Its been a few more weeks now that I have been not worrying about writing music, worried about electronic music……….damn, I feel great actually.
It has changed my habits a lot. Used to be I would read every single thing I could get my hands on regarding this or that new sequencer, or new Reaktor toy, or how to work better in the studio. Fun to play with the sounds, but maybe not that constructive. It was always, upgrade, wait for the upgrade, wait for the new killer feature, over and over. Not that it isn't lots fun but still, its way too much like work.
You can imagine that was for years, I would get home, get on the computer, and write what music I could and read tech documents about electronic music or sampling or synthesis - over and over an over. That was between wanting to kill myself if I couldnt think of anything new.
Now, I am spending a lot more of my time playing my instruments, especially my trumpet.
It all goes back to that klezmer brass stuff, like I am listening to right now – Carnival Conspiracy by the Frank London Brass all stars. This music is just so right for me now – funky, with lots of Yiddish singing, and as good a selection of musicians that you could ever ask for. And catchy too..........
I have been actually learning a piece of music off a record for the first time in many years (except for learning songs to teach students). Its a curious thing that after so many years of copping licks from guitar lessons, that I never did that much, if at all, with the sax and trumpet.
Now I find that it is really exciting to me to be able to learn these klezmer tunes, or should I say tune, since I havent even finished the first one yet. One other thing I realized is that these tunes don't have a lot of upper range playing, at least in the themes, so I can actually play them without killing my lips. Cool.
What this will do for me in the long run, I hope, will get me over the hump with feeling comfortable with the trumpet. For years I didnt even bother much with doing staccato playing on the horn, cause I know playing legato is much harder.
However, playing this klezmer stuff is all about fast repeated tounged notes. There are also lots of repeated phrases, and of course the songs are quite defined, not open ended like long improvised jazz pieces. It just feels good to my soul, learning this music.
Speaking of jazz, I actually got off my butt and played with a some folks in a jam session at a bar another night. If you knew me, you know I normally hate jam sessions, its just too much ego and not all that fun.
This was a bit different, since these people are all huge fans (well, me too) of Django Reinhardt, my own personal favorite guitarist of all time. So these folks have jam sessions based on songs that Django performed.
Its really old school, there is a bassist that actually knows all the tunes, and then a bunch of guitarists playing the Selmer style guitars that Django favored. There are also always (seen this group of people a couple of times at different places) a couple of violin players also. So, someone picks a tune, all the guitarists grab their fake charts, and off you go. Play the head, then everyone solos around the circle, play the head again and you are done. Like I said really old school. Fun too, and challenging to me since I havent practiced or anything like that.
What I did actually was to piss people off, since my tenor sax is a loud horn – it really bothered people, and I couldn't play like I normally do. Not that I want to be loud, but the horn sounds much better that way. I could investigate a quieter mouthpiece if I decide to do this again.
At the end, it was kind of fun, but do I want to do it again? I dont know. It would be easier if I had a soprano, but I am not going to run right out and buy one, just for a jam session. At the very least I showed I could play and not embarrass myself too much, and that felt good.
In my fantasy world, I would be able to hook up with a band that plays the brass music that is so captivating to me – that is, once I got my trumpet chops up or assming (more likely) I could pass myself off as a sax player. I will keep looking, but now I feel good at least that my trumpet is liking me a bit better – after all, it takes two to tango.