Songwriting Class January 27th, 2016

Rich started off the class by asking this question: Why wouldn't someone like your song? And you know, there are so many reasons why someone won't care for it! Here are just a few we brainstormed:

• music is too fast or too slow
• wrong genre (don't play your country song to someone who only loves opera)
• reminds them of their ex
• the person listening to it may have just had a bad day

The point is, audience reaction to a song has nothing to do with whether or not the song is objectively, empirically, beyond a shadow of a doubt, any good. You may be nervous about putting pen to paper. There is an urge to please others and a fear that putting ourselves out there exposes us to shame and ridicule. In the end, don't let nerves stop you from writing.

And don't let the first reaction to your song be the last word. Happy Together was a monster hit by The Turtles after it was rejected by nearly every other band in the 1960s. Another great example is Jimmy Webb's All I Know-- which was deemed "silly" by the person he wrote it for that he was trying to impress.

Mark shared his beautiful song Mountain Sunset with us in class that night. One of the things that was so good about Mountain Sunset is that it did a nice job differentiating between the verse and chorus. That's why songs aren't poems exactly, although you could put a poem to music if you wanted to. Songs have more freedom to differ from the verse and the chorus, or from the bridge. 

Next week we will have other folks share their tunes if they wish, and we will begin to talk about setting words to music. This week (and always, really) listen to music that you enjoy, and to songwriters you admire. Listen, borrow, and take inspiration. Songs don't just appear in a vacuum, and we take what we need from everyone. So listen, relax, and have a notebook, pen, or a recording device handy when the mood strikes you. 

Here is one source of inspiration: Kate Bush and her Hounds of Love album. It's hard to overestimate how important this album was to a weird little kid growing up in rural Virginia. 

For a bonus, here is the song Rich mentioned at the end of class. It's Flora Purim singing Everyday Everynight, produced by Michael Columbier. (Warning: may contain jazz)

See you next Wednesday! We're having a room change February 3rd-- we'll let you know as soon as we can where we'll be next week.

Introduction to Music Theory

Sherry Kubiak gave us a heads-up on this one: a free music theory course! Here is the description from the EdX website:

"Do you have a passion for music and want to learn more about how it works? Are you a musician who learned by ear and has no formal training? Would you like to study music but are unsure of where to begin? Then this music theory course is for you. This course includes six lessons that will give you the knowledge and skills you need to understand basic music theory. You’ll learn from Berklee College of Music professor George W. Russell, Jr. and from Berklee students who share their musical journey and offer advice for those wanting to study music. Above all, the course is designed to impart the joy of creating music and sharing it with others."

 

 

The class started on Monday but it's not too late to sign up.

 

 

White Ripple Community Band January 25th, 2016

The White Ripple Community Band worked on barre chords for the second week in a row, and now all the guitar players have left hands like champs. I've been practicing the past two weeks with the rest of the class and I find it gets slightly less awful each time I give it a go.

We worked on two songs that used four basic barre chord shapes. We charted them out and they are available here for your reference.

For Groovin', we used C and Dm barre chord shapes. Here are the song sheets.

For Crystal Blue Persuasion, we used G and Am barre chord shapes. Here are the song sheets.

 

 

 

Then we mercifully took a break and let the guitar players rest up!

 

We finished off the night by belting out two more songs:

 

The Way You Do the Things You Do by Smokey Robinson and Robert Rogers

 

 

 

Roadhouse Blues by The Doors

 

 

 

 

White Ripple Community Band January 18th, 2016

Here is what WRCB covered in Week 3 of the winter session:

This Little Light of Mine. It's been sung by so many people. Here is a great version by the folk singer Odetta.

Next we did People Get Ready, written by Curtis Mayfield and sung by his band, The Impressions. We did it in the key of G. It's four beats each of the following chords: G, Em, C, G.

For our final song, Crystal Blue Persuasion by Tommy James and the Shondells, we introduced bar chords for the first time. I should let Rich expound on the topic a bit more as he can speak to it better than I can, but bar chords are good! Do not fear the bar chord.

Earlier that day I went to the Old Town School of Folk Music's 2nd Annual Peace Sing in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Day. I love the solidarity in that room-- I often go to the Old Town School to recharge my batteries. Singing is a great way to build solidarity among friends and to drive your enemies crazy. Here is the PDF packet filled with many of the songs we sang on Monday. Hopefully we will be singing them together all year long.

p.s. The lyrics & chords to This Little Light of Mine are in the packet on page 19.

Songwriting Fundamentals January 13th

Last night was our first evening in the Center for Visual and Performing Arts in Munster, and Rich mentioned a YouTube clip that I'd like to share with you.

 

 

John Cleese: 5 Factors to Make Your Life More Creative

Space (“You can’t become playful, and therefore creative, if you’re under your usual pressures.”)

Time (“It’s not enough to create space; you have to create your space for a specific period of time.”)

Time (“Giving your mind as long as possible to come up with something original,” and learning to tolerate the discomfort of pondering time and indecision.)

Confidence (“Nothing will stop you being creative so effectively as the fear of making a mistake.”)

Humor (“The main evolutionary significance of humor is that it gets us from the closed mode to the open mode quicker than anything else.”)

White Ripple Community Band January 11th, 2016

The weather they threatened us with on Saturday, it finally arrived last night. Thank you to everyone who braved the drifts to make some good music!

First song-- Find Love by the band Clem Snide. I first heard it sung at a party a couple of years ago and I knew I had to learn it for myself, so I pulled out my phone to make a recording. It's got just the right amount of sweet and strange to my liking.

Second song-- By Myself by Big Bill Broonzy and Washboard Sam. Nice blues in A. We practiced doing it straight(ish) and then with The Bo Diddley Beat.

Third song-- Catch the Wind by Donovan Leitch. Heads-up: the one you hear in the clip is in a different key than the one we learned last night. (We did it in C.) Get the tune into your head, but don't stress when you sound different from the recording.


David Bowie left for the mothership on Sunday, and my memories keep going back to December 2014 when I got to see the Museum of Contemporary Art's David Bowie Is exhibit. (Twice. Had to.) Being around that much freewheeling strange can't help but make you happy. I'm sorry that he's gone, but that thing we most connect and respond to, that creative essence, the thing that makes us feel wonderful, that we get to share for always.

Happy Birthday to you

Who doesn't love getting birthday wishes and songs just for them on their special day? Communists, that's who.* Here are the chords you can use to wish your loved ones well. It's in the key of A, but really you can transpose it to any key you want.

 

 

In fact, here's a fun thing I read in Daniel Levitin's This is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession: "In 1890, Christian von Ehrenfels was puzzled by something all of us take for granted and know how to do: melodic transposition. Transposition is simply singing or playing a song in a different key or with different pitches. When we sing "Happy Birthday" we just follow along with the first person who started singing, and in most cases, this person just starts on any note that she feels like. She might even have started on a pitch that is not a recognized note of the musical scale, falling between, say, C and C-sharp, and almost no one would notice or care. Sing "Happy Birthday" three times in a week and you might be singing three completely different sets of pitches. Each version of the song is called a transposition of the others."

 

 

 

*Communists love birthdays just as much as everyone else.

It was a soulful night in early January...

White Ripple Community Band started its first class of 2016 by working on three songs. Here they are for folks to work the tunes into their heads...

Hey, Soul Sister by Train
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVpv8-5XWOI


Some Kind of Wonderful, written by John Ellison and first recorded by his band, Soul Brothers Six. It was also a hit for Grand Funk Railroad and Huey Lewis & The News in the decades to come.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51LHNriPZf4


Free to Be... You and Me by Marlo Thomas (and Friends. Lots and lots of friends.) I get sniffly when the carousel horses turn into real horses and ride off into the sunset. You can't take me anywhere.
https://youtu.be/_26FOHoaC78


White Ripple Community Band (and Friends) will be playing tomorrow's Second Saturday event at the gallery. We'll start at 7 p.m. and go until they kick us out! Feel free to bring an instrument to play and bring a song to share if you like, but most importantly bring yourself. All the artist's studios will be open that evening and there is still a chance to buy an inexpensive present or two from December's Small Works exhibit.

White Ripple Gallery & Co. is at 6725 Kennedy Avenue in Hammond, on the same block as the Kennedy Theater.