Music timeline, pt. 1

Here follows an abridged timeline of my life in music so far, followed by some goals for the futue –

• When I was, like, in the womb, my parents played this tape of John Williams playing Bach on classical guitar all the time, and it would usually make me calm down and stop kicking my mom’s spleen. It had the same effect (minus the spleen part) when I was a baby.
• Chilling to George Winston’s December when I was really small. I can actually remember this. Maybe this is why I freaked out when I discovered minimalism later in life.
• Playing a piano recital around age 15 for my teacher Chuck. All his other students were super young, which was odd, because he and me were the only non-“Chopsticks”-type performers on the program. I played an adaptation of “Flight of the Bumblebee,” which I realize now is really cliché.
• Guitar lessons, starting at 12. Mostly consisted of “here are some chords,” and then “go write something,” which is a good approach.
• First band, 16. It wasn’t quite “my” band — more Joe’s, and I just played rhythm, mostly what he told me. It was short-lived, but we had fun, and once opened for The Appleseed Cast (and Dear Ephesus, [sic]). We were called Ozone Park.
• Rambled through a semester of the music major at Gordon, doing well in music theory but not so hot with practicing. One highlight was writing a little rhythm étude in 5-in-3, meaning three-beat measures in the left hand, but with the right hand playing five notes evenly spaced in each measure. What makes that interesting is that 5 and 3 are not multiples of one another have no common prime factors, so the beats line up unevenly; the same concept is at work in what they call “hemiola” (3-in-4).
• Tried to play a song for Beatles Night at the student union that year. Lemme tell ya, freshman year is the worst time to play in front of a bunch of people and bomb because you didn’t practice enough.

Since then until this year I haven’t played much of anything — a hiatus of about 6 years. In the past couple months I’ve been getting my guitar back in working condition, singing a little, and lately trying to figure out sequencing programs on Linux.

And following is the rough musical path I see myself walking for the next year. Like most paths, the tree gets of analysis gets more unclear the further it goes.

May –

• Learn a couple covers
• Learn the basics of ’pooterized music making
• keep re-learning scales and chords
• perhaps re-buy Fretboard Logic books
• Burn up the miscellaneous non-electric strings I and Little Sib have amassed over the years for initial practicing (this is my inner tightwad speaking)
• Get better at singing — take a lesson, read about technique? For self-study use the voice recorder feature on your awesome new non-iPod mp3 player

Summer –

• Buy a new set of strings, replace the jury-rigged bridge saddle with a new one, and start practicing plugged in
• Learn enough covers to busk in the subway
• Get a mic for said activity
• Think about getting (access to) a piano and keeping up some minimal skills in that dept
• Put a creative spin on some of said covers, à la Cat Power
• Get some social goodness going — a mix CD club, a compilation of friends who play music, an equipment coop for buying those expensive mics
• send lo-fi recordings to friends as gifts, and do a just-for-fun collaboration or two
• and maybe organize a regular music critique group inspired by the writing group
• Get set up with basic recording and sequencing software, and crack open the Csound book
• Read more and start writing lyrics.

Fall –

• Invest in new equipment — a decent amp, some pedals, an acoustic perhaps
  • and maybe a keyboard for electronical purposes
  • or an accordion instead.
• Try to organize some semi-serious one-off album projects (aka musical short-term dating)
• Think/talk/share ideas about collaborating across genres (or blurring them) — performance art, theatre, dance

Hope to post updates of this from time to time…