Docbop

Herbie one of the greatest musicians ever and still showing up at jams and clubs to hear what's going on. Happy Appearance Day Herbie.

Some music for a Saturday Nite Lockdown from Herbie and Joni. [video:youtube]

I use a AT2020 USB mic into my Mac and record with Quicktime and with the USB mic instead of the Mac's builtin mic makes all the difference in the world. A excellent guitar player I follow has been making really good sounding videos for years with his iPhone with one of the good mic's that attach to the iPhone and his video look and sound excellent. Chick Corea's daily videos he says are his iPhone, but I bet he has a good mic connected. Having a good mic and not using the internal is a big difference and make a very quick and easy setup.

That has nothing to do with being good music, you're talking like it's a sport not an art.

It ain't got no soul it's electronic boredom, I couldn't make it all the way thru the video.

Chick Corea's daily livestream is now on YouTube as well as Facebook. He moved into his studio with multiple cameras that he used in his past online clinics. It great getting to be a fly on the wall of Chick practicing and playing.

I started learning piano as an wishlist thing so my first piano is a RD-2000 and I like it a lot. I wanted a good keybed similar to an acoustic and I can adjust the key touch from light to super heavy I use for trying to strengthen my fingers. I also live in apartment size and controlling volume was important for me. I have since bought a old Wurlitzer console piano, but it is loud, so I only play it when my neighbor is a work. My wishlist is to get a workstation so I have all the bells and whistles and can do some basic recording. Which workstation that's tough to decide, the Fantom is new and offers a lot, Kronos and Montage both are old and need for a major update or replacement.

That's great with Mike Landau and the great Greg Mathieson on keys. Greg has played for or produced so many great artists over the decades. When I was working for the late great Jesse Ed Davis, Greg fell by the studio to hang one night, there was a 9' grand in the corner that was delivered for a session in the morning. Studio said it was going to be tuned again in the morning so if we wanted to use it, it was okay. Greg laid down a couple great tracks and was all smiles afterwards. It was one of many great nights that someone fell by the studio and ended up adding a little something.

New YT with new kid Kiefer and bass master Abe Laboriel Sr. Too bad Abe Laboriel Jr (Paul McCartney's drummer) wasn't there when father and son play together it's crazy and great. [video:youtube]

If you want a hammer action 88 key none are light weight from a retired person POV.

Best is listen the solo a number of times then sing, growl, hum, yodel, a solo of your own and record it. Now transcribe what you sang. Keep doing that so your start building up the ability to play what your hear in your head. People can always sing, growl, hum, yodel, hear in their head a better solo than they can play because when you play you tend to basic things off familiar fingerings and licks and will limit themselves subconsciously to fit with what they think they can play. When you sing...etc you don't put limitations on yourself so start there and it will also push you to work on technique where needed.

They are really pushing hard where I live that this is the week to stay at home unless absolutely necessary. So checked and none of the local grocery stores deliver or even do curbside pickup. I went to the ATM and there are now X's on the sidewalk and in the bank to show how much distance to give people. Coming home pass a Target store and people lined up outside waiting to get in and all spaced appropriately. I saw a few without masks and they don't realize they won't let them in. The city has ruled that masks have to be worn inside any building except homes and places are turning away people without masks. Being out today was a emptiest I've seen it here, a very little cars out on the streets, and a few people out jogging. I was suppose to get my INR blood test today, but clinic said wait a couple more weeks then do it. Don't like idea of going near medical building with all this going on. On the funny side the local barbershop's FB page has a picture of one of the women barbers now with a buzz cut, but really funny a whole lotta pictures from customers and from online of people giving themselves haircuts. I ordered a clipper so I will be joining the club of bad home haircuts. I told the barbershop they should open a drive-thru buzz cut business. drive up, stick your head out the window, buzz, buzz, buzz, and drive away. As for the idiots saying staying home violates the Constitution no it violates humanity and trying to help all people to get through this tough time. Hey if you want to die screaming.... "but I have the right!!!" with your last breath go for it.

It's a YouTube so you can slow it down and listen, listen, listen, to get the what you can into your ear. Now listen for what chords his lines are implying. The old jazz cats I've been lucky enough to be a fly on the wall when they talk, talk about the chords they are trying to imply, they look at it as the scales come from the chords not the other way around. Jerry Bergonzi jazz saxophonist and educator when asked the ten most important things when learning to improvise says..... the first nine are listening. It like learning to Swing it can't be written down you have to listen enough to get it in your gut. Improv is the same you have to listen and absorb the lines and the ideas they are weaving together. The more you listen the more you start hearing the words and sentences they are speaking. It's like learning to talk as a kid you heard others and imatated they sounds first, then learned certain sounds had relationships. you were already talking before you ever went to school, music is the same as talking. Okay time for more coffee.

Video editing is pretty resource intensive especially for the GPU so that budget is awfully small. When I was working in media as audio editor/mastering and the IT person all the video computer had 2-3 times the spec's of the audio computers. I'd say decide on what video software you're going to use then ask people who use that software what they consider a minimum system requirements are. Then start scanning the internet for close outs.

Tech today will work for us and against us in this epidemic. Advances in medicine, AI, and databases of past flu and virus pattern will help to find a vaccine. Where it is working against is we are so mobile, people flying globally daily people infected and don't know it are getting on jets and carrying the germ to other cities. Look at the hard hit places and they are high population and business/technology centers that have a do global business. To a lessor degree relatives flying globally to visit family. In my opinion stopping people from moving around both locally and global will be big part of the solution.

Korg released the new version of the SV at NAMM this year, check out the Korg SV2 and it's about $2000 and same look, but more features. They have a 73 and 88 key versions and with and without builtin speakers. Korg SV2

I find this video very down to earth and informative. It covers the test many are buying and it's unreliable results. It also talks how people (including me) who got that really bad flu around the end of last year think they got an early version of the virus and have some immunity, which leads in to the talk about virus timeline. I liked Jessa's talk, but of course your MMV. [video:youtube]

Those who are saying guitarists only play in a few keys I say you been playing with too many garage jam bands.

As an former roadie that case took a hell of a hit if went all the way thru to the 2600 and scuffed it. My guess a forklift did it based on size and location Korg will probably replace the whole ATA case, be interesting to see what they do about the damage to the 2600.

You can use a parametric EQ and dial in a range the guitar is in and then dip that frequency range. Problem especially be a keyboard forum the guitar players Only range is the keyboard players favorite range, so you will be ducking down more than just the guitar. Remember back in my recording engineer days we had to do that to a Bob Dylan vocal track he had hissed his S's so much, so my buddy had to learn the track and switch in the parametric EQ on the S's then back out during mixdown. Being this was done on Dylan vocal track only it didn't interfere with anything else.

A couple of my old friends were Beatles FANATICs and later huge Eagles fans, these guys love good vocal harmonies. So they started a cover band called... Yup you guessed it The Beagles.

Why not help another artist with this project. Instead of using real news video I bet you could easily find a local up and coming graphic artist, comic book artist, or similar artist to create news-like art or maybe video you could splice in. So you still get the effect and some up and coming artist gets a end credit and something they can add to their portfolio. Art helping Art.

Just because I just went thru this in the middle of this virus thing, be sure to put your car battery on a trickle charger or drive enough to keep the battery charged. I went to get groceries earlier this week and after all the hassle of the store I come out and my car wouldn't start. The battery was about five years old and wouldn't hold a charge anymore. I called AAA battery service and they come check everything out confirm I need a battery, but then discover they don't have anymore of my type battery and not sure when their next load of batteries will arrive. So they gave me a jump and I drove to the Honda dealer and got a battery. Not a good time to have a car that won't start.

That's good news I haven't had to file for a few years now. I go to H&R Block and they look at my 1099's and SSI and say you can skip it, they don't even charge me, but I tip them for checking for me.