There’s no music I love more in the world than Duke Ellington’s. When I was a kid, the New York Transit Museum had a commercial in heavy rotation on local TV that used “Take The A Train” and I remember being riveted by it. I should point out that Billy Strayhorn wrote this tune, not [...]
Filed in Music
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Also tagged andy jaffe, billy strayhorn, charles mingus, duke ellington, jazz, john steinbeck, max roach, nyc, remixes, soundcloud, subway, tchaikovsky
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Let Us In Revival Revival vs Nirvana mp3 download, ipod format download Vocals and guitar by Barbara. Additional guitar, controller synth, 808 programming and sampling by me. Contains some salty language. This continues our recent push into mostly original rock material about Barbara’s complex romantic life. The sample comes from one of my favorite Nirvana [...]
One of the funkiest albums ever recorded is The Clones Of Dr Funkenstein by Parliament. Even if you never listen to it, you’ll get funkier just by looking at the cover. There’s much to love about this album beyond its joyously ridiculous science fiction theme. There are the deft, bebop-flavored horn charts by James Brown’s [...]
Filed in Key Musicians, Music, Sampling
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Also tagged bernie worrell, digging the crates, eighties, funk, hip-hop, keybs, moog, nice and smooth, parliament, royksopp, Sampling, seventies, talking heads
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Friday, February 26, 2010
The vast majority of music that I hear is recorded, and if you’re reading this the same is probably true of you. Most people don’t have a clear idea what the recording process is like, especially using computers. Here are my adventures in recording. I grew up in the eighties. Cassette recorders were just starting [...]
Filed in Autobio, Composition, Hardware, Improvisation, Music, Recording, Software
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Also tagged analog, audio, audio editing, autotune, computers, electronica, hip-hop, Improvisation, looping, mashups, Music, pro tools, Recording, remixes, revival revival, Sampling, sequencing, tape, tape editing, visualization
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Thursday, February 11, 2010
When I was younger I was obsessed with authenticity in music. I wouldn’t even play electric guitar because it felt too easy, like cheating somehow. I expended a lot of energy and attention trying to figure out what is and isn’t authentic. Now, at the age of 34, I’ve officially given up. I doubt there’s [...]
Filed in Autobio, Music, Race and Identity
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Also tagged acoustic, alicia keys, authenticity, autotune, bebop, big chill, bill monroe, bluegrass, blues, electronica, Emotion, harmonica, herbie hancock, howlin wolf, jay-z, jazz, john coltrane, judaica, klezmer, led zeppelin, lipsynching, michael jackson, motown, nyc, purists, rnb, Sampling, soul, thelonious monk
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Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Here’s a live rendition of Imogen Heap’s song “Hide And Seek.”
Filed in Hardware, Improvisation, Music, Recording
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Also tagged authenticity, autotune, brian eno, electronica, harmony, imogen heap, Improvisation, interface, keybs, midi, Music, pop, remixes, Sampling
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Kramer is the name my mom’s father’s parents gave at Ellis Island because they thought it they might have an easier time with it assimilation-wise than Garfinkel. In Eastern Europe, if you want a WASP-y sounding name, you usually choose something German rather than British. My mom’s wing of her extended family calls itself the [...]
Filed in Autobio, Emotion
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Also tagged america, anxiety, Autobio, buddhism, confidence, family, fashion, george costanza, judaica, kramer, monkeysphere, nyc, obama, seinfeld, tv
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This is a picture of my electronic funk-soul-R&B band doing a show. From left to right, it’s Nicole Bishop, me and Barbara Singer. We were the whole band for that show. I did all the beats, samples and keyboards from my computer using a video game controller. Here’s a screenshot of the program that the [...]
Filed in Autobio, Hardware, Improvisation, Interfaces, Music, Software, Video Games
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Also tagged composing, electronica, hip-hop, Improvisation, interface, keybs, mapping, max/msp, midi, programming, reason, Sampling, sequencing, Video Games
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Thursday, August 20, 2009
Hip-hop artists love Prince. Like them, he blends drum machines, live jazz-funk musicians and samples of other songs.
Filed in Composition, Hardware, Key Musicians, Music, Sampling
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Also tagged digging the crates, drum machines, eighties, george clinton, guitar, keybs, pop, prince, remixes, rock, sample maps, Sampling
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One of the greatest weirdnesses of electronic music is the sampling keyboard. You press a key and any sound recording you want pops out, at whatever pitch. The recent passing of John Hughes made me think of the scene in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off when Ferris samples his coughing and puking on an E-mu Emulator [...]
Filed in Hardware, Interfaces, Music, Sampling
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Also tagged audio, beatles, eighties, ferris bueller, grateful dead, jazz, john hughes, keybs, mellotron, midi, Music, reason, Recording, recursion, Sampling, tape, yello
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