"Ring of Fire" notes

There's some real rhythmic weirdness in this song...

Discounting the pickup notes, there are 4 strong beats of mariachi trumpets, then 3(!) beats of guitar vamp, then the second line, same thing each a set of 7.

(Actually, listening to the bass notes from the guitar, maybe it's really 3 and 4 (not 4 and 3). He seems to do 1-1-5, 1-5-1-5.)

Then the singing starts -- 4 beats of singing, 4 beats of trumpets, 3 beats of vamp, for 11 total beats, and into the next singing line. There is no trumpets after the fourth sung line of the verse ("I fell into..."), but we go straight into the chorus which is mercifully but jarringly straight-four.

After the chorus, the second verse is like the first, 11 beats per line, *except* for the third line, on which, apparently just by mistake, the trumpets come in a beat late, so that line gets a more normal 12 beats.

Really wacky! Now I know why I'm having trouble figuring out when to come back in with the vocal after each line of the verse -- something in me is trying to hit a "normal" rhythm pattern. I'm probably vamping one beat too long, just to get it into 12 beats.

I'd love to see the sheet music for this thing. You don't see many country songs changing meters every measure...

"You Were On My Mind"

I worked up the "We Five" hit "You Were On My Mind" lately. The lead singer is a girl, singing (at first) way down low (for her). I had to transpose it for my range, and it's working surprisingly well.

The original was probably in E, but that was even way higher than the usual tenor-based song. I kept dropping it until I found a pair of keys that were first-position playable: G and A. I have a hard time imagining someone deliberately modulating into F# (from E), but if that's not how they did it, I'm mystified. I suppose it could be capoed, what, 9? (so G would sound in E), but that's very unlikely. Maybe it was C and D, capo 5. There's a prominent sus4 chord, which is B4 when the key is E, which seems unlikely to work, too. I thought I'd eventually find a "natural" place to play it, but I'm not convinced I have.

Anyway, it's a favorite of mine (even if this isn't the "right" way to play it). I was surprised (and pleased) to find that it was playable at all, and didn't sound terrible without the pervasive vocal harmonies. I guess I'll aim at capo 3, unless I end up straining "in situ". I can never tell at home, except just by the actual pitches involved, which seem attainable. It definitely had that "jingle jangle" Byrds-like guitar sound -- maybe Warren's guitar can sound like that, given proper knob-tweaking.

It's good because I need more fast(er) songs. I guess my problem with them comes from various sources. One is that I'm lame at strumming, which comes from a combination of my not doing it much ('cuz I'm lame at it, 'cuz I don't do it much...), and that my guitar doesn't really strum well. Turns out when I use my old only-6-strings-on-it 12-string, I strum pretty OK. Not sure what the difference is -- the string spacing would seem to be part of it, but it can't be that much different. I've considered hauling it in to the coffee shops, for just the strummers, but can't bear the thought of the hassle -- both of bringing it in, and changing guitars back and forth all night.

The other problem is that I feel like most rock songs, even simple pop-rock, really require a bass and drums, and I feel like a Guy-Who-Doesn't-Know-Any-Better when I play 'em anyway (sans bass and drums). The softer, slower stuff (e.g., James Taylor) features far less prominent bass and drums, and I feel like my rendition is closer to what they "ought" to sound like. (An exception is "I Saw Her Standing There", but I'm doing that "as" a blues tune (with, in fact, a far blues-ier bass line than the original), and pretending that it's no longer a "rock" song.

"You Were On My Mind", though, and a few more, are fast, without relying on the bass and drummer to drive it. So it sounds just fine to me, played by me.

Del Lago -- booked!

I got us a second booking at "Café Vista Del Lago" on the Mission Viejo lake! We played once before, and the owner agreed in principle to book us again, but hadn't given a date. I tried to coax one out of him by email, but that wasn't working, so I dropped by in person. A band called "Roland and Etienne" were playing to a packed house (about 35 people). I asked Jose (the owner) how many he thought were "fan club" and how many were "come by to hear (whatever) music", and he thought the former were only 7.

Later, I was talking to his wife, Lorelei, outside, and she said "We gotta get you guys back in here.", and I said I had e-mailed Jose but hadn't gotten any reply. She apologized for him, and asked my to just call her on Sunday, and she'd make him write us in -- which I did, and they did: April 10, 7-10pm.

Anyway, Lorelei didn't mention money, nor did I. We'll see how that goes, again. Presumably, they'll assume we cost the same as last time. It's hard for me to imagine that "Roland and Etienne" do this for $40. Alex, maybe, assuming he doesn't pay the "accessory" boys. If, in fact, the place fills on Saturdays (already) without the band's needing (much of) a fan club, we may have the advantage of being their most cost effective Saturday solution. I guess the question would be, even if we were free, and the place fills of its own accord, would they want us every, or every other, Saturday, or will they want to keep a "variety" thing going (since they have access to at least 4 other bands), just to keep it from going stale. I don't know how to call that one -- I don't even know what I'd do if I owned the place.

But, I think I've figured out what's going on -- there's a big Retirement apartment/condo beehive across the street. It's pretty upscale, on account of being on the lake. I think Jose's managed to coax a bunch of those people into the place -- the "non-fan club" people in there were pretty well along. This is a huge upside for us, based on The List. In fact, a white-haired lady that saw us the first time was there, again, and I talked to her for a while with Lorelei. She remembered us. If Jose's managed to turn his place into a viable social gathering place for the retirement complex, it's gonna really work for him -- and us.

I'll work up an e-mail for all the usual suspects, relatives and friends, urging them to come out and make a big showing. I'm a little afraid of that backfiring -- if they all come the first time, we'll not get anyone out the (presumed) second time. But, considering how hard it is to drag folks out, I guess I'll risk it, just to get some people there at all.

Lorelei agreed with my idea of putting some song lists out as advertisements. Both she and Jose had instantly gotten interested in having us the first time, solely by reading the list, so I suggested that it might help them to hype us to day-time customers. I guess I'll do a custom version with their shop logo on top, and make it more flyer-like, date, time, location, pictures, *and* the list. I had thought that she'd want them the week running up to the gig, but she said to bring 'em in as soon as possible, so I'd better get on it.

Songs To Play At Del Lago

My impression is that the crowd at Del Lago are mostly adults, but it's not Leisure World. The complex across the street are just apartments (or condos), not "assisted living", or a nursing home. Some people are there with their school-age kids, but I think most are 50-something -- adult, with grown-up kids so they don't have to stay at home every night anymore.

When I saw Roland and Etienne lately, they were doing a lot more pop stuff (versus the All Torch Song set I'd heard before). The ones I remember are "Twist and Shout", "I've Just Seen a Face" (!), and a cheesy "You've Got a Friend / Somebody To Lean On" medley. Etienne introduced a very large Latino woman who sang a Mexican love (?) song along with Roland on classical guitar, and then a quite passable "Crazy" with Roland back on "honky-tonk" piano. (I'm beginning to think that Roland is a Really Good piano player, and very versatile. Etienne, on the other hand, is way too cheesy for me -- she thinks she's on Broadway, and it's a little much.)

I think the clientele is up for the middle-years songs we have going -- Beatles and James. Even my mom, at 70, is a big James Taylor fan -- she's not looking to hear "Someone To Watch Over Me" all the time. I didn't really learn those songs to have some age-matched songs for people of that bracket -- I learned 'em like Willie and Linda Ronstadt did, 'cuz they're classics, and fun to re-interpret. I would never learn 'em on cheesy jazz piano and try to do/be (no pun intended) Sinatra with 'em. (And, yes, I know that if I'm not *in* the cheese, I can reach out and touch it with "Crying", and some others, but sometimes you just gotta push that edge.)

Anyway, I think it'll be a lot easier to pass our late-60s-to-70s-heavy song list off on 50-somethings than on the 20-somethings we'd be getting at Diedrich.

"Somewhere"

I've always been impressed by Tom Waits' heart-rending version of "Somewhere" from "West Side Story". It's an amazing thing, but it's all lush orchestra chords -- impossible to decipher. But, I found a MIDI file, and analyzed the bass line, and worked out the chords -- not too hard after all. Amazing writing: there's at least one of every "letter" in there; D, E, F, F#m, G, A, Bb, Bm, and C. It's in D, I guess. Not sure I'll try to do it in public, but it's nice to have finally cracked it.

Tully's solo - 06Mar04

Interesting weekend...

I played at Tully's, solo, 'cuz Warren was busy. It went moderately well. When I got there, there were 4 kids playing cards, sans paid-for drinks, in the "area". I stalled a while, since there was (nearly) no one else in there, but finally Barista Brian asked them to move, which they did. I set up and played some guitar, and they decided to adjourn to somebody's house. I played a few new songs, for practice, to the now-empty shop. Finally, another set of kids came in (5). They were friendly, and apparently into music themselves, and asked for some tunes. An exotic-looking girl asked if I knew "Wicked Game", and professed to know it herself. I said, "Come on up then", which bluff she called! Guitar, mic and all, she launched into it, not too badly. Her friends put money in *my* jar, although I was telling them their mistake there.

Anyway, I got back up and did a few more for 'em. Apparently they had something else to get to (movie?) and left at 8:40. I practiced a little more, and packed up.

Went past "It's a Grind" to see if they were open later than Tully's, and they were. Or at least, still were -- I didn't find an hours sign, but there were 4 couples in there (more than I'd seen at Tully's all night). And not all, or even predominantly Asian. But, it's just too small to play in. Next-next door is a Tea place that was also nearly full, and 8 or 10 people out on the canvas-roofed patio, owing to the nice weather. Might turn into a possible summer place to play.

From there, I went to Del Lago, about 9:30. It was nearly packed! Alex was playing, with a bass player, bongo-guy, and flutist. There were at least 20 people there, and 8 or 10 more outside with over-active children. Jose was thrilled to see me (!), professing to having wanted to call me, but lost my number. Apparently his wife, Lorelei, had just been asking after us a day or two before. I, amazed at the turnout (which did *not* seem to be entirely Alex's fan club), told 'em that we're hip to play there whenever they're open. Jose said he'd check the calendar and give me a call -- I left a card with my numbers on the back.

I listened to Alex for a while. He's OK, and likable, but (to me anyway) the stuff is kinda generic. Strumming and mostly unintelligible singing. I was struck/annoyed that he somehow fills places, and I don't. I'm apparently charisma-impaired. There's an Event Calendar posted, and Jose's got the place booked nearly every Saturday: Alex, Roland and Etienne, Mark Madison, Linda Barbarino (the lady I saw at Moxie Java). I was suddenly *very* frustrated -- I think we're at least as good as any of these, and better than some, but we're consigned to accepting 6 to 10 people in a night and thinking we did pretty good.

I can only surmise that the "play songs people know" strategy is flawed. No one seems to be taking this tack, and everyone is doing better than we are -- including getting call-backs from Diedrich. I'm not sure what to do -- giving it up is one option. Another would be to learn a bunch of obscure songs, based on, apparently, no criteria at all. Best would be to get a night at Del Lago and fill the place. I know how to do the first half of that...

Horseback Riding in Hollywood

We had a great time on Sunday. The stable is at the north end of a street that dead-ends into the Hollywood Hills. You drive right past the original offices of the Hollywoodland Realty company that put the original Hollywood(land) sign up, and the stable is only a few hundred yards from the sign itself, and most of the way up the mountain. You ride west through a gate, and you're in Griffith Park. After going up a while to the top, you wind down the other side, winding up in Burbank, at the 134 and Forest Lawn Drive. There's the Los Angeles Equestrian Center there, next door to a Mexican Restaurant, so they tied up the horses, and we had lunch. After lunch, it was back on the horses, and another two-hour ride back to the stable. We rode out at 11, and got back at 4.

And, yes, I'm really sore. The worst was my bottom, what with the horse insisting on trotting a lot of the time, so I was bouncing on that seat -- and I don't have much padding between the leather and my bones. Especially on the way home, he pretty much insisted on trotting, so I got pretty good at detecting the little half-step that indicated he was about to shift into trot-mode, and pulling him back down into a walk. Too late, though, I guess. My bottom is better now, but my back is still pretty stiff.

We did have a near-tragedy -- about 5 minutes from getting back to the stable, our 'expert' rider dad somehow managed to get his horse's back feet off the edge of the trail, a 45 degree slope. The horse was digging in from a reared-up, Hi-ho Silver position, and Roger fell off. The horse scrambled back to the trail, but kicked him two or three places in the process. Fortunately, it was just his calf, and a small ding to the forehead. The rangers got him out of there (somehow -- we kept going on to the stable), and the paramedics took him to the hospital. They did X-rays and CT scanned his head, and he's OK. Not a good thing for his daughter to have to watch, though. Fortunately, by the time he was loaded into the ambulance, he was past some of the pain and joking around, so his daughter was able to see he was OK. That ol' Roger always has to be the center of attention. I told him it was pretty nice of him to throw himself under the horse to cushion his fall.

Anyway, naturally, on Monday, on their long walk to school, Geneva started the campaign to get a horse. Of course, Daleen, having owned a horse herself already, won't hear a word of it. Even Geneva had to admit that 'maybe I shouldn't have gone on that ride.' She is 'working' down at the Camp Cookie stable for their Girl Scout project, so that helps. Unfortunately, they're supposed to be cleaning and repairing the stable, not playing with the horses, but it's hard to get Geneva to remember that...

Jimi Hendrix's guitars

It's reasonably well-documented that Jimi played a right-handed Strat, strung upside down so it would be "normal" to him -- bass strings at the top. The only "hard" mods would be to reverse the nut, and put the strap button on the "wrong" horn.

This puts the pickups in a strange "shape" for the strings they refer to, and the tremolo bar under Jimi's elbow, which you can see him working in performances. There's also some people who think that the long gap from nut to tuner on the bass strings in this configuration (rather than the treble strings) makes some difference to the sound.

Still, people labor under the belief that the nut-to-tuner gap, and the odd pickup angles (especially the closest-to-saddle pickup, which is strongly angled -- presumably to compensate for something, but in the Jimi-arrangement is now doubly-wrongly compensating) contributed to Jimi's sound, and they want it, too. So Fender makes (made?) the "Voodoo" model -- a not-exactly mirror image white Strat, so right-handed players can upside-down string a left-handed guitar, becoming, I suppose, the Bizzaro-Jimi. Actually, the neck and pickups are backwards, but the "horns", controls and tremolo bar are in the conventional spots. I guess it's more of a right-handed body (with "wrongly" placed pickups) and a left-handed neck. This avoids Jimi's problem of the deeper cutaway being on the wrong side, too.

Thoughts about an audition CD

Warren wants to put "Take Me to the River" first thing on the CD. I'd'a put it last, or not on there at all -- partly because I don't think it's Representative, and partly because I don't think I do it well. I guess we're agreed that for the audition CD, being Representative is optional, but I'm still pretty embarrassed by doing the song in the first place. (It remains a mystery why I worked it up at all. I guess I like the song too much, and hoped for the best.) Part of it is that I don't think of myself as a "rocker" (singing *or* playing), part is that it's (supposed to be) so drum and bass intensive, and we have neither (which is why I tried to add that MIDI part once), and part is that I'm singing it an octave down.

I guess every song I play has a little story to go with it. "Let It Be" is a favorite lately because I think I sing it well, and I feel like it's one song that I'm not really "imitating the original" so much. I don't sound like Paul the way I sound like James, and the guitar part is clearly not Paul's piano, so I guess I like to fantasize that it's (at least a little bit) a re-interpretation, rather than an imitation, which makes me feel cool. Unlike, say, "Fire and Rain" where I'm playing as exactly like James as I can, though I've tried to back down on the sounding-like-James vocally, and sing it a bit more like me instead.

The story on "Five O'Clock World" is that I heard it done by Hal Ketchum, and am imitating his version. I like the yodeling in it, mostly because it's so "out there" -- even more scary to do in public than normal singing. I like doing it, early and often -- and because of the "edge", it's what I chose to do at The Gypsy Den. But then it came to my attention that every "young and hip" listener associates it *only* with the Drew Carey show -- and now I'm mostly embarrassed to do it, 'cuz of the lame cultural reference. When older people are in the house, I think it sounds as I intended it, but with a younger audience, my sincere reading juxtaposed with Drew Carey's ironic comedic take = embarrassing. "Who's the geek up there singing that Joke Song like it was Mozart?"

And if you can bear another story, "A Whole New World" is probably just a mistake. There's a great, soft country version on the "Best of Country Sing the Best of Disney" album, by Collin Raye, a reasonably famous country star. (A) I'm not pulling off the country feel he (and his band) does, and (B) despite it being the Big Song from a relatively recent Disney hit, none of the little kids actually seem to recognize it.

Venue Troubles

We're gonna try to keep Tully's open as an option, or even back again as a residency (barring other Better Offers). I wish Dave had put the hours back to 10:00, not just 9, but you can't have everything.

It's clear that Moxie is Not Gonna Work Out, at least not in the short run. This last weekend was encouraging -- it was way up from the all-time low of Exactly Nobody the weekend before. I'd'a said that two more Saturdays of "near nobody" would have fulfilled our obligation to Jill. Admittedly, apparently everywhere was Really Slow through the holidays, and the grocery strike is still ongoing, so many of the "chances" that Moxie had to "show us the audience" were unfairly stacked against poor Jill and her little cardboard sign.

I don't want to get off on a rant, but my problems with Tully's are (a) short hours and (b) lack of support. Even if they back down on the open resentment, the fact that Manager Dave won't even put a stinkin' sign in the window bugs me. Moxie at least put up The Sign and some of my little posters, and Del Lago put up signs *and* handed us some cash. Dave won't do either -- and for the first oh, three months, that was understandable. But after a year of free Saturdays, you'd think he'd have thrown us a bone. "Live music Saturdays" written across the bottom of the whiteboard standing outside would have been a start.

Still, it's better'n nothin'. Even if the management and staff treat us like a scourge, the customers tend to be mostly nice.

Thoughts About Playing at Moxie Java

Turnouts at Moxie Java have been pretty small. Obviously, we'd prefer a place with more people in it, but I don't know how to find that gig. I'm feeling lucky to have a gig at all, and hoping for the best, traffic-wise. It's a little scary when Steve says, "Not a bad crowd, for a Saturday" (eerily mimicking the first line of the last verse of "Piano Man"). It'll be interesting to see how much attendance we get this Friday. My impression from the two Fridays that I've checked in were that they consist of a few drop-ins, and a lot of friends/fans of the particular act of the night. For the piano guy (Rob Blaney), that makes 50 people; for the guitar lady, it was 8-ish. I guess it's a challenge to us to create a fan base, or make do with the drop-in traffic. The third option is find a new place (like Tully's) that has decent drop-in traffic.

The tough part of having a gig is it limits your ability to go looking for a different one. I keep holding out hope for Mama Java's at Mission Viejo Lake, which has that cute little sub-room especially built for music, but I haven't been able get there to see what they're up to since the "last chance!" night of the little jazz combo. I don't know if the combo was retiring, or moving on, or being fired, or if the shop itself has abandoned hosting music. The upside there is that it's fed by the big "Tortilla Flats" restaurant in the same center, and it's got the cachet of being "on the lake", instead of "next to Von's" like Moxie. When I went to the "last chance", there were about 20 people packed into the room, but they were clearly friends/fans, so it was probably non-indicative of a "normal night".

Diedrich's remains tempting, too, but the whole corporate control thing scares me. I'm not sure I'd like being sent all over different places every week. I guess it also feels like they prefer Original Acts, not cover bands -- more like the vibe at the Gypsy Den. I'm afraid to find out how the Monkees must have felt when they went on after Hendrix.

New Gig at Moxie Java

Well, Tully's changed their hours, and is now closing at 7:30 every night (which is when we *used* to start!) so we're out of there. But, coincidentally, my wife saw an article in the local paper about a new (3 months old) coffee shop that has live music every Friday (*Friday*?) and was looking for local talent. So, I called the lady up, and told her I was Local Talent, and she said that she was pretty booked up for Fridays until December. I told her that we're used to playing Saturdays anyway, and she said that she wasn't really ready to afford (afford?) to have music on two nights, but then suddenly said to come on down, then.

Turns out she pays the acts (all solos so far, apparently) $20/hour, and she wanted us to play 7:30-9 (though they close at 10). We went ahead and played 'til 10, of course, 'cuz we like to. My wife and kids came down, and the lady slipped her a check for $40 while we were playing. That's more than she'd promised, and before she knew that we were gonna play longer than *we'd* promised. It's only $20 each, but it's nice to be appreciated. They advertise the "Live Music On Fridays" in their PennySaver ads and the sign out by the street. There's posters of the Act of the Week in the window and tacked to the cash register. Apparently, unlike Tully's, they *like* having music. They *want* to have music. They want to be The Friendly Neighborhood Hangout. We may convince them to add Saturdays...

Anyway, I have an Indian Princess campout this weekend, but they may call me to come in on Friday (which is their advertised night.) I had dropped by this Friday, just to see what's up, and they were *packed*. It was some keyboard guy, with CDs for sale, and professionally photographed posters and a website... Probably a lot of the people were his fanbase -- friends, family, website mailing listers. But however many of them were Friday Regulars for the music, I guess we'll have next Friday, if we get to go in.

Busking in Japan

I'm thinking about taking my guitar to Japan and playing in the subway stations. I've seen plenty of Japanese kids doing it, generally completely ignored, and I guess I'd just like to see if walking-by folks would like me. I'd be way too scared to do it in, say, New York, but Japan is so non-threatening that I could fire it up without fear of danger -- only fear of "rejection". Even that is infinitesimally low -- Japanese people are too polite to overtly "reject" with sneers, boos, tomatoes, or suchlike. If they don't want to listen, they'll just be "busy" (which, nearly by definition, people in a train station are, anyway), and scoot by. They don't have to feel bad, and I don't have to feel bad. But if I get a few people to stop and listen and throw a few yen into the guitar case, I'll have a story to tell my grandkids.

Geneva's being there is a concern, though. But, again, it's so safe there that I don't think there'll be a problem if she comes along. The train stations are clean, safe, well lit -- more like one of our malls, really. Shiny happy people scurrying here and there. (And great acoustics because of all the tile...) Geneva certainly can come along if she wants to -- more danger of her being bored than anything else. Or, maybe I can leave her in the hotel room watching strange, unintelligible TV shows. But, lately, she's wanted to learn a few songs with me (!) -- maybe we'll work up a few before we go and she can give it a try. If a 11-year-old blonde American girl singing Disney tunes doesn't make an impression in the Ikebukuro train station, I don't know what will.

Once Upon a Time...

... there was a little girl who had too many unicorns.

Campout in Julian

The campout was pretty good. There were only three of us Pawnee, but it was Acacia's two best friends, and, coincidentally, two of mine, so it was a good combination. It was waaay out by Julian, and 4000 feet up the mountain there, so it was bitingly cold, but we got through it.

They asked me (*asked* me!) to play two songs at the Nation campfire, so I did "The Three Mile Hike" (Princess words superimposed on, of course, the Gilligan's Island theme), and closed the show with my "Goodnight Irene (Princess version)". I had a whole two minutes' notice, so I fumbled quite a lot on "Hike", because I have to slide the capo in real time to affect the 4 half-step key changes, which is pretty tricky even when I've practiced the move, and my hands aren't frozen. With no practice, frozen hands, and campfire smoke blowing into me with an inopportune wind shift, it was quite a trick.

Afterwards, we have our own tribal campfire, but I spent the remainder of the evening setting up the telescope to peek at Jupiter, so I didn't play much.

But at the end of the Big campfire, they asked me to whip up "God Bless America" (!) for the morning show. Not exactly your usual guitar-oriented folk song... I spent the early morning working that up, and got a passable rendition ready in time. They sure have (unfounded) faith in my abilities. I guess my problem is that I haven't let 'em down yet, so each subsequent request is more outrageous.

On the way home Sunday, we stopped for the gold mine tour, which was pretty amazing. Three-feet wide by five-feet high tunnels right into the mountain, probably a thousand yards worth, on the level we took. We walked around in there (with a guide) for almost an hour.

Miyazaki's "Spirited Away"

Terrific. Problem was, we thought we were going to the dubbed-to-English version, supervised by John Lassiter (of "Toy Story", "Monster's Inc.", etc.), but when we got to the theater, it was the Japanese language version with subtitles. That's kinda OK with me, but the kids were a little over their heads, bandwidth-wise. Especially since, as the reviewer below notes, it's a pretty complex story for a kid's movie.

The good news is that they're releasing it on DVD this coming Tuesday (dubbed version, of course). At the same time, they're releasing "Kiki" and "Laputa". Gonna be an expensive Tuesday for me, and not only because it's tax day.

It won the "Best Animated Film" Academy Award last month -- beating Disney's "Lilo and Stitch" and "Treasure Planet", and Fox's computer-generated comedy "Ice Age". I think I read that the other three had earned over $100 million each, while the US release of "Spirited Away" had only made $5.5 mil. I can't tell if the US releases of Miyazaki movies don't make money because they're marketed badly (on small budgets), or if they're marketed badly because they don't make money.

Working up some songs

I'm trying to work up "Puttin' On the Ritz". It was apparently written in 1930. I haven't really decided which verses and bridges to use -- the original words were about going down to Harlem and watching the servants spend their pay. There were a bunch of verses added subsequently, to replace the offensive ones, so there's no "real" version anymore. The Pasadena Roof Orchestra version I have uses some of each, so I may follow their lead.

I need a lot of work on the guitar part, especially the bridge. There's a lot of bass line, going pretty quickly. Of course, possibly a bigger problem is trying to actually pull it out in public -- the whole song seems too peculiar...

I was also surprised to like "Let It Be" so much. It's always seemed a little "much", but it plays so well on guitar, and I like singing it (now that I've transposed to a rational vocal range). Maybe it feels better because of the current political climate...

I worked on "Someone to Watch Over Me" some more last night. I'm liking it more and more as my arrangement begins to sound righter to me. It was, and is, clearly, a chick song, but lots of guys sing it anyway, so I guess it's OK. I suppose if Sting can do it, I can. (He says, "There's a little lamb that's lost in the woods", instead of "I'm a little...". I may steal that idea.) I'm trying to get the guitar part smoother -- getting the hang of that "four inside strings" diminished chord. In this case, it's a Cdim, x3424x. It helps me to think of it as a two-finger E7 shape (the 030200 part) *and* an A7 shape (the 004040 part), played at the same time.

The "real" song has one of those traditional, completely different, intro parts, which I don't have any chords to, and most folks don't know that part anyway. The remaining song is kind of short, so there's definitely an instrumental verse in there for Warren. I think it'll go like "Stardust", with an instrumental verse, then a repeat of the final section(s).

Yet more new songs

I guess I'm essentially not happy with the quality of many of the songs that I end up doing just to fill the time -- even when it was only an hour and a half. I'm probably my strictest critic, but I keep hoping to stumble on songs that really "work", to replace the second-stringers. Recent additions like "Let It Be" and (I like to think) "Crying" fall into the first category -- all too many others fall in the second.

Anyway, I think I've settled on some working chords for "Someone to Watch Over Me", after some work on Sunday. It's a classic, of course, and though I'm not sure my singing will make it a "keeper", it was worth a try. (Not to mention the pure challenge of getting it working.)

And we were at Daleen's mom's house last night, and she had a "Songs of Irving Berlin" book on the piano, from which I plucked "Putting On the Ritz". Surprisingly, the chords work quite well on guitar (unlike, for instance, "End of the Innocence", as discovered on Saturday). Again, I don't know what the vocal will sound like yet, but there's a small chance it'll work out. (It probably falls under the category of "Songs to Stump the Lead Player", but it might be fun.)

I guess I've discovered that some songs that sound OK in the bedroom, fall flat at Tully's -- and vice versa. So I'm stuck with working them up anyway, and trying them out live.

P.S. In reading various sites on Berlin, one claimed he only played didn't read or write music, never learned to play properly, and only played black keys on the piano (!). Using a pitch shifting piano (apparently readily available at the time), he *sounded* in different keys. Another said that he could only play in F#major (which may or may not correspond to "black keys only" -- I guess it's F#major without 4s and 7s). Can that really be true? If so it'd be a amazing collection of pentatonic melodies... I guess I should sit down at the piano and pick out "Ritz", starting on F#.

Tully's 15Feb2003

Tully's was pretty good this week. My cold is getting worse, but I seem to be able to kinda sing through it -- I don't have a sore throat, just a cruddy one. I managed to hold off the coughing until between songs. A quartet of nice Chinese people came in about 9, having an anniversary party. They wanted to hear some Carpenters, which I begged off of, on account of being chromosomally impaired for such songs. I happen, though, to have "Won't Last a Day Without You" in the book, 'cuz this little girl at work likes to come sing it when I bring my guitar in for lunchtime practice. So the anniversary couple's friend came up and sang it while I played -- she wasn't bad. And they tipped us $20 at the end. We had to play all love songs for the rest of the night, which, as it turns out, not so many in the book qualify for, but it was fun.

Yesterday I worked up a song at my mom's insistence -- it's called "Frog Kissin'", and the recording I have is Chet Atkins. The song may or may not have been written by him, or Ray Stevens. Anyway, it's a novelty song about seeing the best in people, worked around the fairy tale notion in the title. Cute, but I can't imagine doing it for anyone except my mom.

Longer hours at Tully's!

February 10, 2003 9:28 AM

Wow. We did 33 songs last night. I was afraid my ragged voice would give out, but I actually felt stronger as the night went on, though I did hear myself missing notes here and there. It was odd -- usually I just sing, and think about the song, and the words, and the phrasing, and the chords -- and the singing itself just takes care of itself. It's not like you have to think about how to talk -- you just do it. But with the sore throat, I have to actually *try* to hit the notes -- it's like my voice is slightly out of control and I have to concentrate on it to keep it in line.

Hopefully, it'll clear up soon -- though today it's worse than last night, so I'm not in the upswing yet...

Anyway, there weren't many songs on the list that we *didn't* do last night -- mostly the "second stringers". I guess I'd better go on a more active hunt for more material.

I'm pretty stoked that we get to play 'til 10. It'll be a challenge to have that much really good material, and to be able to play that long, and sing that long, but it reinvigorates that whole thing.

Warren seems to think that I sounded "fine". Seemed to me like I heard me miss plenty of notes -- sharp here, flat there. "Wicked Game" is certainly the most challenging -- that descending line off the falsetto flip is the worst. I don't know how he does it so smooth -- I always feel like my flip from falsetto "don't" to regular-voice "want" is horrible. I end up landing on "want" so hard it sounds like a yelp. And my falsetto sounds so much different than full-voice that it embarrasses me. Maybe it's not so bad from the outside? In my head, it's gnarly. If I didn't like that song so much, I'd certainly skip it.

I lately heard "I Will" on the Musak somewhere, in a version that sounded a lot like James Taylor. I've never seen it on an album, but a deep check of the 'net showed it on something (bootleg?) called "Rarebits", so he may do it in concert, though how it would get it on a Musak tape remains a mystery. Anyway, it gave me the idea to go ahead and transpose it to a sing-able key (duh! Why don't I think of that *without* the cattle prod?), which I did yesterday. It's originally in F (!), but moved down to D, it's (as far as I can tell with my trashed voice) in a sing-able space, and easy to play, not to mention very James-like in chords.

In fact, once moved to D, the first phrase is identical to the first and last lines of "The Way You Look Tonight", so I'm thinking of melding (medly-ing) the two. It'll, at least, save me having to decide on a "next tune" once per night.

I'll have to see if some other Beatles songs can be beaten into submission by the same treatment. I might look at "Mother Nature's Son", as requested by my brother a couple of weeks ago -- seems like a distinctive (and non transposable) guitar part, though.

Anyway, I played through some of the "Working On 'Em" songs to see if I can move 'em into the "Good Enough" section. "Play Me" (Neil Diamond) seems a likely candidate, and "Four Strong Winds", I guess. Also, we probably ought to dust off some of the ones that we were playing, but that I've come to avoid because I didn't think I did 'em well enough -- "Free Man", "Crazy Little Thing", "Still Crazy", and such like. Even "That Thing You Do" maybe...