As you know from previous posts, learning guitar is difficult for me. It is a slow process and generally requires brute memorization and the song or riff firmly imprinted in my mind. Becoming acceptably proficient at any one song takes time -- sometimes, way too much time.
Yet, somewhere in the recesses of my mind, I hear snippets of songs. They come to me while walking the dog or going for coffee in the morning. They can pop up while I am driving somewhere. They are the soundtrack of my daily life. Many -- or most -- of them are not “standards.” Rather, they are original tunes -- what you could call songs of first impression.
If a song sticks, maybe it can be the source of something new. Occasionally, I can hum these songs. I even can hum them into a Blackberry -- that ubiquitous convenience or distraction which takes away our privacy. Despite its intrusion into our ability to escape, the Blackberry allows for a recording so that some song banging around in my head is not lost. Armed with a recording, I can attempt to search a song out on the fret board of my guitar.
More accurately, I hear melodies. Chord progressions -- the basic building blocks of music and harmony -- are not on my mind’s playlist. True music theory also is not in my mind’s playlist. So, ultimately, I have to turn to somebody like Paul the Pyronaut and say, “Here’s my idea for a new melody. What are the chords?”
Because they are not grounded in music theory, sometimes the melodies or particular notes clank when played with chords. The dissonance can be astounding or annoying. A well-planned note may end up being so bad that it sounds like I hit the wrong note. Paul helps come up with chords and subtract out the truly dissonant notes.
Through this process, I have songs -- instrumentals -- which I can call my own. I may not be much of a guitar player, but I am a songwriter of sorts. My songs are simple because my soundtrack is not infused with complicated chords, exotic progressions or meters, or a slew of modes. In fact, I do not have slightest idea of what a “mode” is. I just heard of that somewhere -- probably from shredders or jazz folks.
My soundtrack is straight ahead garage-style rock ‘n roll. It is the stuff that played on AM radio when I was young.
Sometimes lyrics creep into my thoughts but do not leave much of an impression. Those lyrics tend to be cliche-driven. To go beyond that requires too much self-exposure or focusing on the banality of daily life. I will not write a song about drinking coffee in the morning, pondering feelings, or a day (or a week or year) in my life.
Instead, I write instrumentals which are simple, are often repetitive, and more often than not work off of the chord progressions heard in thousands of rock and blues songs. They are limited by my talents and knowledge. They also are limited by my taste in music.
At some point, the skeletons for 8 rock instrumentals existed. That was enough to record a CD. “Record a CD” went onto my “bucket list.” I set a goal of Valentine’s Day . . . or whenever. I knew that I just had to get it done before I die. The recording would leave 20 something minutes to posterity -- 8 songs @ 2-1/2 or so minutes each.
Lucky Posterity!
Yet, somewhere in the recesses of my mind, I hear snippets of songs. They come to me while walking the dog or going for coffee in the morning. They can pop up while I am driving somewhere. They are the soundtrack of my daily life. Many -- or most -- of them are not “standards.” Rather, they are original tunes -- what you could call songs of first impression.
If a song sticks, maybe it can be the source of something new. Occasionally, I can hum these songs. I even can hum them into a Blackberry -- that ubiquitous convenience or distraction which takes away our privacy. Despite its intrusion into our ability to escape, the Blackberry allows for a recording so that some song banging around in my head is not lost. Armed with a recording, I can attempt to search a song out on the fret board of my guitar.
More accurately, I hear melodies. Chord progressions -- the basic building blocks of music and harmony -- are not on my mind’s playlist. True music theory also is not in my mind’s playlist. So, ultimately, I have to turn to somebody like Paul the Pyronaut and say, “Here’s my idea for a new melody. What are the chords?”
Because they are not grounded in music theory, sometimes the melodies or particular notes clank when played with chords. The dissonance can be astounding or annoying. A well-planned note may end up being so bad that it sounds like I hit the wrong note. Paul helps come up with chords and subtract out the truly dissonant notes.
Through this process, I have songs -- instrumentals -- which I can call my own. I may not be much of a guitar player, but I am a songwriter of sorts. My songs are simple because my soundtrack is not infused with complicated chords, exotic progressions or meters, or a slew of modes. In fact, I do not have slightest idea of what a “mode” is. I just heard of that somewhere -- probably from shredders or jazz folks.
My soundtrack is straight ahead garage-style rock ‘n roll. It is the stuff that played on AM radio when I was young.
Sometimes lyrics creep into my thoughts but do not leave much of an impression. Those lyrics tend to be cliche-driven. To go beyond that requires too much self-exposure or focusing on the banality of daily life. I will not write a song about drinking coffee in the morning, pondering feelings, or a day (or a week or year) in my life.
Instead, I write instrumentals which are simple, are often repetitive, and more often than not work off of the chord progressions heard in thousands of rock and blues songs. They are limited by my talents and knowledge. They also are limited by my taste in music.
At some point, the skeletons for 8 rock instrumentals existed. That was enough to record a CD. “Record a CD” went onto my “bucket list.” I set a goal of Valentine’s Day . . . or whenever. I knew that I just had to get it done before I die. The recording would leave 20 something minutes to posterity -- 8 songs @ 2-1/2 or so minutes each.
Lucky Posterity!