Jam Report #34: 1/20/02
Jan. 20th, 2002 02:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annathepiperAs originally posted to the OKP. Transcribed to Livejournal 10/7/05.
In which Monica returns, in which Brom joins us to play, in which much amused discussion of weird acts of songs we can commit in other languages occurs, in which we have not only pie but cake as well, and in which we actually get another public take! Songs: "Acres of Clams", "Mari-Mac", "Jolly Butcher", "You Woke Up My Neighborhood", "Trois Navires de Ble", "Goin' Up", "The Chemical Worker's Song".
We didn't have a full group today, and of those of us who were actually here, some of us came in late or left early. However, we did have a majority of us here as well as a potential new jammer. Today's roll call: Anna,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
solarbird (Dara), daspatrick (Patrick) (though Patrick left early), Dana (armed with her guitar RJ, though the guitar mostly just got held), spazzkat (Paul) (periodically), Monica (recovering from recent illness), and brombear (Brom) (though he came really late). kathrynt (Kathryn) was out today due to needing to finish up some silk scarves, and ssha (Cyn) was out due to a couple of friends of hers visiting from out of town.
For whatever reason, we did a lot less chatting during Jam today than usual -- which had the direct result that we actually played SEVEN songs today!
First up on the roster, after the usual dithering around: "Acres of Clams". Our first take was way too slow, and the guitars didn't quite make the chords for "Fisherman's Frolic"; for that matter, neither did the piccolo on account of I hadn't practiced that little piece of music in a while. For the second take, we kicked up the tempo, so the song came out much more sprightly. I'm getting a better idea of what to play during the main body of the song now -- and I rather like the "almost a tin whistle but not quite" sound I'm managing to pull off.
"Mari-Mac" was next for practicing purposes, since Monica was willing to take a stab at singing it. This song we started off way too slow as well, so Monica stopped us and we tried it again faster. During the first take, though,mamishka (Mimi) also finally showed up. Monica called out "hi" to her, and we managed not to stop playing -- smooth, huh? ;)
Mimi came in on her djembe for the second take, and sang as well, which was definitely needed so that we could balance the vocals against the guitars. She had some issues with trying to get all the words in all the places they needed to be in. So we got a sort of random sampling of various parts of the verses, particularly towards the end when we started speeding up. Mimi was very pleased, though, about being able to mostly sing the lyrics AND play her djembe at the same time. Yay Mimi!
We definitely missed Cyn's fiddle part, though. Especially at the end where she cues us on going out all together. On all of our takes, we managed to not quite end at the same time.
Moving on, we went to "Jolly Butcher" next. The beginning of this ditty is high for Mimi's range, and she is also on the tail end of a cold, so singing this was just a trifle rough for her, but she carried it just fine.
Folks seem to like my trill on the tail end of the bridge, so I'll keep that in there, though I need to smooth up the transition back into the main body of the song. And the bridge in general, as well. This time around I was rather variable on that; I managed to hit the high G's a couple of times, but also managed to totally fall out in a place or two in other takes. And on one take I managed to forget the bridge entirely because I thought we were a verse behind. Doh!
For our fourth ditty of the session, I put in a request to do "You Woke Up My Neighborhood", since we hadn't done that one in a while either. Accordingly, Patrick took over the Colonel. We also tried putting the mike in the middle of us -- which definitely brought out Monica's voice on this ditty, which was needed since we had three guitars and my mandolin going on the rhythm line. A new addition to this song wound up being Mimi doing some backup vocals on the second verse, which sounded REALLY good and ethereal against Monica's voice.
We have some group indecision though as to whether Patrick needs to play his little cheesy ending to finish out. Monica turned to him and deadpanned, "You know I'm allergic to cheese, right?" Dara did a nice little flute flourish, though. We may have some conflicting sources of cheese on the tail end of this. ;)
In between songs Dana suggested that we play something in Klingon, which led to Mimi telling the story of the guy that did "My Way" in Klingon, wearing full Klingon garb, at Norwescon -- gotta love science fiction fandom. Furthermore, Dana also told us that a friend of hers claimed to have the Bumblebee Tuna song in FRENCH, and wanted to know if Dana wanted it. "Je t'aime Bumblebee, Bumblebee Tuna, je t'aime Bumblebee, Bumblebee Tuna!" was enough to get us giggling, but once I pointed out that I had multiple dictionaries for various non-English languages (German, French, Norwegian, Irish and Scots Gaelic, and Russian), and once Dara pointed out that she could do Japanese as well, we laughed ourselves silly.
Onward to more Great Big Sea -- and "Trois Navires de Ble". I had a sort of "where the heck did this come from?" moment with this ditty, as I had to remind Monica and Patrick what the strum pattern on this ditty, and that was definitely a switch considering that they've been playing things with strings longer than I have. Of course, my familarity with this strum pattern is derived from it being the first song I learned a decent strum pattern on, after playing it a few thousand times and driving Paul and Mimi crazy... but I digress.
On this song, though, as on "Mari-Mac", we deeply missed the fiddle on the bits where Cyn plays the passages that GBS does in the song. We found out, though, that at least in some places Dara's improvised flute part crosses with that fiddle part -- we were not without music in those bits, thanks to her flute. But we need the fiddle as well.
Brom finally arrived, just as Patrick was leaving early. Brom has not yet officially joined the jamming group, but he's shown up for a few sessions now, and this time he even played with us. If he keeps this up, Fred will no longer be able to exclusively claim the title of "U.S. Navy Sailor".
But because Brom was in fact joining us, we had to take the time to introduce him to the official GBS recording of the next ditty we tried, which was "Goin' Up".
We had a bit of key discussion on this, since we've tried it in both G and D, but we appear to have settled on G as the place where the majority of those of us that sing are comfortable with singing it. We are having a few issues with our voices sounding "heavy" in that key, regardless. There is a certain "lightness" to Alan Doyle's voice as he sings this song, by contrast. We're thinking that the difference is because he's singing in the top of his range and we're singing on the bottom of ours -- unless we take it up an octave, in which case it sounds a bit weird for some of our voices.
I, in the meantime, tried to play my part on both the little mandolin and the big one, wishing to see which one I liked better for this song, and also because I'd never played the big mand in Jam before. As I mentioned both instruments by name, Summer the little mand and Autumn the big one, this led to the natural conclusion that I clearly needed two more instruments to cover Winter and Spring. Which, it was decided, would have to be a bouzouki and an electric mand.
The group verdict, however, was that the little mand was preferred on the song, to give it a necessary added brightness. Monica thinks that if I play the big mand on something I should do something involving fingerwork to stand out more, because at least in our recording, I sound almost indistinguishable from the guitars. I'm a little more twangy, but I still kind of vanish against the guitars. (As a side note, however, I had the startling realization that I do in fact know all the chords for "Goin' Up" on the guitar now, which was my second "when the heck did THAT happen?" moment of the session. Now all I have to do is learn how to play it at speed on that instrument!)
This session also marks the first time we tried this ditty with the bridge -- sort of. We don't actually have Fred back yet, though he's been working on learning the concertina while he's at sea. We really need something on the bridge, though, so imagine if you will three women going "da da da, da da da" through the bridge in rhythm (more or less) to what the lovely and talented Mr. Hallett plays there. This will have to stand us in until Fred's ship gets back in port!
Last, but not least, "The Chemical Worker's Song". We hadn't played this in a long time either, but since we had enough singers for it we gave it a shot. The challenge was having two bodhrans, though, since Brom had showed up with his bass and his bodhran both. Brom did quite well considering this was the first time he'd ever heard this song AND he had to coordinate a rhythm with Mimi.
One fun thing about doing this ditty is that Mimi is doing a more African-flavored rhythm on it than GBS does. This requires a bit of a mental shift for those of us who have the GBS version burned into our brains, but well hey, it works! Mimi had some bodhran issues, though. Her bodhran was a little high, so she got the head wet -- and then it got too low. In fact, the head got a little bubbly because it was TOO wet, so she set it aside to try the djembe instead. Which didn't quite work out. She expressed discontent with the "breathy" sound of the djembe, due to the way her hands hitting the head sounds. This may still remain a bodhran ditty for her.
We weren't quite sure what we were doing in terms of key on this one, either; we tried a couple different keys on a couple different takes. We need to remind ourselves of what the harmony does as well. Still, Brom's voice on the bottom of the register was a welcome addition, due to our general lack of male voices to round out our vocals for most songs.
Everybody liked me hitting a note a fifth above the final one on the end, a thing I picked up from listening to the B'ys' recording over and over. I always come in a measure later since I can't hold the note as long as the lovely and talented Mr. Doyle does, but go figure. The others like it, so.
During this ditty was also when Monica asked on what day of the week Great Big Sea's next show in Seattle will be falling. Informed that this would be a Wednesday, she expressed a bit of consternation as to what to do about the next day. We all told her she should call it sick, and tell them, "I can't come in today! I have Newfies!"
We also discussed the lovely decorative knotwork on the head of Brom's bodhran, which, Brom told us, was done on drums for beginners -- to distract the listeners from how badly one might happen to be playing. ;)
Furthermore, Brom got giggles out of us twice during our review of this session's recording: once by picking up our large stuffed frog named Jed, who also happens to be a hand puppet and having him sing, "It's not easy being green / The color of a Marine...!" And the second time by jumping on the chorus of "You Woke Up My Neighborhood" with "... turn off your stupid car alarm!"
We like Brom. We think we'll keep him.
The pie: strawberry rhubarb. Which was actually left over from last week, but it kept until this one. Furthermore, we also had CAKE, thanks to our housemateimalion (Chris) having popped up yesterday with an angel food cake in hand. Three Good Measures does acknowledge our continued pie-inclined existence; however, we must also put out an official stamp of approval for warm chocolate sauce on angel food cake. Sadly, no strawberries were involved, which would have made it all the more delightful -- but if all goes well this lack should be made up for on my birthday on Wednesday.
And as one final happy note for rounding out the Weekend Before Anna's Birthday Jam, we are pleased to announce a new public take for the listening pleasure of anybody who happens to actually read this. With apologies to Billy Bragg as well as due credit to that gentleman for inspiring us, we now have our version of "You Woke Up My Neighborhood" posted to our Music page. Alternately, check it out right here:
http://www.murkworks.net/~piper/tgm/tgm-neighbourhood-2k2-1-20-t2.mp3
More in two weeks, all,
Anna the Piper
In which Monica returns, in which Brom joins us to play, in which much amused discussion of weird acts of songs we can commit in other languages occurs, in which we have not only pie but cake as well, and in which we actually get another public take! Songs: "Acres of Clams", "Mari-Mac", "Jolly Butcher", "You Woke Up My Neighborhood", "Trois Navires de Ble", "Goin' Up", "The Chemical Worker's Song".
We didn't have a full group today, and of those of us who were actually here, some of us came in late or left early. However, we did have a majority of us here as well as a potential new jammer. Today's roll call: Anna,
solarbird (Dara), daspatrick (Patrick) (though Patrick left early), Dana (armed with her guitar RJ, though the guitar mostly just got held), spazzkat (Paul) (periodically), Monica (recovering from recent illness), and brombear (Brom) (though he came really late). kathrynt (Kathryn) was out today due to needing to finish up some silk scarves, and ssha (Cyn) was out due to a couple of friends of hers visiting from out of town.For whatever reason, we did a lot less chatting during Jam today than usual -- which had the direct result that we actually played SEVEN songs today!
First up on the roster, after the usual dithering around: "Acres of Clams". Our first take was way too slow, and the guitars didn't quite make the chords for "Fisherman's Frolic"; for that matter, neither did the piccolo on account of I hadn't practiced that little piece of music in a while. For the second take, we kicked up the tempo, so the song came out much more sprightly. I'm getting a better idea of what to play during the main body of the song now -- and I rather like the "almost a tin whistle but not quite" sound I'm managing to pull off.
"Mari-Mac" was next for practicing purposes, since Monica was willing to take a stab at singing it. This song we started off way too slow as well, so Monica stopped us and we tried it again faster. During the first take, though,
mamishka (Mimi) also finally showed up. Monica called out "hi" to her, and we managed not to stop playing -- smooth, huh? ;)Mimi came in on her djembe for the second take, and sang as well, which was definitely needed so that we could balance the vocals against the guitars. She had some issues with trying to get all the words in all the places they needed to be in. So we got a sort of random sampling of various parts of the verses, particularly towards the end when we started speeding up. Mimi was very pleased, though, about being able to mostly sing the lyrics AND play her djembe at the same time. Yay Mimi!
We definitely missed Cyn's fiddle part, though. Especially at the end where she cues us on going out all together. On all of our takes, we managed to not quite end at the same time.
Moving on, we went to "Jolly Butcher" next. The beginning of this ditty is high for Mimi's range, and she is also on the tail end of a cold, so singing this was just a trifle rough for her, but she carried it just fine.
Folks seem to like my trill on the tail end of the bridge, so I'll keep that in there, though I need to smooth up the transition back into the main body of the song. And the bridge in general, as well. This time around I was rather variable on that; I managed to hit the high G's a couple of times, but also managed to totally fall out in a place or two in other takes. And on one take I managed to forget the bridge entirely because I thought we were a verse behind. Doh!
For our fourth ditty of the session, I put in a request to do "You Woke Up My Neighborhood", since we hadn't done that one in a while either. Accordingly, Patrick took over the Colonel. We also tried putting the mike in the middle of us -- which definitely brought out Monica's voice on this ditty, which was needed since we had three guitars and my mandolin going on the rhythm line. A new addition to this song wound up being Mimi doing some backup vocals on the second verse, which sounded REALLY good and ethereal against Monica's voice.
We have some group indecision though as to whether Patrick needs to play his little cheesy ending to finish out. Monica turned to him and deadpanned, "You know I'm allergic to cheese, right?" Dara did a nice little flute flourish, though. We may have some conflicting sources of cheese on the tail end of this. ;)
In between songs Dana suggested that we play something in Klingon, which led to Mimi telling the story of the guy that did "My Way" in Klingon, wearing full Klingon garb, at Norwescon -- gotta love science fiction fandom. Furthermore, Dana also told us that a friend of hers claimed to have the Bumblebee Tuna song in FRENCH, and wanted to know if Dana wanted it. "Je t'aime Bumblebee, Bumblebee Tuna, je t'aime Bumblebee, Bumblebee Tuna!" was enough to get us giggling, but once I pointed out that I had multiple dictionaries for various non-English languages (German, French, Norwegian, Irish and Scots Gaelic, and Russian), and once Dara pointed out that she could do Japanese as well, we laughed ourselves silly.
Onward to more Great Big Sea -- and "Trois Navires de Ble". I had a sort of "where the heck did this come from?" moment with this ditty, as I had to remind Monica and Patrick what the strum pattern on this ditty, and that was definitely a switch considering that they've been playing things with strings longer than I have. Of course, my familarity with this strum pattern is derived from it being the first song I learned a decent strum pattern on, after playing it a few thousand times and driving Paul and Mimi crazy... but I digress.
On this song, though, as on "Mari-Mac", we deeply missed the fiddle on the bits where Cyn plays the passages that GBS does in the song. We found out, though, that at least in some places Dara's improvised flute part crosses with that fiddle part -- we were not without music in those bits, thanks to her flute. But we need the fiddle as well.
Brom finally arrived, just as Patrick was leaving early. Brom has not yet officially joined the jamming group, but he's shown up for a few sessions now, and this time he even played with us. If he keeps this up, Fred will no longer be able to exclusively claim the title of "U.S. Navy Sailor".
But because Brom was in fact joining us, we had to take the time to introduce him to the official GBS recording of the next ditty we tried, which was "Goin' Up".
We had a bit of key discussion on this, since we've tried it in both G and D, but we appear to have settled on G as the place where the majority of those of us that sing are comfortable with singing it. We are having a few issues with our voices sounding "heavy" in that key, regardless. There is a certain "lightness" to Alan Doyle's voice as he sings this song, by contrast. We're thinking that the difference is because he's singing in the top of his range and we're singing on the bottom of ours -- unless we take it up an octave, in which case it sounds a bit weird for some of our voices.
I, in the meantime, tried to play my part on both the little mandolin and the big one, wishing to see which one I liked better for this song, and also because I'd never played the big mand in Jam before. As I mentioned both instruments by name, Summer the little mand and Autumn the big one, this led to the natural conclusion that I clearly needed two more instruments to cover Winter and Spring. Which, it was decided, would have to be a bouzouki and an electric mand.
The group verdict, however, was that the little mand was preferred on the song, to give it a necessary added brightness. Monica thinks that if I play the big mand on something I should do something involving fingerwork to stand out more, because at least in our recording, I sound almost indistinguishable from the guitars. I'm a little more twangy, but I still kind of vanish against the guitars. (As a side note, however, I had the startling realization that I do in fact know all the chords for "Goin' Up" on the guitar now, which was my second "when the heck did THAT happen?" moment of the session. Now all I have to do is learn how to play it at speed on that instrument!)
This session also marks the first time we tried this ditty with the bridge -- sort of. We don't actually have Fred back yet, though he's been working on learning the concertina while he's at sea. We really need something on the bridge, though, so imagine if you will three women going "da da da, da da da" through the bridge in rhythm (more or less) to what the lovely and talented Mr. Hallett plays there. This will have to stand us in until Fred's ship gets back in port!
Last, but not least, "The Chemical Worker's Song". We hadn't played this in a long time either, but since we had enough singers for it we gave it a shot. The challenge was having two bodhrans, though, since Brom had showed up with his bass and his bodhran both. Brom did quite well considering this was the first time he'd ever heard this song AND he had to coordinate a rhythm with Mimi.
One fun thing about doing this ditty is that Mimi is doing a more African-flavored rhythm on it than GBS does. This requires a bit of a mental shift for those of us who have the GBS version burned into our brains, but well hey, it works! Mimi had some bodhran issues, though. Her bodhran was a little high, so she got the head wet -- and then it got too low. In fact, the head got a little bubbly because it was TOO wet, so she set it aside to try the djembe instead. Which didn't quite work out. She expressed discontent with the "breathy" sound of the djembe, due to the way her hands hitting the head sounds. This may still remain a bodhran ditty for her.
We weren't quite sure what we were doing in terms of key on this one, either; we tried a couple different keys on a couple different takes. We need to remind ourselves of what the harmony does as well. Still, Brom's voice on the bottom of the register was a welcome addition, due to our general lack of male voices to round out our vocals for most songs.
Everybody liked me hitting a note a fifth above the final one on the end, a thing I picked up from listening to the B'ys' recording over and over. I always come in a measure later since I can't hold the note as long as the lovely and talented Mr. Doyle does, but go figure. The others like it, so.
During this ditty was also when Monica asked on what day of the week Great Big Sea's next show in Seattle will be falling. Informed that this would be a Wednesday, she expressed a bit of consternation as to what to do about the next day. We all told her she should call it sick, and tell them, "I can't come in today! I have Newfies!"
We also discussed the lovely decorative knotwork on the head of Brom's bodhran, which, Brom told us, was done on drums for beginners -- to distract the listeners from how badly one might happen to be playing. ;)
Furthermore, Brom got giggles out of us twice during our review of this session's recording: once by picking up our large stuffed frog named Jed, who also happens to be a hand puppet and having him sing, "It's not easy being green / The color of a Marine...!" And the second time by jumping on the chorus of "You Woke Up My Neighborhood" with "... turn off your stupid car alarm!"
We like Brom. We think we'll keep him.
The pie: strawberry rhubarb. Which was actually left over from last week, but it kept until this one. Furthermore, we also had CAKE, thanks to our housemate
imalion (Chris) having popped up yesterday with an angel food cake in hand. Three Good Measures does acknowledge our continued pie-inclined existence; however, we must also put out an official stamp of approval for warm chocolate sauce on angel food cake. Sadly, no strawberries were involved, which would have made it all the more delightful -- but if all goes well this lack should be made up for on my birthday on Wednesday.And as one final happy note for rounding out the Weekend Before Anna's Birthday Jam, we are pleased to announce a new public take for the listening pleasure of anybody who happens to actually read this. With apologies to Billy Bragg as well as due credit to that gentleman for inspiring us, we now have our version of "You Woke Up My Neighborhood" posted to our Music page. Alternately, check it out right here:
http://www.murkworks.net/~piper/tgm/tgm-neighbourhood-2k2-1-20-t2.mp3
More in two weeks, all,
Anna the Piper