spider's Lullaby. Also recalled the arrangement of Grieg's Hall of the Mountain King from his incidental music for Peer Gynt.

Practiced those three tunes, along with the melodies of A Jug of This and Scarborough Fair. The arrangement of Simple Gifts is getting, well, simpler, and is almost coming close to sounding good in places. I've been spending a little time on scalar and arpeggio practice, as well as a few minutes (or more) of improv.

I did play around with turning the A Jug of This melody into a song - whether I go further with those ideas or try a different tactic to create a playable tune, I don't yet know.

From a technical standpoint, while I'm neither quite as fast nor as accurate as in the past, I'm not nearly as far off the mark as I had thought. The instrument makes a great deal of a difference: on the acoustic, with its six-mile-high action and fat neck, squeezing a decent sound out is a challenge. With the 540P, I'd have to say that with the natural aging of certain abilities, I'm probably a better player now then ever before.

Why am I doing this now, when I have "better" things to do? Is Nero fiddling while Rome is burning?

I've never stopped listening as a musician, so while I can't say that music hasn't remained a part of my life, it needs to retain its core position. Everything in life that means anything is music; everything else is just noise.

Justin really shows an interest - and a talent - in the musical department. However, he sets it aside for many distractions. If I'm making music, I'm more likely to encourage him to make music - even during the times when we're not working on songs together. And when we do work on a song together, there's even more benefit for both of us. There's also the opportunity to teach him more about harmony, orchestration, and arranging as he works through writing a tunes.

Rachel and Brandon both enjoy listening - requesting that I play far more often than I play on my own. For every minute that practicing music takes me away from my kids, and the things I should allegedly be focused on, there's at least a minute of rapt listening, joyful dancing, smiling and watching, or gleeful strumming on their part. I'm sorry - how, exactly, is that neglecting my children?

There is also a selfish reason behind it: you see, my memory retention has taken a hit over the past few years. A combination of things, including high blood pressure, medications, and a deliberate dumbing down in response to feedback that I answer questions too quickly (so people think I haven't thought about them) and that I seem to have answers for everything. So in addition to whatever medical and pharmacological factors might - or might not - be having an effect, I've been purposefully trying to hold as little in my head as possible: I made Dory from Finding Nemo my ideal. Keeping all those tunes straight in my head is a way to work on my memory, and increase my abilities.

Musical To-Do List:

• Guitar:
• Smooth out the Requiem transcription


• Keep playing A Jug of This and Scarborough Fair


• Work on The Old Dun Cow melody


• Do something with A Jug of This


• Don't let A Rose in Winter Fields escape (again (again (again!) !) !)
• Flute:
• Find the book - or an online chart - so you can figure out which note is which
• See if you can manage A Jug of This
• Recorder:
• Pay attention to what notes it's capable of!
• Try A Jug of This if it's possible (transcribe if needed)
• Chanter:
• Limited number of notes. Figure out what's possible out of the tunes already grabbed.
• Find a simple one, learn on guitar first
• Violin:
• Find a string shop - see if it's worth repairing
• Maybe restring anyway, and get a cheap bow
• Hammered Dulcimer:
• Stop by a shop and get a piece of corian already
• Reassemble stand
• Figure out where you put the hammers "so they'd be easy to find"

Comments

[malinaldarose.livejournal.com]

Do you need a fingering chart for the flute? I probably have one somewhere -- I played for many, many years.

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

I do have one. Somewhere. =)

I have at least one complete flute method instruction book, and an accompanying five to six inches worth of practice music, textbook excerpts, and other assorted flute-specific instruction material.

I don't plan on finding it anytime soon, so I just wanted to remind myself to browse for a chart on teh Intarweb or something! =)

If you happened to know exactly which note is sounding with everything open or closed, I can probably derive the rest without needing a chart...

[malinaldarose.livejournal.com]

Everything closed is E flat just above middle C, if I remember correctly. Everything open, except the right pinky key would be C# at the top of that octave -- or the octave above that, if you tighten your embouchure.

Or...you could just look here: http://www.wfg.woodwind.org/flute/index.html

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

[melintur.livejournal.com]

Recorder - 2 octaves plus a few notes, fully 12-tone Chromatic. ;)

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

Cool! All I've done with it so far is noodle about a bit. I'll pick it up faster if I actually have a tune to play.

[patrixa.livejournal.com]

Well, guess you inherited some stuff from me after all -- like responding too quickly at work meetings. I cannot tell you the times I was told to hold back because most staff needed more time and it made them feel"dumb" if I answered too quickly, especially if my responses were good ones. Part of it was I was focused and paid attention to what was being discussed, so what seemed a snap answer was not-- at least to me. It was also why I would get so impatient with Dad -- he needed time to ponder and I didn't -- it took us many years to come up with a comfort zone which was he would say something like "I need to think a bit" and I would say "okay" You can decide how often that worked!

But I still don't know where your musical talent comes from...it is definitely YOUR VERY OWN TALENT honed by yourself! Words, poetry, stories -- they are family traits -- but music -- well you have far superceded anyone in the whooole family, living or dead.

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

What about Gwynfarld Dyfel (aka Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Grandpa Gwynfarld,) way back in 1038 AD? If he was the Bard Prince (and his dad, the Prince Bard, or vice versa) there is some history to it! =)

[patrixa.livejournal.com]

Never heard of him and that is a Welsh name which I don't think is in Dad's history -- he never claimed Welsh as a background, only an ancicent Saxon king that was mentioned and which family historians were divided as he has a bad reputation. bard could be the same as minstrel which is what musicians were often called; bard was often eqal to poet 00 and jester to jokes? Besides, stuff that far back has little practical claim on the present. And since you have no proof this bard was musical, and that musical people in our have not been noted for the last few hundred years, you'll just have to accept responsibility for your talent therein.

Oh, btw, your aunt, Belva, and great grandfather James were poets. I forgot that.

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

Well, he may not have claimed it - and the notes are of dubious value, seeing as how the generations included don't add up to 100BC despite including that date for the oldest ancestor of his great grandmother's mother.

The White family has the Saxon king, however Orlando White was married to an Allen, and it's her mother's father (or maybe further back? I closed the window!) who's a Bowen, and that's what takes us back through oodles of Welsh names.

But that's another post, from back over the summer when I first looked into all of this. =)

[patrixa.livejournal.com]

AAAAHHH! And for some reason you thought I might have remwmbered what I read then?

oy, I barely recall yesterday; no that's not true, I do remember yesterday, I do, why i think it snowed -- or was it sunny? .Whatever, the sky and clouds were out, I'm sure of that. Oh -- and I baked cookies. Yeag, that was it. My mother's mother was a baker and that's what I inherited-- baking skills. %-P

[1jadedhart.livejournal.com]

there's a very good luthier on rt209 in brodheadsville. he's highly recommended, reasonable prices, been in the business for years and really not far from you. shoot me an email if you want his name/number. bet he could work wonders on that violin. there's also a violin maker in bangor, don't know anything about him though.

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

Oh, coolness... do you know if the luthier keeps regular business hours, or does he work out of his house/by appointment only?

[1jadedhart.livejournal.com]

i'm not sure about his hours. he has a shop on 209 so i know he doesn't work out of his house. i know a few people that have taken instruments to him before and they were all very pleased with his work.

i just did a quick google, here's his web page:

http://pa.local.yahoo.biz/robertticeluthier/

you know your way around music

[nightwind292.livejournal.com]

if you listen to the simon + garfunkles version of scarabourough fair, especialy the one that made the best of, it's two differnt songs performed together.

What's the OTHER one?

Re: you know your way around music

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

Canticle - which is itself a reworking of an earlier tune of theirs. So that would be TWO other songs, in a sense. =)

The version I'm playing is just the melody, without any further setting or arrangement, and is strictly traditional.

Re: you know your way around music

[nightwind292.livejournal.com]

thanks for the assistance