Progressive Rock Artist seeks Audience
Due to real life pushing its way into our scheduled fantasy, I have to pack up the Prodigal Sounds studio and I don’t know when or where I’ll get it back together. Hopefully not too far into the new year. I’ve made a push to finish up as much music as possible over the last few weeks, when time allows (which it doesn’t, really).
We’re moving to the San Francisco Bay Area.
Last night I finished the first draft of my fugue. I say first draft because there are still a few notes that I am not happy with. In isolation each voice sounds consistent but all together… well there are some, not dischords exactly, but places I might be able to polish.
Eldest Brother asked me how I composed (did I use score?) so I figured I’d describe the process. Basically I have four MIDI tracks defined in a SONAR project, each configured to send to a single instance of the TruePianos VST instrument.
You can tell from the segments that I have been building it up a few bars at a time, and then I tweak the notes in the piano-roll view, selecting a voice at a time to edit:
This draft is very mechanical sounding. That’s ok given that it is a kind of “audio score”. In the final version I intend each voice to be performed in real-time on a different instrument (probably Piano, “Hammond”, Guitar, and Chapman Stick).
The end of the fugue leads directly into Part 4 of the full composition, which is why it finishes up with that shuffle chord sequence.
I suppose I should explain why I found myself talking to Mr Chapman of Stick Enterprises the other day. I’ve come to the point in one of my compositions where I determine what instrument I should use for the bass guitar. It could be that I’m going to use the Stick. I’d also been doing some reading on the Stick Enterprises web site about “dual bass reciprocal” tuning, which drops the 5 treble strings down in pitch to be more in the region of a regular bass guitar. This apparently allows for some alternative fingerings in playing complicated bass lines. (The “bass” side has strings pitched a 5th apart (like a double bass), while the “treble” side is strung in 4ths (like a guitar or bass guitar)).
Since I only ever use my Stick for bass lines, it seemed like something I could try out to see if I liked it.
So I phoned up Stick Enterprises and ordered a set of medium gauge DBR strings, and at Emmett’s recommendation, they also included a complete set of replacement brass slotted post screws.
The strings and posts arrived last week, and I have now completed the conversion. However, it was a little more of a project to do than I hoped.
I replaced the post screws one string at a time, and this was no problem at all. I was a little disgusted at how corroded and grubby the old posts were. The new ones are shiny and look great.
I had to widen the string slots at the base of the Stick to accommodate the heavier gauge strings on the treble side. I confess I resorted to taking a regular wood saw and – with great care – widened the slots for strings 2,3,4 and 5 (in this view, that’s numbered from right to left).
The next hurdle was that the lowest string on the base side (position 6), being medium gauge and heavier than the existing set, was too fat to thread through the hole in the shaft! I tried shaving the last 3 inches of the string down with a file (this has worked before) but I couldn’t get it to fit. I was convinced that I would have to leave the older, lighter string on but I really didn’t like the feel at all. I ended up drilling out the hole in the tuner with a drill bit. Yow. I wish I hadn’t have to do that. But it worked – the string threaded through the hole and I was able to put the full set of new strings on.
The final problem has been with the pickup. It’s a stereo pickup, with independent channels for the treble and bass sides. This has not been a problem for me, because I only use the bass side and therefore I can process the output through my (mono) effect chain. With both sides now in the base register, it totally defeats the purpose if I have to choose which side to play on exclusively. (Newer Stick pickups have a mono mode switch.) Another issue is that the two sides sound different. The combination of differences in string gauge plus pickup position means that splitting a bass riff between the two sides results in distracting tonal variations.
The solution is that I need to find a 2 channel pre-amp that will merge the two outputs, and give me independent EQ’ing. I’ve been doing some research and I think I’ve found something that might work, but that’s a subject of another post.
So this evening we’re going to write a Fugue.
What?
I mapped it out in the structure of this mega-opus. Right here, see? “Part 4: Interrupt and Fugue”.
Do you really think this composition needs a fugue?
Sure. Every mega-opus has a fugue in it. It’s “cool” and it’s how people know that you’re, you know, a serious composer.
…You do know what a fugue is, don’t you?
Sure! It’s a fiddly bit with multiple voices that come in one by one, playing with counterpoint and harmony until everything explodes together in a joyous cascade of notes. Sometimes more than once.
…um, OK. You really think you can write one?
Come on, how hard can it be? We already have a bunch of themes to work with. And, of course, I’ll have your help too, naturally.
Hello? Muse? Are you still there?
…Darn.
A few months ago I decided to spiff up the lighting in my office/studio. I happen to enjoy working in a cave with moody, ambient light, so a 24 foot amber light rope strategically draped behind the shelves works out just fine:
On my desk to the left I still use a regular desk lamp for a brighter intense spot illumination.
When I turned on the Korg M1 yesterday, the LCD window displayed “#24” which was followed by “Init Program – Low Battery”. Yes, the thing I’d been dreading for a number of years had finally happened: the internal patch backup battery had died, which meant that all the voice and combi patches had been lost from the synthesizer’s memory. And just when I need the “Melange” patch for my current project. Still, not bad for an instrument purchased in, what, 1989?
This is a scary thing for older synthesizers because not all of them are designed to have their internal batteries replaced. The Korg M1 is better off than most, in that the battery can be replaced, and it is of a common type: the ubiquitous 3 volt CR2032 Lithium “coin”.
First up, here’s what you can’t do: You can’t magically get the M1’s voice memory back. It has really gone. Even if you replace the battery, all the means is that the M1 will remember new patches that you program in. Even the “factory default” voice bank has been wiped. So if you don’t already have some kind of backup/restore method in place, there’s nothing you can do after replacing the battery to get your programs back. More on this subject below.
What you’ll need:
1 CR2032 3v Lithium replacement battery (about $5 from Radioshack – link)
1 medium Phillips head screwdriver
1. Clear off the kitchen table and cover it with a blanket or something to give a firm but gentle work space. You’ll need to work on the underside of the M1, so in order to protect the joystick from damage, build up a support on the right side of the table on which you can rest the top left edge of the synth. I used four DVD cases to make a roughly brick shaped support under the blanket.
2. Disconnect the M1 from power, MIDI, and audio, and eject any cards from the memory card slot. Carefully carry the synth over to the table and place it upside down with the front (keyboard) edge towards you. You should rest the right side on the support to protect the joystick underneath from pressure.
3. You need to remove the base plate from the synth. You do this by unscrewing it – basically every screw you can see except for the ones holding the rubber feet in position. You do not need to remove the rubber feet from the base plate! (There’s about 14 of these screws – I forgot to do an exact count.)
4. Slide the base plate towards you before lifting it off and putting it to one side. Now would be a good time to wipe dust off the inside surface of the base plate – on my instrument it had quite a coating of dust.
5. The battery socket is located on the underside (actually, the component side) of the large circuit board. You will need to unscrew this from the body of the synth in order to turn it over. On my instrument there were 5 short screws spaced around the periphery of the board, but there appeared to be holes for others, so check it over carefully.
6. You will also need to remove two longer screws from the interior of the circuit board. These attach the board to the memory card socket.
7. I found it impossible to flip the board over until I had detached the 4-wire connector on the left side, shown here. It’s a tricky type of connector if you haven’t encountered it before, so take care and gently pull up on the wires to detach it.
8. Now lift up the board, pivoting it on its back edge.
9. The battery socket is actually located behind the ribbon cable. There should be enough room for you to reach in with your fingers and remove the battery.
10. It will pop out quite easily if you push gently down on the top of the battery while simultaneously lifting up the edge with your fingernail. This is easier to do than to explain! Take note of which way up the battery was, and replace it with a new one.
11. After you have put the new battery in place, simply reverse the steps to re-assemble the instrument. Don’t forget to re-attach that 4-wire connector!
Once you have put the M1 back together and put it back on your keyboard stand, you may be dismayed to realize that all 100 or so voice programs say “Init Program” and sound the same (a nasty piano sample with a square VCA envelope). The instrument does not magically restore the “factory default” programs. You will have to get these from another source.
Just for once, I had “done the right thing” a couple of years ago, and backed up the M1’s program and combi memory banks using SoundQuest’s MidiQuest software SysEx librarian. Thankfully, I could restore all my custom patches – including “Melange”. (All I had to remember was to adjust the M1’s global settings and unprotect the memory, enable sysex, and put the instrument into “dump” mode. Yes this took a few minutes of panic to figure out why the restore wasn’t working.)
Things for you to try:
You can get the original factory sounds here:
http://www.vintagesynth.com/patches/m1patch.zip
Inside the ZIP file are several .SYX files. I think you can use MIDI-OX to load these. See: http://www.midiox.com/
There is a lot of good information here:
http://www.hitsquad.com/vocal/about2837.html
I hope this information helps someone else out there.
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