10-11-2009, GCNE Meeting, "The Loft"

In attendance: Victor McSurely, Glenn Hughes, Chris Paquette, Rick McCarthy, Brad Hogg.

Commenced, tonight, with practice on entering the space. Glenn and Chris had forgotten to arrange their cables, so were treated to "cable arranging music" as they did so. They returned, and we entered the space, acknowledged the group, then the future audience, and then the group again, and then sat down and began in silence.

Mostly adhered to a slightly-solid set list tonight, in anticipation of the gig. First song: "Growing Circle". Played once through, and sounded very good. Next was a free circulation. This wobbled and bumped for about five minutes, until Victor called it off. We worked for a bit with circulating clapping, first without a metronome and counting, and then with. We first simply counted in five and clapped on our respective beats, starting from Glenn:

Glenn
Brad
Chris
Rick
Victor

and running through that several times. We then upped the ante, trying 8 counts and moving to 9, and then running in the opposite direction:

Glenn, Brad, Chris, Rick, Victor, Rick, Chris, Brad, Glenn
Victor, Rick, Chris, Brad, Glenn, Brad, Chris, Rick, Victor

Victor then presented and led us through an exercise, leading directly into a circulation in C Major. This was completely different in character--music felt present, to this "scribe," and we were definitely listening more to each other. When this finally ended, another couple of minutes of silence followed, with Victor asking us to try and take that with us into other music [my paraphrasing].

Batrachomyomachy up next, with a slower start for practice and then an at-tempo runthrough. Calliope was mentioned, but not played, and the trio (Victor, Chris, Glenn) worked on Bicycling to Afghanistan. Passing by Askesis, we moved on to Philip Glass's "Opening," from his Glassworks album. We initially began looping just the first four bars, with and without the metronome--the rhythm and timing is the same throughout the entire piece, so it is key to really get the duple-against-triple feel completely locked in. For the basses, this is especially crucial, as their downbeat becomes the homing centre for the circulated melody chords (and, since the bass will eventually be circulated as well, it's even more important to know exactly where the downbeat sits). Rick and Brad were still not one hundred percent on the actual bass notes and structure of the piece, so after working for a bit on the first and second portions, Victor and Glenn took to the hall to allow Chris to teach Rick and Brad the bass parts. On their return, we ran the C section of the piece a couple of times, and moved on to Third Relation. Work on this primarily consisted of working with dynamics, as well as firming up the tempo. The mirroring of the intro and the popping/dancing of the midtro and outro are really starting to pop out and become tangible, in a very good way.

Intergalactic Boogie Express with the trio, with Glenn and Chris on bass, and Victor on unharmonized lead. Moved on to Eye of the Needle, with Victor halting us in the first go-through to remind us of the exercise from earlier. We played this twice, followed by a break for standing and discussion of logistics (regarding load-in times for the gig, what sound equipment to bring, rehearsal times that can and will include the travelers from New York and elsewhere, the upcoming workshop with Tony Geballe, various sleeping and transportation arrangements).

Returning to the circle, we dived in with Moving Force, with some clarification of the bass parts for Chris. Lark's Thrak, playing through once. We then touched on Asturias; we have not played this together yet, but all seem to know it (with the twinkle parts not exact, but easily corrected). Back to the trio and Bicycling, which was much better than earlier in the night (which was not bad by any means). We closed with a circulation in C Harmonic Minor, moving to C Major--it was interesting to hear the two keys crossing over each other, in the middle, up until the end. Ending the meeting in silence (it was roughly 11 pm), we all bid adieu for the night.

GCNE Meeting, 09-27-2009, "The Loft"

This account will also be anecdotal in nature.

Meeting was begun at roughly 7:40pm in silence. In attendance: Victor McSurely, Glenn Hughes, Chris Paquette, Rick McCarthy, and Brad Hogg.

As a warm-up, we began with the 16-bar exercise--this was played for roughly 10-12 minutes. Leading from this, we then looked at a particular piece that will be on the setlist of the October gig, looking only at the intro. The triplet circulation was split up between Victor, Chris, and Glenn, with Rick and Brad taking on bass duties. Continuing on to Third Relation, we then worked with this for a bit, playing it through once or twice, followed by fairly intensive spot work on tightening up certain sections (the middle section and outro in particular, with an eye on bringing out the "dancing" polyrhythms).

This was followed by work with Eye of the Needle, addressing some minor issues of volume differences, and then breaking for a short period. After the break, instead of working out logistical issues of self-advertisement for the gig, we spent some time learning Growing Circle. This was played first by Glenn, Victor, and Chris; we then all learned the bass part. Rick and Brad took on the bass part "for keeps".

After playing through it twice (and once more on the ending for Brad), the Circle then worked out some small but important issues: updating the homepage for GCNE, selecting a minute-taker, updating the Myspace page and uploading recordings, creating a facebook group, and a couple of other small items. Ending in silence at roughly 10:15, we tore down and bid each other adieu for the night.

GCNE Re-Inaugural Meeting, 09-21-2009, "The Loft"

With no notes taken, this account will be largely anecdotal.

Meeting began with silence at roughly 7:40pm, Monday, 09-21-2009. In attendance were Victor McSurely, Glenn Hughes, Rick McCarthy, Brad Hogg, and Dev Ray.

Following silence, some discussion followed. Both Victor and Dev commented that, with two new members in attendance, there was a sense of a new beginning for the Circle. A performance challenge was announced, as well, with the upcoming date of October 30th, opening for Your Move at the Cambridge YMCA. It was also mentioned that Victor, Dev, Chris Paquette (not in attendance this night) and Brad were participating in the current attending-at-a-distance online GC course, with Victor taking a special aim to working with the presented material in the Circle. Various other minutiae were discussed, such as possible and likely guest players for the upcoming gig, logistical issues, future circle meeting exercises, possible collective sittings, et al.

We then warmed up with some circulation, followed by beginning work on Eye of the Needle and Third Relation. Rick didn't know his newly assigned part to EotN, and Brad wasn't clear on the form of TR, so groups were split, in order to learn these parts. After rejoining, EotN was played through twice, and then work began on TR, with a couple of full play-throughs. At this point, we took a short 10 minute break.

After the break, the AAD course was mentioned again, specifically with regards to the current Developing Variations exercise. We worked with circulating and playing through the exercise (on a G blues scale, for those keeping score), as well as through chord sequences, and followed this with work stemming from the Hammerhead exercise, and leading into circulating A Harmonic Minor ascending and A Phrygian descending. We ended the night with a final run-through of Third Relation and Eye of the Needle, and ended in silence at roughly 10:25pm. The meeting adjourned, with Sunday nights becoming the preferred night for meeting.