Jam Report #78--Needs More Brains Edition
Jul. 14th, 2008 10:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annathepiperIn which summer schedules give us a somewhat reduced group, but in which we nevertheless have extremely tasty key lime pie; in which we play "Mari-Mac" faster than Great Big Sea, which is to say, way too damned fast; in which we explore how to up the zombie quotient in a zombie shanty; and in which we throw in some frog lyrics for good measure. Songs: "Chemical Worker's Song (Process Man)", "The Shanty Formerly Known as General Taylor", "The Clockwork Waltz", "Mari-Mac", "Hot Frogs on the Loose", "Pirate Bill and Squidly", "Captain Kidd".
Everybody in the jamming group these days has busy enough schedules that it's anybody's guess as to who will get to show up on any given date. However, we still had a credible turnout this time around:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
technoshaman, cflute, pocketnaomi, kendaer, mamishka, solarbird, and myself.
First up, by request: "The Chemical Worker's Song", though we only touched on this one fairly briefly. It's coming together, driven very nicely by Meems' vocals as well as her nifty dramatic ending on her drum. I, on the other hand, am still not entirely happy with my vocals. Meh.
This kept us in a vocal sort of mood, though, and also by request, we went right over into Zombie Taylor. I shared with the group my assertion that if we were going to do a zombie filk of "General Taylor", we needed to up the zombie quotient in it. The lyrics are a good start, but seriously, song about zombies? NEEDS ZOMBIES. So I figured, we could interject random occurrences of "BRAINS" all throughout the song. Pepper 'em in slow at first and more frequently as the song progresses. This went over quite well. Even if I couldn't hold it without laughing my ass off, especially since Dara was putting in her "BRAAAAAAINS!" in much sillier tones than I was. And Callie was including pantomime. Muahaha.
This, I believe, will take quite a bit more practice to do with straight faces. But I think we're on to something here.
Next up, much more straightforwardly: "The Clockwork Waltz". Also beginning to come together, though I still need to practice reading Dara's notation for the song so I get down firmly how all the repeats work. We had a bit of discussion about how I should do a few intro bars too to signal where Dara needs to come in. This may well help me out with the bit at the beginning that always throws me off. Dara, though, also noted that the one 4/4 measure in the beginning part may be about to change, too.
Meems got in a bit of drum assistance with J.T. and Glenn, here, as well. And it was Meems who clamored for what got played next: "Mari-Mac"!
I definitely very much miss my piccolo part that I played for this song in the first era of Jam. So Dara and I actually broke out our old flute parts to share with Callie, in case it could provide her with inspiration to come up with a good flute part for herself. This required me to break out the iPod to play through the GBS studio track, just so we could suitably demonstrate how both of our flute parts went. Turned out though that Callie had even improvised several bits akin to what Dara had come up with before, which was quite cool. And I was happy to leave flute improv in her hands as I jumped back onto Rags for our actual playing of the song.
As usual Mimi pretty much tore like a tornado through the song, which is giddy and exhausting and all around fun to do. Only this time, we were in accord that at least on the second take, we were just a touch too fast. I recommended we scale it back down from "Newfoundland on caffeine" to just "Newfoundland". *^_^*;;
This prompted Mimi to make jokes in return about how we had too many frogs. "We have MORE TEMPO THAN USUAL," I wailed. Callie immediately sallied with an impromptu rendition of part of "Hot Frogs on the Loose", with J.T. and Glenn joining in. Which garnered much laughter.
On, then, to "Pirate Bill and Squidly", which is also coming together; I actually more or less played all the way through without getting too lost. Had to play softly, though, since Callie's throat was kind of sore and she wasn't mustering much volume. But it was all good; it's good for me to practice playing softly, anyway. Dara got in some nice mandolin strumming here, doing things more complicated than my basic rhythm strumming on Rags.
Last but not least: "Captain Kidd". I told everybody that I'd been experimenting with playing it in C for busking purposes, but that we were not changing keys. Which was good, said Callie, as her flute bits were learned in the key of D. And unlike me, Meems has no problem at all with the key of D. But I'll practice it both ways, I think, just because I can muster more volume and power if I sing it in C.
More work here was done on the drums, too. J.T. was doing an interesting little Arabic-flavored rhythm on his drum, but it was a counter-rhythm to what Meems was doing, so they had to work a bit to get those synced up. We all decided that while the Arabic-sounding thing was cool, it didn't quite go with this song anyway.
Which led into me playing selections off the Heather Alexander album Insh'Allah, by way of suggestions for things we could try that could incorporate those nifty Arabic-flavored rhythms. Most interesting for us to tackle would be the three-part battle song off of that disc, which does all sorts of interesting rhythms that would be a challenge for us all to do. But we may well tackle that in upcoming Jams, along with "Laddie Are Ye Working?"
The pie: key lime, which was deemed swoon-inducing by all.
Next Jam: August 3rd!
Everybody in the jamming group these days has busy enough schedules that it's anybody's guess as to who will get to show up on any given date. However, we still had a credible turnout this time around:
technoshaman, cflute, pocketnaomi, kendaer, mamishka, solarbird, and myself.First up, by request: "The Chemical Worker's Song", though we only touched on this one fairly briefly. It's coming together, driven very nicely by Meems' vocals as well as her nifty dramatic ending on her drum. I, on the other hand, am still not entirely happy with my vocals. Meh.
This kept us in a vocal sort of mood, though, and also by request, we went right over into Zombie Taylor. I shared with the group my assertion that if we were going to do a zombie filk of "General Taylor", we needed to up the zombie quotient in it. The lyrics are a good start, but seriously, song about zombies? NEEDS ZOMBIES. So I figured, we could interject random occurrences of "BRAINS" all throughout the song. Pepper 'em in slow at first and more frequently as the song progresses. This went over quite well. Even if I couldn't hold it without laughing my ass off, especially since Dara was putting in her "BRAAAAAAINS!" in much sillier tones than I was. And Callie was including pantomime. Muahaha.
This, I believe, will take quite a bit more practice to do with straight faces. But I think we're on to something here.
Next up, much more straightforwardly: "The Clockwork Waltz". Also beginning to come together, though I still need to practice reading Dara's notation for the song so I get down firmly how all the repeats work. We had a bit of discussion about how I should do a few intro bars too to signal where Dara needs to come in. This may well help me out with the bit at the beginning that always throws me off. Dara, though, also noted that the one 4/4 measure in the beginning part may be about to change, too.
Meems got in a bit of drum assistance with J.T. and Glenn, here, as well. And it was Meems who clamored for what got played next: "Mari-Mac"!
I definitely very much miss my piccolo part that I played for this song in the first era of Jam. So Dara and I actually broke out our old flute parts to share with Callie, in case it could provide her with inspiration to come up with a good flute part for herself. This required me to break out the iPod to play through the GBS studio track, just so we could suitably demonstrate how both of our flute parts went. Turned out though that Callie had even improvised several bits akin to what Dara had come up with before, which was quite cool. And I was happy to leave flute improv in her hands as I jumped back onto Rags for our actual playing of the song.
As usual Mimi pretty much tore like a tornado through the song, which is giddy and exhausting and all around fun to do. Only this time, we were in accord that at least on the second take, we were just a touch too fast. I recommended we scale it back down from "Newfoundland on caffeine" to just "Newfoundland". *^_^*;;
This prompted Mimi to make jokes in return about how we had too many frogs. "We have MORE TEMPO THAN USUAL," I wailed. Callie immediately sallied with an impromptu rendition of part of "Hot Frogs on the Loose", with J.T. and Glenn joining in. Which garnered much laughter.
On, then, to "Pirate Bill and Squidly", which is also coming together; I actually more or less played all the way through without getting too lost. Had to play softly, though, since Callie's throat was kind of sore and she wasn't mustering much volume. But it was all good; it's good for me to practice playing softly, anyway. Dara got in some nice mandolin strumming here, doing things more complicated than my basic rhythm strumming on Rags.
Last but not least: "Captain Kidd". I told everybody that I'd been experimenting with playing it in C for busking purposes, but that we were not changing keys. Which was good, said Callie, as her flute bits were learned in the key of D. And unlike me, Meems has no problem at all with the key of D. But I'll practice it both ways, I think, just because I can muster more volume and power if I sing it in C.
More work here was done on the drums, too. J.T. was doing an interesting little Arabic-flavored rhythm on his drum, but it was a counter-rhythm to what Meems was doing, so they had to work a bit to get those synced up. We all decided that while the Arabic-sounding thing was cool, it didn't quite go with this song anyway.
Which led into me playing selections off the Heather Alexander album Insh'Allah, by way of suggestions for things we could try that could incorporate those nifty Arabic-flavored rhythms. Most interesting for us to tackle would be the three-part battle song off of that disc, which does all sorts of interesting rhythms that would be a challenge for us all to do. But we may well tackle that in upcoming Jams, along with "Laddie Are Ye Working?"
The pie: key lime, which was deemed swoon-inducing by all.
Next Jam: August 3rd!
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no subject
Date: 2008-07-15 09:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-16 01:48 am (UTC)Also, I don't want to up and change the chords on Dara, or make Callie have to transpose her flute part. But! Thanks for the offer anyway. :)