The Story So Far...

Just a quick check-in by way of an update, and all that whatnottery:

• The "Surfing on the Moon" gig at Madhatter went reasonably well, even considering the pounding in my ears and the brand new bald spots at the sides of my head which resulted from four weeks of programming and about...um...two days of actual "rehearsing" prior to the event.  This was a great experiment which proved to me the following:  
1. My silly little pop tunes can be arranged to be played on sequencers and sound pretty good in public.
2. The brand new silly little pop tunes that I hope to put on the next Tool Factory Project album actually work as songs and ought to make for a dandy CD, and it should be less of an uphill battle to record them with most of the backing tracks already programmed into machines (the big payoff from those four weeks of programming, I guess.  My hair will grow back...).  Expect more news on this as it develops.
3. For them what's interested in seeing some quicky vid captures of the event, hie thee away to my Griff Makes Music page on Facebook:  Griff Makes Music on Facebook
• Caught an amazing lecture by Nicolas Collins at the U of M School of Music yesterday afternoon on the subject of digital vs. analog technology in the production of electronic music.  Nicolas is the author of an enjoyable and inspiring book on hands-on electronic music making titled "Handmade Electronic Music: the Art of Hardware Hacking", which I highly recommend.  His work is largely devoted to abstract sound art (including large-scale sound installations and that sort of thing) and it was encouraging to hear some examples of his work and be reminded yet again that the world of music composition is a completely open field where nearly anything that's possible is viable in some context.  I was particularly amused by Collins' comment that, when he referred to himself as a "musician and composer" he would invariably encounter individuals who, after a performance, would feel it their duty to say something along the lines of, "yeah, but that's not music."  Since he's become a "sound artist", he has yet to have anyone tell him what he's doing "isn't sound."  Brilliant, that.
• Speaking of electronic music, work proceeds apace for my lecture/performance at the Merriam Park Library on April 24th titled "A Century of Electronic Music."  As I've been researching for this presentation, I've been gobsmacked by the reality of just how incredibly vast this field is, and I'm hoping that in the course of a two-hour program I can give enough of a taste of the high points to inspire some folks to dig in and learn more about this subject on their own.  The more I read about it and the more I listen to electronic music, the more excited I am about producing more abstract music myself.  For more info on the program at Merriam Park, see the list of upcoming events at the bottom of this page.
• On the subject of abstract music, my friend Richard Cretan (who writes the "Glebe Cow Drooled" blog) recently clued me into the work of Morton Feldman, about whom I had previously been ignorant, and now I'm a huge fan.  Amazing the kinds of textures and emotions that can be evoked when one steps away from conventional concepts of rhythm, melody, phrasing and counterpoint.  Of particular interest to me is the recording of his "Piano and String Quartet" produced by the Kronos Quartet with Aki Takahashi on piano.  Mesmerizing piece of music of over an hour in length that is at once both disturbing and surprisingly calming.  Wonderful stuff.
• Finally, just today I made the first test burn of my new Renaissance lute CD, which I finished editing yesterday.  I'm fairly happy with the performances and the selection of material (mostly Scottish, a little bit English, and one or two pieces from Germany and France), and I'm looking forward to finally getting a master done once I've fooled about with the sound wrap, program order and so on.  Then it's off to the duplicators and on to the promotional gigs.  It will be fun to have my performing life center around the lute again for a time while my studio life gets back into the realm of oscillators, filters, and knob-twisting.  It's all good, baby!

If you're reading this for the first time or the fiftieth time, please check out my current palate of recorded material, available from CD Baby, iTunes, Amazon.com and just about everywhere else on the WWW.  Click on the little pictures at the left to go to the CD Baby page, where you can hear sound samples, read endless shameless self-promotional banter and, hopefully, make a purchase or two.

Until next time, eat your veggies, be nice to critters and trees, and for heaven's sake, hang up that danged phone when you're driving!

Be excellent to yourselves...

Rick