Category: Music

Dis Is Da Drum

Yes it’s true, I bought a drum set. Believe it or not my wife thought it was a good idea. Well better than getting a motorcycle anyway.

It arrived just over a week ago. I got a complete kit with all the drums, cymbals, stands, hardware, and a throne, all as a single unit. I didn’t even know that was something you could buy all together. This saved me the trouble of picking out all the individual components and the whole thing was a reasonable price. I guess it’s a basic, entry-level set but everything is well-made and sounds good. I also got sticks, mallets, brushes and (of course) earplugs.

The kit I got was from Ludwig, with Remo heads and Zildjian cymbals. It’s a gold sparkle finish, very nice. The kick drum is 22″, and then there’s two rack toms, a floor tom and and a snare drum, plus a ride cymbal, crash cymbal and hi-hat.

On the web they advertise the same kit with a 20″ kick drum and correspondingly smaller toms. This seemed like it might be suitable for jazz, but no one has it in stock, so it may not really exist. I asked one of my jazz drummer friends about the 20″ vs 22″ kick. He says back in the day jazz drummers used full size kick drums just like everyone else, and he prefers the 22″ anyway cuz it has a bigger sound and is more versatile, good for rock as well as jazz. So I stopped waiting for the smaller set to be in stock, which is just as well cuz it’s still not available after a month.

Unpacking and setting it all up was a major endeavor. I’d never done that before and I learned alot. Michelle was a big help. Then it was on to tuning the heads. Sweetwater has some videos on their web site, which was useful. But the tuning is by ear and by feel, so it’s hard to get that across in a video. I’m now in a phase where I’m experimenting to see what sounds and feels good.

Once I has it set up put together a little practice routine to get started. I haven’t played drums since high school or maybe college, and while I’m happy that I still know a few beats and basic grooves, that’s about it. So the focus on fundamentals. For on thing I’m just practicing single hits on all the drums, to get consistent control over the tempo, loudness and accents. Hitting the drums and cymbals in different places and at different angles to hear the different sounds. Getting consistent between the right and left hand. Experimenting with grip, where to hold the stick for the best balance, how tight or loose, and how to best take advantage of the bounce you get after a hit.

Next is moving around the kit, smoothly and without the sticks interfering with each other. Also experimenting with the placement of the drums and what feels comfortable. Third is patterns, mostly on the snare. I only remember a few rudiments, but I’m working on constancy, gradually increasing the tempo.

Last is beats and grooves. I must say many years of playing piano while singing has really my hand/foot independence. Again the focus right now is consistent tempo and volume. Being able to hone in on one part and not loose the others, particularly the kick drum. Putting in accents or extra hits to vary the groove. I noticed that when switching from the hi-hat to ride cymbal, the ride seems much louder. It’s a challenge to bring down the volume with keeping the kick and snare at their level, particularly since I’m playing the snare with my left hand.

One thing I never considered before is that the drum set is organized backwards in terms of high vs low, compared to the piano or other percussion in-struments like the vibes. In a basic beat the bass drum is on 1 and 3, and struck with the right foot. Then the backbeat is on the snare on 2 and 4, struck with the left hand. Compare that with a stride rhythm on piano, where left hand does both the bass note on 1 and 3 and the chord on the back beat, but the and moves to left for bass notes and to the right for the chord. I’ve known left-handed drummers who play the whole kit reverse. And there are right-handed guitarists I can think of who play left handed. I wonder if should try reversing the kit to see how that feels.

In any event, I’m working my way thru different videos about tuning the drums. After that I’ll look at a few basic videos about the issues I’m already working on in my playing, and maybe see if I can find a series of lessons online. I’ll probably also get a few books. Something like the Rubank elementary series (I wonder if they still make those), and a book of different rock and jazz patterns, beats and grooves. Everyone tells me a good samba beat is one of the hardest things to play well.

I might even try recording a drum part for the song I’m working on, but that’s still a little ways off.

The Global Jukebox 2.0

I’m happy to announce that last Friday, July 31, we released The Global Jukebox version 2.0. This is pretty much the culmination of my last year’s work, with the help of alot of people including my brother Martin, our administrator Kiki, our visual designer Alona and the project director Anna Lomax Wood.

There’s lots of exciting new stuff in it. The top three new things are an extensive style redesign, a whole new world taxonomy, and an all-new education section, including the Musical Roots classroom experience. So take some time and explore the world of world folk music and culture.

https://theglobaljukebox.org

There’s lots more in the offing, so hopefully it won’t be long before release 2.1. Enjoy!

Some Like It Hot

This has got to be the hottest July I can remember. It’s been above ninety pretty much every day the whole month, and alot of days above ninety-five. I usually like the heat but this is a bit much even for me. It’s not even enjoyable to be be outside except in the morning and the evening. No end in sight.

We took a mini pretend beach vacation this weekend. Saturday we went out to Jones Beach on Long Island to swim in the ocean and enjoy the scene. It was very nice. The water was warm and as calm as gets. Lots of fun swimming and floating. It was less crowded than usual because the parking lots were only allowing parking in every second space. We had originally intended to go to Robert Moses Beach but the parking there filled up before 10 am.

Sunday we went to an outdoor restaurant at Rye Beach, on the opposite end of the beach from the Tiki Bar and Playland amusement park, and enjoyed the sunset, some yummy seafood, and some live music with a sax player, percussionist, and a guy with a laptop computer playing loops and tracks. I’d never been to this place before but since the Tiki Bar is closed this summer we went exploring. Perfect chill vibe.

…

In origami land, I’m drawing ever closer to finishing my book. The diagrams have been basically done for a while, but then I went back and picked out a harmonious color palette, with different colors for model with different themes, and re-rendered all the steps. Along the way I made a few improvements to the folding sequences and page layouts. I’m really going for a good-looking and high-quality book. Next step is model menu/TOC and then test folding and photography. Too bad it’s so hot. I might have to put in the air conditioner in my studio downstairs.

Also in origami land, I’ve resumed my scheduling project for Origami USA. If you recall, back in the winter, before the pandemic, I’d taken on managing the scheduling tool and the actual scheduling for the OUSA Conventions. The tool itself was an MS Access Database with a bunch of custom views and lots of macros. The plan was to use it for this year’s convention to get up the learning curve on the whole scheduling workflow, and then design and build a new tool in time for the new Chicago convention in the fall.

Well the OUSA June convention was replaced by the Un-Convention, which was a great success but had no need of scheduling. The Chicago convention is not happening either. But we figured we might as well go ahead and build the new scheduling tool, and hope the world is back to normal for the 2021 convention. So now I’m underway with that. First step is to install Drupal and a suite of plugins, since the what drives the OUSA web site. Next is to identify the points of integration and then come up with a design and a tech spec. Should be fun.

…

Since I’m doing these blog updates rather infrequently these days, I might as well cover all the bases. We did a surprise soft launch The Global Jukebox at the end of June, for the benefit of our partner/sponsor CityLore, with whom we created an education section and interactive Musical Roots experience for use in New York City (and other) schools. However, there were a few loose ends in the app we didn’t have time to properly address. We’re just about finished with them and are preparing for the official Global Jukebox 2.0 release to live. Coming soon, very exciting. Watch this space for a future announcement.

…

In the world of music, I’ve been going to the jazz jam sessions the last few weeks. All is cool so far, and it’s good to making music with other people. At first I felt pretty rusty, but now that I’ve shaken off the cobwebs I’m realizing my playing is reaching a higher level than before.

It still remains to get the new rock band off the ground, but there’s signs of hope.

Meanwhile, I’ve been continuing on working on a new batch of originals in my studio. Did I mention it’s really hot? The song I’ve zeroed in on is a medium-slow jazz number called Winter Wolf Whisper (although I’ll probably change the name) that we used to do in the Haven Street Quintet. Of course doing it on the computer requires changing the feel, so working thru that. One big thing is drums. I’m torn between making sound more natural and human, versus more electronic and machine-like. I’ve always been fascinated by bands with two drummers, or with a percussion section, so I’ll probably try combining both approached.

Still, I feel like I’ve gone as far as can with my current approach to drums. So I decided to buy a drum set. Something to practice on, and potentially record. Actually having drums has been on my list for a long, long time, and they’ll also come in handy if I ever have band rehearsals at my house again. I was pretty amaze at the kind of deals you can get these days on a new kit, complete with cymbals, stands and a throne. It should be here on Thursday, so mare on that soon.

We Jammin’

Even as the pandemic rages across other parts of the country, some things around here are getting back to normal, at least a little bit. One big portent is that my main rehearsal studio, Lagond, has re-opened. So I started asking around my musician friends to see how people feel about coming out and spending time indoors together, if the time is right. While I was mulling over the possibilities for putting together a new jazz or rock group, I gat a call from Mike, the drummer from the old jazz circle, looking for a sax player.

So I went down and jammed out. Lagond is doing all the things to keep us safe, requiring wearing a facemask coming in and out of the building, and putting hand sanitizer by every door, hooked up to a hi-hat pedal so you can operate it hands-free. We were in the big room downstairs with the piano, and we were set up so that everyone was at least twelve feet from his nearest neighbor.

It was good to re-connect with those guys. Most I haven’t seen in a year, maybe a couple years. And it was certainly alot of fun to play music with people again. Looks like I’m gonna keep going the rest of the summer, as long as the situation stays cool.

Ken was sitting in on bass. He and I were talking about forming a new rock band last winter, so we re-kindled those discussions. I reached out to the other musicians involved and they’re into it. So it’s time to start thinking about when and how. No matter what it looks a long time before there’s any gigs, but that’d give us time to develop our sound.

Sugar-Free Jazz

I updated my web site with a new page for my new work-in-progress album, whose working title is BZIV. You can see it here:

https://zingman.com/music/bziv.php

I realize my web site is long overdue for some updates, so hopefully I’ll be getting around to some of that soon. For now, it’s one new page.

I even created a stand-in for album cover by taking a couple photos of my origami (a Stellated Dodecahedron, a.k.a a 3-D star, and an Astronaut) are ran them thru some photoshop filters. It’s a nice image and seems to go well with the tone of the album so for.

I have three completed songs: The Story Lies, Who Speaks on Your Behalf, and Sun of the Son. Together they’re just about twenty minutes, or an album side. Halfway there. I must say this is a very good rate for me, twenty minutes of produced music in a year.

I’ve finally gotten to work on the long-waited and much hyped Plague of Frogs, although I’ll be changing the name because nobody wants to hear a song about the plague these day. Probably something like It’s Raining Frogs, or Battle of the Snow Frogs, or Frogs of War. As mentioned before it’s a 10-minute sci-fi epic. It’ll take a while to complete.

The rest of the album was going to be three to five other half written songs I have, but I might save them for a potential new rock group in the offing. This might get off the ground sooner than expected. Lagond, my main rehearsal studio, just sent out an email today that they’re opening back up soon.

Meanwhile, Sun of the Son came out so well I’m now thinking of making a whole record of digital studio jazz-like music. Get deeper into the aesthetic, bring in influences like Material, 80’s Miles, Kamasi, King Crimson, and who knows what else. I have three songs I wrote for Haven Street that are good for adaptation: Lift Off, Mobility and Winter Wolf Whisper, which I many change the name of to something like Autumn Eyes or Dolphin Eyes. After that I have two more, half-written jazz jams, currently called Heavy Water and Bluzoid. I might even tack on my version with lyrics of Jay’s balled Slope.

That’s alot of music to work on. The key is break it down into manageable tasks. I can play all these songs on sax, and I’m re-learning them on piano. I’m also trying them out on bass and even guitar so when it’s time to start recording I’ll know what I’m doing. Before I can get too far I’ll have to decide how to approach the drums. It’s going to be some combination of midi, loops and layers. I realize I don’t know precisely what Eric was doing on the drums, so I have to go back and listen. We never cut a record with this songs, so I have to go back thru the recordings I made of our gigs. With luck I’ll find some takes that are good enough to put on our web site, so watch this space.

New Mix: Sun of the Son

I thought I was done with this song last fall, but after listening to my new mixes I thought I could make it better. The main thing I did was to tone down the effects on the snare drum because it was kinda overpowering in a couple sections. While I was in there I cleaned up the phrasing on the horn a bit, and added some percussion to the jam section to give it more of a Kamasi vibe. Hopefully this one is now finished, and it’s on to some new songs.

https://zingman.com/music/mp3/bziv/SunOfTheSon50b.mp3

Warning: it’s a ten-minute computer jazz jam, so the can enjoy the radio edit if you’re into the whole brevity thing:

https://zingman.com/music/mp3/bziv/SunOfTheSon50b_radioedit.mp3

New Song: The Story Lies

Well the exciting thing that happened this week was that Lizzy came home for a visit. We haven’t seen her since the start of her semester back in January.

In music news, my other new song, The Story Lies, is done, and you can hear it here:

https://zingman.com/music/mp3/bziv/TheStoryLies23c.mp3

As mentioned before, the song was originally written by my brother Martin. I’m quite happy with the way it came out. It’s very much a groove song compared to WSOYB, and my version is much funkier and jazzier than the original. Instrumentally it’s a blend of bass and drums, keys and guitar, with a sax jamming out over everything. It’s got a great chord progression that lends itself to the John Coltrane sheets of sound approach, so I managed to work a little of that in. The lead vocal is a single track with no harmonies, and like the vocal delivery. On the original version there were some backing vocals, so I ended up adding a synth part on the chorus to take up that space.

New Song: Who Speaks on Your Behalf

At last! We finally left the house one day last week. Jeannie was bored being pent up at home, so we took a day trip out to Montauk at the very end of Long Island. It was a lovely day for a ride, and when we got there it was a great time just hiking around the beaches and cliffs and rocks for a few hours. There were some other people there but the parking lot was mostly empty and it was easy to keep one’s distance. And believe it or not, passing thru Queens at rush hour on a Wednesday, there was virtually no traffic.

But the main point of this post is music. I started in on what will hopefully become the fourth Buzzy Tonic album at the beginning of the year. I’m close to done on two new tracks in my home studio. One is Who Speaks on Your Behalf, which is pretty much there, just the mastering to go. The other is The Story Lies, which is close behind, so I’ll talk about that one next post.

You can hear the song here:

WhoSpeaksOnYourBehalf26a.mp3

Who Speaks on Your Behalf was originally written by The Cheshire Cat, the best band to come out of Buffalo in the late 80’s and early 90’s. Maybe even better better than my own group jazz fusion group Event Horizon. There really was a lot of great music at that time and place.

The Cat consisted of John Massé on vocals and keys, Joe Q on vocals and bass, Ryan Boyle on vocals and drums, and Mike McLaughlin on guitar. They had alot of talent, with three strong singers at both lead and backing, with different style voices and great harmonies. They were all excellent musicians, and everyone in the group wrote. Their sound was sort of pop-prog, a blend of synthesizers and guitars, often heavy, sometimes funky or atmospheric, with influences of Rush, Pink Floyd, the Beatles, Faith No More, Grand Funk Railroad, King’s X and the Chili Peppers, to name a few.

They had a bunch of great songs, but Who Speaks on Your Behalf was my favorite. It has a lot going on musically, and moves from mood to mood, heavy to sunny and back, with a big build section. Structurally, motivically, lyrically and harmonically everything is tightly related. Almost a pocket symphony on the level of Strawberry Fields Forever or Good Vibrations. Plus it has a great lyric and a great vocal delivery.

I figured the song out on piano many years ago when the Cat were playing it live regularly. For this version I went back and listened to the record to make sure I had the form and the chords right. I ended up spending most of the time on the track programming the drums and practicing the opening riff on bass. Everything else went down pretty quickly. I was happily surprised at how easy it was to get a great teak on my vocals.

My lead guitar skills are pretty limited so I didn’t even attempt the guitar part. Instead I put on some synthesizers and a horn section consisting of a soprano and a tenor sax. I think it came out well. The sound of my version is somewhere in the neighborhood of Steely Dan, 80’s Sting with a dash of Pepperland. The guys in Cheshire Cat liked it too, and seem really flattered that someone remembers their song and cares enough to do a new interpretation after all this time. It was worth it, it’s a great song.

Sea of Time

What is it now, week ten? Even less has happened than last time I updated my blog. The kids are almost done with school. Spring and the nice weather have finally arrived. I got sick, got better. Not the plague, thanks for asking.

I’ve been trying to get in shape for spring. In my regular home workout I’ve gone up in weight on both dumbbells and bench press, and have added some new leg exercises. I’ve also gone out biking a few times, which is refreshing and lots of fun. I haven’t gone to the Nature Study Woods yet because the trails there are narrow so it may be hard to keep distance form other people. Instead I’ve been going around the neighborhood streets, which is still a good workout cuz it’s pretty hilly all over. I’ve gotten as far as downtown Bronxville and back. I haven’t been on my skates yet this spring because my street is so laden with potholes it’s useless. I need to find a nice smooth place to skate.

I spent Saturday catching up on yardwork that I’d normally do in April, and spent some time out in the sunshine. I took the Mustang out for the second time this season too. I suppose we ought to wash the cars at some point, but we’re literally not driving anywhere. Last time I put gas in the tank was in February.

In the recoding studio I’m well into mixing my songs, getting pretty close to done. I’m at the listening back and tweaking phase. Tonight I went in to EQ the bass on one of my tracks, but I ended up EQing the guitar instead, scooping out alot of low and accentuating the high treble. Suddenly the bass has alot more space and everything is clearer.

I’m thinking about what songs to do next. Whatever I pick, there’s going to be a phase of laying down basic tracks, working out keys, tempos and song structures, and programming the drum parts before I can get into actually tracking and arranging. It’s Raining Frogs is the new working title of the next song up. It’s a long and complicated song so this phase will take some time and effort. I liked working on two songs in parallel this time around, so I think I’m gonna keep that going and pick another song or two. I have a few half written rock/pop songs that I could develop, but I’m holding out hope that eventually the quarantine will end my nascent new rock group will return, and then I’ll have some material to use for that.

So my other idea is to polish off some of my jazz demos and work them up into some kind of computer jazz thing, like I did with Sun of the Son. I have three originals completely worked up from the jazz group that we never recorded and probably never will. I have two more from our set that I want to rework with a new approach, and I two or three others that have the core idea and they could jam out any number of ways. I think I might do the first three of these. I have a feeling they’ll go down pretty quickly.

Oh, and my Charlie Parker Omnibook in Bb arrived, so I’m woodshedding Donna Lee and Confirmation, trying to work out when I should go up the octave. An the Patterns book I’m to pattern 98 and they’ve finally introduced dominant 7th chords.

Lastly, spinning of from Jeannie’s weekend Zoom call with her family, I’ve started a new weekly D&D campaign with Michelle and Lou and most of my nieces and nephews. This time the campaign includes Denis’s kids Carrie and Anna, who are 15 and 11 and really having fun. We’re doing the whole thing online now. TSR has a web site that automates character sheets including spells, HP, XP, weapons and attacks, really everything, and that’s super helpful. I haven’t yet found good mapping software so for now we’re using the whiteboard built into Zoom.

We’re playing the classic module Keep on the Borderlands, adapted for 5th edition, and with some extra monsters, and trying to give a bit of a plot beyond hack and slash with a backstory and some hidden magic items among the treasure. The party is pretty and very diverse. There are alot of Elves, some Druids, Witches and Sorcerers, plus a Barbarian (Katy), a Monk (Michelle) and a Rogue (Addie). Lou, as is his way, is a Dwarven fighter. It’s a pretty sprawling dungeon, but that’s a good thing cuz we could be stuck inside a long time.

Sea of Tranquility

We’re now into week seven. Not too much going on. Or should I say everything that’s happening is happening slowly. Spring has been pretty cold and rainy so far. I mowed the lawn last week for the first time.

I’ve finished the style redesign on the Global Jukebox, and now I’m doing data work, updating the model for the cultures tree, and adding in 700 pop songs. We should be going live before too long.

In music land, I’ve been working my way thru Patterns for Jazz on the sax, I’m up to pattern 78 now, getting into flat thirds and fifths. I’ve also been working thru the Real Book, sight-reading every head and running down the changes, doing a few every day. If there’s a song that’s interesting I’ll take a few days and study it and try and memorize it. So far all the Charlie Parker songs have been interesting in that way. Right now I’m up to Blues for Alice, and the next few songs after that are Bluesette, Boplicty and Bright Size Life, so that’s a fun place to hang out for a while.

I ordered the Charlie Parker Omnibook in Bb. I studied the thru whole book back in high school, but in Eb on alto. I always thought playing Bird songs on tenor was kinda weird, cuz they don’t lay on the horn as well. They tend to wrap around the octave in funny ways and are often either too high or too low, since Bird made use of the full range of the horn. And his tunes are hard enough to begin with. But now I’m thinking it’s worth it to try and get some of his riffs in my bag.

On piano I’m also working my way thru the Real Book, but at a much slower pace, picking and choosing songs to work up as solo piano pieces. Mainly ballads, with alot of emphasis on voicings. I’ve finally gotten pretty good at Body and Soul, and I’ve been playing ‘Round Midnight for ages. Next tune I’m gonna woodshed is either My Romance by Rogers and Hart, or Naima by John Coltrane, or maybe both.

It also occurs to me I know literally hundreds and hundreds of rock and pop songs on piano and voice, and there’s many more I kinda know, but I rarely play more than a handful of them. So I’ve started putting together a notebook of all the charts so I can rotate them in and out of my practice and keep them fresh.

In the recording realm, I’ve finished my sax and synthesizer parts on The Story Lies and Who Speaks on Your Behalf (actually only WSoYB had synths), so now we’re up to the vocals, and then it’s just the mixdown. At the start of the year I was hoping these songs would be done by end of June. Together they’re about 10 minutes, which would put me on track for 20 minutes of produced music for the year. Now it’s looking like they’ll be done in early May, and with luck it’ll be more like 30 minutes of music this year. Woo-hoo!

In origami land, I’ve been continuing to work on my book. I settled on eight or maybe nine models, somewhere between 50 and 60 pages. I have six of the models done with new diagrams and layouts complete. The others are mostly done: the diagrams are finished and I have a draft of the layouts. That is, except for one model. The Martian appeared my previous kit book, and although it’s a great idea I was never really satisfied with the final design. So now I’m redoing that model without the constraint of having to keep it to an intermediate level with a low step count. Changing the body proportions, adding more detail to the head, everything. It’ll be substantially a new model in the end.