zbd1960

I've taken my cello the train - which is a real PITA as the only realistic solution is to have it on a seat and pray the train isn't too busy. 

Ignoring deficiencies in eyesight is not sensible, and in the case of driving, illegal. You need an eye test to determine what is going on and what the options are. 

I was 16 when I realised my distance vision had 'issues', so I had to wear glasses for distance and owing to a weak left eye, I needed to wear them all the time.

As is common with most people over 40, reading became affected and I had to switch to varifocals. There are different qualities of lenses and inevitably the more expensive ones are better. I never had any issues wearing varifocals, some people do. I opted for lenses typically costing around £400 plus frames.

Then in my mid-50s I discovered I had sudden onset cataracts. I had replacement lens surgery in both eyes and the new lenses in my eyes corrected my distance vision, so I now only really need glasses for reading. I use 'occupational lenses' which are so I have a mix of reading and intermediate reading - so I cna read music etc. They have a greater depth of field so things farther away remain in focus.

Your eyesight sounds like it is opposite way around to mine, but there will be solutions, probably not cheap ones if you want good results.

Ignoring eyesight issues is storing up future problems.  

A rather more staid event as it was the first concert given by the two new community choirs (same MD for both). So, the more sedate environs of the local Methodist church. Rep was essentially a mix of music form shows, American Song Book etc. As we're new groups, we don't have enough rep to fill a full concert so some 'filler' provided by a couple of precocious youngsters aged around 8 or 9. Whilst both were extremely good (the young pianist was scarily good) I could have done with that tbh.  One of the stalwarts of the local music scene provided some very different stuff with a mix of folk/jazz improv type stuff - duets on various combinations of piano, flute, violin, tin whistle, and later on a small Gamelan set-up... And the issue is when you have 'guests' they tend to do too much....

However, the two choirs did well.

I was going to say teak is heavy. 

Things you didn't think you'd need to do: remote login to the organ from the Macbook...

I have a 24" monitor built into the music desk so that I can play from PDFs. There is a spare USB socket near ground level around the back where I could connect a USB stick or portable drive.

I'm thinking that rather than that, I could try remotely connecting the Mac to the organ's PC and do it that way. So, some online searches pulls up that MS makes the Remote Desktop app for Mac. I did need to run a script on the organ's PC to alter some permissions (again an online search sorted that out).

I then remoted into the PC from the Mac and copied across assorted PDFs.

I have encountered one issue that I've not definitely resolved yet. When you load a PDF (enScore) page forward stops working after the initial scroll to the start of the music. It might resolve when I next power up as I didn't do a re-boot after the changes to the PC. If not, the next thing to check will be drivers I suppose... (a big reason why I switched to Mac at home 8 years ago).    

My cello case is a Hiscox. I've had mine about 15 years now and it was £300 then. It's bomb proof, but not light. 

15? You need to try a theorbo. 

9 hours ago, bass_dinger said:

Just... "wow"!  What a fantastic setup. Thank you for sharing that. 

 

There was a time when I wanted a bass pedal board, and to fit some reed switches and a midi output unit.  However, I have neither the space, nor the talent, to take such a project forward. 

The pedal board has no wiring to connect it to the organ - just magnetic reed switches. 

There was some interest in my new Hauptwerk organ and set-up at the NW Bass Petting Zoo yesterday, so I thought I'd write a bit more about it.

Over the last 25 years or so, various software developers have worked to create 'virtual pipe organs' using MIDI. In short, someone goes out and records every single pipe individually, including its reverb decay in the acoustic. You recreate the organ console in the software. Physically, you have MIDI keyboards and pedalboard. The stops of the organ are controlled either through touch screen, or (if you have plenty of money) you can have physical stop pistons that you pull out. When you press a key, the recorded sound is what you hear. The whole organ is loaded into RAM so that there is no lag. So, if you have 30 stops drawn, hitting one note means 30 sounds are simultaneously sounded for that one note. If you're playing four-note chords in each hand AND two pedals at the same time, then that 10 x 30, in this case, so 300 sounds to play... except it gets worse... Some stops are 'mixtures' so if you sound a note, it ALSO sounds a bunch of other harmonics of that note e.g 12th, 19th, 21st. Usually there are at least 3 harmonics sounded with a mixture, but 5 or 7 are common, especially with French 'cornet' stops. So, if you had a 5 mixture, those ten notes become 50 notes, sounding say the root, 12th, 15th, 17th, 19th, 21st.... of EVERY note you're playing.

This is part of what creates the complexity of organ sound - it's an analog mechanical synthesiser.

I decided a while ago that I wanted a major retirement activity (yes, I know I have lots of music already with cello, saxes, basses, viols...). I've never really been a keyboard player as I never had lessons. I bought a piano when I moved to Shropshire 25 years ago (a 1970s Yamaha upright). I had some lessons then, but not many. 

I've always been a fan of organ music. Sadly, the sound of many English organs is quite boring as they lack the reeds which add character to Dutch, French, and German organs for example. The English organ sounds specialises in creating a uniform sound across the main diapason/principal ranks. 

My organ was built by a guy who specialises in building bespoke Hauptwerk set-ups. I opted for a 'positiv' style case as it was going to be in the lounge and I wanted a 'nice' piece of furniture.

The main frame structure is solid English oak, as are the 'cheeks' of the manual stack, the organ bench seat, and the expression pedal tops. The pedalboard is recycled from a 60 year old organ and the pedals are solid maple. Some other parts are oak veneered MDF which has been painted so you see the wood grain.

The main large flat panels are painted MDF. They were primed and had three coats of paint. The speaker grill design was chosen by me from a sample of 500 designs. I opted for an Art Deco quasi Lutyens 'sunburst' design, rather than something more gothic/Victorian. That was cut by CNC machine. 

The screens are all Iyama - two 22" mounted vertically for the 'stop jambs' and a 24" in the music desk which can be used for PDFs of music (pages can be turned with one of the toe pistons). All touch-screen. 

There are 8 general pistons and 24 divisional pistons, 8 per manual. There are a further 8 pistons which can be defined and I've opted to make them pedal pistons. There is a 1,000 step sequencer. This is used for example to set-up a recital - you assign all your stop settings to values. For example, if I had a piece which needed 5 changes of stops then I could pre-program each set of stops and assign them to say sequencer steps 20, 21, 22, 23, and 24. As I need ot hcange registration, I just have to hit either one of the + thumb pistons, or the + toe piston to change to the next registration.

I kept the number of toe pistons down to five: three couplers and a + to advance the sequncer, and a page turn for the PDF on the music stand. Toe pistons are expensive items as they're about £50 each for nice brass ones.  I ruled out having a further 8 for the pedal divisional pistons.

If you have multiple users of an organ, you can assign ranges to specific players so that say Fred uses 100 - 199, Bill uses 200 - 299 etc.

Custom built computer has 128gb RAM and two 1tb SSD drives.

The sound output is to active Neumann studio monitors. A pair of KH310s inside the box, a pair of KH120s externally on stands, and a KH750 sub.

If you want to see the guy who built it getting excited over the first sounds out of it... this is a short 1 min video.

Finally, why didn't I just buy say a Johannus, Content, or Viscount off the shelf? Whilst some models are cheaper than what I've paid, most are significantly more expensive and even £25k ones are vinyl not real wood! Despite the cost of mine, the end result is a much superior cabinet and significantly better sound system than you'd get for a commercially available home system.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/154ZAxxZ0N0JOuuf9byiSqP-uMdwtq7Xs/view?usp=share_link

Those who were trying my custom 'Titan' 6-string (walnut top) and were wondering what the control options were... and I'm bad at remembering them... here's the set-up.

From front to back:

Volume (pull for passive)

Pickup select/balance

Neck switch - down P, middle series, up reverse P
Stacked bass (bottom) treble (top)

Bridge switch - up parallel, middle single coil, down series.

Final furthest back control - Middle.

Also, a shout out to @rwillett for making the whole thing possible. 

Great day. 

I should be able ot be there for 10 - I can be earlier if any help is required to set-up as it's about an hour from here. 

More photos and some sort vids of the sound testing - not me playing

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1hCs4C6m-TZsL4XBN6vBvpoypaSFvsoUV?usp=share_link

OK.... here we go...

A custom built Hauptwerk virtual pipe organ. Three manuals, 32 key pedal board. Custom built PC with 128gb RAM, assorted Arduino and MIDI boxes, Focusrite interface, two ARC Studio DSP boxes, 1 pair Neumann 310 inside the cabinet, 1 pair Neumann 120 externally, 1 Neumann sub.... 

OK.... the two-day installation of the "Bird Scarer" started yesterday...

It is an instrument which has been built by a bespoke builder for me... It won't be fully functional until after we've installed all the electronics etc today. I will post more later, but here's a teaser...

Long shot... try recording the sound with various set-ups and then have a session with you all listening to the recording on some decent kit.... Probably overly optimistic. As a long-in-the-tooth hi-fi nut, I know that not everyone hears things the same way.  

Two most common rattles on my cello are the end-pin, which is easily sorted, or it's the mute when not applied. The mute is a basic Torte one and when not in use it's slid over teh strings between the bridge and the tailpiece. In some locations it causes a rattle, which menas adjusting how/where it's sitting until the sound goes away.  

Generally I eat most things - guitars are probably safe and cables a bit too chewy

As the non rock n roll bassist, I also sing, but I sing in classical choirs - choral societies and chamber choirs... The nearest I usually get to modern music is arrangements for choir of American Song Book stuff. I sing baritone (roughly the two octaves up from the F at the bottom of the bass clef).

I'm a very experienced singer and I've been chair of various groups over the years - I know how they run. Anyway, for the last year I've been singing with a local choral society. They have a number of problems.... They have an MD with an inflated ego and it looks like the committee aren't up to challenging him. They don't have a separate accompanist, which is a major hindrance. 

The main issue though is the tenor and bass sections are weak. The basic cause is a lack of younger voices. At 65 I'm younger than any of the tenors by a large margin and I'm the second youngest bass... None of the other first basses (baritones) is strong which means I feel as though I'm always leading the line. This is where a good MD comes in and works to get people singing out.

It makes rehearsals very tough going for me. I have to be on point all the time as if I'm not there's just nothing there. If I go off the rails, which happens (it's easy to come in a third too low or something) I've got no way of fixing it as there's no one else there.

If this were a vocal consort with just three or four voices to a part, then that's a different thing, but this is supposed to be a 60+ member choral society.

The current repertoire in rehearsal includes complex 8 part a cappella stuff. I've sung all of this repertoire before, so it's stuff I'm aware of. It's obvious that most of this stuff is new to most of the choir who've not sung this rep before.

I pushed back to the MD a couple of weeks ago and told him this isn't working. He was very dismissive although words were said at the next rehearsal where it was evident I'd had some impact... The next rehearsal was hopeless. You would never know that there were 9 basses.

It's supposed to be fun and this has become hard going. The choir just isn't up to this repertoire (don't get me started on sopranos unable to maintain pitch in the a cappella numbers).

I've called it a day.   

Hi, welcome

My plans have changed - I have ditched a conflicting event (long story) - so I will now attend and I will bring some kit. I'll probably bring my ACG 4 and Manton 6. 

19 hours ago, Stub Mandrel said:

 

I was in my late 20s when I stopped going to jazz gigs after I realised any band called "XXXXXXX  Jazz" was going to do just that, and that most people's solos were virtually the same regardless of the song. As someone in a blues band, I've seen a lot more musical creativity in blues solos than most jazz ones...

Yes, that was also true. That is exactly why I saw it as pointless everyone soloing every piece as all you got was generally the same solos repeated every time.

27 minutes ago, Muzz said:

Yeah, that rings a bell: I used my Stomp in the jam night setup, but I'd just tell the punters 'That switch is the tuner, don't frig with anything else, ditto the amp settings because it's going through the house PA, too.' 99% of bassists just used the tone control on the bass and it never sounded anything less than good, but one night a pair of Jazzers turned up; they 'Didn't like' any of the drummers they'd heard (despite our drummer having played residencies in jazz clubs in London, in between his pro career on cruises and in hotels) because 'Nobody in here can swing' so decided to just do a bass and guitar 'set'. The bassist insisted I take the Stomp out of the loop (buggering up the gain/level stage) and proceeded to take five minutes farting around with the combo settings before playing. No hint of thanks after they'd bored everyone with what was 15 minutes of presumably one of Spinal Tap's Jazz Odysseys, and received the sort of applause where you can identify exactly which 3 people are clapping. They left straight after, and didn't come back. They weren't missed.

As a sax play and someone who has an interest in jazz, one of the things that I get frustrated with going to listen to a jazz gig is the typical way that playing is approached. The typical method is: play the head, perhaps repeat head with some variation/decoration, everyone takes a solo for 16, 32, 64... bars (cue perhaps solo sax, trumpet, guitar, bass, keys, drums...). After 15 minutes of boring the audience to death, return to head and finish. Repeat process with next tune. 

You do not need to have everyone taking a solo in every tune, but that's what a lot of jazz groups do. They then wonder why their audiences almost no one under 70 in them.

I don't go to a lot of jazz gigs, but I've been to enough, first one in my 20s, and they all operate this way. More imagination would go a long way. 

55 minutes ago, Chienmortbb said:

My lot moan if I am 3 minutes late, they all live eithin 15 mins of rehearsal space, I live 1 hour away.😜

It's always the same. I used to have a challenging 55 mile drive to rehearsals for one orchestra in the Birmingham area. My drive was at least an hour and ten and was 50% rural A roads and 50% M54, M6, M5. I was never late, unlike those who lived within 3 miles who'd dribble in  

Never rule out complete incompetence...