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Things Are Gonna Get Better – 192kbps OGG Vorbis

Things Are Gonna Get Better – 160kbps MP3 VBR

… or where you go when you know.

In 1491 there lived
a boy, his name Copernicus.
He changed his mind for all of us
My god, where are you now?

By thinking he moved all of us,
The moon, the sun, Copernicus
The church, the gods, Copernicus!
The days the earth stood still.

For is it that the
Sun lies not above us
but below us, dear Copernicus…?
And would you claim the Earth is
not the center of the universe?

[...]

Copernicus, Copernicus!
Can you not feel him, watching us?
Beseeching us, imploring us:
My god, where are you now?

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Casio – 192kbps OGG Vorbis

Casio – 128kbps MP3 VBR

Here’s a long overdue something, a tribute to a silly yet truly awesome musical instrument. My first instrument ever was a funky 128-voice Casio, my fifth birthday present. The keyboard was the last of its kind in the store, the display version — so there was no manual or box for me to learn from.

At my art camp job, there are some sweet aged Casio keyboards for people to play. They are even older than mine: the type with only 16 real voices and the option to play two voices in unison. This is an expanded version of a very random jam on Wednesday.

Sequenced using Rosegarden4 with fluidsynth and Xsynth as DSSI plugins. All soundfonts used are free. Enjoy!

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Close Your Eyes – 192kbps OGG Vorbis

Close Your Eyes – 128kbps MP3 VBR

Well, another school term has passed and yet another whirlwind of homework and activity has come and gone. Shifting gears was totally weird. I guess I fell into a mode where there was always another assignment around the corner that had to be worked on… the shadow of procrastination and doom lurking over my head. When there wasn’t, there wasn’t this startling realization or a lifting sense of freedom… just the realization that I didn’t have to go home and get studying any more. The day after finals were over, sleep deprived and braindead, I recorded this song.

This piece is about a month and a half old. While I wrote it, I imagined it as an experiment in multitracked pianos. Most of the primary melody however was improvised as I added layers on Friday. Everything, except from various percussion, is piano. The cymbal crash is a mixture of two samples courtesy of the freesound project. There’s some great stuff over there.. I wish I’d learned to use the site sooner!

I guess what I envision when I play this piece is the sort of unfolding patterns of shapes and colors I see when I press on my eyes. A sort of introspective journey. Close your eyes.

Cymbal crash attribution:
By ltibbits : crash-Z-custom-projection-19-choke.wav
By loofa : BIG DOOR SHUT DOWN.aif

This piece is released under a Creative Commons License.

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192kbps OGG Vorbis

128kbps MP3 VBR

I know I haven’t posted much, let alone music, in quite a while — though that does not mean I haven’t been working persistently on both. I am very excited to finally share a new musical composition. I woke up this morning with the intention to create music, and work this tune that had developed by accident in the last few days. Originally, I had intended to put up an entirely different piece. However, this one stuck in my head constantly and just would not leave until I had completed it.

This is the first time I have done multi-track recording in a very long time (I believe on the last, I was about 9 years old). With cornelius’s suggestion to try multiple instruments in my mind, I tried adding a flute to the mix. Another instrument was added, and soon another. Keeping in mind that I never claimed that I could play flute, I will simply sing the praises of digital pitch correction. Hopefully this is what you had in mind, cornelius.

I’m not all too proud of the piano performance, and I’m sure I’ll find more flaws later… but right now, I’m just proud of the music. This tune is available under a Creative Commons license; the same one as this blog.

Other than that, I hope you will simply enjoy the composition, and that it will speak for itself. Play it loud!

Download:

192kbps OGG Vorbis

128kbps MP3 VBR

Way back when in April, I wrote about a little song I composed and recorded on my laptop and an iffy vocal mic. It was a frenzied effort at making it work after an hour of mixed success. There were obvious technical flaws in my recording: the micing was mono and sounded terrible, there’s was buzz throughout the piece, and I played it like a new and unfamiliar piece.

Recently, my father acquired some really cool home recording equipment. This meant a chance to try things again and get it right technically; also a chance to test out the new stuff with a song I’d had months to play and practice.

This afternoon we sat down and tried things out. Micing up the piano was very exciting, as we finally had two mics and so were able to do it in stereo. Sitting down and playing was a bit stressful, though this time I was much more used to playing with the mics running. The version I settled upon was the 3rd or 4th rendition — many others were stumble-filled as I was often jarringly aware of being recorded.

I hereby christen this new recording as Sunbreaks-NG, for “New Gear”.

Sure there are still a few oopses and mistakes — but hey, I’m so infinitely more happy with this recording that I’ll forget about those for a while.

I also took some time to try recording a newer song tentatively named “Sunset.” It was an absolute trainwreck, but I tried so hard to get to the end I’m pretty proud of myself for doing it. I must have improvised though at least 3 mistakes and had to stop and restart at one. However, there is one of the improvisations that I actually really like, and am considering adding into the “real” piece! Hopefully with some more recording time I’ll be able to get this song down in a form that I will be proud to upload here.

As you might have noticed, one of our profile servers (which your account is on) has been rather slow recently. Affected users are noticing that their charts are taking ages to update, and neighbours are not calculated fast enough. This is due to the changes we’re making in the way profile data is stored and searched. [...]

To sweeten the deal we’re upgrading your account with a free 1 month subscription. (or extending it if you already subscribe). Along with the usual subscriber perks, you’ll have access to the beta test of the new site update (in early June). This will give you a chance to try out the new charts system before everyone else, and tell us what you think before it’s launched.

This is incredible behavior on the behalf of Last.fm Ltd. So their charts were being a little sluggish to a free member for a week or so. I’m not easily swayed by subscriber-ish generousity, but I must say I’m quite impressed by the fact that as a free user (never given them a penny), they gave me a free upgrade to their service simply because they felt it was not updating quickly enough. <3++.

Other online services: take note.

It seemed that Sigur brought back a few of their more gloomy, melancholic songs instead of the extreme happiness in the last concert – though they played those songs with an energy I hadn’t heard before. It was especially funny to hear the first encore, “Dauðalagið,” just after this morning reading john of management’s tour diary:

“when the band played daudalagid at a soundcheck in tokyo they gave up before the end, pondering later why their songs were so bloody long… go figure.”

… the studio version of that track is 13 minutes long. But hey, they made it through it tonight! And it was spectacular.

Everything was quite loud. The mix was kind of so-so, with a lot of bass but not much complexity that I could hear. It might have been where we were sitting, near the side and just under the balcony. It was pretty crazy to hear (and feel) so much raw sound in the venue, with it’s classical-styled sculptures and very upper-class “refined” image. In the beginning, Amina played their songs wonderfully, though I was wholly dissapointed that people were still coming into the hall throughout their perfomance. Other than a lot of musical chairs (ha ), the crowd was pretty mild though.

Sigur Rós seemed to be really into it though, with Kjarri dancing his legs and everyone really moving with the music. They definitely didn’t hold back in the crescendos either.

This is the second time in two concerts that I’ve seen Jonsi absolutely destroy a bow, quite literally shredding it away through the end of Hafssól. The hair part of the bow (I don’t know what it’s called) was tearing, with an ever growing mass of curly, broken hairs at the end of his bow. I think I may have seen smoke. There could very well have been. Last time, his bow snapped in half. I swear, there’s a very good reason he keeps two on stage!

Hafssól seemed to really give the guys trouble – the vocal harmony was way off in the beginning, with Jonsi and Kjarri both singing their parts with a delay from each other. I was surprised to see Jonsi back off of the harmony and let Kjarri continue it – and even more surprised when they repeated the melody to get in sync, and tried it again successfully.

My friends seemed to really enjoy the show, and I had a great time. Right now, I really need to get some sleep so there’ll still be some life in me come tomorrow. Eh? So it’s tomorrow already. Well, it’s been a wonderfully full day, though now it’s time for rest!

Good night!

Sigur Rós is (are) an Icelandic band who play original, long, simple and yet very sonically “full” music. They play a mixture of rock instruments, strings, used in a genre that’s pretty much all their own. There are no (to my ear) understandable lyrics, though singer Jonsi’s often high-pitched vocals in Icelandic and “Hopelandic” (a kind of phonetic scat singing unique to the band) have a very meaningful quality, even without the words. Jonsi also often plays his guitar with a bow, adding to the uniqueness of their sound.

Back in September, I saw them live in a medium-sized rock club… standing room only on the lower level. They brought in all their instruments… pianos, electric guitars, bass, strings, bells, music boxes… you name it. It was amazing, standing front and center about 10 feet away from Jonsi. Even for a relatively small audience their energy was spectacular, and it simply was amazing to hear them live. It was a really special night. However, one thing was really missing from that evening: I wish I could have shared the experience with more people.

This time, I’ve invited a good friend and my long time Piano teacher to join me. They have both heard some of the music as well as my drawn-out ramblings about it, though I think the experience will largely be new to them. Sigur Rós are playing in a significantly larger venue this time… a real concert hall. We’ve got okay seats… but hey, after last time, I’m more content with being a bit on the side! I’m curious to see how things might be different from the last time I saw them. They’ve been touring on and off for quite a long time now (more than a year I think), so I know if I were them I’d be pretty tired. However, I trust that they’ll make it quite a memorable show.

Sigur Rós are musical and melodic in a way very unlike any other music I have ever heard. Listening to them really frequently over the last few years, I’ve really come to find personal meaning in their songs. To me, their music (which consists of a variety of instruments) contains a kind of emotional expression that I haven’t found equated anywhere else. And when they play live, it’s especially poignant and beautiful.

I’m really looking forward to tomorrow. I have my hopes that it will be a really fantastic night!

And now for something completely different… free music!

Over the past week I’ve been working on a four minute piano piece. It’s part of continuning composition projects working with my piano teacher. This week, I finally got my act together and wrote something I feel is whole, and recorded it well enough that I’ll let myself get away with it.

In my opinion the song is about that experience when the weather can’t decide whether or not to be sunny. This is the first jazzy piece that I feel this satisfied with… so it’s a bit of a happy thing to get it out there. Oh, and everything was recorded and edited using Open Source software.

If you’d like to check out this piece of music, it is available for streaming and download on the Internet Archive.

Yeah, it drags in some places and occasionally I hit extra notes, but hey – it was a joy to create. Isn’t that what counts?