Music - Improv - Trek Across the Desert

The final posting for May, 2023!

This is relatively long, and toward the end I went crazy with the pitch bend, because, why not?

Music - Improv - Sneaking Around

Did I just post that I felt like I noodled around a lot in the previous post Pay in Advance?

This is a slower version of that kind of noodling around the same rhythmic bass.

Music - Improv - Pay in Advance

I'm going to guess that I used to sit down and play something like this a lot, just sort of noodling around.

It almost didn't make the cut because it's pretty raw, timing-wise. But I managed to listen all the way through the long meandering bits. And I feel like I wouldn't mind sitting down in the future and just noodling around like this.

Music - Improv - The Ether is Real

It starts our mellow but then I went in for a lot of 60's synth bleeps and blurps which are reasonably well integrated musically ... I think ...

Music - Improv - Property Theft

I feel like this one was inspired by Tangerine Dream's soundtrack for Thief, hence the name!

I saw Tangerine Dream live in Concert at the Irvine Meadows. Holy moly those dudes have a lot of gear.

Music - Improv - Flight and Landing

This is pretty simple and chill. A little bit of filtering fun with a rhythmic bass.

Music - Improv - Midnight Seduction

Hey! It's another one with my little motif in it.

Also - I think this is kind of cool - I'm playing the arpeggiator like an instrument, changing the chords (sometimes down to just one note) as I play the melody.

Music - Improv - Humdinger

I'm running out of stuff to say about each piece.

Music - Improv - Tension Headache

Short fun with pitch sweeps.

Music - Improv - Swirls

Fun playing along with an arpeggiator.

Sounds like two passes to me.

Music - Improv - Sunrise - Long

This is a long piece based on my little motif.

I love to fool around with this when I sit down at the keyboard.   

Music - Improv - Sunrise - Short

I have a little motif I like to fool with.

This is a short piece based on it.

Music - Improv - Stomach Gurgling

I posted this one ... somewhere ... sometime ... in the past ... and a dude mashed it up with two other pieces! 

His post: http://groovytimewithdjuseo.blogspot.com/2008/01/stomach-churner-smeske-vs-ceolceili-vs.html 

Ah, bummer! 

The place he posted his mashup went off-line.  Maybe it's in the internet archive somewhere.

 

Music - Improv - Trapese Artist

More analog funk.

Music - Improv - The Anal Probe

I think I'd just read a book about alien abductions when I named this one.

Lots of analog goofing in this one.

Music - Improv - Pea Shooter

Oh my, happy music!

Music - Improv - Flying Home

Sometimes I wonder how some of these would sound if a real pro arranged them.  This is one of those. Someday I might hire someone (a real pro) to transcribe one for orchestra just to see.  Luckily I know someone who is great at it.  :)

Music - Improv - Space Wine

Contemplative! One pass with multiple keyboards.

Music - Improv - Soaring

Who doesn't like white noise passed through a modulating low pass filter?  And some pitch bend too!

Music - Improv - Short Sketch

This one was an experiment with unstructured music done in two or three passes.

For some reason this one sticks with me.

ChatGPT - Negatory

This fabulous article explains clearly how what chatGPT does is statistical but without understanding, using negation as a definitive example. 

Music - More (or less)

When I started posted music I noticed it wouldn't always show up in my feed!

I did some very good googling and found this post that describes the problem.

Apparently large assets (jpgs or music) result in the page preview timing out and that post gets skipped.

The fix ... put "<!-- more -->" in your post (in HTML editing mode) before the big asset and the previewer will stop rendering and avoid the timeout.  (I thought, that's a comment, not a command, but people do add meta data into comments, and this worked, so ...)

So my music posts now have the music after the "more" comment.

Music - Improv - Mid Afternoon Hike

Back when I lived in Irvine there were empty fields.  Most of it is filled in with houses now, me thinks.  I would head out for a hike in the hills which seemed like a good idea when I started but then the sun came out and it got hot and miserable on the way back.

Somehow this piece represents that!

Music - Improv - Pacing is Everything

Most of these are mildly interesting, again, because of the improv-ness of them.

For some reason I like this one more than average.

 

Music - Improv - Orbiting

Slow analog improv in one pass.

Music - Improv - Mystic Sword

Another one done in one pass! I think the auto-chord on the tiny Yamaha keyboard would keep going after I'd poked at it with a new chord.

Music - Improv - Hack and Slash

This one also very analog sounding but with some digital overtones, probably from the D-50.

Music - Improv - Dance with a Polygon

Another one with a heavy 60's funky synth vibe.  This was clearly done in one pass with a decent drum machine.

Music - Improv - Coffee from Corfu

Another one somewhat in the style of Perrey and Kingsley with a bit of Dick Hyman thrown in.  I think the cheesy drums were from the Yamaha micro-keyboard.

Music - Improv - Warble Spit

There were some dudes in the 60s who made early synth music and it was mostly very electronic as opposed to the more refined Wendy Carlos approach.

They were Perrey and Kingsley.

Nowadays they are most famous for composing the original music for the Main Street Electrical Parade.

Some of these improv pieces are in their style - and this is one of them.

Music - Improv - March from Hell

This one uses a lot of the Yamaha Portasound mini-keyboard with drum kit.

When I say "improvised", I mean "fooled around for an hour and then hit record."

Music - Improv - Machine Symptoms II

In this one I think I wanted to fool with after-touch.

Music - Improv - Machine Symptoms I

This piece uses the arpeggiator, some MIDI loops, and an improvised melody.    

Music - Improv - Cloud Cover

The thing I wanted to do in this one was succeed in using the pitch bend.  I think it works.

At first I thought this must have been done in two passes, because I would need three hands:  one for the chords, one for the pitch bend wheel, and one for the melody.  But as I listened I realized I stop playing chords during the pitch bend moments.  Woohoo!  One pass.

Music - Improv - Burning Sun

First in a series of music posts in April! (See note from the future here.)

In April I'll be posting about 30 tracks I've made over the years.

My feeling is this piece was done in one pass into a 4-track cassette deck (MT44).

Music - Overview

My plan for April was to post a song a day.  As you can tell from the leaderboard, I posted zero things in April.

I have about 65 tunes I have composed over the years.  Well, composed is an overstatement - most of them are improv pieces done for a 4-track cassette deck.

(Picture from here.)

I loved that thing.

Most of my music is not particularly interesting except that most of it is improvised on the fly.  In some cases with one take, in other cases two passes on the 4-track, and in some cases, multiple passes with mixdowns from two or three tracks into one.  In some cases an arpeggiator fills things out.

The instruments varied: the D-50 had the best and phatest sound.  But I also had a "Yamaha Portasound" mini keyboard that I used way too much.

Previously I thought that even though it is May I could still post one song a day in April!  This would be done by setting the publish date back in time!  But all I did was DDOS myself with work, trying to cram in all of April and continuing with May.  So instead, April will be blank.