Ben’s Blog

I’ve never played much at all with a pick. Recently though, I’ve been experimenting with it again.

One thing that’s really interesting is how crisp the tone and the attack is when you use a pick. It’s almost like going to arco from pizz on an upright, the tone is so much more focused.

Here’s a quick measure of the Gigue’s opening phrase, first time with pick, then with fingers. I’d love to see that in a visual waveform, because the attack and overall tone is just so different. suite4_testclip.mp3 

And, here’s a longer clip from Suite III, bouree 2. pickpractice.mp3

Maybe I’m restating the obvious with all this, but it was never obvious to me. In fact, I was always convinced that people talking about playing with a pick for speed reasons, and maybe to cut a bit better through the sound for real loud stuff, but I don’t think I really appreciated the difference in tone there.

One funny and pretty gratuitous heavy metal story on that note. In 1994, I missed Yngw1e playing in Boston by one day. So, I hopped a puddle-jumper to Buffalo (my car wouldn’t have made it that far) to catch his show the day after next. I showed up at the club at 2PM for a 10PM show. I just started talking to everyone like I belonged there, and before you know it I was talking to his guitar tech, his roadies, road manager, people in the club. Everyone thought I was with someone else, or for some reason was supposed to be there. Then, in came my most pen-ultimate musical hero. I couldn’t believe it. “How are you man?”, said the greatest guitarist in the history of the planet. I couldn’t believe it– finally my opportunity. Being the biggest V0ss fan out there ever, basically the ultimate gig in my mind would of course to be his bass player, so I had to seize the chance.

After making some small talk for a bit, I said, “Yngw1e, I’m your biggest fan, and I’m the greatest bass player, I want to be your bass player.”

Funny enough, he didn’t cast me off right there, my forceful (and youthfully misguided) opinion seemed to catch his attention. He just asked, “Do you play with a pick?” I said, “Uhm, yeah, I can do that.” But, then I couldn’t hold it together, and I started breaking out albums to sign, which he graciously did, but then it was time for me to get shooed out of there, ala Wayne and Garth with Al1ce C00per in Wayne’s World. Pretty funny.

For about six months after that, I went on a tear practicing with a pick, but it’s probably been about 14 years since I’ve played much with a pick.

I think some parts of suite 4 might sound pretty good with a pick, we’ll see.

bentorrey :: Feb.28.2007 :: Musical Thoughts :: No Comments »

My good friend Cdizzle sent me a link to these guys on YouTube. I went right to iTunes and got the self-titled album. Really great stuff. Definitely check it out.

I continue to have tons of fun playing along with the record with my EAB, imagining what Benev3nt would play if he joined R & G. Playing the melodies is also great pick excercise for me on my EAB. I have fun harmonizing some of the melodies, giving it kind of a “VM” (Vinni3 M00re) feel. 

Here’s one example arranged for two 5-string EAB’s (high C), which I really shouldn’t post without authorization from their publisher. Hopefully my I.L.T. (Intentional.Low.Traffic) “strategy” (of ’salting’ the names slightly) will keep my traffic down near the goal (zero).

bentorrey :: Feb.21.2007 :: Stocking the Pond, Filling the Well :: 1 Comment »

A couple weeks back I was listening to HRB in the car and they were playing a 1930’s recording of Toscanini conducting Tchaikovsky’s Romeo & Juliet, one of my favorite pieces, during a feature called “great recordings”. I decided to have a close listen to it though, of course, despite having a bias both against the audio quality of the recording and comparing it against my “favorite version” of the piece. One thing I noticed right away was the tempo–pretty fast, almost a rushed energy to the recording.

Then it came to that famous part that they usually play when the beautiful women walks in, and she’s so beautiful that the guy falls off his chair or something. Yeah, that part-where the violins resolve to the tonic a bit late leading over the bar with the major 7th, and then the french horns play a nice line of quarter notes starting on the 2nd and root. I think it’s french horns. Anyway, just as that phrase started, one of the french horns flubbed that first note-badly. He/she slid up into the note, extremely noticeably. I listened to the rest of the recording, but couldn’t stop thinking about that “flub-up”.

Did that make the recording any less great? I don’t think so, it wasn’t “perfect”, but it was still great. There was a wonderous energy to the performance. Great doesn’t have to be perfect. I like that.

Relating that back to my practice, I realize I need to “roll with my flub-ubs” much better. Recently I’ve been videotaping myself recording the Bach Cello stuff, and I find that I am too focused on a vision of a “perfect take”, and I can give a real specific example. I was practicing the Suite 2 prelude, and then in the measure below, I’ve got a bit of a stretch to make it up to the high D, and I didn’t quite make it–landing squarely on a C#. Then I yell a loud expletive and then backtrack to work on the fingering and the stretch. It’s painful to watch.

Instead of doing that though–I need to think about how I can “roll” with those flub-ups. In that case, hang on the C# a bit for effect, then roll to the D as if you meant to. Victor W00ten’s great book mentions how you’re never more than a half-step from a “right note”, and in this case, yeah, I want to land on the high D, but if I don’t quite make it, don’t let it ruin the performance, let the mistake exist and make it musical somehow.

Going from this (with a loud expletive after missing the high D):

to this:

is the goal of my current practice. I find it really helpful to videotape myself to be aware of how critical I get and how I miss opportunity to “roll with flub-ups”.

bentorrey :: Feb.19.2007 :: Musical Thoughts :: No Comments »

San and I caught this incredible Independent Lens documentary on WGBH a few weeks ago, and had to Netflix it to watch it again. It’s great! Highly recommended.

from the description on Netflix:
“When he became a teacher in the 1940s,Albert Cullum realized something was lacking in his classes and decided to stray from the by-the-book, discipline-heavy style favored by his colleagues, instead using poetry and drama to put life and emotion into his teaching.”

bentorrey :: Feb.12.2007 :: W.O.T. (Way Off Topic) or is it? :: No Comments »

All the stuff that I’ve been working on over the last year basically has come from working through the Artist’s Way. If you haven’t read that book (I highly recommend it!), one of the concepts is the “Artist Date”, where you find some activity weekly that inspires the artist in you. It can be anything, but my favorite thing to do is to see live music.

I was googling around looking for stuff and came across the Boston Classical Guitar Society’s concert series, which I found by way of Steve Lin’s excellent Boston Guitar Project site. Bookmarked both and sent in my membership dues to BCGS. As I surfed around, something caught my eye: February 9th, Flamenco guitarist Grisha Goryachev…ok, I’ll check that one out.

Wow!!! I was late, missing the first half entirely (long story), but wow, check out Grisha Goryachev. Absolutely amazing. Stunning. Fantastic. Revelational. Inspirational. 

Relating this back to the Artist’s Way, it’s funny, when I was younger, I used to put on Carlos Montoya records and try to play along on my 4-string bass- with varied results. Something about watching Grisha play made me want to try that again (that’s the purpose of Artist Dates). I found myself dusting off an arrangement of Malengua that I used to attempt, but this time it sounded much better on the 5-string EAB with a high C. Instead of tapping the intro, slapping it seemed to sound the best sonically. I mixed that up with some tapping of the theme too, along with some (pretty lame) attempts at the legato technique he uses. Just a hack, but a start. I put a private video on Youtube.com if anyone wants to watch, just add me as a friend (youtube ID is bentorrey).

Back to Grisha–I’m definitely going to take a lesson or two with him down the road. Maybe bring my transcription of Asturias for bass to get his help with that, and mostly just hand him my 5-string EAB, ask him to play it, and see what he comes up with.

bentorrey :: Feb.12.2007 :: Stocking the Pond, Filling the Well :: 2 Comments »

On Tuesday January 29, I met up with Michael Mayo over at Emerson to record Suite # 3.

Sonically, the EAB sounded better than ever. The Thomastick-Infeld phosphorbronze strings really made a difference in the sound I think (they should for $50). Plus, we miked my amp rather than the instrument directly (Special thanks to Dave for helping me load in the gear). Michael dialed in a great mix of miked amp and DI, and sonically it sounds great.

But, I had sort of an off-day playing wise. Time was certainly a factor–considering load-in, load-out, time to listen to takes, some quick edits, and real-time mix down–I had exactly 90 minutes to get good takes of the 6 pieces which around 25 minutes of music anyway. I had to go with the Chinese calligraphy approach that I blogged about. Gigue, Courante and Sarabande were first takes (and it shows), Prelude, Allemande and Minuets were two takes.

But, time wasn’t the only factor. Concentration, nerves, problems playing from memory, problems when reading. I think I’m overdue for a re-read of the Inner Game of Music (thanks Earl Harmon, for reminding me about that great book). One of my favorite parts of that book is the P=p-i equation, where your ending performance, P, ends up being the difference between your potential, p, and the interference, i.

Yeah, that i was huge. Interference. Tons and tons of it. I was ready to play this suite better–I had practiced it for months, and then on this day–interference. The Inner Game book is all about how to minimize that interference, i, and it’s time to dig in now.

Nonetheless, I have to remember I didn’t set out to record all the Cello Suites as a finished product–but just to record them as they are in my process of getting back to music. viewed from that perspective, the day was a resounding success!! The Suite has 6 movements, and I recorded all of them.

So, have a listen.

bentorrey :: Feb.02.2007 :: The Quantity... :: No Comments »