Anyway, I think I’ve made some progress since last torturing you folks. There’s still the challenge of relaxing and having fun while recording, which may never improve all that much. Baby steps with that, and not giving up hope yet. I’d like to think my playing is a little better normally than what’s represented here. The whole fun factor and all.
The following tunes are in varying stages of having them under the fingers. They were all picked mainly because the enjoyment in playing them, so a few tracks may have some fumbling of the fingers.
For comparison, I recorded Donnybrook Fair and The Little Fair Cannavans again. This time trying for a more legato/less tonguing style, using some suggestions made on Brother Steve’s site.
Legato or not, Mr Ed, I think you need to concentrate on evening things out and getting the right pulse. At the moment, in all of those examples, you are speeding up significantly on some phrases or parts of phrases and dragging significantly on others, leading to a lack of pulse and direction in the tunes. My suggestion, FWIW, is that you cut out all extraneous ornamentation - just drop it for now - and concentrate on getting all the note lengths even. I would suggest not using a metronome as I have a feeling that it might give a false sense of keeping with the beat when really, the timing is out.
Fair play to you for putting these out there, though.
And keep at it.
PS Slow down. Right down. Do not, ever, try and play faster than you can play in time.
Hmm, I was trying to add some "swing’ to it instead of playing so straight like my tunes posted previously. Been listening a lot more to ITM too. It looks like another brick wall to work through. Part of it could be just the anxiety of recording. I just can’t seem to get relaxed while doing that, which makes it difficult for anyone more knowledgeable about ITM to help.
Could you give me a basic idea by what is meant by “pulse”? I’m not sure/confused on what that is.
I’m gonna try to get a recording up today of The Little Fair Cannavans, trying to keep it simple, with good rhythm.
Thanks for pointing these things out. It’s hard to notice when actually playing the tunes. It’s like being drunk and singing…
Same here. And probably for everyone, if that helps.
I think I can. I’m going to have to be a bit mean, as it were, to do this, and take what I consider to be the worst example above. Sorry about that, but it makes the contrast easier to illustrate.
Take Kitty Goes a Milking. Yours doesn’t have the regular pulse of a reel. There should be a regular beat, two in a bar, giving a very strong pulse throughout the tune. The first couple of bars should sound something like | BEEP-pah diddle-dee PAH— DEE-dle | BEEP-pah diddle-dee DEE-dle dum-de | with the syllables in CAPS spaced exactly even distances apart. Especially in the first bar of each phrase, you are rushing the first half of the bar and sort of fitting in three notes where there should be five (my “BEEP-pah diddle-dee”). then the second half of the bar also doesn’t have all the notes in. Within phrases, you need all the notes, and that regular pulse absolutely has to be there.
What recording are you using as a model for that one?
Oh, and by the way, my “diddle-dee” pattern is a triplet, but you don’t have to do that. I might do that on fiddle, but on whistle or flute, I’d using a roll. Anything so long as it fits in exactly the right space of time so as not to disrupt the pulse.
I’m struggling with Kitty Goes a Milking, so I’m glad in a way you said that’s the worst example. The only recordings I have of that tune are on the Bill Ochs CD and Mary Bergin’s. The Bill Ochs one is where he introduces rolls in reels, and I’m really having a hard time with that one. The exercise in the book seem ok, but once it’s time for the tune… It seems like I’ll never get these rolls down.
Yep. Now I just have to transfer that to my playing. I think you had the easier part. LOL
Thanks, Mr. Gumby.
I’ve listened to that one many times
Ah well, it’s a bit of a blast from the past.
Kitty’s gone a milking has been recorded an awful lot of times, there are nice versions around by Paddy Breen and Bobby Casey, Willie Clancy and Denis O Brien for example. If you want to continue on with my blast from the past, here’s a lovely bouncy version on the concertina (two actually) you could do worse than following that rhythm/pulse.
Whew! That’s a relief! After doing some more recording, much of which won’t see the internet, it’s become obvious that I need to follow this advice for starters:
No matter how hard I’ve tried to avoid it, I’ve fallen into the newbie speed problem.
Those are nice tunes you are working on and I enjoyed listening to them. You’ve received good advice already - the only thoughts I would add is the tunes are made for the dancers so we are conditioned to hearing them played at a rock steady tempo, and swing is a good thing but it has to work with the tune and maintain the tempo. Might help if you can imagine dancers moving to your music. The other thing is playing with a drum machine or god forbid a metronome. Best option is if you can find a slow session and go regularly. Playing with others can be the most fun will help steady you out.
I’m glad you enjoyed them. The drum machine and metronome might be something I’ll try if for no other reason than to force me to slow down. The main thing for me to remember is that I shouldn’t set up the expectation to play as fast as Joanie Madden, Paddy Moloney, Mary Bergin, and others who have listened to and played ITM for many years. Even they don’t always venture into the higher BPMs.
There might be a session about an hour drive away. I’m not sure if it’s a slow one or not, but it’ll be a while before I even think about venturing out to the city unless it’s absolutely necessary. Maybe this spring if things go well.
Right now though I’m going to work on: Relaxing -
For one thing, it sounded like I was over-blowing when recording. It’s something that might be happening because of nervousness/anxiety when that blasted red button is clicked. A lot of things seem to get worse when that thing is on. Relaxing should also make it easier to…
Slow Down-
The clips themselves speak better about that than I can put into words.
It is much improved, but you’re still rushing the penultimate measure in each part. You need to keep it steady. And it’s still faster than you can manage. Slow it down.
Just before you reach the last note in each part of the tune, there is a run up of three quavers - you’re rushing those. They’re faster than the main pulse of what you’re playing. At least there is a pulse now, but it absolutely has to be steady. Like clockwork.
Just wanted to pop in and say I’m still working on tempo, rhythm, and relaxing. That last thing has been the hardest, especially when trying to record to hear how things are coming along. I’m beginning to loathe it so it’ll be a while before any clips are posted. It isn’t necessary anyway to hear how I’m doing, but can be helpful.
Hopefully the internet will survive having one less newbie post clips for a while.
It seems like I’ll never get these rolls down.
