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The song is called "Morning In New York"


Thought I'd share a little instrumental I composed last night, for a good friend in New York. She works in a music related business, and kills herself trying to help bands and artists get a shot at success. I wrote it to encourage her, to start her days off with a little peace of mind and a little love and concern to take with her on the hectic New York streets.


The song is meant to bring to mind the beauty of a New York morning, with all the bustle starting, the day getting underway, people already hurrying on subways and hailing cabs, but still in that morning state of mind. Don't know if you can hear all that in there, or get that feeling, but hopefully you can. If so, I captured what I was striving for.

Instrumentals are fun, eh?
Nice to hear some jazz. I was beginning to think that most everyone here was either metal or hard rock.
Computer-drums, right?
But - good background-type music . . . mellow, but with the rhythm of the city . . .

Very nice Thank You Craig, I enjoy a well constucted instramental. I have a CD of SURFING WITH AN ALIEN by JOE SATRIONI and love it.

RhythmMan_BluesRockFolk wrote:Computer-drums, right?

Yeah, it is a drum track on my keyboard. Those voices you hear on the beginning are part of the rhythm track. I thought they were cool, so I left them in. Everything else... bass, piano, guitar, flute and sax are all played by me as individual tracks on keyboard. My keyboard is not the best there is, but has a multi-track sequencer, and the sounds are not that bad.

I am crossing my fingers for a new "Roland Fantom G" in a couple months! Some of the best sounds out there, 128 Midi tracks and 24 Audio tracks. Mic XLR input with phantom power, quarter inch inputs for guitars or bass, etc... Screen is 8 1/2 inchs wide, color, and can be driven by a USB mouse. Yes, you can plug a mouse into this keyboard!

sanshouheil wrote:Very nice Thank You Craig, I enjoy a well constucted instramental. I have a CD of SURFING WITH AN ALIEN by JOE SATRIONI and love it.

Satch!

Good stuff. If one of your students was Steve Vai, then you know that guy has to be a damn good guitarist!

Thanks for the compliment on the song too bro!

Damn Craig,
You play synth a hell of a lot better then I play Guitar! I could tell it was a good ol' southern neck tickler behind the keyboard. All those "triplets" are a dead giveaway! Don't want ya to get too big a swelled head, but you are a talented devil.
John

HowlinJ wrote:

Don't want ya to get too big a swelled head, but you are a talented devil.
John

LOL. Thanks John.

Sounds much better from my keyboard though. It's dimished going into the computer. Still trying to get better at Cubase and Cakewalk.

What I really need is a really good keyboard again. The wifee says she's buying me one when her bonus comes through in April. If I had a decent keyboard like the "Roland Fantom G" I'm looking at, I think it would be really good. The ideas are good, just need a better keyboard and then I could tweak the parts better.

But thanks. Much appreciated!

Craig,
I programmed whole gigs on my trusty ol, Yamaha SY 55 . (I once had a duo with a sax man, Brass Keys. ) I pre programmed all the drums and bass. and used a Yamaha MDF2 filer to store the whole mess. Worked good.(except ya couldn't jam with it.) I'm still using the 55. The song Caledonia on my profile is all SY 55. The fidelity is bad because I ripped it from an old cassette recording, and I don't know much about Audacity as yet, so I didn't try to "fix it up" I still didn't get that MP3 player you were tellin' me about so I'm still a bit "behind the times". My son Ry has a Sharp MD-MT29OH minidisk recorder that we used to record "I Put a Spell On You" when we were playing in "The Gin House Rockers a couple of years ago. That's a live one mike recording. I hope to use it to start recording our new trio soon. The sound quality is poor on that one because it was ripped from the minidisk to a C.D. and then to the computer.
"Come on to Me", one of my originals, is by my old band from the early 80's. It was a song contest winner and is on vinyl .I succeeded in ripping it from the turntable to the computer.
John

HowlinJ wrote:


My son Ry has a Sharp MD-MT29OH minidisk recorder that we used to record "I Put a Spell On You" when we were playing in "The Gin House Rockers a couple of years ago. That's a live one mike recording.

You guys are good live. And that is a pretty clean recording for a single mic through a mini-disk recorder.

Yeah, I like that song "Come on to me". Lots of style. Cool tune.

Craig, you said,
"What I really need is a really good keyboard again. The wifee says she's buying me one when her bonus comes through in April. . ."
.
Sounds like she's a 'keeper,' man.

RhythmMan_BluesRockFolk wrote:Craig, you said,
"What I really need is a really good keyboard again. The wifee says she's buying me one when her bonus comes through in April. . ."
.
Sounds like she's a 'keeper,' man.

She's getting there. LOL

On a production level it's pretty good...but on a compositional level, I dunno...it doesn't really go anywhere.

I'm not trying to be cruel, just honest. And of course that's my big pet peeve with modern material anyhow - that it's lacking melodic integrity.

Have you considered going back to your primary intstrument and "playing in the sandbox" again? That's what I do with piano when I feel like I'm straying too far from my creative center.

Irminsul wrote:
On a production level it's pretty good...but on a compositional level, I dunno...it doesn't really go anywhere.

I'm not trying to be cruel, just honest.

That's not cruel. It's meant as mood music, so it really isn't going to ever "go" anywhere. It's meant to invoke a feeling, but not be distracting like a performance.

But, actually, on a production level it kind of sucks (thanks for saying that part was good though) but you are still right, that on a compositional level it is somewhat repetitive and not interesting enough throughout.

It's just an idea I was playing with, inspired by a friend. She loved it, by the way!

When I get my new board, I will tweak it, and give it depth and more interest. It still has to stay on that fine line of being more background music though.

I couldn't sleep last night and played around with some ideas.

But by the time I started on this idea, I was tired by then, but I liked some of what I was doing, and I wanted to lay the basics down, before I forgot what was swimming in my head. Which I tend to do ALOT if I don't record it.

It's a nice groove. I'll do it more justice later!

Recording it, captured the "feel" of it. That's what was most important to me, cause now I can go back to it when I have a better instrument, and won't have lost what I was feeling when I played it.

In fact, I'm pretty excited, cause I think I want to do a whole album of stuff in that vein. Instrumental music that sets a mood, but doesn't force you to be pay it direct attention, and instead just enjoy it, and let it give you a good vibe.

Heck, I think you're just showing your artistic sensitive side Craig and doing a little groov'n. I Like it but I do have a broad taste in music also. My favorite listening music right now is the soundtrack to the Lord Of The Rings series.

Craig Maxim wrote:
In fact, I'm pretty excited, cause I think I want to do a whole album of stuff in that vein. Instrumental music that sets a mood, but doesn't force you to be pay it direct attention, and instead just enjoy it, and let it give you a good vibe.

Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois pioneered that concept back in the early 80's. Check out two recordings that really may inspire you: Eno's "Music for Airports and Elevators", and Eno/Lanois's "Hybrid".