What are you listening to right now?

[j_tour]

[j_tour]

[j_tour]

One of the more entertaining sessions of Barry Harris.  "I never played this tune because I didn't like it," IIRC he says in here somewhere, but I'm still using his idea of just running down the form, from the top of the keyboard to the bottom, while still making the changes of the tune:  yeah, like just how you'd do on a rhythm-changes tune like "Anthropology" or any of those.

[Bob]

https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?topic=67197.0

[quantum]

[ranjit]

quantum -- I didn't realize other people here followed Rick Beato. He's pretty good! I've went through most of his theory stuff, and it looks like it would be quite useful in a film scoring contest. He has an understanding of a wide variety of musical styles, which is commendable.

[ranjit]

Check her out if you haven't already, she's really good!

[Bob]

Listening yes, along with kind of disturbed watching.

[j_tour]

I was reminded recently of the following performance, which I'd seen before.  Yes, while it is musically coherent played as piano solo, a tight small orchestral accompaniment makes the difference.

Polina has a brisk, authoritative attitude toward the piece that I admire.

EDIT I remember one of the first things that struck me about her performance, maybe a year ago or so:  her control over fingers 4 and 5 in the RH is so undisciplined and, well, floppy. 

Not a model of mainstream technique, however, she manages just fine. 

Plus, she doesn't take any sh*t from the conductor:  she's clearly commanding the tempi, or likely was in rehearsal.  Very much a commanding yet sensitive performance.

However, her performance at below of the Scarlatti K141 is the angriest, most aggressive performance I've heard.  Obviously, she has no problems with fingers 4 and 5 in the RH.

What an oddly compelling approach to the Scarlatti:  like an angry vulture or something.

[j_tour]

This is my next tune, just for fun, to play around with.  Never really knew it, except just the chords and the melody.  Dark, melancholic, and yet full of an unresolved desire, sort of true to its title.  McCoy and Joe both have fine solos, but I don't feel a need to transcribe them.  Something a bit different but with the same tempo. 

One of those times one wishes just call up a good drummer and go for it, preferably on stage, but that's not the season yet.  I think it could be excellent on the Hammond organ:  keeping the bass urgent and driving will be a challenge, but a good place to use darker registrations on the upper manual, as well as manipulating the "percussion" effect and Leslie speaker speeds.  Maybe one of those rare places to use the 2nd percussion instead of 3rd harmonic percussion effect.

[quantum]

quantum -- I didn't realize other people here followed Rick Beato. He's pretty good! I've went through most of his theory stuff, and it looks like it would be quite useful in a film scoring contest. He has an understanding of a wide variety of musical styles, which is commendable.

His breadth of knowledge in musical subjects is one thing I appreciate.  He poses some interesting questions near the end of the Beethoven video.  The ones relating to the perception in perfect pitch I found intriguing. 

It would be interesting to take into account historical pitch references and instances where A440 was not the standard. 

[Bob]

I've heard this before but didn't know the title/composer.

[Bob]

[Bob]

[quantum]

[anacrusis]

That's a solid execution of Op 10 no 1, even without the water.

Listening to this gem right now:

[Bob]

[j_tour]

I still don't understand how and why these "people" drive the way they do. 

Rule number one:  don't tailgate.   Ever.  I don't care if it's a farm tractor or some dickless piece of sh*t on a tricycle.

Rule number two:  don't tailgate.  Ever. 

Rule number three:  don't ever *** tailgate.

Every *** day, I'm telling you. 

[Bob]

Nice.  I don't remember listening to this before.  I think I've heard of this... used in The Shining?  I searched for some piece of music from The Shining at some point.  I don't remember finding it, but this sounds like it could be used there.

Béla Bartók - Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta


Capable of knocking things off my speakers too.  Haha.


Yep.  I think I finally found it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_for_Strings,_Percussion_and_Celesta
"The popularity of the Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta is demonstrated by the use of themes from this work in films and popular music. The second movement of this work..."
"The Adagio movement was used as the theme music for The Vampira Show (1954–1955). The movement was also featured in the Encyclopaedia Britannica film The Solar System (1977) and the Stanley Kubrick film The Shining (1980)."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shining_(film)

[j_tour]

What else?

And

And of course

[Bob]

More watching than listening.

You can skip to 1:20 for the fun part.

[j_tour]

A recent thread about getting a young person into playing real, roots music made me think of this.  Not this exact version, but same style.  Cut it down to size, and it's fine for a kid.  The minor version is a little like "When the Wicked Shall Cease their Troubling," but any kid would like to play the major key better known version.  In whatever key.

In fact, I don't think I've heard this particular version from Mac before:  Saints in Bb, take a solo, and then kind of an extended tag ending. 

Good for kids.  Cut it down a bit, for size, and all that, but that can work.  Do it live!  </Bill O'Reilly>

New edit:  cut that down a LOT for kids:  I just tried it out at about the same tempo and keys, just the similar idea.  That about killed my wrists.  I'm still feeling it, and I was just fooling around for fun, during a snowstorm here.

So, note to future self, and perhaps others:  a little bit more relaxed is good, even at the same tempo.  And, mind you, I already could tell what chord voicings and basic style Mac was going to be doing, just from familiarity with that style, so it's doubly embarrassing for me.  Like, I didn't have to read any music, or whateve, just play that kind of thing, and it still about killed me after about two minutes.  Need lots of energy to radiate the eighty eights in the rock and roll style.

[j_tour]

The Killer with Jimmy Page

[pencilart3]

Anyone here listen to godspeed you! black emperor or similar post-rock artists?

[j_tour]

Anyone here listen to godspeed you! black emperor or similar post-rock artists?

Yes.  And godspeed to you too, black emperor!

No, in seriousness, some of my old crew do this kind of thing.  I didn't know it had a name, just that "oh, that's what N and X's people are up to...cool.  Want to go see them?  Nah, it's OK.  Let's go shoot some pool."  Average musicians, good people, at least the ones I know, but not for me.

How can one be "post-rock"?  I disagree with the premiss.

(About the above:  yeah, well, not Booker's best performance of his arrangement, but he was surely blasted on heroin at the time, and he still got through his arrangement, sort of).

And exhibit b (BTW, don't look too intently at the barre chords Jimmy Page plays at one point about mid-neck:  that should scare pianists straight from going into rock guitar, playing the devil's music!)

[Bob]

[Bob]

This is what I was looking for yesterday.

[j_tour]

Damn right.  Blues in F, hit it and quit it.

[Bob]

Remind me a lot of the no no cat.

[flanker27]

I hereby apologize for the "meh" quality of the recording, but even with that, I've been mesmerized by this song for a couple months now.

[ranjit]

[j_tour]

2Cellos, "Thunderstruck."

Recommendation from a barfly a few days ago.

Pretty good.

[ranjit]

2Cellos, "Thunderstruck."

Recommendation from a barfly a few days ago.

Pretty good.

Not bad.

Is there some sound editing going on? Can cellos actually sound like that?

[j_tour]

Not bad.

Is there some sound editing going on? Can cellos actually sound like that?

I don't know anyone who plays 'cello, but all I hear is some deft sound mixing based on a handful of microphones of various types.  Seems legit to me.

No stranger than, say, some of the sounds from Bartók's string quartets.

Could be wrong, but I don't think so.

Here's AC/DC doing it.

[compline]

[j_tour]

[j_tour]

[j_tour]

I was very happy earlier today when my car USB thumb drive cycled around to playing this album, and it was the following track that led to my renewed vows of allegiance with Jimmy McGriff.  Yes, he had tremendous time in his LH and his LF, and he could play changes, and he was a master at the expression pedal, but he was a badass blues player.

Once I got back home I couldn't remember the name of this tune, but a few minutes at the keyboard fixed that:  it's that distinctive turnaround that defines it.  You know, one of those classic tunes you've played a million times in your sleep. 

For some reason it defines the key 'C'.  Also, no offense to Mr. Mills, but how to rise above a drummer who is asleep or something. 

[Bob]

[ranjit]

Dwarf fortress is a game where you take control of a procedurally generated colony of dwarves, which will grow and one day collapse. The theme song, composed and played by the developer, encapsulates the feeling perfectly, and feels like it doesn't have a beginning or an end.

Plus, it has a catchy motto, "losing is fun" -- works well for learning the piano too!

[Bob]

[compline]

[j_tour]

[Bob]

Nyan Cat turns ten years old today.

[j_tour]

[volcanoadam]

It sounds quite exotic to me, but I love it!

[j_tour]

Just found out about this.

Cute.  A lot of the RH "licks" are straight out of the real thing. 

[j_tour]

Just saw this at random.  Nice:  I forgot this tune existed.  Not exactly the way I'd do it, if I had to, but she [Sangah Noona] is a great entertainer. 

Made me smile a bit, anyway, in trying to relax for the second Pfizer vaccination today.

[Bob]

Something new.

[ranjit]

This man is fantastic, one of my favorite current pianists and very creative.