10-18-2009, GCNE Meeting, “The Loft”

In attendance tonight were Victor McSurely, Rick McCarthy, Chris Paquette and Glenn Hughes.



A bit of an informal beginning to the meeting began in the bitter cold at approximately 2145 with Victor and Rick working on Calliope in sections. Chris joined a few minutes later and Calliope was first looped in sections and then played with abbreviated sections to work the transitions, all with a metronome. Victor was stressing the importance playing the bass part with authority and conviction. And possibly emotion.



Glenn arrived roughly an hour in and joined the Calliope work and the piece seemed to work though Chris mentioned having some difficulty with the phrasing on the C bass part immediately after the intro. Victor suggested that the first three notes where of paramount importance in establishing the part and that playing while counting the eight notes might be helpful.



The group then moved on to Bicycling the Afghanistan as a trio with attention on dynamics before splitting up to have Chris teach Rick the beginning of Batrachomyomachy's bassline. As we only spent a few minutes on this Rick played only the first few bars before dropping out to let the piece be performed as a trio.



On to work on Opening with severe timing issues with Rick in the bass part and later left hand tension which forced Rick to sit out while the leads worked their part. Victor suggested trying the exercise of counting “1 and 2 and 3 and...” as the piece might be more accurately thought of as being in 6 instead of 3+3. Victor suggested that the piece might sound better with the bassline circulating between players as it would circulate at a different rate of speed than the lead lines. Glenn commented that he would be satisfied simply pulling it off properly.



Moving Force was up next with Victor suggesting that Glenn cover the notes prior to Victor's harmonics in the ending to create a bit of “spread.” The group then fearlessly embarked upon working Derailed. Rick continued to massage his hand.



Larks'/Thrak up next with the full group and a few details then worked out in the rock and roll section, a re-clarification of chords.



Logistics regarding lodging for and arrivals and departures of our out-of-town performer guests at the 10/30 show where discussed as well as our practice schedule and gig itinerary leading up to showtime. The meeting adjourned in the bitter cold at approximately 2335.