[Chris Weber]

Not too far afield from mainstream instruments, but a couple decades back, a music store near me had a Bösendorfer – their top of the line piano, with a list price of $200,000, with the extra keys in the bass. They told me that when Chick Corea came to town he always had them move it to the site so he could play it. The lowest note was pretty close to the lowest frequency humans could expect to hear, although I forget the exact Hertz.

It was definitely my favorite axe in the store. A seriously large piano. And, of course, made in Vienna(!).

• This reply was modified 1 year, 7 months ago by  Chris Weber.
• This reply was modified 1 year, 7 months ago by  Chris Weber.

[Chris Weber]

My maternal grandfather was 100% Irish. His parents arrived in the States from Ireland 3 years before he was born.

Had the classic boiled dinner today and some Guinness with some family.

All the best to everyone on the High Holy Day.

[Chris Weber]

I remember John Cage. He did what was called “prepared piano”.

By which he meant, putting things like rocks on the strings inside a piano, for example.

It does change the sound. He did a variety of things like that.

Can’t say I remember any of his greatest hits though.

[Chris Weber]

I always thought the mellotron was closest related to a modern sampler, since they both have one recording per key. Same idea, very different technology.

I remember in the ’80s, I think it was, I saw Patrick Moraz demonstrate a Kurzweil, which was pretty expensive, $10,000, at the time. First real sampling keyboard like today’s examples, iirc.

[Chris Weber]

When I read your description “tuning forks” I was expecting like a Rhodes. But this sounds more like playing chimes.

[Chris Weber]

Ok, I thought that was just a banjo when I first saw it, and the banjo timbre worked really well with the song.

But it does have 6 strings, so that makes it a banjitar? Like a combination of the two?

Normally, iirc, a tenor banjo is 4 strings, and a regular(?) banjo has 5.

[Chris Weber]

Glenn Gould is great, I have vinyl of him too. A friend of mine turned me onto him long ago. 🙂

And I’ll add one more. When I was in high school, and I was surrounded by friends who also played guitar, we used to listen to and play Gordon Lightfoot.

But if you could read my mind, you would already know that.

[Chris Weber]

Thanks for the reply. Those statues are great. I have never seen them before.

I was fortunate to see Oscar live once in the ’70s on a bill with Dizzy Gillespie. Amazing night. He was special.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 7 months ago by  Chris Weber.

[Chris Weber]

The Beatles didn’t need to read music. Most people in history have heard
and felt and sang or played, and didn’t know how to read music. Most
people these days start learning to play and at the same time
learning to read music. When I’ve taught music, I teach them to
play by ear. I tell them it’s easier.

They usually are taken aback by the idea, but then I ask them, can you
sing Happy Birthday? Did you have to read music to learn it?

I’ve always thought music was innate, it’s wired into all of us. I’ve
always said music is language. We are built for both, or maybe they
just are two sides of the same thing. All music has rhythm, first
and foremost, and has pitch too.

The oldest
recorded French piece of literature is the Song of Roland, from the
time of Charlemagne. We see it as a poem, but was it really a song?
Why do they call it a song? Either a poem or a song is a way to help
illiterate people remember it and pass it on, because they both have
rhythm, and a song at least would also have pitch. Rhythm and pitch
aid memory,

I think there definitely is a universal
musical code. Bach, the Kinks, and the Beach Boys are all western
music, so the music theory for all of them is the same; they’re
closer to each other than to the folks in the Amazon, or to Indian
Rajas or Japanese hogaku.

One more thought on the cultural
ubiquity of music. Growing up in Europe, even if you didn’t seek out
classical music, it was around you, it was in the culture. The
Beatles were all raised as Christians. Church music is classical
music. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard Bach at Mass.
Christmas music is related to classical music. I think the Beatles
were exposed to classical music, even if they didn’t pursue it.

Very interesting thread guys. Sorry
it’s taken me a couple of years to reply…

• This reply was modified 1 year, 7 months ago by  Chris Weber.
• This reply was modified 1 year, 7 months ago by  Chris Weber.

[Chris Weber]

Interesting, thanks for posting about the Theremin, guys. I had heard of the Theremin, long, long ago, but I’m not remembering ever seeing one played before.

Having said that, I remember long ago thinking about other ways to design musical instruments. One big issue with most instruments is the UI, the user interface. It takes a lot of practice to get the digital dexterity to control the sound with your fingers. That’s still true with the Theremin, but I remember thinking about the possibility of an instrument where the hands never touch anything a number of times.

So thanks, now I know it already exists, and I’m caught up to the year 1920.

Still waiting for the connection that just plugs directly into the musicians head though…

[Chris Weber]

To add to Canadian artists, my favorite is Oscar Peterson. Different music entirely, but his style and mastery always made him instantly recognizable.

[Chris Weber]

The typewriter sounds like a percussion instrument to me, unless I’m missing something.

I wonder if Mona has one of those?

[Chris Weber]

That looks like a version of pans (aka steelpan, aka steel drum) to me. The island instrument made out of hammered steel drum, usually. Big in reggae, for example.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 7 months ago by  Chris Weber.
• This reply was modified 1 year, 7 months ago by  Chris Weber.

[Chris Weber]

Billy was a very good singer. You can hear him singing on his hits. I was fortunate to see him once with his band at 20/20 in New York. 20/20 was at 20 West 20th Street and was a club owned by the well known singing duo of Ashford & Simpson, the husband/wife team.

Great show, he played all his hits and sang that night, but that was a long time ago, I’m thinking it was in the ’80s.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 8 months ago by  Chris Weber.

[Chris Weber]

That’s the right song to show their
synergy. Some Lennon-McCartney songs are mostly one or the other,
but that song truly is the two together and greater than the sum of
its parts and their parts. And to such enormous effect. It’s hard
to say this about the best songwriting team in history, and I
generally don’t like the idea that there has to be a #1, but maybe
that’s theirs.

It reminds me musically, or
emotionally?, of Space Oddity from Bowie or Simon and Garfunkel’s
America. Maybe they all have something similar lyrically – can
you, within one emotional memory, or feeling, juxtapose common things
that everyone knows but that, together, describe the feeling, or put
you in the moment, transported by the music. You know: I read the
news today—oh boy; the papers want to know whose shirts you wear;
it took me four days to hitchhike from Saginaw.

Songs about everyday things, and life,
and a journey, a journey through life, and none of which is
remarkable in itself, but the sum paints a picture.

But Bowie and Simon were solo writers.
With Lennon-McCartney you get 2 guys who each write music and lyrics
and sing and play, and they do it in different styles. So when it
really comes together, it’s magic.

I think there’s a question in here
somewhere for the next Q&A, how do Mona, Lisa and Rudi do this?
I know they’ve been asked about their writing process before. Lennon
and McCartney had a lot in common, and definite differences. Is it
possible to be closer to someone than your identical twin sister?
And then throw in George Martin or Papa Rudi to temper the mix.