14/03/10

Where has Graham gone?

Ah…. The joys of playing 4 hours of piano on a Sunday lunch time. More specifically a Mothering Sunday lunchtime. At times I love my job but after four years in the same place it becoming slightly lack-lustre although swapping Saturday nights for Sunday afternoons has meant less having to fight with the ever-increasing volume of the dinnertime crowds. However….. The boss has disappeared! A sharpish transfer to Edinburgh! And we are to have a new manager in May! I have now seen out approximately 7 of them - although I fear I have lost count some-what.

Spent Saturday night working on Fabbri (may black-horned imps prick his heels for eternity in a fiery pit ringing with the screams of the souls he has tortured in life and filled with the stench of the charnel house). That was fun.

Friday was practice with Ross for his degree project. We’re working on the Oletta Adams’ track ‘Get Here’ along with some Paul Young. More work on the horrendous Will Smith Backing track is follwed by articulation class and an hour and a half with the wonderful Keith Jarrett. Who I quite like. Pete explained to us what is expected of us in regards to course work for assessment. We have to choose a piece of music, produce a score, write an analysis of the track and also produce a graphic representation of the piece. I feel the stress piling on my shoulders already. I think the key is in the choosing of the track. Although in a notational sense some pieces of music may be slightly more complicated I think they might possibly offer more scope for analysis and graphic representation.

Thursday we had a one to one with Marlisa. Which was nice. Everything seems all good but the prospect of completing all I intend to achieve in relation to Graded Unit hangs heavy on my soul. I think time constraints are a real issue as far as it is concerned. Where as most people will be using their Easter Holidays as an opportunity to put some real leg-work into the completion of Graded Unit presentations and portfolios I shall be attempting to entertain one easily bored insomniac 6 year old. I fear I shall have to be either cruel or devious or both in order to get any work done. Logistics! It’s all about the logistics! Later on Thursday we ran over Fabbri again (although unfortunately not literally). Session skills yet again was comprised of a lot of hanging around and slow-coach sound engineering students. Again I recorded nothing. I think it is as frustrating to Gav as it is to the rest of us, although , as with real-world gigs, real-world recording sessions involve a lot of hanging about so I suppose it’s true to life. Afterwards started on Will Smith Backing track in DAW as have decided it just is not going to work with the keyboard….. it had better bloody work with cuBase!

Wednesday.

Practice. Stuck in the smallest room ever again! Without a properly functioning PA! Been trying to programme backing tracks in to my keyboard for the ill-fated Will Smith medley over the beginning of the week. Not convinced it’s going to work. We have to put together a soundtrack to a Tom and Jerry cartoon excerpt in Marlisa’s composition class. The instrumentation and compostion in the original scores of similar cartoons are of great complexity and I think even though we have a strong group of musicians that this will be an extremely challenging task.. Hope to perhaps have a look at it during DAW tomorrow and see where we may be able to work on sound effects that we can trigger on laptop during the actual performance. First Study is plodding along well also. Feel much more confident with my scales both Major and harmonic minor in 3rds and major scales in 6ths. The harmonic minor 6ths are still causing me grief but I believe they will come with practice. Generally ….All quiet on the western front.


Oh and now we all have to audition for degree. My cup runneth over.