GCNE Meeting, 11-22-2009, "The Loft"

In attendance: Chris Paquette, Glenn Hughes, Victor McSurely, Dev Ray, Brad Hogg.

When Glenn and Brad arrive at roughly 7:35, Victor and Chris are already setting up the PA. Rick is unable to make it, due to a failed starter on his van. Dev comes in a few minutes later, apologizing beforehand for being a little unwell.

After a moment of silence, Victor mentions that there are some logistics that he'd like to touch upon, regarding "what comes next". We have just put two challenges behind us--the Oct. 30th gig and the Tony Geballe weekend--and it's time to both review and look ahead to the coming months. "But," Victor says, "maybe it's better to talk about that later, after we've done some playing."

We begin with a free circulation, with a somewhat ambiguous key (G Major?). After a minute or two, Victor lobs a note across the circle to Glenn, and the game changes from straight to random circulation, with both single notes and chords. The sense of "play" is very palpable in the room, as the circulation comes to a close.

Continuing warming up, we move on to work with Calliope, just working with the primary C Major part. We run this slowly at first (probably around 72 bpm), with the emphasis on accuracy in a staccato manner, and then bump the speed up to about 78, and then again to 84 (falling intentionally short of the marked tempo of 88).

Moving on from this, we jump into work with "Where is the Nurse?". Glenn has been working the mirror section of the lead pretty hard, and it shows. One straight playthrough, and then we move into more focused work. The timing on this piece is still giving us a bit of trouble: the aksak semai groove is easy and pleasant to fall into, but if attention is not paid, the timing in both the lead and the bass can start to shift. For the leads, this means that some spots can start in the wrong spot; with the bass, it can mean cutting the end of the bar off too soon, which throws the lead off. Victor suggests that we try tapping the time with our feet:

1-2-3-1-2-1-2-1-2-3-1-2-3-1-2-1-2-1-2-3-
R-----L---R---L-----R-----L---R---L-----

This is much more difficult than it sounds, and the idea meets with hesitance and protest. Most hold with simply tapping in time as best they can, and making sure they land on the one. "Sections" work with the end of the piece, then moving it back to the entering-outro, the Bb section, the full melody (which has some odd placements of notes). We run the piece once, work on a couple more details, and then run it once more. This last time sounds very tight, to the scribe's ears, and we break for a few minutes.

Back in the circle, Glenn presents "Prelude I", from The Well-Tempered Clavier. With some arrangement instructions (circulating, with a 5+3 pattern in the circle) and rhythmic circulation work, we hammer out the first eight bars, and agree to have the piece ready for next week.

Continuing repertoire work, Bicycling to Afghanistan is up next, with Brad sitting this out. Some small performance notes, and then Batrachomyomachy. Someone mentions the "frogs" part of this piece, and this gets replayed in a Freudian slip on the composer's name. In retrospect, it really wasn't that funny, but still. . . . Moving Force gets a good look, too.

At this, we call it a night on the actual playing, and took a good look at what we are to do. Our next just-about-confirmed gig will be in January or so, with something maybe popping up before then (hopefully). The push to get ourselves out there needs to start soon; just about everyone knows some venues to look at, and Dev can get us onto an opening gig without much trouble at all (now that he's no longer handling booking for his charge). The concept of a location-based regular performance is also presenting itself, with some potential spots in Cambridge and elsewhere in Boston. Promotional work will also be of priority, and there is quite a bit to do, there. Much of this comes down to what has been an apparently recurring theme for Victor, the "completion of the gesture", and everyone seems to be on-board, as best they can. More will present itself in the near future, but for now, this seems to be enough for the night, and we adjourn at roughly 11 pm.

GCNE Meeting, 11-15-2009, "The Loft"

In attendance, tonight: Dev Ray, Rick McCarthy, Glenn Hughes, Chris Paquette, Brad Hogg.

Straggling in tonight--Brad, then Rick, then Glenn with the keys to the building. A few seconds of hemming and hawing, and the choice to play plugged in. While setting this up, Dev and Chris arrive, with Glenn noting that that Victor will be taking the night off, citing slight fatigue and a strong desire to ensure that it doesn't progress any further than that. After plugging in, turning on, and turning up, with some basic circulation to set levels, we're off!

Following the basic game plan of running the set list, we warm up with Growing Circle--generally pretty good, but some tuning issues throughout, and the scribe forgetting part of the bass part. Moving on to Batrachomyomachy, with timing and rushing being the primary issues. Some quick section work for the basses, and then on to Calliope. Poor Glenn is currently the only lead on several pieces, but is pushing on mightily. Bicycling to Afghanistan is skipped, since Victor is not present, so we move on to Askesis. There are several issues of timing with this piece, with a tangible increase of 10-15 bpm within the first couple of beats after count-in. Glenn urges the circle to pay attention to the groove and lay back a bit, which to the not-currently-playing scribe's ears seems to help noticeably.

Third Relation comes up next--the theme of timing is becoming a popular one, tonight. A moment to address and eliminate the tuning issues, and then playing 3rd Rel. both slowly, to drive home accuracy, and then quickly, to bring it up to performance tempo while not rushing. We choose to skip Intergalactic and move straight on to EotN. As we play this, the scribe notices a curious sensation of trying to hold back and not rush and yet still rush the tempo. Timing is emphasized yet again. Brad also mentions a difference in dynamics that several people at the recent OCG II course chose, regarding the end of the piece; both Glenn and Dev point out that every circle plays it differently, and also bring up the visit with the circle from Elan (a link to his page is here) last year, and how he really wanted the last note of the piece to pop, and the difficulty of bringing out that build without overplaying the dynamics.

Skipping both Moving Force and Derailed, as well as Lark's Thrak as an entity, we play Asturias, with some quick basic arranging and explaining of a couple of parts. After this, we move on to simply working with the 5s and the polyrhythms in Thrak, instead. We initially try this by standing and stepping in time, in order to get the pulse into the body. This probably ends up resembling the worst of your high school marching band experiences, as playing in 5/16 over a steady pulse of quarter notes is quite difficult. Bringing it back to the stool and simplifying to feeling the pulse in eighth notes has a substantially greater amount of success. At this point, we start to really work on feeling the pulse and hearing the music of both the 5s and the polyrhythms. Glenn and Dev both mention how they don't really count it anymore, because they're listening to the actual sound of the 5-against-7 feel, i.e.:

X--x-X--x-X--x-X--x-X--x-X--x-X--x-X
X--x-x-X--x-x-X--x-x-X--x-x-X--x-x-X and continue as necessary.

After about ten minutes of this work, the change is really clear, and there are several points where you can hear the space between the notes, and know that everyone is on the same page. With this discharged, we choose to break for a few minutes, before working on Where is the Nurse?. A bit of small talk during the break, with Brad mentioning and explaining some of the work that he saw and took part in, at the OCG II course, including some new circulation and whizzing techniques.

Diving in with Nurse, we run the piece, with Glenn and Chris on lead, and Dev, Rick, and Brad on bass. The week in between the workshop and this meeting hasn't really derailed the piece, though there's a couple of spots that everyone will have to address in personal practice--it's definitely feeling like a pair of pants that fit well, look great, and are mostly comfortable, but not quite lived-in, yet. Rick moves to lead, and Dev and Brad take to the hall for section work. Upon return, the focus work clearly pays off.

We then move to circulation work. Dev chooses a key (G Major), and we move to free circulation. At first, the key is actually quite ambiguous, but then slowly emerges. Moving on from this, the issue of time comes up again, and Glenn chooses to work the circle on having a steady pulse and flow. Taking the issue of what note to play out of the mix, we work with assigned notes in C Major/A minor, and simply making sure that the note sits in a time frame. We then choose to add another note, giving ABCDEFGABC, and circulate this pattern several times--this works quite well, and eventually, timing is no longer an issue, and it just simply flows through the circle. Glenn says that it feels like the note is moving through him, when it really works.

We move this on to a sort of controlled whizz with a standard Eb magic chord, and circulating it in a steady pulse rhythm: 1-2-3-4-5, and then 1-2-3-4-5-1-2-3-4-5. Eventually, this becomes 1-e-&-a-2-e-&-a-3-e-&-a-4-e- - -1-e-&-a-2-e-&-a-3-e-&-a-4-e- -. Succeeding with this, we move it to a chromatic movement, so Db-D-Eb-E-F-Gb-G-Ab-A-Bb-B-C-Db-D-Eb, and then back down again, with a slowly increasing speed. This is both easier and harder than it looks, and by the end of the night, we manage to get a few really good circuits under our collective belt, and call it a night in silence at roughly 11pm.

11-7 & 8-2009, GCNE Workshop with Tony Geballe, Victor's House.

11-07-2009 - In attendance: Victor McSurely, Rick McCarthy, Tony Geballe, Andy Cahill (our new addition), Dev Ray, Chris Paquette, Glenn Hughes, Brad Hogg.

A couple of late arrivals, this morning, due to a small communication error. Tony Geballe has graciously agreed to come up from New York (though he had just been in Seattle a couple of days before) and work with us for the weekend, to provide some guidance to the circle. Began with a group sitting at 10:30 to 11:00 (no GC course, this!), and then guitar work began.

Tuning, and an opening circulation. Warming up with a cross-picking exercise in G Major, with diatonic chords. D Maj, E min, F# dim, G Maj (all root form, no inversion). First two string groupings

5-4, 5-3, 5-2 &
5-4, 5-3, 5-2, 5-3

then three

5-4-3, 5-4-3-4 &
5-3-2, 5-3-2-3

then four

5-4-3-2, 5-4-3-2-3-4

With this discharged, Tony suggests we work on a piece of music called "Where's the Nurse?", written at Camp Lebanon in 2002. This is an interesting piece of music: it's become one of the standards of the repertoire, but unlike almost all other repertoire, does not have a symmetrical division of the beat. Even the most rhythmically complicated pieces in GC tend to have some relation to the quarter note, or 4 16th notes (though a large amount of the music tends towards 5 or 7 beats, it still divides into a steady pulse). "Nurse" breaks with this tradition by accepting another tradition, that of Turkish music. With a pulse of aksak semai, or 3-2-2-3, one might still attempt to count this with a steady beat, dividing it into 5--this doesn't sit right at all. The asymmetrical approach is best for this, and really gives it the "limping" feel it implies.

We began work with Nurse by first getting the feel of the 3-2-2-3 in our hands, just by clapping and stomping feet, and then playing a basic 5-note bass riff. We then moved on to the first chords of the piece, and the picking pattern (which helps to establish the feel of the piece). Using this, the introductory bassline was taught, which brought us up to 12:45 and lunch, much to our surprise.

Reconvening at 1:30, we slogged our way through the rest of the bass part, as well as starting to work on the lead part's chordal and melodic parts. This work took us up to roughly 3:15, and another break (both for our brains and posteriors). At 4:15, Dev took an early leave, as he had a gig that night with his charge. Another 5 minute break at 4:40.

At this point, we had begun to work on the final section of the lead part, which is made up of a diminished chord run in 3-2-3-2/3-2-2-3, and then a final section in 3-2-2-3/3-2-2-2. The last two chords are both difficult and easy, but the picking pattern jumps around a bit--this eventually produced what was apparently an incredibly amusing (and dazed) facial expression from Brad. We completed the lead part, ran it a couple of times, and closed the night with 3 cued notes from Tony, at 6 p.m., Rick bidding a somewhat hasty farewell--it was his wedding anniversary, and he needed to honor that commitment and undertaking.

11-08-2009 - The two late arrivals from the day before were conspicuously early, this morning. Rick arrived shortly thereafter, with the comment that the rose from the night before was an effective life-saver. A group sitting at 10:05-10:35, with Andy showing up a tad late and joining the sitting in the dining room.

Reconvening with a circulation, and a recapitulation of the warm-up work from the day before, with the addition of playing in triplets against a steady pulse, and always with 4 "bars" to a chord. For example:

x x x x x
5-4-3-2-5-4-3-2-5-4-3-2-5-4-3-2

or

x x x x x x x x
5-4-3-2-3-4-5-4-3-2-3-4-5-4-3-2-3-4-5-4-3-2-3-4

and then change chords, and go on.

We then jumped right into Nurse, with an aim to review, clarification, and tightening of parts. At 12:15, Tony took an opportunity to bring out his iPod and play some traditional Turkish folk music, so that we could get an idea of what this really sounded like. To the circle's scribe, this seemed to help with timing and feel in the group, and certainly helped him. This brought us up to the first true playthrough, with parts, right before lunch at 1:00 p.m.

Small talk at lunch.

1:40, back to work. Now we were working on the closing mirror parts to the lead; once these were established in a few people (not all, as they were quite difficult), we were able to do a full runthrough with all the parts (bass lines with ascending closing notes, and leads with both straight and mirror leads) at 2:45. Victor pointed out some matters of dynamics, so we addressed these, to bring all the parts out, and led up to a break at 3:15.

3:40, Tony plays some more Turkish music for us, with a slightly different feel (the scribe detected a feel of 3-3-2-2, though it could easily have been 2-2-3-3), and mentioned the name of the lead musician in the group (whose name will be posted here, once it can be remembered or acquired).

We switched gears for a little bit, at this point. Tony asked us to play Eye of the Needle, and explained how we need to be able to see it as a moment, beginning first with the basic 13-note pattern. This pattern is a musical gesture; 4 of them together become a longer musical gesture, and then the entire introduction becomes yet another gesture (this is quite redolent of the 4th principle of the performance event, "Any performance is a multiplicity of performances"). Victor appended this with comments on taking this attitude with many other things, and completing gestures. When one takes a musical phrase and plays it, and carries that thought into the next phrase, it carries a weight and purpose to it, and follows through into larger gestures [my paraphrasing].

With this, we revisited Nurse again, tightening the gaping holes in the hull of the vessel, and making a really seaworthy vehicle of it (someone had mentioned pirates, earlier). We then moved to other work, primarily Batrachomyomachy--this brought an aside from Tony, about how he had originally begun writing this piece while at Claymont Court, and had been reading a Polish book with a translated title of The Red King. This would have been the name of the song, but Tony quickly realized that this probably wouldn't be an advisable name for a song in Guitar Craft, so Batrachomyomachy it became. More patchwork, but good work from those who play the piece, and a noticeable improvement in the twenty minutes we spent on it. A short break at 5 p.m.

A few minutes later, we sat back down and ran Nurse once. Tony then pulled out a small recorder, placed it in the middle of the circle, and we then played our one take of the weekend, just in time for Victor's family to arrive back home from Manhattan. We invited them to take a seat inside the circle, where Bridge was happy to tell us about his weekend. We then played Nurse once more, for the newly acquired audience, and then played a final circulation to close out the weekend. With well wishes flying all around, we relinquished Victor and his home back to his family, and all took off for their respective homes. All in all, a well-spent weekend.