After I put up the house music video recording (from Blog #1) on YouTube, people started leaving comments. It was generally well received, and one person especially enjoyed it. He said he worked in lighting design in the electronic music industry, and he was listening to my track every day for inspiration! He encouraged me to do more of this kind of music. I wrote back and said that I would love to, but I don't know where the opportunities are. He said... "The best opportunities are at the Winter Music Conference held in Miami Beach every year."
And thus began the Miami Beach adventure -- part education, part vacation, part road trip, part sun, part rain, part north, part south, part hip-hop, and part jazz!
Steve and I loaded my keyboard into the Cherokee and headed south. On the way we stopped in Hopewell, Virginia (we're from Hopewell, New Jersey) and a Super 8 in South Carolina. In an interesting coincidence, we stayed at the very same Super 8 on the way home. We also stopped to see family in Jacksonville, which is five hours from Miami. After you've been driving for days, five hours doesn't seem very long.
I think I was the only instrumentalist at the conference. Everyone was either a DJ, vocalist, songwriter, producer, journalist, management, or anything else related to the electronic music industry. I heard some interesting ideas about collaboration between DJ's and instrumentalists. In fact, while I was in Miami, a wedding client called and asked if Sweet Harmony would jam with the DJ at his wedding! We played this wedding last month and the jam was fun. I do think the idea needs to develop more, and ultimately the live musicians should take center stage.
There are parallels between the creativity of electronic music and the creativity of jazz. A DJ building a set is similar to a jazz musician building a solo. I learned that the DJ chooses the set by reading the crowd, by the vibe of the room and the city, and by his or her own taste. There is more room for creativity if the DJ is also a musician and can establish a beat, then improvise harmonies and melodies over it. The electronic dance music genre does not call for "busy" melody and harmony, but it is more spread out over the driving beat. I like that feeling of two disparate voices moving together.
And as a result of this experience, my Newark, NJ basement house recording is now a full-fledged jazz composition called "Miami Beat." You can experience it on this page, although the best way is to come hear it live at my upcoming concert:
Thursday, August 6
7:30-8:30pm Princeton Public Library
65 Witherspoon St., Princeton, NJ 08542
609-924-9529
The video shows first the drummer, then the bass player, then it will show me when I start to improvise. When listening to the original studio creation (from Blog #1) and the resultant jazz composition -- what do you hear that's different? That's the same?
Much thanks to my devoted husband for taking the video!!
From Tara, 9/9/08
My husband accompanied me to a studio recording session on Saturday, Sept. 6 in Newark, NJ. The engineer found me on Gigmasters and said that from reading my bio, I had the experience to do what he needed.
He had a beat laid out -- it turned out he was a drummer-turned-DJ -- and my job was to create the bass line, the chords, and the melodic improvisation. The style: house music, a branch of hip-hop.
I don't have much experience with house, but I think I did a decent job. I enjoyed it. There was another DJ there, and one of their friends, and they all said they loved what I was doing. It was a matter of taking what I do already, and fitting into a different genre of music. I love that idea. After all, musical genres are very flexible, especially jazz... you can have jazz-rock, jazz-funk, Latin jazz, hip-hop jazz, ethnic jazz...
I always draw from music I know to create new music, and the first song that popped into my mind was "Comin' Home Baby" by Mel Torme. Here's a YouTube video of him performing the song.
This beat was faster though, so I condensed the bass line to fit the groove, and tweaked some of the chord changes to flow better. I don't know if I could create a bass line without thinking of the chords at the same time. To me, they are inextricably linked.
The engineer picked out a piece of the bass line that he liked, and used his software to make it loop over and over. So, I realized that chord changes were not needed, at least for the first two minutes of the music. It was a very repetitive, driving sound.
But I didn't want to play one chord over and over, so I found two different chords to play over the same bass line. I really liked that sound, since the chords were opposite to each other, which created a feel of dialogue: first one voice speaks, then the next, over and over again.
Next came the "blowing," as we say in jazz -- meaning, the improvisation. I jammed over the beat/bass line/chord foundation for several minutes and he picked out his favorite piece. I learned quickly that you can't be proud or possessive when recording for a DJ. It's their job to choose pieces of your work and loop them into the music. That's what this kind of music is, and you have to respect that. It's not like playing a live concert or recording a CD, where every note of your playing is heard from start to finish.
Then, the engineer wanted a bridge, so we had to do the process all over again. This time my inspiration was "Catnap" by Nils, a German-born smooth jazz guitarist...
I don't listen to a lot of smooth jazz, but I love those chord changes! This is a great song to listen to after a hard day's work, or when sitting at your computer getting things done. I like listening to songs that don't have words when I'm working, since the music keeps you moving, but words would be a distraction, especially if I'm trying to write things.
Again, this DJ's beat was a lot faster, so I condensed and added some "snap" to the bass line, and it worked for him!
Now the engineer is re-mastering the recorded product, and getting it ready to play in dance clubs where he works as DJ. Imagine hanging out in some hip club and hearing my playing coming from the speakers! It's an exciting thought.
The whole thing took four hours. My husband was with me -- I am grateful for his support and encouragement, and for the fact that he can involve himself in a situation and not get bored! He took this video of me.
Then when we got out, the effects of Hurricane Hanna were upon us, and we drove the whole way home through heavy downpours and flooded roads.
