Tuesday, June 17, 2003

Well, I HAVE been working in the studio a bit, just not talking about it here...

Voice classes at college this summer have made a real difference in my singing - my recorded voice is still not gonna give a real singer a run for the money, but it's at least less painful to listen to.

So, follow this link:
Beautiful Still
for a song I wrote for Kim last year, and finally recorded a scratch vocal for.

Or follow this link:
NoWhereRadio
for:
1) Baby Baby Girl, a song I wrote for Alyssa,
2) Lift, a rock/gospel setting for Charles Wesley's "Rejoice, the Lord Is King", and
3) a far more polished version of "Beautiful Still", performed by my friend Al Carmichael. I don't think any vocal class will ever get me singing like THAT...

Monday, June 16, 2003

Wow - Blogger weirdness. Strange new interface at the back end. Apparently I'm the victim of an autodetect scheme that says I don't support the right kind of stylesheets, and that it'll eventually be overrideable, but not yet. Sheesh.

So I gotta learn the new interface before I post anything of substance...

Friday, June 06, 2003

Nice dinner with fatsarah last night, who is neither fat, nor particularly princess-like. Especially compared to some other Princess Sarahs I know.

A couple of weeks back, I found out a fellow CCAN listee was in my summer vocal class. And a couple of fellow listees from a private list of classical composers managed to attend our DC concert, linked below.

It's always a thrill to meet people that you sort of know, but have never met. I'll have more chances this summer - NPM convention in Cincinnati in July, Homerec BBS's second annual Jamfest in Connecticut in August.

Friday, May 16, 2003

True in so many ways:

Tuesday, May 13, 2003

New listening list, that's all.

Oh, and check out my trip report at http://stceciliawashere.blogspot.com/.

For those of you who like that sort of thing, it's the sort of thing you might like. ;)

Tuesday, May 06, 2003

Report Card

Deja vu all over again...

Music History - A
Chorale - A
Organ - B+

Spring / Summer is gonna be a homegrown theory review with emphasis on ear training (2 credits) and organ (2 credits). Prof promises we'll get to service playing this time. And no more Wachet Auf. YAYYY!!!!!
Yahoo! News - Sony Buys Sonic Foundry Products

Another one bites the dust, UH
Another one bites the dust, hey hey hey yeah

Crap. This can't be good. SF has been hurting for a long time, I knew something was coming. Hadn't thought of Sony, though.

So, of my major music software investments:
Encore: Passport is owned by GVox (and sinking fast?)
Gigasampler: Giga is now owned by Tascam
EVP-73: Logic is now owned by Apple (no PC upgrades coming, I bet)
Cubase and Model-E: Steinberg is now owned by Pinnacle
Acid, Sound Forge, and Vegas: Sonic Foundry is now owned by Sony

IOW, the only music software that I use that is still owned by the people who developed it is:
B-4 and Pro-52: Propellerheads

Are they next?

That's it, except for some loop libraries. The rest is freeware, except for some stuff from PGMusic (PowerTracks Pro, Band-in-a-Box) that I haven't been using.

Monday, April 28, 2003

Missed that one

The (former) band got together Friday night - I couldn't make it, due to the choir concert. It was gonna be a jam, but I called over after the concert, Carl's son said they went out to the bar. Probably a karaoke bar - Fred and Luke used to go a lot. Sorry I missed it, though it woulda taken a LOT of drinks to get me up there, I think...

Friday, April 25, 2003

Another semester gone

Choir concerts tonight and Sunday. Prof loved my term paper on pre-1950 music technology. Think I did okay on the final. Choir's an "A" as long as I show up. Music History's floating along at about an "A-" right now.

That leaves Organ. I completely hosed up "Wachet Auf" at juries. My other piece, Foote's "Pater Noster", went okay. Ah well, public humiliation is an excellent opportunity for personal growth...

Wednesday, April 16, 2003

I'll be Bach

I've been doing this progressive fast thing for Lent - each week, give up something additional:

Week 1: desserts
Week 2: seconds
Week 3: alcohol (this was AFTER St. Patty's )
Week 4: snacks
Week 5: meat
Week 6: coffee
Week 7: the web

Week 7 is now upon us. I'll be back after Easter...

Tuesday, April 08, 2003

Potential Band Name of the Day

"Chzill".

Kind of a gangsta lounge vibe...

Monday, March 31, 2003

Check out fatsarah's reaction to last night's weirdness in EL.

Days like this make me glad I can say "my degree's from Wayne State," or "I attend Madonna." Usually, I'd bring up my three years at MSU if asked, and I really think their James Madison College was an excellent program, but MAN! What a bunch of morons!

Wednesday, March 26, 2003

Still Here

But not much to say. Not doing much studio work now, concentrating on mastering Bach's "Wachet Auf" Schubler Chorale. So far Bach's winning. My height (6'4") seems to be a factor in my difficulties: quoting myself from another forum, I look something like "Ichabod Crane riding a unicycle playing a calliope" when I play this piece. So, in addition to my organ shoes, I'll probably have to start carrying around a pair of 2"x4"s to prop under the organ bench. Of course, then my arms will be too high, meaning I'll probably have carpal tunnel in 6 months.

Suffering for my art, I guess. Paying my dues so I can sing the pipe organ blues...

Monday, March 10, 2003

In other news

I'm now "dedicated member" status over at Home Recording BBS. It means I get to pick my own "avatar", the little icon that appears next to my handle ("dafduc").

I think I'm going with this:
Never Mind
It appears that Fred was the glue holding us together. As soon as he left, Luke stopped showing up. So last week, Carl put an end to it. Maybe we can get together and jam, but the project is dead.

So, if I'm to keep this site going, I'll have to redesign - it can still be about my studio, and my recording projects, but not about the band. There is no band.

Thursday, February 27, 2003

Fred Has Left The Building Redux


RIP, man. Sorry we made all those jokes about you. You were really cooler than us. With a way better pianist.

Wednesday, February 26, 2003

Fred Has Left the Building

We had this deal where Fred was going to cut vocal tracks over our "keeper" (in fact, barely demo quality) instrumental tracks, and we were going to let those be the basis of our final decision. What actually wound up happening was that Fred and Carl talked a couple of days before the scheduled session, and decided to kill it now. Poor Freddie, we hardly knew ye...

No rehearsals for the past couple of weeks - Dan had surgery, then my wife did. This weekend, however, should give us some idea of the immediate future. Stay tuned.

Monday, February 10, 2003

B-a-a-ack: Potential Band Name of the Day

Dr. Luke.


A little background: looks like Fred's on his way out. Not a done deal yet, but he's not happy, and the guys (except maybe me) aren't happy. So we were talking about how do we find a new singer, and realized that as long as we're doing studio stuff, Luke doesn't have to play and sing at the same time. So we have time to find the right fifth person, whether they're a drummer, a singer, or both.

For now, that makes Luke our front man. I'm thinking it may stay that way, too. The nice thing about "Dr. Luke" as a band name is there's an instant Christian callback to Luke the physician, but it's not so aggressively Christian-sounding as to preclude us from doing a secular thing.

Friday, February 07, 2003

The Sincerest Form of Flattery

Over at Dave Barry's Blog, Dave joins in on the "potential band name of the day" fun. I've had a dry spell lately, so it's good to see someone else pick up the ball and run with it.

Even if the name he picked is worse than most of mine.

Monday, February 03, 2003

Fred seemed real moody at last night's rehearsal, the rest of the guys are about to mutiny (if you can call it that - Fred really never set himself out as a leader, but he's the guy who did the legwork) - pitch is a real big issue, preparedness is, too.

It's too bad - **I** liked us when we were clicking, but apparently the pitch issue is enough to throw everyone else off their lunch. Sigh...

We'll try to keep moving forward - we're going to give Fred a shot at the studio versions of these before we give up.