The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: irishenglish
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 11:52 AM

First off, a slight correction to mandotim-KT Tunstall is Scottish.

Ok, I'm going to say this again for WAV's benefit because when he says, "As a multiculturalist, I admire much more folks from around the world who are good at THEIR OWN culture," he gets me going, and not in a good way. On another thread of WAV's creation, I wrote this,

"On your website too I saw something about World Music-"World-music stalls and stages should be places where folkies of different nationality present different unfused music to each other. You do realize that word, unfused is a real difficult one to use in context of music. West African music does not follow a colonialism rule. You can say someone is from Guinea-Bissau, or Mali, or Senegal, but the music itself comes from an ancient source that predates those names for countries we now know. Thus someone like Toumani Diabate's lineage of griots comes from the area we now know to be Mali, but was not Mali until 1960, before he was even born. The same can be said in Europe. Ever hear regional European music WAV? Do you realize that there has been so much polinization in European music that you can have someone from regions of France singing in Italian, or someone from Sardinia singing in Catalan? See? unfused doesn't work when you have music that by a map says it belongs in one country, while culturally, actually belongs in another. So your stated belief that different nationalities should present their own native, unfused music to each other, is in actuality, a deluded belief that music stops at border checkpoints, even the ones that didn't exist until the 20th century."

I have also asked you repeatedly, on several threads now, to clarify when you say you admire folks doing music from their own culture. Does that mean that the old English, Scots, and Irish ballads that are found, and sung to this day in places like Kentucky, or Newfoundland should be abandoned? Because following your rules, one can say that those folk who do sing those songs, are abandoning the native culture of their own country. That's not what I think, I find it fascinating that, as for example Richard Thompson saying that an old ballad, King Henry, was found pretty much intact in rural Kentucky. So you have Americans singing about a tribute due to the king of France, and tennis balls, and all sorts of strange things that are in the original variants of the song.

I will also say that, in its most simplest explanation, Rock is an American form. Again, I say simple, because we know its roots go far deeper than that, if one wants to go there. But will you deny the effect rock can have at this point on all cultures? Case in point is Runrig. Using an American form, they have energized and in some way, revitalized Scottish Gaelic, in their 30 + years. Will you honestly stand here and tell me that there is something wrong with that, because they are using an "american" form? Rory Macdonald, and at the time Donnie Munro (Bruce Guthro actually has a lilt, but its not quite the same) have not, nor ever will be considered Americans in their singing style, they are Scots through and through. So would you dismiss them, and all they have accomplished because they are singing songs about their own culture and history and language (including singing in that language)simply because they use an American form to express it by?

Ponder this if you will please WAV. Please don't answer with a link to your website. I HAVE been on it, I have read most of it. I seek to understand, and I seek to debate your points, not be redirected to the source of the problem.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 08:33 AM

Ah - what I was saying about websites - KISS...

From Plenty of bagging for grocery website

The new GROCERYchoice website keeps a Labor election promise to provide consumers with more information about grocery prices. But it has provoked a HEROC complaint from a disabled guy that he can't read it or otherwise access it - in contravention of the Govt guidleines about disability accessibility to Govt websites! :-)

It's bloated full of fancy tricks and cute graphics, and I even broke it looking up something simple - so I sent in a complaint direct to the ACCC too! :-)

KISS...

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 08:26 AM

WAV, I looked at your life's work and was reminded by your poem on Moroccan tea about another bit of English culture that began elsewhere.
Tea drinking. A Muslim/Turkish tradition!!!!!! So, were all those tea-sippers not practising THEIR OWN CULTURE?
Oh well, back to oranges and such like foreign ungodly fruit, which nobody would buy if English apples and pears were nicely swelled.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 07:22 AM

Carol - Internet Explorer 6.
Don - I read all with interest and agree with some of what you said, but standby what I said: there are taut tushed mimers who have made a fortune, whilst many genuine musicians have struggled to make ends meet, from the music industry; and, accordingly (pardon the pun), if we like fair competition, we don't like capitalism. Have you read much John "business is glorified theft" Steinbeck? For a better way for humanity, I refer you to my snippet on REGULATIONISM above &/or my life's work.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 07:12 AM

Yeah, some folks find these reality sandwiches kind of bitter-tasting

With respect, Don, we don't all share your particular reality, which, judging from your rant, and the above statement, is a very different reality to my own. Your sandwiches are only bitter tasting in respect of the narrow-minded absolutism they embody; hard won no doubt, but I've always found that folk music is best served by non-musicians, certainly non-musos, for whom professionalism is a complete anathema.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 07:01 AM

Here is an extract from a fun novel, an icon of Englishness, which, coincidentally, was written by a foreigner. D-d Hungarians.....

"It do seem more like April than September, don't it?" continued Mr. Hempseed, dolefully, as a shower of raindrops fell with a sizzle upon the fire.

"Aye! that it do," assented the worth host, "but then what can you `xpect, Mr. `Empseed, I says, with sich a government as we've got?"

Mr. Hempseed shook his head with an infinity of wisdom, tempered by deeply-rooted mistrust of the British climateand the British Government.

"I don't `xpect nothing, Mr. Jellyband," he said. "Pore folks like us is of no account up there in Lunnon, I knows that, and it's not often as I do complain. But when it comes to sich wet weather in September, and all me fruit a-rottin' and a-dying' like the `Guptian mother's first born, and doin' no more good than they did, pore dears, save a lot more Jews, pedlars and sich, with their oranges and sich like foreign ungodly fruit, which nobody'd buy if English apples and pears was nicely swelled. As the Scriptures say--"

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 02:53 AM

What, like cucumber sandwiches?

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: Don Firth
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 12:06 AM

Thanks, Robin! It's nice to be appreciated.

Yeah, some folks find these reality sandwiches kind of bitter-tasting. . . .

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 09:50 PM

You're Evil Don.... :-)

I like you.... :-P

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 09:23 PM

I've been involved a couple of times with attempts to put "folk groups" together, and the stumbling block has always been an unwillingness for one or more (usually more) to rehearse sufficiently, if at all!

We'd manage to get through a song once without somebody screwing up (that's just the beginning of rehearsing), then a couple of people would start to pack up their instruments and say, "That sounded great! Okay, let's go grab a beer!" Or the attempt when one person, a fairly well-known singer in the area at the time, never bothered to show up for rehearsals. The implication was "You folks need the practice. But I'm a pro, and I don't." Or the times I showed up at a potential singing partner's apartment ready to practice, and her roommate tells me, "Oh, she's not here. She went skiing this afternoon."

That's why I work solo.

About the only times I've been able to work with someone else successfully was when our performances consisted mainly of swapping solos with a little banter between, interspersed with occasional duets. Because we were not always able to get together as often as we needed to, this sort of programming did seem to work pretty well.

I really have to hand it to groups that actually manage to get it off the ground. First, you have to want to get together, then you have to be able to get together, then when and if you do get together, you have to be willing to work until you get it to the point where you're all satisfied with what you've accomplished and people are willing to pay to hear you sing.

And when it comes to individual performances, if there is a lack of consistent practice, it really shows!

Don Firth

P. S. Of course, I'm talking performing professionally here. If I person just wants to sing and play for fun, then you have to decide how far you want to take it. Just sing in your own bedroom, sing for your family, sing at parties with a few friends, or post stuff on MySpace or YouTube? Great! But still, if you're going to ask that other folks listen to you, you want to do it well enough so they don't sit there writhing and flinching, right?

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 07:38 PM

Love your rant Don.

1) Agree with you about 'learning the dots' totally. I knew everything before I went to University...

2) Rate of Pay. One of the reasons I lost interest in going to folk clubs was the expressed lack of interest by others in getting together 'for rehearsal'. "Ya don't HAVE to think, Ya gotta just open up yer arse and let the music fall out".... :-P (and that's usually just the sort of result ya get!) :-)

And I have noticed that many 'self taught folkies' just don't get what 'rehearsal' IS. Perhaps I have been 'spoiled' by my Classical Music Upbringing (like only eating Beluga Caviare, perhaps!). In which case I thank my lucky stars that I WAS 'spoiled'!!!

'Rehearsal' is not just playng the notes over again and again without change in tempo or expression as fast as you can till the other musos run screaming from the room. (Hmmm, that also sounds like many 'sessions' I have been to!)

'Rehearsal' involves thought. If you don't understand that, I'm not going to bother wasting my time explaining that. And it involves fear, excitement, discovery, boredom, etc.

When I had been taking piano lessons for a couple of years, and still in single digits, I began to think that I was pretty hot shit. "Hey Dad, look how fast I can play" I said.

My Dad stopped what he was doing, said to Mum, "This is very important", got out his violin, tuned it (and without any other warmup) took his bow, placed it on a string at the frog, and pulled a VERY SLOW bow, in perfect tune, in perfect pitch, no waver or squawk, that took what seemed like AGES (several minutes)!

"Son", he said, "Any ignorant Fool can play loud and fast, but to play slow and soft and well takes talent, training and practice". I have never forgot that. Pity that most I stumble across who think they are 'hot shit musos' don't seem to have been 'spoiled' like me.


"I don't know how many folkies I've heard who, when they've learned a song from a Ewan MacColl or Joan Baez record, do their damnedest to sing it exactly the way Ewan MacColl or Joan Baez recorded it."

This is a substantial victory for the owners of 'The Recording Industry' - hollow but overwhelming.


"Almost all of the more successful, highly paid performers in most fields put in the time and the work."

Which sadly means that most of us are 'Just Amateurs'... :-)


"I used to be good once, but now I'm out of practice!"

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 04:48 PM

This particular rant would be appropriate on any one of a number of threads here on Mudcat, but since the subject has come up, this is as good a place as any.

< rant >

lady penelope is exactly right about the "written music versus learning by ear" thing. But, of course, it's not "versus," it's "plus." Any aspiring musician who either refuses or can't be bothered to learn to read music is intentionally handicapping himself or herself. You limit yourself to having to learn songs either from other people (often used as a justification by folkies because, "after all, folk music is supposed to be orally/aurally transmitted"—for urban-born singers who didn't grow up in the oral tradition, when did that become Holy Writ!??), or from recordings of other singers. It was this limitation that prompted me to learn to read music—because I had a whole book case full of song books (Sandburg, Lomax, Sharp, et al) that were useful to me only if I had heard the song before and already knew the tune. Learning to read music freed me from that narrow restriction and opened the whole field to me.

And the misconception that learning a song from written music means that you are limited to singing it only the way it is written is almost too dumb to bother refuting. But here goes:   listen to a number of actors, say Lawrence Olivier, John Gielgud, Derek Jacoby, do Hamlet's soliloquy (learned from a book or script). Same words, same content—but quite different in pace and emphasis. Or operatic tenors, say Placido Domingo, Ferrucio Tagliavini, Jussi Bjorling sing "Che Gelida Manina" from La Boheme (learned from an operatic score). Quite individual in style and approach. They all "dink around" with note-values, pace, and general approach. Each singer or actor puts his or her own individual stamp on the work.

I don't know how many folkies I've heard who, when they've learned a song from a Ewan MacColl or Joan Baez record, do their damnedest to sing it exactly the way Ewan MacColl or Joan Baez recorded it.

The written music is a starting point and a learning aid. It is not a set of handcuffs. Unless you make it so!

Learning to read music is not that difficult, once you get over your prejudices and misconceptions. And it is an extremely valuable tool for any musician.

####

And as to the matter of "Within the broader music industry, and beyond, what some get for their hour's work, compared with others, is ridiculous and inhumane. . . ." and what follows, displays substantial ignorance about what it takes to be a performing musician.

Segovia was able to command some pretty high fees for his concerts. So, by the hour, his pay seems to be "ridiculous and inhumane" compared to the singer of folk songs who performs mainly as a hobby and picks up the occasional tenner for doing a gig. But Segovia practiced six hours a day. Every day. Year after year, for every year that he performed. And this was time that he didn't get paid for.

How many singers of folk songs do you know who practice six hours a day, every day?

Can you imagine the amount of money that Van Cliburn (or his parents) spent on piano lessons as he was growing up? He also put in many hours a day at the keyboard. Hours for which there was no pay.

If you total up the amount of money spent on lessons, often the tuition paid and time spend in music schools and conservatories, and the number of hours that these musicians put in to eventually get those "ridiculous and inhumane" fees—and then, divide that into what they earn—earn—you may be very surprised to find out how small their "hourly wage" is, after expenses!!

And I'm not talking about only classical musicians here. Bruce Springsteen and the band he works with start rehearsals—yes, rehearsals— regularly, at nine o'clock in the morning. The Greatful Dead? Same sort of "woodshed" time put in. Kenny Rogers and the First Edition? Almost all of the more successful, highly paid performers in most fields put in the time and the work.

". . . talent, motivation, and dedication. . . ."

So, unless you have the motivation and the dedication, and are willing to invest the time, the money, and the energy, then don't bitch about the "ridiculous and inhumane" pay that these artists get.

If you pick up the guitar (or whatever) three or four times a week and practice for forty-five minutes, and learn a new song (from a record) and practice it for an hour or two before you can sing it without goofing it up, just count yourself damned lucky if someone is willing to toss a couple of quarters into your hat to hear you sing it.

< /rant >

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 04:33 PM

What browser was being used then the Kevan Tolley site was opened?

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: lady penelope
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 04:29 PM

Er, excuse me WAV. Why do you consider anything that could be classified as 'pop music' to be american and not a product of the culture in this (British Isles) country even if that's where the artists influences are from? It's vastly over simplistic to equate any one single country with genres this way. Are you going to attempt to say that there are no european influences in american folk music???

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 04:24 PM

She's Canadian, when you obviously mean from the USA.
Here are some things supposedly traditionally English:
Morris dances- Of Spanish origin, possibly from North Africa too.
Tennis- Developement of a French game.
Recorders- The earliest examples were discovered along the Northern Seaboard and the Baltics, including Poland. The earliest image of one comes from the Balkans. Most of the innovations in it's developement were carried out by the French, most of the makers were German. Most of the music was italianate, even when composed by Englishmen!! They, obviously, were not practising their own culture.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 02:31 PM

I thought KT Tunstall and Westlife perform in the pop style, which is one of the American genres. This is not to say I've never enjoyed any American pop - Avril Lavigne, e.g., is a great American singer, in my opinion.
On my computer, I had trouble with your first site, Carol, but like your other one.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:22 PM

THEIR OWN culture

Here's the universal cultural formula, WAV: Culture = What Folks Do.

Its the doing of it that makes it their own, rather than any nationalistic provenance which can always be proven to be at best spurious, at worst specious.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: lady penelope
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:10 PM

I don't understand this 'written music versus learning by ear thing'. Nobody complains or argues about the written word, why this friction about writing music down, or being able to read it? And what's this absolute rubbish about written music being an anathema to the 'folk process'? You think 'cos some one writes a melody down it'll never be improvised upon, nor evolve in any way??? Puh-lease...

Really guys, get over the whole written music thing. It's a tool and like any other, works extremely well for those who learn to use it properly. If you don't wanna use it, fine, but don't turn not using written music into an idealistic 'folk banner' to march behind. Sheesh...

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: Amos
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 01:06 PM

THose are very nice web pages, Carol!


A

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:45 PM

Here's a couple of websites I designed and built using only some CSS I stole from other sites and HTML. I've not ever used any tools for building websites, and while mine are far from professional, it shows that someone with little or no training can build a workable website without using any tools (everything I know, I learned from a book on HTML, from studying other people's websites, and some basic stuff from the Mudcat). The first one uses a free service and as one can see, the ads aren't too intrusive, and they can even be hidden by the person viewing the page...

http://www.geocities.com/kevan_tolley/index.htm

http://www.alcdv.com/ArtFurniture.html

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:40 PM

WAV, nearly every aspect of English cultutre has it's roots somewhere else in the world. Morriss dancing is a case in point, as is tennis. Your very recorder is another case in point, a foreign instrument used to play courtly music brought over from Europe.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: mandotim
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:39 PM

WAV, I wish you would get off your one-note melody about Englishness; I'm trying to have a rational and friendly discussion here. KT Tunstall; have you ever heard her sing? Do you know what she sings about? Her songs are about her experience here, in England. Westlife are Irish, and I didn't name the song I used as an example. It was a traditional Irish air, sung unaccompanied, with words by an Irishman. How was that 'American culture'?
Are you saying that the whole of the Beatles canon was American? Have you ever been to Penny Lane? Do you know where Strawberry Fields is?
I'm going to leave this thread now, because I'm always bored by monomaniacs.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:34 PM

It didn't take me long to teach myself, in my late 30s, to sight-read (only the top-line melody, mind) but I find playing-by-ear/mimicking my above-mentioned Chants much more difficult (I'd earlier simply found a way to sing/chant my verses without being able to read or write music). On the other hand, someone sat next to me at a folk-club, who can't sight-read, worked out the fingering for a folk-song literally within minutes of me singing it - I guess it's at least partly knowing the instrument very well, as you say, Carol.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: CarolC
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:17 PM

For me, when the recorder was my main instrument, I practiced until the fingering became second nature and I never really had to think about it any more. And then, once that happened, all I had to do was know a melody in my head, and if I could whistle it, I could play it on the recorder. Which, I guess, is another way of saying I tended to play by ear. I could do this with any simple melody, but much longer classical pieces, I had difficulty with playing because I couldn't memorize them very well, and I never was able to read music for the recorder.

I can read music for the accordion, and I do (mostly for the basses, which I sometimes have difficulty memorizing), but I can play a melody on the keyboard side by ear (if I can whistle it, I can play it). I'm sure that's because I've been playing on keyboards since I was a child and the notes have become second nature on that instrument as well.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 12:05 PM

I agree in part, again, Tim - but the examples you give are people from these parts practising American culture instead of their own (as The Beatles were very good at). As a multiculturalist, I admire much more folks from around the world who are good at THEIR OWN culture.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: mandotim
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 11:21 AM

WAV, I won't apologise for seeming idealistic :)! However, there is some pragmatism here as well; if you look at those performers who have sustained a career beyond the ephemeral world of the one or two hit wonder, there is generally a degree of real musical ability there, either in the performer themselves or in those who play/arrange/produce the music for them. I'm able to ignore (mostly) the taut tushed mimers, as you put it, and listen to what's actually going on in the music. A good example here is K T Tunstall, an English singer/songwriter. She could be viewed as a lightweight pop singer, but no; she is older than the norm, and has done the hard work of gigging with a band for some years before getting a break. 'Manufactured' boy/girl singing groups tend not to sustain, although they make a lot of money while they can. Those who do sustain tend to have talent; have you ever heard Westlife singing a capella with no amplification? I took my youngest daughter to see them some years ago. They stepped out from the mikes, and filled a large theatre with a really glorious sound.
There is a danger here though, and that's the pernicious practice of sampling the work of others and putting it out as your own; the recent offering from Kid Rock springs to mind, a blatant sample of Warren Zevon's Werewolves of London. Anyone with a mixer and a computer can do this now, thanks to digital technology, and it worries me that there is less incentive to develop original talent as a result.
Regarding the determinants; I forgot 'luck'!
Back to promoting your website I see. Sigh.
Tim

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 10:12 AM

Perhaps this exists independently of the ability to sight read?

Let's hope so! This is a particular bugbear with me as, try as I might, I cannot understand musical notation in any shape or form. I think there's a defective gene, or some sort of dyslexic thing going on in what I laughingly call my brain that has been a scourge and embarrassment for my entire life. If I hated music this wouldn't be a problem of course, much less if I wasn't a pretender to the cause in terms of experimental, medieval & folkish idioms, but I console myself with the thoughts that musical notation is a comparatively recent development in terms of western history anyway, emerging with regard to the medieval scholastic tradition and developing into the music we now think of as Classical, which by definition includes all Western derived Art Music of the last nine hundred years.

Meanwhile, the non-literate Non-Art Music existed by virtue of some other process, evolving out of the melismatic modal crooning of the Indo-European hunter-gatherers which somehow sang itself into existence like birdsong and of which we still find an echo in the Irish sean nos or the Sami joik, or in the Muezzin calling the faithful to prayer, which, in turn, works its way into the Revival of British Folk Song via Ewan McColl trying to get some of that into his own singing, and urging others to do likewise. This other thing we think of as the Oral Tradition is not simply a matter of playing by ear, rather being a part of a transfigurative process of dissemination by which the thing itself undergoes a vibrant renewal with each new birth, both individually, and collectively, which is the essence of the process we might think of as being Folk Music. Once we write it down it's dead on the page; it's a relic in a museum, but not without its own persuasive mediumistic potency should we be successful in raising the spectres of ages past in that most glorious of Seances we call The Singaround, or, for those of an instrumental bent, The Session.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 09:04 AM

"The real determinants seem to be talent, motivation, dedication and a degree of originality."...now that really IS idealistic, Mandotim...you don't see any taut-tushed mimers making a fortune from the music industry - I think there's heaps of hype...

"Within the broader music industry, and beyond, what some get for their hour's work, compared with others, is ridiculous and inhumane; hence, many relatively competent musicians within the folk-scene are really struggling to make ends meet; so, if we like fair competition, we don't like capitalism. A better way, as I've suggested in verse, is to accept that humans are competitive, and have strong regulations (partly via nationalisation) to make that competition as fair as possible – whilst also providing "safety-net" support" (from here).

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: mandotim
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 07:40 AM

Hi Foolestroupe! Agreed; in something like the blues, or country, or even traditional tunes, there is an underlying formula that tends to dictate the structure. The people I consider to be really talented seem to be able to play outside the patterns and switch readily between genres, and are able to be proficient in the new genre almost immediately. Gardner (see here) has a theory of mutiple intelligences, suggesting that our traditional idea of academic intelligence is too limited. One of his 'intelligences' is a musical intelligence. Perhaps this exists independently of the ablity to sight read?
Tim

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 07:13 AM

Also Tim,

In a 'restricted music genre' some musos only need to know the 'formula' to make their part fit in the ensemble,e.g. some parts need only the chord progression, not the melody as such.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: mandotim
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 07:05 AM

Regarding the need to read music, I'm reminded of the old story about the very famous country music bass player in Nashville, who was asked on arriving at a recording session 'Do you read music?'. The reply? 'Not enough to hurt my playing'.
As with so many things, a search for absolutes and 'ideal' situations seems futile. There are just too many variables; live or recording studio? Music genre? Structured or improvisation? Solo or ensemble? The good news is it seems to be possible to succeed in music with or without the ability to read music. The real determinants seem to be talent, motivation, dedication and a degree of originality.
Incidentally WAV; well done for not mentioning your website in your last post.
Tim

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 06:52 AM

I was thinking of the BBCs young musician of the year competition, which is mostly classical and once involved a senior judge criticising a young classical musician for NOT sight reading. And, in the last one, the Beeb showed (perhaps too much) how the students prepared, with visualisation techiniques being popular. Thus, I stand by what I said regarding a trend toward playing-by-heart in the classical scene, more than in the past (which that judge also noted).
Would you both agree, FT and Volgadon, that the ideal "in all genres" is to be able to sight-read and play-by-ear well?

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 06:13 AM

"memorising it (which is a folky thing, but, apparently, also the trend in classical music"

Actually the Prima Donna Soloists have always done it in Classical Music, but 'Session Musos' in all genres have always been good 'sight readers'.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 06:12 AM

The trend?????? Eh? Most musicians try to memorise the tunes they play, at least partways. Classical music tends to emphasize exactness, and is of considerable length, so naturally you use sheet music a lot.

"memorising it (which is a folky thing, but, apparently, also the trend in classical music);"

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 03:53 AM

Thanks, FT, and, yes, as the months go by, I am getting a bit quicker/better at learning a new tune from the score; memorising it (which is a folky thing, but, apparently, also the trend in classical music); and mimicking, on recorder/keys, my Chants from Walkabouts (I've about half of these simple tunes "worked out", I think?!).
Having read your info. on HTML, I opened the "walkaboutsverse" dead-thread, which closed just short of a 1000 posts, and, for comparison, did a right-click of my mouse for "properties" - it said about 1300KB, which made me think that maybe my FrontPage version is not that inefficient at about 650KB for 230 poems..?
I think others did that same level 1 course on web-design, at the CSV, on FrontPage, and I've heard others say we should not have been learning on Word. But, as I say, there was not much extra to learn when I did transfer to FrontPage.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 07:37 PM

"someone who knows HTML [note correct capitals!] could (given quite a lot of time I'd imagine) cut the KBs down again considerably,"

Not as much time as you might think. Actually it would be easier with most of those programs to just start from the beginning with a clean slate - and a PLANNED [on paper] Layout.

"The CSV course I did here was just level 1, and we learnt web-design with Word."

AAAAAGGGGGHHHH! I'm disgusted people are paid money to brain damage others with that rubbish! :-) It's NOT 'HTML' it's just an error ridden "word porncessor"! I mean it F***s up the HTML...


"FrontPage ... there's still lots of unnecessary html in there."
"when I find a spelling mistake or suchlike, FrontPage makes it quick and easy to fix"

Ah! If you want to speak French fluently, you don't think in English and translate everything - you learn to THINK IN FRENCH! If you want to write good compact correct HTML, you WRITE GOOD CORRECT HTML DIRECT! If you want, you CAN write it with just notepad, but I used NotePad Plus (even PAID for it!) under Windoze - I am looking for something else to run under Linux. The program colour coded all the correct open & close HTML 'buckets' if the syntax was correct, or it just showed black text starting where there was a problem. It also could load templates for any programming language. It thus picked up any HTML syntax spelling error instantly, while typing.


"more-and-more have broadband and are used to heavier sites from using myspace"

Ah - but people still PAY for the VOLUME (with limits), so that argument is just as hopelessly weak as the one about 'big files just load slower on dialup' - the MacroCrap Argument... just ask John in Kansas about Microsoft .... :-) I HATE 'MyCrapSpace' - and I use all sort of tools to shut off most of the graphics to speed it up, unless it is something I really WANT to see... :-) When I save a 'file' from places like there, I also get umpty dozen files of pointless useless crap in css & js files as well, that usually just DUPLICATE all the 'standard HTML defaults' anyway! ... which means that 'the author' (or their manager) doesn't really know the theory of what they are doing...   KISS! There's also less to go wrong then...


"also, there's the keyboard and recorder fingering to more than 50 tunes to learn and, ideally, get into my head"

Hmmm, you REALLY need to think, if learning tunes always seems so difficult, are you really a 'muso'? :-(

50? 50 ?!! 50??!!!!! Only 50 !!!!? I play about a dozen different instruments, and never bother about learning things off by heart, after all I learnt by 'the classical method' where it is usually expected that you will have the dots as a mainly unlooked at 'security blanket' anyway. That said I can play thousands of tunes (different ones on each instrument) without music, but the hassle is remembering the way they start... :-) Of course I can also extemporise endlessly, as I used to do on Pipe Organ instead of playing from sheet music during the Walkout - wait on, I mean after the service finished! :-)

Of course, we all have to start somewhere, and the first few years are always the hardest...

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 05:48 PM

I was just wondering why you called it a play, when it shares little of the format or style of a play. Documentaries are great, news is pointless to watch for more than a couple of times a day, sports are alright if you enjoy them and music is wonderful, but so is watching comedy.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 05:23 PM

Either way, Volgadon, I'd rather watch (sometimes while on the computer, sometimes while practising the more difficult keyboard and recorder fingering in my repertoire) documentaries, news, tennis, or listen, via satellite, to folk radio from different parts of these isles.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 10:54 AM

Well, as it shares very little in common with plays, I would call it a comedy series.

As for poetry, that isn't really what you said.

"Well what kind of television series is it then, Volgadon? And I meant that I read quite a lot of Chaucer, Milton, Shakespeare, Wordsworth, Blake, and other "big names" in the English anthology of verse. I've also read a bit of American verse, as well as Australians such as Henry Lawson."

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 05:11 AM

That's what I thought, FT - FrontPage is more efficient than Word (above), but someone who knows html could (given quite a lot of time I'd imagine) cut the KBs down again considerably, with the exact same E-scroll format (which I do prefer to 1 page/poem). The CSV course I did here was just level 1, and we learnt web-design with Word. I taught myself FrontPage (there wasn't much extra to know) when folks on mudcat and elsewhere said it was more efficient; but, yes, I believe you that there's still lots of unnecessary html in there. However, when I find a spelling mistake or suchlike, FrontPage makes it quick and easy to fix, plus more-and-more have broadband and are used to heavier sites from using myspace, etc...also, there's the keyboard and recorder fingering to more than 50 tunes to learn and, ideally, get into my head!

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: Amos
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 02:55 AM

Spaw done jumped the shark with a weiner in his mouth this time.


A

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Aug 08 - 12:01 AM

Is there a surgeon handy who can deal with such severe cases of the Mudcat lingua franca?

SRS

(AKA tongue-in-cheek disease)

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 04 Aug 08 - 07:29 PM

"...is that you playing a crumhorn, FT?"

Nope - I've been eating beans again.


Oh, the site! Sorry!

No - I obtained the music midi files from someone on the net - who has now shifted, and I have lost track of where his new site is.



"folks said I should re-do my site,"

I would totally agree.

If you look at the way I did 'The Fooles Routines' pages, that is the sort of layout I would suggest, WAV - one poem/item per HTML page. I made a basic HTML file template, then plugged in each routine. As I wrote new ones, I just wrote them straight in to the template (remember to save a backup copy of the template somewhere!). As I added each new one, I just modified the HTML index pages. I have several indexes, some by date, some by theme. You can do as many manual indexes as you want. Really, for a 'small' collection, doing it by hand that way is far less hassle than setting up some sort of live search engine!

I would also suggest that doing the HTML 'by hand' as basic as possible, using all the HTML defaults, gives the smallest file sizes - faster downloads, and more files in the storage area allowed. Most of those programs you mention add so much pointless bloated crap that you can easily shrink down to about 1/4 or less the size of 'real' (essential***) HTML. If you really paid attention to those courses, and properly read the HTML (recommend staying with HTML Ver4) manual, you can easily work it out - then it's just practice!

***HTML was intentionally designed for simplicity (assuming that the viewer would be setting all the defaults, such as fonts, sizes, colours, etc), then the 'experts' turned it into just another "Pretty Print Text Layout" mess.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: catspaw49
Date: 04 Aug 08 - 06:47 PM

I quit smoking everything as you know darlin'..............I'm just trying to give WAV a few options here.

I think Max and Dick will see the value and importance of his life's work and try to perhaps get him aboard here so he can more easily and broadly share. Making a more searchable and accessible version of his verse cannot but help and will also bring additional interest in both the Digitrad and Mudcat. At the very least it would be a wonderful complement and valuable adjunct to the DT.

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: katlaughing
Date: 04 Aug 08 - 12:45 PM

Spaw what are you smokin'? I don't even see any kitty litter needing to be cleaned up!:->

Subject: RE: BS: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: catspaw49
Date: 04 Aug 08 - 12:32 PM

I'm sure Max or Dick could help you a lot with a better way to search yourwritings to help find pertinent information. I could see it as a part of the DT in a way once Max agreed to host it.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 04 Aug 08 - 09:30 AM

When I first posted the "walkaboutsverse" thread, Spaw, folks said I should re-do my site, with one poem per page. I've left it as an E-scroll (similar to a mudcat thread), but I did transfer it from Word to FrontPage, which cut the KBs from about 900 to about 650.
I've also tried and failed to put the lot as a myspace blog - so, instead, I have just the same Weekly Walkabout as here.
This was done with a level 1, and a bit of level 2, computer certificate behind me, on a free put-up-with-ads site, and I accept there are many who could do it better. But, once on the site, it is very easy to navigate, I think.

Subject: RE: BS: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: catspaw49
Date: 04 Aug 08 - 09:06 AM

It also might be worth taking it another step further. If you have actually visited WAV's site it needs more coherency and organiztion not available in the webspace he's using.

His works are an important example of the emerging additions to the folklore of the world and need to be hosted elsewhere so they can be more readily seen. As he is a 'Catter perhaps Max could host it here. It would save a lot of the reposting WAV has to do and instead of long threads he could be aided in making his works available to all on disc as is done with the DT.   This might be done as an adjunct to the DT which might aid in also drawing more to Mudcat.

His verses could also be accessed by several different searches if it were hosted here. This too might aid both the DT and Mudcat in visitors.



Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 04 Aug 08 - 09:03 AM

...is that you playing a crumhorn, FT?

Subject: RE: BS: The Weekly Walkabout (temp.)
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 04 Aug 08 - 08:55 AM

"There are other places for self-promotion and publication - and, personally, I would dearly love to see an end of it on Mudcat."


The Fooles Troupe think deeply about this and then ignore it.


THE AUTHOR


:-P