Audio Log: Walk in the Woods

This musical composition is based on an idea I recorded early this year (the first vocal track that appears in the piece). I recently started organizing my database of vocal and instrumental ideas from the last few years, and this is the first of those to make it out of the perverbial gate. "Walk in the Woods" will be a confusing title for those who are familiar with my field recordings, but the name just seems to fit. 111 BPM. Seven tracks including midi piano, midi drums, midi bass, vocals 1, 2 & 3, and guitar.

Audio Log: Frog-ness

This recording is from spring 2007 in the Woodland Cemetery in Keene, New Hampshire. At that time, I was living about a quarter mile from the cemetery and could hear the frogs very clearly from my apartment. When I got down to the site and put the headphones on I was nearly blown away by the volume. As I listened longer, an eery quality began to emerge. The frog species featured in this recording include spring peepers (above), and wood frogs (below). The peepers are the higher-pitched peeps, and the wood frogs are the lower cluck calls.

Word Strings

time to do it up with a smile on my face can you place it when it's racing by flying higher than a hawk beak curved swerve right while in flight it's a diet of mice with eyesight that can slice the air with a minimum of staring don't look long when the sun is glaring at you through the red-tinged feathers

filleted fish swish back and forth with their tales of woe pro or con something doesn't belong hang low submerge your toes in a cold bath the path to righteousness is paved in dirt and grass shaggy manes popping out after a prolonged rain ask the wrong question and you might just get your answer

Audio Log: Heavy Surf

This recording is from Maine's Mount Desert Island in May 07'. I was there for a field course on the ecology of the island, and captured this recording from the Black Woods Campground in the early morning before the day's planned adventure. The waves were roiling wildly following an intense storm from the day before, with lots of heavy breakers and regular spouts of fifty-plus feet. I remember feeling an intense trance-like state upon pulling myself away. The total time for this recording is four minutes.

Audio Log: Update

I recently upgraded the audio player for this blog from Fabricio Zuardi's original XSPF music player to Lacy Morrow's first updated version, and plan to upgrade once more to Lacy's most recent XSPF jukebox very soon. Some of the benefits of the first update include a snazzier appearance, the ability to scroll through audio files, a shuffle function, and the remaining time for the cued track is now displayed in the upper right corner of the full player (haven't set this up for the slim player yet). The next update will allow me to more easily stay abreast of future developments for the player, and provides greater control over the player appearance through skinning, but there is a slight learning curve involved with this transition.

The initial reason I went with Zuardi's XSPF player is that it gets the job done with a minimum of self-assertion. It's also nice to have control over how audio content will be accessed, rather than submitting to the whims of whatever software happens to be the default on a viewer's computer. Also it used to be possible to hide the right-click menu for Zuardi's player using html, but unfortunately this is no longer working on FireFox. Luckily, Lacy's updates to the player include a revised menu that removes undesirable menu items.

Update to the update: the XSPF Jukebox is now in place. It's a bit tougher to go back and replace each player with a jukebox, so rather than spend a lot of time upgrading older posts the jukebox will be implemented from the post, "Audio Log: Phoeverb" on.

Audio Log: Phoeverb

This recording is from early summer 08' in a friend's backyard on George Street in Keene, New Hampshire adjacent to Robin Hood Park. I was tenting out and had my recorder handy. As I was drifting out of sleep in the morning the sounds of the eastern phoebe (pictured at right) and the distant woodthrush inserted themselves into my dreams, wherein they became the most beautiful sounds I've ever heard. You can imagine my delight upon finding them to be just as beautiful in full wakefulness. This location has a wonderful natural reverb that adds an amazing flourish to the clear crisp calls of birds. The total time for this recording is approximately six minutes.

Audio Log: Learning Development

7/4. 95 BPM. Eleven tracks including midi piano, midi organ, midi drums, midi bass, guitar, mandolin, and vocal tracks 1-5. I started this track with the opening vocal, and got the bass and piano where I liked them. I then composed the harmonies, which made the whole thing sound like it was evolving toward a major shift. That led me to develop the organ for the B part, and I then revamped the bass and drums to match this section. The choppy delay organ came later after I realized the full organ sound (while strong and awesome) gets a bit dull with too many repetitions. This tune is my most complex to date in terms of the number of components and transitions, as well as the key change. It took a long time for me to hear where this song was taking me.

Audio Log: Latin Flavor

126 BPM. Six tracks including midi piano, midi organ, midi drums, midi bass, djembe, and guitar. I started this track with the midi drums with the intention of composing something with a latin flavor. I then created the bass and organ parts and built out from there.

New Tuque!

Finally finished the new hat just in time for a dose of winter weather. I had to start this thing a few times because of unfortunate mishaps. The worst was realizing that the free pattern I found on the Internet was about twice the size of my head. Didn't figure that out until the hat was three to four knit sessions along and could've passed as the body of a child's sweater. In the end, I measured the result of this mistake against my head to get an accurate count of stitches to CO (that's Cast On in knitting code) using size 6 round needles.

My basic pattern (developed through much trial & error):
CO 76
K2 (knit two), P2 (pearl two) - 23 rows
K - 29 rows
K 17, K 2 tog (knit two together) - 1 row
K - 6 rows
K 7, K 2 tog - 1 row
K - 1 row (repeat after each successive decrease except the last)
K 6, K 2 tog - 1 row
K 5, K 2 tog - 1 row
K 4, K 2 tog - 1 row
K 3, K 2 tog - 1 row
K 2, K 2 tog - 1 row
K 2, K 2 tog - 1 row
K 2 tog - 1 row
Thread through the remaining stitches and tie 'em off. Don't forget to weave in your wispies!

The hat is snug at the moment, but I anticipate it will stretch to perfection with regular use.

Audio Log: Bumblehum

This recording is from late spring 08' at Antioch University New England. I happened to notice a large number of bees (dare I say a swarm) gathering pollen from an ornamental shrub in the main quad after a morning class. It sounded so lovely that I biked home to grab my recording equipment and was back to record within fifteen minutes. There are quite a few genera of bees represented in this recording, but most of the buzzing is from species belonging to the Bombus genus, more commonly known as bumblebees.

Audio Log: Tin Roof Rain

This recording is from early summer 08' at Crider Shelter on the Monadnock-Sunapee Trail. The roof of the shelter is tin and it was raining lightly as I woke up, which made for an awesome start to my day (really!). The rain gradually gets heavier and louder as the piece progresses. I set up my tent screen inside the shelter in order to keep the insects at bay. At one point during the recording a songbird (sorry, don't remember the species) landed on the floor of the shelter to get out of the rain. The tent screen prevented the bird from detecting my presence, and for a few moments it felt sort of familial. The entire recording is just over ten minutes.

Sourdough = Yeast Feast

Continuing with the theme of microorganisms from the last post, and to follow up on a reference from the much earlier post titled, "Fun Guy!!!", three days ago I started brewing up a sourdough culture using nothing more than flour, water, a mason jar, and an apple. First, I whipped up a watery batter mixture (flour & water) in the mason jar. Next I placed the apple over the jar opening so that it was suspended above the mixture (AKA sponge), sort of like a poor-fitting cork. Over the intervening three days I stirred the sponge two to three times a day, and VOILA!!! It's smellin' pretty derned good! Next stop, Loaf Town!

So how does this all work?! From what I've picked up over the years, fruits tend to host a diverse community of yeasts - the active party in a number of cultured foods such as bread, beer, and other baked goods. By placing the apple (pears, dates, and other fruits should work as well) over the sponge, I'm basically promoting an exchange of yeasts between the fruit and the sponge. You know something is eventually going to infect the sponge. With this technique, you're stacking up the odds in your favor that the infecting organism is going to be a dinner party (sourdough) instead of a frat party (moldy beast!). Eventually the yeasts settle in to chow on the batter, and if it smells sweet and delicious - we're in business!

Thanks for joining me on a mini adventure to the wonderful world of microorganisms. Check back next week for a progress report on those bread loaves.