GRollins

I gave up. It's complicated immensely by the fact that the tempo is uneven. Start at the 1:00 mark when the anvil comes in. I started by counting 4 1/2...call it 9 if that makes you happier...but then the anvil tempo speeds up and it's...what? 5 1/2, maybe (call it 11), but at a faster pace. Now, clearly there's a structure to it because his percussion section hangs together, tight as can be. They know what they're doing and it's working. But...I suggest that it's largely because they're so sympatico that they remain loose and track the pianist's tempo. There are members here who break out in hives if they don't have a click to work from. I strongly suggest they avoid this piece like the plague. For my part, I absolutely love it. Fluidity in tempo works for me. In the hands of a competent musician, it can convey emotion, as it does here (note that the overall tempo increases throughout, especially when the cane guys get to their feet, but it's already been accelerating before that). For what it's worth, I hear heavy flamenco influences, though the piece would be a nightmare to dance to in a club. Grey

Chapman Sticks and harp guitars hit the same spot in me--someone who's good with one can sound like an entire orchestra. And, yeah, that guy's good enough to make me seriously envious. Thanks for the post. I must have been needing a Yes fix. That came out of left field and was just wonderful. Grey

Ya gotta love "live" performances where the guitar and bass aren't even plugged in... That said, I haven't heard that song in years. Loved it. It was on the juke box at the pool I went to and we'd all sing along when someone put in a dime. Grey

My mother got into Quicken like it was a religion. Tried to convert me. I said I was happy with my spreadsheet (which I've been doing for, like, thirty years or more). I swear I thought she'd cry. That Quicken thing really got hold of her. I'm sure it's great, but my spreadsheet works for me. I've got everything in there. Credit cards, income, expenditures, etc. A one stop shop for keeping up with what's going on. My ex wouldn't even look at her statements. She just tossed them in the trash. Of course, she was always maxed out on every card she owned, so she didn't want to be reminded of the damage she was doing. I eventually got to the point where I said I wasn't going to pay off her credit cards anymore. She left. Don't let the door hit you in the butt, dearie. Grey

Oh, and I also religiously keep a spreadsheet of every penny I spend. If the credit card balance doesn't match my spreadsheet, I know something's up. To me, that's just common sense, from any number of points of view, but I don't know a single person aside from myself who does it. Grey

For years, I have paid all bills from my checking account but only keep $50 in that account by default. When I have bill (e.g. credit card), I move exactly the amount of money I need to pay the bill from savings to checking at the last moment, then initiate payment. Since the only account anyone knows is my checking, my savings account cannot be drawn down (at least that way...). If they hit my checking, the most they'll get is the $50. Grey

A few months ago, there was some discussion in a thread here about security. A member was going on about how their password was secure because they used some sort of middleman service that scrambled things. I said you're not secure. They told me I just didn't understand and went on to describe the sales patter from the service. I said it's not your one, measly password they're after--it's much more efficient to hit the business and get a hundred thousand or ten million accounts when some nitwit leaves the default password on a server. The bad guys can just waltz in the back door; your super-duper password security didn't mean diddly-squat. My point sailed right past the member--they went back to saying how secure their password was. I gave up. Wonder if that member has a Reverb account and how they feel about their hoity-toity password service now. There's a small voice in my head that's asking if this would have happened if Reverb hadn't been sold. Have the new owners cut IT corners? We'll never know. Grey

I'm not clear as to how having old info is causing slowness. Unless someone--or perhaps multiple someones--are actively searching through the old threads, I don't see how that would affect the current ones. Presumably, the recent threads would be in drive sectors that are tightly clustered and be easy to access. Perhaps a defrag is in order? That said, I'm still experiencing logoffs and slowness...whatever the cause might be. Grey

Yep, that's what's in the link I posted above. Grey

I'm one shot in on Moderna. My second shot will be Monday. Unfortunately, that doesn't change the music scene in my area, but that's a separate discussion. Even at a penny per view, 10,000 views will only bring in $100, and that assumes no fees, taxes, etc. Then divide that among ever how many band members you have. Not a practical way to earn money. And how many bands are even hitting the 10,000 mark? Grey

Another piece of the puzzle from my favorite news aggregator, Slashdot: Apple pays a penny per stream Grey

It's all in your attitude. You're the one who has to sell the performance. Have fun with it. If you are legitimately, truly enjoying yourself (not acting), the audience will have fun, too. Grey

Yeah, my "problem" now is this kick started my investigating the modular/Eurorack world. I've been pouring thru pages and pages of eurorack compatible modules, cases, rack/rack frames, power supplies, etc... I've veen figured out a way to easily mount a 2x 140HP eurorak case on my Gibraltar stand. Ugh :D Okay, this is how I approached it, chronologically: 1) Stark raving terror--everyone kept saying "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here!" and I listened. "money pit" "expensive" "unmanageable" "no presets" "knobs are too small" Blah, blah, blah, woof, woof, woof. Right? Heard all that? Yeah, me too. 2) I fell into my concept of deep oscillators. Made me unpopular but, hell, I'm used to that. 3) I hit a moment where I wanted to grab control of the signal in my Voyager in a place where there was no place. "You can't get there from here." At the moment, I can't remember what I wanted to do, but the signal path, though flexible, was not flexible enough to let me do what I wanted to do. Pissed me off, it did. 4) Realization that if I had my oscillators/LFOs/VCAs/etc. as separate blocks, I could do anything I wanted, given enough patch cords. 5) Reevaluation of the whole Euro thing...okay...maybe...all right, yeah, the knobs are still small, but...what if? 6) The discovery of the Winter Modular Eloquencer sequencer. What the everlivin' flagnog? You mean a sequencer can do THAT??? 7) Started buying modules. --So...yeah, dammit, the knobs are still small. No denying that. --"Money pit?" "Expensive?" Yes, it costs money to buy things, but I went in with a plan and my Euro-rig has been stable for quite some time (I've only bought one module in, like, the last eight or ten months); I'm not buying endlessly, although I can see that someone with a different worldview might get hooked. --"No presets?" Mostly true, but not entirely. Some units, like the Eloquencer, have memory. At this time, most don't, so yeah, you're going to twist knobs. I don't see that as a bad thing. Others do. I'm right. They're wrong. So there! --"Unmanageable?" Cords don't offend me. They do others. The very flexibility that makes Euro attractive to me means that you're creating a signal path. Those signals have to get from point A to point B somehow. Get wires in pretty colors...it helps you keep track of what's happening. My main complaint is that percussion in the Euro world mostly leans towards very fake-sounding noises. I wanted things that sounded like real drums, etc. That took some module hunting, but I got that solved. At this point I'm happy with my percussion section. Those who think '80s drum machines sounded good are going to be content from the get-go. I did make one mistake. I wanted a phase shifter. Got a Doepfer. Don't buy the Doepfer if you want more than a gentle swoosh, it won't do more than gentle. It's not bad, it's just not what I hear in my head. Other than that, my stuff's making me pretty happy. Note that I use all my doo-dads alongside my "regular" synths, e.g. Voyagers, Yamahas, Korgs, etc. I use an Allen & Heath mixer to make everybody play nice. Works great. I'm a happy camper. Grey

You're looking at this all wrong. Your audience needs to see you working for them--to give them the sound they want to hear. If you're trying to be all stealthy about it, yeah, that's going to look dumb. You need to make sure they witness every tweak and twist of the knobs. Go look up Keith Emerson's quotes on the subject. He even did unnecessary and totally fake things, just as part of of his showmanship. Go forth and do likewise. Have your front(wo)man do some patter whilst you're doing your thing about how you're applying the whichness of the whatfor to the fratzenjammer. Make a thing of playing a test note, then giving a knob one, final tweak (even if it's unnecessary) before giving the rest of the band a nod to show that The Genius Of The Keys is ready to give the house the ride of their lives. Man, it's all in your attitude! If you're apologetic and cringey about it, yeah, it's going to go over like a lead balloon. If you're standing tall and proud, they'll go along. Don't hide it, BRAG about it! Look all Mad Scientist while you're adjusting your oscillators. Hell, put on a tinfoil hat or something for the adjusting! It comes back to something I've said many times: People don't say, "I'm going to hear" a band, they say, "I'm going to SEE" a band. Dammit, give them something to SEE! It's not all jumping and leaping on stage. It's more than that. There are a thousand subtleties that make up a live performance. This is one of them. Own the moment. No apologies. This is live music, people, not a recording, and you're going to get to see me make your music! (On a practical note , there's no real reason why it should take more than a few seconds to set a Model D, anyway. You might need to draw it out some to make the most of the moment--maybe more than one test note...) Grey

We don't need no steenking presets! If Wakeman, to this day, insists that he would marry a Moog Model D if he could, that should tell you that knobs aren't a bad thing. He points at his multiple Ds and says, "There are my presets." At the price of the Behringer D, you can afford multiple "presets," yourself. I've got two of the things and love them to pieces. Ya want presets? Buy a Voyager...but it'll cost a boodle more. You can buy butt-loads of the Behringer Ds for the cost of one Voyager. Your choice. I've got both--a Voyager keyboard & an RME, in addition to the two Behringer units (and a bunch of Euro thingies, sort of a roll your own approach to building a custom synth). They're all great. More fun than the law allows. Now, if I only had time to play... Grey

Hit Post Reply and it took about 45 seconds for the above post to go in. Grey

Got logged out again. Grey

I think you missed my point. It's not a matter of hearing Chick say something--clearly there's value in that--it's that if my memory is right, you've lost the interactive potential now that he's gone...short of having a seance. Grey

I'm in no way far enough along in my keyboard skills for it to be worthwhile for me to invest in such a course, but I thought I remembered one of the touted benefits as being that you could ask Chick a question and he'd answer. But...with Chick being dead, that benefit has vanished. Might there be someone else who could/would step in to fulfill that function? I don't know. If so, would it be someone that you, as a prospective student, would accept as being an authority on Chick's level (e.g. Herbie Hancock)? That would have to be a subjective judgement on your part; Herbie might be quite acceptable to some, but not to others. Or I could be wrong about the q & a part of the whole thing. Grey

Yeah, but if he was that good at six years, just think what he'll be like at, say, eighteen if he keeps at it... It tickled me that he kept looking over at his support team while he was playing. Don't worry, you're doing just fine. Don't sweat the mistakes, li'l buddy--you're doing better than I can and my hands are twice the size of yours. I'm proud of him. (...and just a little envious...) Grey

Look...I know that I'm not so hot at keyboards, ya know, but to be shown up by some little squirt one-eighth my size is really humiliating. I think it's adorable the way he keeps having to scoot back and forth on the bench to get to one end of the keyboard or the other. My hat's off to the guy. Once his hands grow to match his ambition, he's going to be a force to be reckoned with...oh, and some reach on those arms, too! The date on that video was 2016, so he's 11 now and probably got enough size to do a credible version of Wakeman. I wonder if Rick Wakeman's seen this? Grey

Just got logged out again. Grey

I got timed out again the other day--didn't make a note of the date/time, though. Grey

Be it age or otherwise, I don't find streaming as satisfying as a viewer, but can see that perhaps someone younger might feel differently. But...if the "someone younger" argument does not hold (open to question, perhaps), then the younger folks aren't going to spend the money for a one-time event, which leaves advertisements as the only other revenue option. Grey

I find it interesting that the people who are saying that streaming "could be" or "will be" profitable are all speaking in hypothetical terms. Can they even come up with a handful of examples of bands who are making money...a handful against the thousands of real world bands who aren't? Set the Stones and Led Zeppelin aside--I'm talking about someone who started from scratch and built a following without a TV show to boost them or being someone's kid brother...you know, real people. Ordinary people making non-miniscule money. Using ONLY the internet. Gonna be a short list, I suspect. Really short list. My point seems to have been missed, somehow, though I've stated it several times in several ways: No, I don't think mediocre bands should make money--after all, they're mediocre (at best, and some are just flat-out execrable) and I don't see any benefit to the world at large in rewarding mediocrity. The problem I see is that the bands that might actually have something to offer are buried under the vast numbers of bands who are--at best--me-too bands. They clog the channels with boring, useless performances that are not worth watching in anyone's estimation, except perhaps their wives and/or girlfriends. They have a perfect right to post their stuff--I'm not saying otherwise--but what's needed is a way to filter out the music that's not even worth a 5/10 rating. The thing is to find a consistent method of rating the performances that are out there so people who don't fall into the wives & girlfriends (husbands & boyfriends?) category can save hours and hours and hours of their time for not having to wade through the crap. Grey