Jam Report #11: 5/20/01
May. 20th, 2001 03:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annathepiperAs originally posted to the OKP. Transcribed to Livejournal 10/2/05.
All three guitars back for once; Kathryn and Cyn sing harmony on "Jolly Butcher"; I sing lead on "Old Black Rum", and the guitars have adventures with capos; talky version of "Mari-Mac", and Cyn joins in on fiddle, and Monica escapes certain death. Songs: "Jolly Butcher", "Old Black Rum", "Mari-Mac", "Little Beggarman".
Finally, after interruptions of both a personal nature and a public one, the Murkworks Jammers got back together this weekend! And we have to say that it all went rather swimmingly.
For one thing, we had![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
daspatrick (Patrick) back finally -- the boy's been tied up trying to get his pre-graduation work done -- and the biggest attendance we've had some time, even aside from him. So we had all three guitars, Patrick, Monica, and spazzkat (Paul); kathrynt (Kathryn) and ssha (Cyn) to sing; and solarbird (Dara) and me on the flutes. Furthermore, this session was also notable in that we did four songs and spent a considerable amount of time on all of them as well.
First up -- "Jolly Butcher". We're getting significant improvement here, in terms of keeping the tempo and all of us playing together. Kathryn and Cyn played with harmony on the chorus, which sounded quite delicious, and they're also both extremely fond of Alan's version of how to close up the last verse when the B'ys sing it live in concert. I'm still having problems with the highest notes on the bridge, though, at least when we play it up to speed. The transitions from F sharp up to G and down again are tying my fingers up in knots.
Furthermore, Patrick played around with some variations on this ditty that have a great amount of promise. More on this later.
Second -- "Old Black Rum". Okay I lied, Kathryn and Cyn weren't the only singers. I <really tiny font> sang lead on this one </really tiny font>, and the others are swearing up and down I did a good job of it. I already kind of knew I could sing this one and could also do it sort of growling out the lyrics like Alan does -- but I'd never actually tried to sing it with the group before. Nor had I ever really tried to sing lead on anything with the group before, for that matter. I don't quite have the breath control down, or the ability to sing from my diaphragm, to carry this song all the way through... but apparently I had it at least down a bit better than I'd thought, since on the latter few takes I more or less managed to fake my way through it. Especially with Kathryn showing me breath tricks, which we'll have to work more with later.
Maybe I'll channel Alan better if I sing this one with a Guinness in my hand. For right now I'm not sure whether I was channeling Alan more than I was channeling Elvis -- since I punch a lot of the higher notes the way Elvis used to, so I can actually reach them. I told Kathryn about this and she says that's called 'planting', what I was trying to do by thinking 'down' and bending my knees a little to actually make it up to the C that this ditty starts off on. All I know right now is, my throat doesn't hurt nearly as much as I thought it would have after going through "Old Black Rum" several times. I must be doing something right. I hope. :)
Two out of three guitars slapped capos on, so they could play D, A, and G, while Patrick stuck with the Real Chords(TM), F, C, and B flat. There's some debate about whether Paul and Monica should actually un-capo and Patrick should capo, since they're overpowering him.
Kathryn is also having an incredibly good time belting out "ON HER HAIR!" on the second verse. She claims this is because she should do what she's good at. Me, I'm happy we hit some good chords on the "HEY" in "HEY, will I live for another day?" part of the chorus.
Third -- "Mari Mac", by Paul's request. The most giggly bit of this section of the show was Monica continuing the trend of Variations on Great Big Sea, by improving an entire slow talky-blues version of the song. We determined that song takes bloody forever when you slow down the tempo to talky-blues range, BUT, we also determined that we are actually comfortable enough playing with one another that we can actually manage to improvise an entire song that way. ;)
Today marked the first time we actually tried to bring Cyn in on the fiddle on "Mari Mac" as well, after she and Kathryn tried to pick out what Bob does at the beginning of the recording. I said to Monica that we should try to transcribe out all of Bob's fiddle parts, but we were both a bit dubious about whether that was in fact possible, and whether the world would end if we tried to crack the Mystery That is Bob.
We still have some tempo issues on "Mari Mac", as well as lyrics issues, but we're getting a more solid idea of where the tempo does actually need to speed up.
Somewhere in between takes Patrick launched into some more of his usual filler -- in this particular instance, Boston chords. We told him WRONG BAND, but then Monica did observe that "y'know, there's NOT that much ocean between Boston and St. John's," for which we did not actually kill Monica, since we like Monica, and besides she is the Person in Charge of Keeping the Tempo on "Mari Mac".
Towards the end of "Mari Mac" I looked at my watch and realized it was ten minutes after four, so then we lost Patrick since he had to go meet his lab partner. BUT! We decided we weren't quite done yet, so on to--
Fourth -- "Little Beggarman", which is already sort of a variant as we're doing it, since our version isn't bearing much resemblance to how the B'ys sing it, either in concert or on disc. But the guitarists are having fun with it, and we did a couple of good takes, and we did find the lyrics Kathryn needed. I'm not happy with my twiddles on this one yet since I don't know the song well enough, and I can't actually sing it yet with Kathryn and Cyn since I do not actually know the lyrics. Doh!
The pie -- dutch apple, again. Back to the classics, in honor of us actually playing together again for the first time in weeks.
Next time will have to be after Folklife, as next week a friend of mine and Dara's from Norway is coming to visit, and bringing her three-year-old child with her. So we plan to be spending most if not all of that weekend keeping tiny hands out of portions of the Murkworks where they should not be. The rest of the weekend will be spent soaking in the glory that is Folklife, and if I am particularly lucky, I will <drumroll> FIND A MANDOLIN OR A BOUZOUKI! Approving noises were made by the group when I announced my intention to do this, so hopefully I will actually be able to contribute more than one instrument to the mix soon.
And lest you all forgot that we started this in the hopes of getting something worthy of submitting to the Kitchen Tapes -- we haven't forgotten yet. We are, however, getting significantly better... and significantly closer to getting at least a couple of these songs to a point where we'll be willing to share what we're doing with the rest of you. Watch this space for further details!
Cheers,
Anna the Piper
All three guitars back for once; Kathryn and Cyn sing harmony on "Jolly Butcher"; I sing lead on "Old Black Rum", and the guitars have adventures with capos; talky version of "Mari-Mac", and Cyn joins in on fiddle, and Monica escapes certain death. Songs: "Jolly Butcher", "Old Black Rum", "Mari-Mac", "Little Beggarman".
Finally, after interruptions of both a personal nature and a public one, the Murkworks Jammers got back together this weekend! And we have to say that it all went rather swimmingly.
For one thing, we had
daspatrick (Patrick) back finally -- the boy's been tied up trying to get his pre-graduation work done -- and the biggest attendance we've had some time, even aside from him. So we had all three guitars, Patrick, Monica, and spazzkat (Paul); kathrynt (Kathryn) and ssha (Cyn) to sing; and solarbird (Dara) and me on the flutes. Furthermore, this session was also notable in that we did four songs and spent a considerable amount of time on all of them as well.First up -- "Jolly Butcher". We're getting significant improvement here, in terms of keeping the tempo and all of us playing together. Kathryn and Cyn played with harmony on the chorus, which sounded quite delicious, and they're also both extremely fond of Alan's version of how to close up the last verse when the B'ys sing it live in concert. I'm still having problems with the highest notes on the bridge, though, at least when we play it up to speed. The transitions from F sharp up to G and down again are tying my fingers up in knots.
Furthermore, Patrick played around with some variations on this ditty that have a great amount of promise. More on this later.
Second -- "Old Black Rum". Okay I lied, Kathryn and Cyn weren't the only singers. I <really tiny font> sang lead on this one </really tiny font>, and the others are swearing up and down I did a good job of it. I already kind of knew I could sing this one and could also do it sort of growling out the lyrics like Alan does -- but I'd never actually tried to sing it with the group before. Nor had I ever really tried to sing lead on anything with the group before, for that matter. I don't quite have the breath control down, or the ability to sing from my diaphragm, to carry this song all the way through... but apparently I had it at least down a bit better than I'd thought, since on the latter few takes I more or less managed to fake my way through it. Especially with Kathryn showing me breath tricks, which we'll have to work more with later.
Maybe I'll channel Alan better if I sing this one with a Guinness in my hand. For right now I'm not sure whether I was channeling Alan more than I was channeling Elvis -- since I punch a lot of the higher notes the way Elvis used to, so I can actually reach them. I told Kathryn about this and she says that's called 'planting', what I was trying to do by thinking 'down' and bending my knees a little to actually make it up to the C that this ditty starts off on. All I know right now is, my throat doesn't hurt nearly as much as I thought it would have after going through "Old Black Rum" several times. I must be doing something right. I hope. :)
Two out of three guitars slapped capos on, so they could play D, A, and G, while Patrick stuck with the Real Chords(TM), F, C, and B flat. There's some debate about whether Paul and Monica should actually un-capo and Patrick should capo, since they're overpowering him.
Kathryn is also having an incredibly good time belting out "ON HER HAIR!" on the second verse. She claims this is because she should do what she's good at. Me, I'm happy we hit some good chords on the "HEY" in "HEY, will I live for another day?" part of the chorus.
Third -- "Mari Mac", by Paul's request. The most giggly bit of this section of the show was Monica continuing the trend of Variations on Great Big Sea, by improving an entire slow talky-blues version of the song. We determined that song takes bloody forever when you slow down the tempo to talky-blues range, BUT, we also determined that we are actually comfortable enough playing with one another that we can actually manage to improvise an entire song that way. ;)
Today marked the first time we actually tried to bring Cyn in on the fiddle on "Mari Mac" as well, after she and Kathryn tried to pick out what Bob does at the beginning of the recording. I said to Monica that we should try to transcribe out all of Bob's fiddle parts, but we were both a bit dubious about whether that was in fact possible, and whether the world would end if we tried to crack the Mystery That is Bob.
We still have some tempo issues on "Mari Mac", as well as lyrics issues, but we're getting a more solid idea of where the tempo does actually need to speed up.
Somewhere in between takes Patrick launched into some more of his usual filler -- in this particular instance, Boston chords. We told him WRONG BAND, but then Monica did observe that "y'know, there's NOT that much ocean between Boston and St. John's," for which we did not actually kill Monica, since we like Monica, and besides she is the Person in Charge of Keeping the Tempo on "Mari Mac".
Towards the end of "Mari Mac" I looked at my watch and realized it was ten minutes after four, so then we lost Patrick since he had to go meet his lab partner. BUT! We decided we weren't quite done yet, so on to--
Fourth -- "Little Beggarman", which is already sort of a variant as we're doing it, since our version isn't bearing much resemblance to how the B'ys sing it, either in concert or on disc. But the guitarists are having fun with it, and we did a couple of good takes, and we did find the lyrics Kathryn needed. I'm not happy with my twiddles on this one yet since I don't know the song well enough, and I can't actually sing it yet with Kathryn and Cyn since I do not actually know the lyrics. Doh!
The pie -- dutch apple, again. Back to the classics, in honor of us actually playing together again for the first time in weeks.
Next time will have to be after Folklife, as next week a friend of mine and Dara's from Norway is coming to visit, and bringing her three-year-old child with her. So we plan to be spending most if not all of that weekend keeping tiny hands out of portions of the Murkworks where they should not be. The rest of the weekend will be spent soaking in the glory that is Folklife, and if I am particularly lucky, I will <drumroll> FIND A MANDOLIN OR A BOUZOUKI! Approving noises were made by the group when I announced my intention to do this, so hopefully I will actually be able to contribute more than one instrument to the mix soon.
And lest you all forgot that we started this in the hopes of getting something worthy of submitting to the Kitchen Tapes -- we haven't forgotten yet. We are, however, getting significantly better... and significantly closer to getting at least a couple of these songs to a point where we'll be willing to share what we're doing with the rest of you. Watch this space for further details!
Cheers,
Anna the Piper