Musical miscellany

Bill Evans' Symbiosis album is a most recent discovery of mine (discovered in my hard drive, that is...I don't know why I had never listened to it before). It's definitely not your usual Bill Evans stuff (that is, piano trio on standards and originals), but it is instead more "third stream" jazz...(for a definition, see Wikipedia's entry on it.) If jazz or classical music is your kind of thing, this is definitely an album to check out. Recently I've been working with a colleague on some piano duet music for an upcoming event. In preparing for it, I realized that I haven't worked on 'legitimate' music for quite a while indeed. That is, by 'legitimate' I mean stuff with a more classical bent. I mean, it's just an arrangement of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik and the overture from Rossini's Barber of Seville, and it's not super-difficult so it's not really hard core or anything, but it's great nevertheless to get back into stuff where I have to sit down and grind away at some parts. One thing about playing jazz for so long is that I'm finding my chops are deteriorating; my fingers are definitely not as fast as they were four years ago. Maybe I should start working more on stuff like this. The duo work is good also because it's just plain fun to make music with people. It's why I've been a band geek for as long as I've had the opportunity, in the end it's a lot of fun. This is relatively unexplored territory for me, and I like it; maybe I should keep my eyes open for duo opportunities in the future. As for my usual jazz trio work, I think it's time to go in for another lesson or something...we've found lately that we're settling into a routine, playing the same old stuff the same old ways. It's fun and all, and it doesn't sound bad, but I think I've definitely got to keep on doing that growth thing. Two things I've noticied: Improvisation, and solo piano work. One is kinda linked to the other, because in the end I think it boils down to having a few new tricks up my sleeve. What I tend to play seems to be very diatonic (probably a product of classical background); I need to incorporate more chromaticism into my lines and such. Plus when we're doing stuff that's sparse (Miles' Blue in Green, if I'm playing a ballad by myself, etc.) the texture seems kind of thin and bland. I think I need some techniques to broaden the sound that I get out of the piano. Anyway, that was a rather long and probably uninteresting music-rant. Maybe I'll write more tomorrow, I should probably turn in now, considering I have a fluid mech midterm in 8 hours... ...32 days until Germany!

Blinding flash of the obvious, and no rest for the weary (wicked?)

So I was sitting uncomfortably at my desk here in dorm, on my desk chair whose back had fallen off, and is just generally not fun to work in. Then it hits me, a blinding flash of the obvious. I am working on a laptop computer. Suffice to say that I am now sitting on my bed and it's infinitely more comfortable. This is a much more tolerable working state. I think I'll have to do this more often. Ergonomic epiphanies aside, this is shaping up to be an....eventful week. The musical finished off yesterday; it was a pretty good run. I didn't exactly play super-brilliantly, but considering the limited span of time and such that the band was together for it, it sounded pretty good. So we struck the set, and eschewing all sensibility and rationality, I went to the cast party, disregarding the fact that I had a midterm the next day. Originally I had intended to stay briefly, maybe have a drink, and chat with people. Suffice it to say that it did not go that way at all, and that there are tales of debauchery that cannot and should not be repeated in any company. Good news though is that the midterm went better than I expected given that I studied for about 20 minutes before the cast party. Writing a paper now, that's due Friday...I have a decent list of publications to reference so I should not have too too much trouble with this. But yea, I should probably get to it, consdering that I have 2 midterms on Friday to study for.

Montreal and Musicals

Montreal is a pretty nice city. I think that I could possibly live there -- the city has a pretty good vibe, and nothing about it really offends me. Other than the rampant smoking everywhere. That was somewhat excessive. Out of all the cities I've visited thus far though, it's right up there with home (past and present), in that I think that I could really settle there. Either way it's a cool place to visit, especially for something like this. Twelve hours 'til opening show of the rez musical this year, "Best Little Whorehouse in Texas"! It's been a mad dash to get ready; about this time 3 weeks ago I barely had a band to play with (ie it was just me and the director), and now with our combined efforts we have a full rhythm section and a couple of horns. It's sounding pretty good! Getting ready has somewhat been to blame for my lack of blogging; what with school and music and Montreal and so many other things going on at once, I've barely had time to just relax. Next week though...there's always next week. Hard to believe that in a month and a half, I'll be on a plane to Germany!

String music and cognitive dissonance

I don't know why, but lately I've really been into string music. Specifically, bowed instruments. I have never really been into listening to them in general; I didn't particularly dislike them but I always tended to focus my listening to piano repetoire, and when jazz came along, jazz pianists and small groups. But somehow along the way, I really started digging the sound of the string instruments. Though contrary to classical convention, for now at least I like the vibrato to be a bit more restrained than customary. While vibrato does add depth to the tone (visually I can see a warm tone filling the room), there is also something to be said for a more stark, austere tone I think (where it's a focused column of light as opposed to a lightbulb, to continue the visual analogy). Perhaps it's a reflection of my pianist sensibilities. Though, once in a while I find myself unconsciously shaking my finger while holding down a note, as if to 'fake' a vibrato effect. Regardless, I'm diggin' the string music -- not just in the classical realm, but also some Stefan Grappelli (jazz violinist), some covers of popular tunes by string ensembles (no, not just Metallica, it's overdone and a prof here does that with his group String Theory :P), and even some prog-bluegrass by Bela Fleck, virtuoso banjoist. An interesting thing that happens in my dichotomy between engineer and musician is sometimes I just feel like I'm more attuned to one than the other, at a particular time. I was playing horrible at rehearsal tonight -- horrible! But yet I came back and did some pretty good work on my homework, and I just felt on the ball with it. On other days it might be reverse, I could be the most scatterbrained when it comes to coursework but play pretty well. It's not particularly a 'left-brain/right-brain' thing, because really, I find music to be analytical as well, and a very beautiful theory in physics or concept in mathematics is as much art as science. I wonder if there's a mechanism for deciding when I'm "off" one thing and "on" another.

Glimpse into Matt's cave

Yes, I am a power nerd. One of the first things I do with my new digicam, is to take a test picture -- what of? Of my desk setup. Specifically, note the dual monitor display that's running off the laptop, multiple empty caffeine cups, and general messiness. Yeeha!