I first met Blair at the Maples Inn in Montreal in the mid to late 1970s. The “Mapes” was a local watering hole on the north shore of Lac St. Louis. It was the place to hang out, drink under age, and hear the thrash of local talent like All the Young Dudes, Mahagony Rush, or the Angry Young Ducks, as well as visiting artists like Mary Margaret O’Hara’s group Songship. Blair was playing the Mapes with Melange, a tight prog-rock unit from his home town of Hudson. He was a skinny, energetic kid who played open-handed, sat tall on his stool incessantly bouncing his hit hat foot, and smacked a shallow snare drum that cut through dense, odd-meter textures.
On a break I made my way through the crowd to the bar and introduced myself to Blair. We talked music until he returned to the stage.
Hudson
We met a second time at the Chateau in Hudson when I was there playing percussion with the Ste-Agathe Flyers, a band from NDG (Notre-Dame-de-Grace). Blair was in the audience and on a break we resumed our conversation about music.
The next time we met was by chance at a Jean Luc Ponty concert in 1979. We were both living in Toronto. Shortly after that we jammed at Humber College where I was studying music.
Mosaic
In 1985 we put an trio together called Mosaic and wrote music that integrated a wide range of influences. Later we formed Pirate Jenny Trio (with singer Jennifer Moore) and Deconstructing Tiina (with accordionist Tiina Kiik). And since 1994 I joined Evergreen Club an eight-member ensemble that Blair is the Artistic Director of.
April Wine
I happened upon this video of Blair taking a drum solo during an April Wine performance. It reminded me not only of how versatile a musician he is, able to move comfortably within many genres, but it also captured the spirit of the music from The Mapes back when we first met.
The fourth large project I am involved with is Grace, a soon to be released CD by Evergreen Club Contemporary Gamelan. Back in 2005 I was commissioned to compose a piece for the Sundanese gamelan instruments of Evergreen Club in combination with voice, percussion, bass clarinet, cello, organ and film. The piece is based on the parable of the prodigal song with lyrics written by filmmaker/writer Jean Marc Lariviere. The eighteen minute work was recorded in Halifax in 2008 but for a variety of technical reasons it will have to be re-edited, mixed, and mastered. I plan to do this once the SONGS CD has been completed this 31 January.
MOVIE/MUSIC
I have been collaborating with photographer Chuck Samuels for many years. We have created a photo/sound installation piece that takes a look at the infamous shower sequence of Alfred Hitchcock called Psychoanalysis and twelve movie/music videos (see: Aquarium). We have also co-written a screenplay.
Chuck created the video for Translating Grace and it will be uploaded for viewing on mosaicland and evergreenclubgamelan.ca once the CD has been manufactured.
I am looking forward to the completion of this project as it has been in the works for a long time, and I can’t wait to be able to watch and listen without having to work on it.
The first time I heard I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry by Hank Williams
I thought it sounded like a movie that was made during the Great Depression. Some guy on the road with a guitar, singing songs for his supper. Sorta like Woody Guthrie, but this was way before I even knew who he was. Then I heard the Cowboy Junkies version and I started to cry.
They caught that melancholy that you only find in the depths of a Canadian February.
The phenomenon of genius discovery after the fact is Mike Disfarmer’s story. From a small town in Arkansas he was a curious man who photographed his community.
His portraits remind me of Diane Arbus. There’s an odd story being told, about the subjects and the artist.
Bill Frisell
A tireless talent, guitarist-composer Bill Frisell keeps on putting out interesting work. A recent project centers on Disfarmer.
What get’s me about a lot of his work is what isn’t played. And like Disfarmer’s photographs there’s a question that arises: how does this work?
Looping is a technique I have often used when composing. It involves repeating or “looping” musical materials, such as a melodic phrase, a texture, or a chord progression.
The term “loop” comes from early electronic composition where a piece of electromagnetic tape is physically spliced together to form a loop and is continuously fed across the play head of a tape player so you hear the same thing played endlessly.
This alone could be perceived as monotonous, but integrated into a piece with other loops of different lengths then you have a texture that has a feeling of sounding the same but as you listen it is always different.
ACOUSTIC INSTRUMENTS
Now if instead of using electronic materials to create the loops you were to use acoustic instruments played by musicians to generate the loops in real time you have a similar but very different effect. The effect plays on both listener and performer.
The listener is free to roam and explore the texture or to let it flow past them, like sitting by a river. For the musician the experience is different. It is no simple task to play the same thing repeatedly. Each repeat requires a great deal of focus because all the other parts are shifting in relation to what you are playing. So a musician experiences the constant change in texture while attempting to maintain his or her place in the composition.
VIDEO
Now consider adding to the shifting texture of musical loops a visual loop and you have a video called Aquarium.
Note: the music is meant to start twenty seconds after the video.
RECORDING THE GUITAR PART
Right hand fingers: thumb (p), index (i), middle (m).
I have a vivid memory of recording the guitar part for Aquarium, an eight minute song I composed for an album called Passing Time. It was at Grant Avenue Studio (Daniel Lanois’ studio) in Hamilton, and Bob Doidge was the engineer.
Playing the part was like doing a T’ai chi standing meditation. At first it’s a piece of cake until about two minutes in. Then legs start to shake, and perspiration glides down your back until you calm yourself and settle into the next phase of meditation.
Playing guitar without any string noise is next to impossible, especially when you’re recording a 4-bar part that loops thirty times. You’re under a microscope, and you don’t want to have to do it again.
HOW TO PLAY THE GUITAR PART
My guitar students often ask how they can improve their technique and develop their “strength”.
Here is a way to greatly improve your playing on many levels
learn the guitar part for Aquarium
play the guitar part for the entire video
To build up your stamina
memorize the part, it’s 4 bars long
strive for clean sound with even articulation and a flow to the rhythm
Try This
Using a metronome, set at 60 bpm
play the part twice
play it four times
then eight times
then sixteen
then thirty-two
The part is played thirty times. To prepare for the recording I played it forty to fifty times without stopping, but instead of counting repeats I used a clock. I would play it for at least 10 minutes without stopping. Then I’d take a short break and do it again.
Endurance
When doing it on your own it’s an exercise in endurance.
When playing along with the recording you have to focus on your part relating to the rhythm of the different parts while maintaining your 4-bar phrase.
I love the concentration, endurance and focus that’s required in playing a part like this. There are eight pieces on Passing Time, and they all employ looping techniques.
Song purchase
If you’d like to purchase one or all of the songs on the CD please contact me directly through this site. (Your information is only used here.)
In September 2010 I shot sixty-four lessons for the Creative Guitar Ensemble DVD project, Grammy Award Winners. The idea for the DVD was to create multi-guitar arrangements for eight classic songs for Beginner to Semi-professional guitarists to play together in a group. Each song has on average eight different guitar parts.
Shooting Creative Guitar Ensemble DVD
Bob Bader, Geoff Bowie, and Vish Patel were the cameramen, and Vish doubled as audio technician. Since the shoot Vish, who was working in television as an editor, started shaping the video into rough cuts. He worked feverishly, trying to finish before he moved to Japan. Alas, he was unable to complete it. And I was concerned that this would take the wind out of the DVD sails. But from just outside of Tokyo Vish has completed the editing, and is currently doing color correction.
While this is going on I am editing/mixing/mastering the audio, in between three otherlarge projects, and programmer Sean Alphonse has been creating the creativeguitarensemble.com website in Memphis. So, things are coming together and I am excited. I can see the completion of the DVD, and the growth of the site. Just have to stick with it.
Demo lesson, pre-mix
Here is an example of what a lesson is like before it is mixed. See video below to hear what the music sounds like when it’s mixed.
Promo video, mixed sound
Here’s what Where Did You Sleep Last Night sounds like after it has been mixed.
Music History
Before I started playing guitar I had heard a lot of music. It was mostly from my dad’s record collection, the radio and television. I was intrigued by the overall sound of records and became fascinated with how music was created. When I got my first guitar I learned a few riffs and chords but was disappointed with how they sounded on my $25 Winston steel string. What I was playing sounded nothing like the record. It wasn’t only that my playing was inexperienced. It was the absence of all the other instruments of the song I was trying to play. So I tried to figure out as many parts of a song as I could. At first it was the chords and lyrics, then tunes sung or played as accompaniment. Doing this helped my playing a lot and it gave me a greater understanding how a song works. Gradually I was able to figure out easy guitar solos, bass lines, drum grooves and percussion parts.
Playing in a Band
Most guitarists start with learning the guitar part of a song. This makes sense. However, alone the guitar part can sound okay but it lacks the other parts to give it a context. Ask a guitarist who doesn’t sing to play a song and they’ll rifle off a riff or a chord progression. To a listener this is not impressive. For a guitarist, it’s not satisfying. Unless you’re playing solo classical or jazz guitar, you need to play in a band. And to most guitarists this is the best part of playing, making music with other musicians. Whether it’s a duo with a singer, or a metal band, or a group of guitarists being a part of a group is fantastic.
Composing & Arranging
I was naturally drawn to write music. My motivation on guitar was to create the illusion that what I was playing was all you needed to hear, that it was a complete piece. This was next to impossible, but it got me searching for solutions. I had a lousy voice but I used it to hum, screech, whine, warble, or to do whatever I could to add to the sound I was making on my guitar, because it wasn’t enough.
I wrote down every idea that came to me, as a composer will do. I would trim out parts of famous songs to make it more doable with one guitar and my crappy voice. I bought a two-track tape recorder and this was a major break through. I could hear two parts at the same time while I played a third.
My very first band I played percussion in. This was a great position because I developed a deeper sense of rhythm, the function of drums and percussion, and the concept of groove. After that I joined a cover band as a guitarist and ended up arranging the music. This lead to a couple of singer/guitarist duos and a group that played original music influenced by Brazilian music.
Gradually I started my own group, Mosaic. I began thinking of myself as a musician, instead of a guitarist, and one of my dreams was to write a string quartet (2 violins, viola, and cello). I figured that if I knew how to compose a string quartet I would officially become a composer.
I went on to write two string quartets, one that includes voice. I have composed and arranged numerous large and small ensemble pieces, many that feature guitar.
When I started teaching guitar at the Royal Conservatory here in Toronto I put together a mixed ensemble program called Fusio. And from this I got the idea to put together guitar ensemble arrangements for my students so they could play together.
In my early twenties I read Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce. When I finished the “artist’s coming of age story” I had a strong impulse to write a novel based loosely on Joyce’s masterpiece but understood that I needed to live a little before tackling such a beast.
The Big Clock
Years past and one day the itch to write the book arose. And I felt confident. So I completed my first draft. Based on a structure reminiscent of the film-noir classic The Big Clock the first draft had potential. The second and third drafts fleshed out the characters, streamlined the form, but revealed a trouble narrator.
P minor blue
A year and a half passed without a solution to the narrator problem, until one day. When I started I took a different approach to writing.
Metapsychological Formulation
Recently I have been exploring the creative process in a somewhat different way. It’s based on the ideas of Dr. Harry Anderson, a psychoanalyst who recently released his life’s work in a book called From an Art to a Science of Psychoanalysis, The Metapsychological Formulation Method. It’s a must-read for anyone interested in how the mind works, or in dismantling psychological obstacles.
Free Association
Stream of consciousness is key to the work of James Joyce. It captures that sense of free association where the mind is free to go where it needs to go. From a creative perspective the idea is to let come what comes and follow that. This is similar to how I worked before only I would stop midstream and finesse the material instead of going where creativity was taking me.
Using free association is a lot like improvising on a musical instrument in performance. You don’t go back and fix or work on a section, you just play and go where the music takes you. I have found writing this way leads me into the unexpected, and when I am finished there is very little that needs to be changed.
Flashback
In the fourth draft the Narrator has come alive, and the characters are richer. The structure is similar (a stolen car crashes, the protagonist re-experiences the key moments in his life up until the crash, the story continues) but the jump back in time, unlike the flashback in The Big Clock, takes the protagonist back to before he’s born, to the night he’s conceived.
When It’s Ready
I can’t say when the novel will be finished. We’ll just have to wait and see.
“If you’re not having fun, you’re doing something wrong.”
- Groucho Marx
I am creating four large projects: a lessons website, a dvd, a cd, and a novel. All of them are progressing well but it makes for a busy day.
The CD
Blair Mackay and I are co-producing the next Evergreen Club recording. Its a collection of songs, mostly from Bandung.
He and I have been collaborating since 1985, starting with Mosaic, then Evergreen Club, and Pirate Jenny. We’ve produced a lot of good music and we’re still working together. I think it’s because we love music, we understand each other, and we’re both from Montreal.
Plus he’s a fabulous musician who is a producer at heart. That’s more of an over-viewer than a details person like myself. He sees things from above. Or, maybe it’s from behind since he’s a drummer first and foremost. Strong aesthetic, open, and great ears.
Tina Jandela
- River Love
I arranged Mang Koko’s Tina Jandela for solo kacapi (20 string plucked zither). It’s on Evergreen Club’s Naxos recording. Here’s what the solo version sounds like, with a little percussion at the end.
Since then I have arranged it to include a variety of instruments, like suling (bamboo flute), gambang (marimba), guitar, and voice.
Right now
I am recording the most recent arrangement. There are eleven different parts. One is a recording of a favorite spot of mine on the Don River. It flows in and out of the song.
Sibelius Version
This audio file below was created in Sibelius notation software. It’s meant as a sketch of what the piece might sound like. The sounds are reminiscent of the instruments they’re pretending to be. Except an oboe sound is meant to invoke the singing of Jennifer Moore.
You have to use your imagination to get a sense of what I have in mind. The piece starts with the sound of a river, a kacapi groove comes in and Jennifer sings a short tune. The group enters. At 2:17 there is a nine bar section that loops: Jennifer sings “la, la la, la, la, le parapluie bleu” on one track while she improvises on another. She recorded her parts a few weeks ago. It sounds great.
Tina Jandela LYRICS
Jennifer Intro
there’s life still in these fallen trees
and oh, the river’s song is deep.
it’s a slow dance upon the green,
i open the latch, a step between.
and morning awakes,
lingering tender,
like you, my love.
Verse
Tina Jandela there’s a blue umbrella
Slow dancing in the streets children run to greet it.
Tina Jandela je vois une femme très belle
slow dance in the street le parapluie bleu.
Practicing guitar can be difficult on the body. To be locked in the same position with one arm swooped over the body of the guitar with your head cocked in a gaze at the fretboard is ultimately not healthy, if you don’t take regular breaks. The same can be said for staring into a computer, whether it’s work or play.
Sedentary Life
A way to combat the strain of a sedentary life is to get up regularly and stretch. I recommend three minutes every hour. This doesn’t sound like very much but it can be difficult to do.
Yoga
I am a novice yoga practitioner. Years ago, I went through a number of Lilias Yoga and You (lower video) classes on video. They were great. She’s an excellent teacher who has a relaxed presence that is unpretentious. During this period I developed a few twenty minute yoga routines that integrate a some T’ai Chi moves I learned as a young adult. These routines have helped me deal with the strain of playing musical instruments (guitar, kacapi, gamelan, and glass instruments), as well as staring into a computer (composing, arranging, audio editing and writing).
Surya Namaskar video
Here is a video that shows the twelve postures of a surya namaskar, or sun salutation. Once learned, it can take less than three minutes to complete.
Lilias Folan Yoga video
This video shows Lilias at work teaching yoga on PBS.
