Ben’s Blog

If I ever decided to host my own Boston radio awards, I would award Eric Jackson a lifetime achievement award. The amount of music I’ve been exposed to through his show over the last 15 or so years that I’ve been listening to him is just amazing.

I always love the intro, and the fact that he plays it every night. What a great version of a great tune, love Tommy Flanagan’s great playing on this beautiful tune by Horace Silver.

A few months ago, as I was relearning the Bouree BWV 896, I played around with an arrangement of Peace for solo bass. Rather than try to fill in a lot of harmony, I kept it really simple, like a two voice counterpoint. It was fun to try to play. It’s my musical tribute to Eric Jackson, imperfect as it is.

Horace Silver’s Peace, arranged for bass

bentorrey :: May.31.2007 :: Filling the Form :: No Comments »

I really like # 7 from Carcassi’s 25 Estudios. A lot of bass players play this one, it’s a great little piece. It DEFINITELY WORKS BEST fingerpicked, without a doubt, but this weekend I was fooling around with it and thought of a new distinction for a variation that I thought I’d share.

I’m just tapping the repeated A notes up high with my right hand. It takes some work to play smoothly, and it’s a bit of a physical stretch, but it’s an approach that could be useful for other pieces as well.

Here’s a few things on this:

1. Here’s a slow example of just the A’s up top over the opening d minor riff. carulli_07_demonstrate_slow.AVI
2. Here’s a longer example with metronome but timing still needs a ton of work. c07_met_better.AVI
3. Here’s the PDF of the arrangement. carcassi07.pdf
4. BEST of ALL: Here’s a zipped GP5 for practice with Guitar Pro. carcassi07.zip

Hope you enjoy that. I’d like to work up a set of variations on this piece, and might try that tapping approach.

Although fingerpicking is definitely the best solution (and presents several interesting fingering challenges to sustain the bass voice correctly), it definitely puts the bass line up an octave, and lately I’m trying to get all my instrument’s range into the picture. A frequent feedback I get is that I generally play everything up high on my instrument. I often do, mosty to avoid “muddy” sounding chords, but this little snippet lends itself really well to displacing the lower voice down an octave, something I need to do a lot more of in my arrangements.

bentorrey :: May.20.2007 :: Filling the Form :: No Comments »

This morning I put NPR on while brewing up a cup of coffee. In between stories they played some really nice music which I recognized right off the bat. That’s a good thing- otherwise I would have spent a ton of time finding out who the composer was.

Luckily, I had already seen The Motorcycle Diaries (fantastic movie!!!) and heard Gustavo Santaolalla’s amazing soundtrack, which I had to run out and buy right away on CD. I like to put that on my iPOD and hike over at the Fells, it’s great “journey” music and is the perfect length for a hike on a stretch of the Skyline Trail that I like to do on Saturdays.

About 5 minutes into Babel I knew that was another Gustavo Santaolalla soundtrack. Great composer, I’ll have to get that one too.

bentorrey :: May.18.2007 :: The Movies :: No Comments »

Suite # 5 is so metal, in fact, I would vote Suite # 5 as the “most metal” of all the Bach Cello suites. I’m working hard on it now, and, feeling that I need to “channel” some metal energy into my playing of the suite; some fire, more dynamics, more drama. To that end, I’ve got some wristbands going that I hope will help me channel some energy from my legendary hero B1lly Sh3ehan, who also signed my favorite LL Bean jacket (where was my copy of ‘Sink Your Teeth Into That’ on vinyl–darn!) a few months back at B3.

Thanks Billy, you ROCK!!!!!!!

The Prelude is an epic adventure in itself, and really almost feels like two different movements. The beginning is broody and dark, followed by the lighter melody that builds and it all sort of comes together at the end, both energies beautifully merged in to a big finish that I have to just nail.

I think I’ll use some tapping in the parts near the end, the trick will be the transition in time and keeping the volume up. You can take a listen to three junk clips here:

prelude5nearendtap.AVI
prelude5endtapbetter.AVI
prelude5beginning.AVI

I think this suite might come out really nicely if I keep working really hard on it.

In terms of listening and cello versions, I’ve been really digging Yo-Yo Ma’s recording. He shreds it man!

bentorrey :: May.16.2007 :: Filling the Form :: 1 Comment »

Alex Skolnick is one of my favorite musicians*, The New Order being definitely one of my top 10 “must have” metal albums.

Anyway, always loved to try to play snippets of the great melodic solo in Musical Death (A Dirge) which I always did pizzacato, but it’s a fun snippet for pick practice.

It’s brutally difficult actually, since playing with a pick for me feels like walking around with two bricks stuck to my feet, lol, but I hope someday I’ll feel more comfortable, and the cool things you can do, like palm muting, are so fun to explore that I need to continue to develop the technique to use this in my own playing a bit.

So, here’s a few things on this:

1. A very inaccurate “transcription” (just from 0:38 to 1:24) that I use as a memory map really. I haven’t notated a lot of the coolest stuff, like the wide bend that Alex turns into a rhythmic phrase (59s) before the big sweepOfDoom (1:02). musicaldeath_adirge.pdf
2. Zip’d GP5 of the snippet. musicaldeath_adirge.zip
3. A hack of me trying to play this. Needs work, but it’s fun, and great pick practice. dirge_practicing.AVI
4. Guitar Pro’s awesome Speed Trainer kicking my butt on that diminished sequence that I can’t seem to pick right. dirge_speedtrainer.AVI

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* Thonk blew my mind. I’m such a huge Michael Manring fan, and, separately (I thought) I had always been a huge metal head. To hear them play together was just amazing. Awesome interview about Thonk at http://www.innerviews.org/inner/manring.html

bentorrey :: May.16.2007 :: Musical Thoughts, Pick Practice :: No Comments »

A few months back I was looking for some good driving music. I was thinking about some early Testament (no pun intended), but as soon as I saw Warren Burnheart’s fantastic “Ain’t Life Grand” album I totally forgot what I was looking for.

Man, what a great album. Definitely get it right away. I remember the first time I heard Sara’s Touch. It was on the Sunday FNX jazz brunch. I tuned in right as the bass solo was starting. “Wow, who the heck is that?”, I remember thinking.

Jay Anderson is IMHO is one of the greatest upright voices you’ll ever hear. His solos have a lyrical quality- such beautiful space between phrases, and he has a wonderful way of using all the range of the upright bass. Magnificent tone, bluesy and tasteful.
Sara’s Touch, Moonshiner, Vignette and Blue Lake are great examples. In fact, I had transcribed those way back in the days, and hoped to find the transcriptions, maybe clean them up and present them here. I did find parts of Vignette, Moonshiner and Blue Lake, but they’re not presentable as they are. I never found my full Sara’s Touch solo transcription, so I’ll redo that sometime soon and present the PDF.

Until then, get a few albums and check out Jay Anderson, http://www.jayandersonbass.com.

bentorrey :: May.13.2007 :: The Quantity... :: No Comments »

So, I’ve been a little less mobile of late and enjoying some cinematic “classics”. Now I’ll admit, I don’t have the greatest taste in movies. I pretty much only like 80’s action movies (Arnold, Seagal, Van Damme). You know, the classics.

So, I was a bit wary when my wife’s cousin showed up with The Transporter. Newly made movie, action hero I had never heard of. But, turned out to be a great movie.

A lot of times you might not notice the music in a movie, but a few times during the movie I remember thinking, “that’s some great music”. After the movie, my wife’s cousin said he wanted to buy the soundtrack. So, I rolled the credits back to figure it out, and low and behold, it’s a Stanley Clarke soundtrack.

Wow, the breadth and depth of some of my musical heroes careers is just amazing to me sometimes. Not a few days before, I had sent back a great concert we Netflixed with Stanley on upright (LOVE STANLEY ON UPRIGHT!!!!!), Jean Luc Ponty and Al Di Meola at Montreaux in 1994. Then, a few days later I’m watching an action flick, and turns out it’s scored by the same great musician.

Another one of my heroes that strikes me like that is Keith Jarrett. I was driving home a few months back and heard a classical piece on HRB, a flute and continuo piece. The keyboardist was really giving the accompaniment a lot of zest. I listened until they mentioned who. Wow, Keith Jarrett. I haven’t listened to enough of his classical stuff. Anyway, the next morning, going into work, I’m listening to the Jazz Spectrum, and bang, the Koln Concert. Another side to an amazingly versatile musician.

Brings to mind a famous Robert Louis Stevenson quote:
“To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life.”

bentorrey :: May.13.2007 :: The Movies :: No Comments »

If you’re one of the 3-5 people reading my blog besides me, myself and I (lol), you’ll know that recently I’ve been rediscovering how cool it is to play with a pick. It’s so foreign feeling for me as a pizzicato player though that I’ve found some exercises really helpful. I thought I’d share one such exercise, the interlude from Jet to Jet on the great Alcatrazz No Parole studio album from 1983.

Here it is arranged for two six-strings in standard tuning or 5’s with high C’s like I’m playing mostly now. Important to be strict on down/up picking and make sure to play each three note sequence on the same string, which becomes real obvious I guess, especially if you bring this up anywhere near the blinding speed with which YJM effortlessly plays this.

I did a video clip of me playing one part at varying speeds for practice along with, but that’s on my now non-booting PC. So, for now, here’s a quick junk clip with my digital camera:

And:

1. A zipped GP5 of the arrangement, using GuitarPro’s awesome Speed Trainer feature to slowly speed this up on each loop. jettojet.zip
2. A PDF of the arrangement* jettojet.pdf
3. A MIDI file of the arrangement, I use Windows Media Player’s play speed settings to slow down MIDI or MP3 files (Ctrl-SHIFT-S) jettojet.mid

On a compositional note, this clip is a great example of YJM’s compositional brilliance.

And then, sometimes I think maybe I make too “big a deal” out of composition. Really this is a pretty simple melodic phrase, harmonized, and runs through the circle of fourths. Couldn’t I write something like that?

Not in any way to diminish YJM’s pure genius, but just to consider trying to get unblocked about my own composition. I know something that blocks me is making composition out to be such a difficult thing that I can’t even start on it.

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* Special thanks to master guitarist/composer/transcriber Peter Lidstrom who originally transcribed this clip for me. I lost his transcription though, and this one isn’t as good.

bentorrey :: May.13.2007 :: Pick Practice :: No Comments »

I really enjoy Apocalyptica. I wonder if they’d consider doing some Vinnie Moore tunes?

I’d love to hear all the Mind’s Eye material with this brilliant cello ensemble playing.

If you haven’t heard Apocalyptica, check them out, they are a cello ensemble that plays metal tunes.

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

YouTube is an endless source of inspiration. I was youtubing (v) around last weekend and found a guy playing Las Abejas on his 6-string bass. Awesome. Youtube Nukebass and you’ll find him. Great stuff.

Years ago I had worked on La Catedral’s first and second movements on bass and a few months ago I started working on that again on my 6-string. I did a quick few recordings with my EAB unamplified and my digital camera.

Catedral clip 1
Catedral clip 1 (faster take)
Catedral clip 2

La Categral’s first movement is such an amazing composition. When I try to play this movement on the bass I’m struck by a few things. Firstly, “wow this is difficult”, and then you grab a nylon string classical, and it’s like “wow, it’s all there in one position”.

Which leads me to thinking about composition and what music is out there that I can compose/discover/channel that fits right on my 5-string EAB like the first two measures of La Catedral’s first movement does on a guitar. Composition is my real goal anyway, and sometimes it helps to come out and declare the goal, like you might a major in college.

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* by any chance if you DON’T have John Williams Plays Barrios on Sony Classical (1995), go get it right now!

bentorrey :: May.12.2007 :: Stocking the Pond, Filling the Well :: No Comments »