Friday, September 2, 2016

Columbidae: Amazing Grace Duet, with seconds (harmony), A fan of Steeleye Span from the early 70s especially (and folk rock too - here's "Ten Man Mop or Mr Reservoir Butler Rides Again" (great name for an album:)) from them from 1971, Which versions of Amazing Grace make people cry with happiness and why (and how)?, To exploring "Music Playing Spaces" for Scottish Smallpipes playing on Tuesdays from 8-9 or 10 pm (Pacific Time) in a few weeks ... to begin ... (and explicitly for exploring happiness / bliss generation through group music making:)


Hi B, A, R, :)

Here are Rees and I playing Amazing Grace on practice chanters a few years ago - 


Amazing Grace Duet, with seconds (harmony)



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD1uB2I2qnE :)

A fan of Steeleye Span from the early 70s especially (and folk rock too -http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Folk_rock_music) - here's "Ten Man Mop or Mr Reservoir Butler Rides Again" (great name for an album:)) from them from 1971 ...https://open.spotify.com/album/5rXXUQOu5zelG0Rb4Va7pR or https://play.spotify.com/album/56fS1iUenSQIITEmBwm5kp (which I hadn't heard of before) and on the good Spotify radio channel maker ... 

I'd like to explore creating recordings (with you all, and online?) coming into conversation with such, perhaps emerging out of our music playing spaces. Are any of you Steeleye Span fans? (I don't recall that they play with pipes very much).

I'm attaching Amazing Grace in 5 parts on sheet music ... might be fun to explore playing together in terms of singing, as well as singing harmony lines while playing Scottish smallpipes, as well as exploring in terms of musicality ...

Which versions of Amazing Grace make people cry with happiness and why (and how)? :) The relative slowness of Amazing Grace (and its beauty) may allow us to explore how making music online together in real time with Alan in New Zealand (over Android smartphones, with faster phone signals than are broadband signals, and which synch with Google Hangouts .... still wouldn't resolve Alan's distance for real, real time music-making probably)! Here's Rees and I playing Amazing Grace on practice chanters a few years ago - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD1uB2I2qnE :)

To exploring "Music Playing Spaces" for Scottish Smallpipes playing on Tuesdays from 8-9 or 10 pm (Pacific Time) in a few weeks ... to begin ... (after my shoulder heals a little further, and explicitly for exploring happiness / bliss generation through group music making:)

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Alan, Rees and Bruce! :)

I'd like to introduce you all to one another. Alan MacKenzie is an interested piper in New Zealand who's getting a new set of finely fettled Scottish small pipes from Auckland soon; originally from Canada, Alan married a Kiwi and is the father of 3 teenage boys. Bruce plays three kinds of Scottish pipes and lives in Oakland; he originally went to what I would call a high-achieving Quaker college in Philadelphia, Haverford. Rees is an undergraduate Engineering student at UC Berkeley; I gave him GHB piping lessons in his home in high school and online using the CoP Green Book. Since Rees is a full time UC Berkeley student, he may be busy, but it's with Rees I started "Music Playing Spaces" in Google Hangouts in 2012 or so.  


Let's wait a month or two to start exploring online "Music Playing Space" Hangouts together, Alan,  (for my shoulder to heal further, although as a "Music Playing Space" I may explore playing keyboard too). But I was thinking about calling this specifically a Music Playing Space for Scottish Piping ... to be seen - I like the idea of openness to all musical instruments - and openness in general. And in many ways the idea is a practicing space nee playing space - for working on our own music (and generating musical skills' learning in new ways) - and while being social in texting and face-to-face while muting ourselves, but of course anyone can un-mute to share musical ideas that way (and / or by hopping into another group video Hangout for a while, for example). I've just broached the idea once recently with Bruce, who may be holding a musical gathering at his place on Tuesday evenings at 8pm in the SF Bay Area re the Scottish Fiddlers group he's in, but Bruce also seemed to express interest in actually coming on Tuesdays to where I live in beautiful Canyon CA to get the hang of the information technologies in "Music Playing Spaces." Rees, if you're interested, you'd be welcome to both come to Canyon, as well, or join the online Hangout. 

I have half a mind to eventually open my smartphone on Monday evenings (Sunday afternoon at 3p your NZST, I think) when the Open Band plays for Scottish Country Dancers in Berkeley at 8pm - https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand - as a  "Music Playing Space" so you, Alan in NZ, and anyone could join in to playing with this. Patti Cobb usually sends around sheet music for this, which I've found helps a lot. 

I'd like to open further Music Playing Spaces as well on other evenings of the week Pacific Time ... and for learning in different ways, so let's stay tuned to each other in these regards. I'd also like to explore them in real real time for jamming learning and to even explore explicitly generating bliss neurophysiology (out of the box here :)

Musical cheers, Scott

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Yay, Alan!

I'm a fan of the College of Piping (Glasgow) Piping Tutor (vol. 1) - the Green Book - for learning, and it did well by Rees Parker, whom I hope may join us occasionally in a few months .. And videos of the CoP Green Tutor's first tunes are here - http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Bagpipe_Tutorials ... and I'm also a fan of exploring ... See you in a "music playing space" in a while :))

Cheers, Scott


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Music-wise this autumn, as my right shoulder heals, looks like I'm lining up possibly Scottish Country Dancing live music--making on keyboard (and eventually small pipes) for 2 hours on Mondays in Berkeley and Thursdays in SF, a Music Playing Space online on Tuesdays (with Rees, Bruce Maxwell and Alan MacKenzie in New Zealand - small pipes focused) - and 10 weeks of online lessons with the great Stuart Liddell! :)) I'm glad to be lining up 3 nights weekly, at least, of regular playing, and socially - (albeit Music Playing Spaces are potentially for practicing independently, yet socially - a development re my own practicing:).


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Hi Alan, Rees and Bruce, 
Great to communicate with you each directly recently and to learn of your possible interest in a Music Playing Space, potentially on Tuesdayevenings. Might we begin in about a month (after my right shoulder heals further)?
While not Scottish piping, I enjoy this Real Blues Reel from the amazing Kathryn Tickell -

Real Blues Reel


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mq9wrzSdB1w - on Northumberland Pipes - and am curious how to possibly transcribe this and tease out on sheet music the bagpipe's line, for example. (I like both her "Signs" and the "Gathering" CDs, and her Pandora channel is also pretty good - http://www.pandora.com/station/play/2202270650304539077 ).
Looking forward to Music Playing Spaces (to play the music we're growing each ourselves:),
Scott

Here's the developing MuseScore - https://musescore.org - written with pipers in mind too, and which may interface with Audacity, - and Amazing Grace in 5 parts in sheet music to come ... Rees doesn't have smallpipes (yet), I think, and thus we'd have to figure out how to flatten his practice chanter a half step or something :)

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