September 13th, 2006 | Comments: none
This afternoon I came home and belted out “River Summer,” determined to not worry about minor mistakes and slightly off-key notes. The result is the best recording of that song I’ve been able to come up with yet, warts and all. That song depends so much on the live performance aspect to make it work that the carefully recorded versions I had ended up far too sterile. I also used some distorted clav sounds in place of the regular old piano, which gives it some extra oomph I like. Progress also on “Emily’s Song,” “Amy,” and “Sunday Best.”
August 15th, 2006 | Comments: 2
Work has been steady, if not particularly fast, on recording music. “Amy” is nearly finished - just need to finalize the vocal comp and do some mixing. I’ve got final takes of the piano tracks for “River Summer” and “Sunday Best,” awaiting vocals. I’ve worked on updating “Had it Up to Here.” Most of my work the past couple days, though, has been on a new arrangement for “Emily’s Song.” That one has been a struggle for me. I love the song, but figuring out how to best arrange hasn’t been easy. I’ve decided to strip it down a lot, at least in the verses, to allow the harmonies to stand on their own more. I think I have it, though, and now it’s just a matter of getting all the parts recorded.
I’ve put a moratorium on writing any new material (which is difficult) until I finish these songs. It’s highly likely that this is also a track list for my next CD, MP3 collection, or whatever I put together:
- River Summer
- Half-Hearted Stab
- Fire
- Emily’s Song
- Amy
- Had it Up to Here (Damn, Idaho)
- Sunday Best
- The Fall-Spring Machine
There will probably be more, but those are the “for sure” songs. Phew!
July 28th, 2006 | Comments: none
Well I’m back from vacation in Russia. The clock where we were is exactly 12 hours off this one, which means I’m unnaturally bright and sunshiney at 5 AM.
My goal for this time period before the school year starts is to get some solid recording work finished. The jet lag isn’t helping: I need to record vocals for a few songs and it’ll be a few days before I’m in any shape to sound decent.
I just discovered Crystal, a free softsynth, and boy howdy is it awesome. I’d been lusting after Absynth or MX4, but this is just what I need, and you can’t beat the price.
What I’d really like is this:
The picture doesn’t do it justice. My clumsy banging wouldn’t either, probably. It’s a Russian piano, built in 1850 or so. The wood grain is absolutely stunning. As nice as sleek black painted pianos are, this one is just so beautiful it makes paint seem like a travesty.
July 4th, 2006 | Comments: none
Makes me very, very sad:
Makes me happy:
June 27th, 2006 | Comments: 1
Amazingly, it’s over. This picture is a pretty good representation of how I feel, emerging dazedly from a cave and all. Especially if you imagine there’s some joy mixed in with that “wuh, what now?” look:
I got a nice mention in the Empire the other day, directing people to my MP3 page. Welcome to anyone visting my blog at the same time. New music should be coming on a much more regular basis now, so feel free to subscribe to the RSS feed, put your email in the thingy over there, or add me as a myspace buddy for bulletins.
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