You are currently browsing the monthly Archive for May, 2008.
If you’re taking a break and looking for entertainment, please hop over to the voting for Round I of the Masters of Song Fu competition. Vote for the best song submitted by the 3 masters. I’ll let you decide which song is best**.
**if you can’t decide, take my advice and vote for Paul and Storm because they are the ultimate masters of “Song Fu”, IMHO.
Well, I seem to have recurring blog problems due to a software upgrade at Edublogs. Will be on the beach this weekend and next week, but will try to post if Edublogs ever lets me log in again.
Hey guys, – I will be back…don’t give up on me!
MTV, CMT (Viacom?) and the Grand Ol’ Opry filed papers in Washington DC Tuesday to try to stop the impending onslaught of high tech gadgets that plan to use the same frequency spectrum for wireless broadcasting. According to a c|net report, Google, Microsoft, Intel, and Dell (among others) want to use the frequencies between licensed TV and wireless channels (AKA “white space”) to enable new digital camcorders, mp3 players, etc. to access the internet. The new devices seek out an “empty” space and attempt to avoid “taken” frequencies, but some of us remember the old wireless days when truckers’ CB rigs could blast into virtually any venue (church, school assembly, rock concert).
While proponents of these new devices say it could lower internet costs by increasing competition, it seems like a step backwards to those of us who were finally beginning to trust wireless microphone systems. What will the future hold? Will we have to pay AT&T/Sprint/Verizon a monthly fee for a “private” wireless channel or will these new digital spambots threaten all frequencies? Imagine 5 years from now when wireless “spamming” becomes a closet industry (and your wireless vocal mic’s frequency is taken over by recorded message for some political candidate).
Anyone remember when touring groups actually had to tech. rehearse their movements onstage to avoid tangled mic lines?
I heard an interview on NPR the other day and found Victor’s views on music education incredibly interesting(and he has a book available now! I just ordered my copy!). I still can’t find the audio, but I found this text from:
Bass Musician Magazine
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Jake /Kot (Editor)/: In my interview with Alain Caron, he had very similar things to say about his playing being a language of its own, right down to comparing syllables to phrasing.
Victor: Right! You can move people with this language. The difference is that it’s rare that I’ve ever met a musician that actually treats music like our first language, English. We agree that’s it’s a language, but for some reason we treat music totally differently. Most of the time when it comes to learning music, I would go as far to say that we go about it backwards, in reverse. I’m not saying that any approach is wrong, that’s not my point. Realizing that English, and I only say that because it’s my first language, and music are both forms of communication, it’s easy for me to see that I’m still much better and more comfortable with English even though I’ve been playing for a very long time. So when I look at the approach that we use to learn and speak, and even teach English, and compare it to the usual approach we take to learn music, I realize, wow, it’s a drastically different approach, to the point where I say that we’re learning music backwards. Let me explain what I mean by that.Lets say that I have a child that I think wants to play piano. My first thought is going to be who can I send her to for lessons—nothing wrong with that. But if I take that same approach—if I have a child that wants to speak English, for me to think, ok, who can I send them to for lessons is an odd thought. We just surround the kid with people speaking that language. We talk to the child and allow them to talk back, uninhibited. They can say whatever they want, and we hardly teach them anything for the first few years, and what I mean by ‘teach’ is teaching in the classic sense of the word as in sitting them down and giving them instructions. We don’t do that for the first 3 or 4 years at least. We let the child fend for itself. We more or less throw them in the deep water when it comes to speaking English. They have to figure it out themselves. I recognize a few key factors when I look at what allows us to get good at speaking English quickly, really quickly. I want to present these factors because as far as learning music goes, we seem to be looking at what, 15 or 20 years to obtain that same skill level communicating on our instrument.
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid464021199/bclid463916479/bctid1566340783
Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler is reportedly entering rehab. My best wishes go out to Steven as he seeks help to get in control again.
Last night we drove a bit to find Crockmeir’s Pub to hear my old buddy Stan Foster and his friend Mark Custer play a few sets. They played together in a very successful duo (Custer’s Last Stand) in the mid-1980s but due to careers, family responsibilities, etc… they each followed different paths. This is the first time in 10 years that they’ve done a gig together and they’re doing it out of their home territory, so none of their regular (old) fans are there (except for me and my wife). Stan’s wife, Donna Hall, joins them for several numbers; she’s got a good voice with lots of range and control.
In the opening of the video, you hear Stan say “I’m not sure about this one…” but they were fine. They had a few fakebooks lying around and didn’t hesitate to take requests. It’s good to see them back together!
Think just a moment about how much economic sense a duo makes; –plus no lugging a drum set back to the van! They used hand-held percussion or a rhythm machine to good effect (–just dialed up a beat and faded it in and out). Mark had a pedal rig for his acoustic that gave him a nice variety of tone. Stan used the extended range of his 5 string bass to its fullest advantage. Good sound, happy customers, and at the end of the night, you divide the pay in half and head to the house.
I believe that duos deserve special respect; –it requires a special amount of musical give and take to pull off everyone’s favorite cover tune. I rarely see solo acts that can (or will) do covers any more. But in terms of profitability, it seems a bit strange. Venues that handle large bands often pay more than smaller venues, so unless you’re a solo act playing a large venue, the money is not much different.
What is your experience?
From the ASCAP site:
Centering around 10 core principles, the rights listed include, “We have the right to be compensated for the use of our creative works, and share in the revenues that they generate” and “We have the right to license our works and control the ways in which they are used.”
Sorry for the lack of posts; –I’m in the middle of moving my parents to a new home that’s 3 doors down from mine. It’s a bit crazy this week, but hopefully this will decrease the time spent driving to their house twice a day to give them their medicine and check on supplies, housekeeping, etc… If I get a chance, I’ll post pics of their new home. A big thanks goes out to my students, Bill, Tom, and Nathan, for all their help in fence building, painting, and moving furniture.
Last December I recorded a solo chamber work for bassoon and piano in my office/studio with one of my former students as a personal favor for composer Carl Paul Vollrath. The acoustic piano I have there needed a tune, so I played the digital keyboard instead. The track was shipped off to MMC Records and I was very honored when they decided to include it on a sampler of new music by classical composers. The track is available via:
http://www.emusic.com/album/Various-Artists-Musicscapes-Vol-1-MP3-Download/11206480.html or
http://www.mtraks.com/artist/various_artists/release/84202-musicscapes_vol_1
I’m also finishing up the liner notes for Dr. Vollrath’s upcoming release featuring Richard Stoltzman on clarinet. Scheduled for release next month, the project consists of 2 CDs of clarinet music (recorded by Bob Lord at MMC). If you’ve ever written liner notes for your own music, you can imagine how tough it is to summarize someone else’s music. What I ended up doing was writing a layman’s analysis of the character and form of the pieces. It’s descriptive enough to encourage folks to listen (and hopefully buy the printed music).
It’s really tough being a classical composer in this age; ensembles generally are very conservative with their programming choices and if you noticed the program the New York Philharmonic took to North Korea, you’ll see what I mean. Dr. Vollrath retired from teaching recently and is devoting all the time and resources he has to these recording projects.
Think about this for a moment. Would you pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to see some of your life’s work recorded? This situation is absolutely amazing to me! Carl gives away many of his compositions to performers in hopes of having them performed; unfortunately, few are. It’s not a quality issue, it’s a glass ceiling that classical composers have to find a way to break through.
It works out great for the labels; think of them as the audio equivalent of a “vanity press” (those publishers who will publish a certain number of copies of your book for a fee). But for Dr. Vollrath, these compositions are his “children” and no price is too great in order to see them come of age. He has already released a 2 cd album of piano music and one cd of chamber music for trumpet and horn. I won’t begin to speculate how much these projects cost.
I’ve known many musicians who would play anywhere simply for the joy of sharing their music (gratis). Classical composers are ’up the creek without a paddle’ because they cannot realize their works without the cooperation of other like-minded performers. Either you get really good at writing grants for arts enrichment, playing political games and courting rich patrons or you do what Carl is doing; –focus on the music and do the best that he can. You’ve got to admire someone who has spent a lifetime of disciplined composition for the sheer love of the art, perhaps never knowing when or if the notes on the page will ever be heard. Putting your soul down on manuscript paper because this music that no one else hears is welling up inside you and has to be released. That’s creating art for art’s sake.
For you budding guitar players out there, check out Jack Pribek’s post on harmonic cross-relationships, soloing and stress relief:
“You’ve got to be in to go out and you’ve got to be out to go in”
Protooler did a nice “Preview Review” on Digidesign’s Transfuser. Be sure to read it BEFORE you try the preview!!!
WiretotheEar satisfies those low bass cravings with a great little post about
Finally, things can get a little weird for 3 crazy musicians on the road. (Source -J Coulton) Take a bit of portable technology and some downtime and you end up with this:
Piracy Czar? Are you kidding me? I thought we already had one of those…
According to the 2008 press release archive on the RIAA.org site, the following universities have been targeted for pre-litigation settlement letters.
January 10th: (18 universities)
Arizona State University (33 pre-litigation settlement letters), Bowdoin College (11), California State University, Monterey Bay (25), College of William and Mary (15), Duke University (16), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (19), Mount Holyoke College (15), Rhode Island College (22), Saint Mary’s College of Minnesota (13), Stanford University (15), Texas Christian University (14), University of California, Berkeley (26), University of California, Los Angeles (26), University of Connecticut (25), University of Iowa (24), University of Nebraska-Lincoln (22), University of Texas at Austin (50), and Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University (36).
February 21st: (12 universities)
Boston University (35 pre-litigation settlement letters), Columbia University (50), Drexel University (33), Indiana University (40), North Carolina State University (35), Ohio State University (30), Purdue University (28), Tufts University (20), University of Maine System (32), University of New Hampshire (32), University of Southern California (50), and the University of Virginia (16).
On May 6th, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the PRO-IP Act which strengthens laws against illegal downloading, allows for seizure of property involved in the commission of said crime and gives new enforcement measures to investigators. Billboard.biz quoted David Israelite of the Nat’l Music Publishers Assn:
“This bill will go a long way towards making sure law enforcement agencies have what they need to get the job done,”
According to Mark Hefflinger of DMW Daily, the bill also-
The bill, which passed unanimously in the House Judiciary Committee last week, would also establish a White House-level piracy czar — dubbed the Intellectual Property Enforcement Representative — to coordinate law enforcement activities. (emphasis mine)
David Utter at Webpronews succinctly summed up the situation last year when the act was first getting off the ground:
More bureaucracy, another well-connected insider getting a sweet gig to graze at the taxpayer trough (we’re betting whoever gets the new IP Enforcement Representative job will have a big media background), and absolutely no impact on foreign counterfeiting whatsoever appear to be the salient points of PRO IP.
But Heaven help the first college kid busted under PRO IP for MP3 trading. It’s going to be brutal.
Folks, this is a strong piece of legislation that kicks the Intellectual Property Rights game up a notch; –it’s not just national in scope, it defines an international effort to set up rights and enforcement measures. I predict that given the success the music industry has seen so far, within a year we’ll see an astronomical increase in pre-litigation settlement letter mail-outs. And those won’t just be going to college campuses.
Thanks to Coolfer for this tidbit:
In our music industry survey courses we often refer to “Happy Birthday to You” as being copyrighted when speaking about copyright law. Well, guess what? Your teachers could be wrong. According to a paper by Robert Brauneis, the copyright is:
almost certainly no longer under copyright, due to a lack of evidence about who wrote the words; defective copyright notice; and a failure to file a proper renewal application.
Brauneis, Robert, “Copyright and the World’s Most Popular Song” (March 14, 2008). Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1111624
Additionally, Robert has a website with evidence pertaining to the “Happy Birthday” song.
Here’s an example of a possible musical source dating back to 1875: A Happy New Year’s Song.
MP3
http://docs.law.gwu.edu/facweb/rbrauneis/happybirthday/scores/A_Happy_New_Year.mp3
PDF Score:
http://docs.law.gwu.edu/facweb/rbrauneis/happybirthday/scores/A_Happy_New_Year.pdf
Excellent work by Mr. Brauneis! I’ll sing at your next birthday!
Now if I can just get all a refund of those royalties and sync license fees I’ve paid over the years…
So the Iron Chefs at Digidesign have been cooking up a new virtual instrument plugin and this one’s gotta be designed either for phlebotomists or the Trance Loop/Electronica crowd. Judging from the samples, you beatmakers out there should be well pleased. I was severely disappointed in the example of an Acoustic Piano sound, but impressed at the ultra-modern beats with extra-wide spatial imaging on everything else they listed. Yea, I’m a plug-in junkie and I’ll be downloading this. It will probably be just like the Eleven Plugin; –I’ll fall in love with it and when it expires it will be about $300 more than I think it’s worth. Heck, I could probably find a real acoustic piano (used) for that…but why expect killer piano sounds from a plugin called “Transfuser.” But enough of my sardonic wit, go check it out for yourself.
One more thing, be sure to ignore any “Transfuser” criticism you might hear from Christian Science or Jehovah’s Witness-affiliated websites.
There’s a new widget in town and it’s above the blogroll on the left. I’ve been checking out ReverbNation.com and finally got something to embed on edublogs.org. I found a few friends there (Lynam, Monte, Jack Pribek and Justin) the rest is a bit random.
If it plays without you activating it, please leave a comment… and I’ll disconnect it.
It seems like everyone is posting scenery pics today; –I’m stuck at work and I’m jealous!
Peace,
-j
I don’t Twitter, but this is still cool. I think I posted a link to it many weeks ago. Unfortunately, edublogs is still keeping me from embedding this widget, so you’ll have to visit the page:
http://www.snoopdogg.com/extras/default.aspx/mid/3872
To try it out, you have to know someone’s twitter name; then click on “shizzle your friends’ tweets”.
For example, - Paul and Storm’s twittername = paulandstorm
Jonathan Coulton’s = jonathancoulton
If you’re a rising star, you should think about Twitter because it’s another “buzzing” line of communication between you and your fans. Widgets posted to your webpage can display “Tweets” and you can keep your fans entertained 24/7. Is it a fad? Probably, but like my old boss used to say: “never be the first to discard the old or the last to pick up the new.”
When you’re building bridges, tools can come in quite handy. And any artist that can sell product AND create the “culture/community” among fans that Snoop (and NIN and Radiohead, etc, etc…) should have an honorary MBA on their wall.
Where do you want to be in 5 years? 10 years? Will you be a one-hit-wonder or a cultural icon?
“–Ay, there’s the rub!
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause.”
I’m still in shock; somehow this loss escaped my attention until I read it in this month’s Music Trades magazine. I’ll think of Bill Ludwig Jr. as the father of the school percussion kit. A heck of a lot of professionals owe a debt of gratitude to those big kits. Back in the 1980s, I was fortunate to be able to meet Mr. Bill Sr., Mr. Bill Jr. and Mr. Bill III when they came to the dealer I was working with for a Selmer-Ludwig promotion. Back then, they were experimenting with “offshore” parts production and had some parts defects. Read the rest of this entry »
From www.potluckcon.com:
The Pot Luck Audio Conference is a yearly gathering of people who are passionate about signals, sounds, music, and recordings.
Formerly TapeOpCon, we are now moving into our seventh year. There will be three days of fun and informative workshops and panels. We will be featuring three different working studios, four main panels, and over thirty-two workshops.
Finals start tomorrow and the last possible turn-in date is Tuesday, May 6th at 4 PM.
Don’t risk it! Email is an unreliable choice to turn in final projects. Burn film projects to DVD and make a copy for me. Audio projects can remain on the audio drives in studio A and B. Make copies for yourself if you want it in your portfolio later. If circumstances beyond your control prevent you from making the deadline, go see the department chair and get an OK for an incomplete grade. Then leave me a voice mail or put a note in my mailbox.
In other news, the Branson newspaper is featuring Mr. Pribek in a series of articles. It’s a good read and you can listen to my Pribek CD in my office.
Jack’s blog is here:
For those of you who have Protools, there are two good articles on inexpensive plugins on the Protooler blog. Read “Mixing on a Budget - part I” and “Mixing on a Budget -part II”.
Friday is officially “No Pants Day”; I will not be participating at school and if you’re my student, I urge you not to participate either. (via Listenerd)
Jonathan Coulton has posted a 20 minute Flip video (condensed) of his trip to Seattle and Portland for gigs w/ Paul and Storm. It’s wacky and a fairly entertaining way to waste 20 minutes when you should be studying.
You can read about Marilyn Manson’s sex change on Industrial Addiction (or not).
Metal Martyr hopes you think twice before you get a tattoo (check out the link to badtattoos.com).
Sheplaysmusic lists the Top 10 Bad Girls of Music.
The coolest place in the whole world to intern is still looking for interns. Why doesn’t anyone want to learn a trade anymore?
Finally, juried exams start tomorrow; –if you haven’t already spoken with me about accompanying your jury, then you are too late. It’s not that I can’t do it. It’s better that you learned a lesson about planning ahead.
Peace, folks. Good luck on exams!
-J
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