A Mighty Wind

Was working on the trumpet today and realized I'd been cheating the lower notes by over-tonguing. That is, I'm not hitting those slots fast and clean and I was hiding that failing by playing very staccato.

I'm also still having a lot of trouble slipping the lip coming back down from the High C. So as usual, a lot of the practice session is very mechanical. Scales and worse.

That's how it goes; steadily smaller incremental improvements, meaning more practice time for less perceived gain. Which is a good reason why I find it more exciting to learn a new instrument than to continue improving on one that I own. I'd really like to learn another brass instrument -- especially since brass translates, meaning much of what I've learned on trumpet could be applied to, say, French Horn.

Against that is the thought of what might actually be useful in the task of getting some more music completed. I'm still playing with the idea of "bardic covers"; of using generally Early Music/folk instruments to cover a variety of game and movie themes.

The real fun of this is the challenge of using idiomatic writing and performance techniques of the instruments; renaissance recorder consort voicings, Irish bodhran licks and penny whistle ornaments, fiddle double-stops, and so forth.

And, yes, that's a hell of a lot to learn. Especially at the composing end, especially for someone who really doesn't know that much theory.

On the upside, the way the Terminator and Hellboy covers have been staggering shows me that stuff with a lot more rhythmic content is going to go a lot better. And if I can get over the hump of understanding the jig form, then I'll have a template to create and record (within the limitations of that style) with a great deal more comfort.

(Hellboy is a weird meter I still haven't quite figured out. Recording the bass part has been a pain in the butt as I keep jumping the thirds and slewing the syncopation. Terminator has a simpler meter but the original was dense pad-like synth sounds and that means the translation ends up with slow, legato, extremely exposed lines...lines where every bow crossing or intonation error leaps out in the listening.)

I've been listening to a lot of PPF and other YouTube multi-instrumentalists and I've come to a more nuanced position on digital trickery. Which is simply that I'm not about authenticity. I'm about expression. Sure, some people get bragging rights because they could perform the whole thing live. I'm just as happy if I can get it right once in a hundred tries and put that one on tape. I'm completely find with adjusting EQ, compressing, doing all the usual audio mixer tricks, but also doing pitch correction and effects (octave shifting, flanging, chorusing, distortion) as necessary.

(Speaking of which, I have a weird scheme in mind to improve the sound of electric cello. Which is to take the recorded performance, shift it up a couple octaves, play it back through a contact microphone attached to an acoustic violin, record that, combine the recording with inverted copy to remove the original signal and save only the body resonances, re-pitch that, and add it to taste back to the original recording.)

So, yeah. The smart thing to do now is to keep practicing at the instruments I have, keep working on arrangements with them, and prioritize pieces that fall within my existing skills (like Uncharted Worlds, which doesn't require any techniques I don't already more-or-less have, and should be possible within my existing instrument collection.)



Arrangement-wise, the new Terminator idea seems to be working in the MIDI mock-up. I'd really love to do a cover of the Relic Hunter theme. And there's a couple other Mass Effect pieces that are quite similar to Uncharted Worlds in instrumentation/technique needs. One being the first Citadel underscore. Another being...Vigil. Which really, really cries out for the melodic line to be played on a Turkish Ney...

3x3x2

I started trumpet practice today running up and down the slots. And something changed. Hit the high C and just kept going...every note fell right into place, nice and clear, as I continued up the scale. I think I hit the Double C before my lip finally gave. Didn't get back nearly as high the rest of the practice session -- but at the end of the day can still go to the E without too much trouble. (Now the big issue is working my lip back down smoothly from the high range).

Still, learning a new instrument is vastly more exciting than continuing to practice at one I can already sort-of play. I have much work to do on everything I own but my wandering eye falls on so many new toys...

Okay, and there's also upgrades to what I already have. A decent ukulele. A proper student-model trumpet. A real sax. On the flip side, though, I have a small apartment and have difficulty finding places to practice the louder instruments. For all that and more I kinda like specializing in the small and quirky; U-bass and Venova instead of bass guitar and saxophone, for instance.

Or piccolo french horn. These play in Bb, same as a trumpet. The sound is sort of a weird hybrid between french horn and flugelhorn, they aren't terribly in tune with themselves and are a pain to play. But they are cute...

So that makes roughly three instruments that I'm really wanting to buy right now that all fall into about the $300 range. And I'm going to try to hold off until I've paid off the Grecian vacation. I still don't know what a Grecian Urns but I'm losing a lot of work hours over the kid's show I'm in the middle of mixing now.

Travel truth and lies

The rain and cold are dragging at me. A project at work just got put on work-through-the-weekend priority. A school strike is messing up our tech schedule for the show I'm mixing. And then there was a little fire. Everyone is okay but half my tenants are displaced and contractors are slamming around at all hours and nobody is getting any sleep.

##

I'm going to talk about the novel progress in a bit, but first I'd like to share some of my own travel lessons.

There's the big three I learned from my mom:

1. Pack light
2. Reserve your first night's stay
3. Go to the water

In inverse order, there's a lot of advantages to a river. It is cooler -- going to the river saved us in Bangkok. The river is sometimes a simpler and straighter route -- I used the Thames to get from the Tower Bridge area to Greenwich and it was simpler than figuring out buses and Tube. But mostly, the river is a different world. The city is noise and smoke and crowds and, yes, tourists. The river shows you a slower and more gentle world and gives you glimpses of the working reality of the place outside of the shopping districts and tourist hotspots.

First night; I've amended my mom's method. She likes to spend the first day getting to know a town, wandering around, and finding somewhere both cheap and cool to stay for the rest of the trip. For Greece, I just paid everything up front so I wouldn't have to deal with it. The only adventure was finding the places when I landed. Which is the other key element here; splurge on that first night. You are jetlagged, it is two in the morning, you don't know the language or your way around. Sleep in a Western-style hotel that offers a shuttle service from the airport. You'll be a lot more rested and ready to deal with a whole new world after that.

Packing light: okay, I used to camp. Then I was in the Army, more, in the Paratroops. One dirty secret is that we may parachute in but all the gear a modern army needs to operate would be flown in or trucked in later to meet us. Thing is, it didn't always get there. So us experienced guys would jump with rain gear, a poncho liner to sleep on, some 550 cord, a knife, and enough food and water to keep going for a day or two.

Not saying I always get it right, but the pack for Crete was almost perfect. Here's the big trick; airlines currently allow two carry-ons (without paying extra); one larger that goes in the overhead, and a smaller one you can keep with you. I saw a lot of people on all six flights that didn't understand the advantage this gives. Moment the seatbelt light went off they were all back into the overhead bins making a commotion. I have a shoulder bag I picked up in Berlin -- sort of a small messenger bag. I put everything I thought I might need on the flight in there, including tickets and passport. Means I could check my larger bag if the airline asked me to. When I arrived I'd repack and it would be my day bag, holding camera and maps and charging stick.

Two changes of clothes. Enough to last a week and then you have something to wear while you do laundry. This was all casual walking stuff; I had no intention of dining anywhere fancy. But here's another trick; I know they are less comfortable, but prioritize trousers and long sleeves over shorts and t-shirts; a lot of other countries are less casual than the US and many places of worship won't even let you in with short sleeves.

I did bring camera but almost never used it. And no laptop. Not even any books. But if you are going to be doing everything off a smart phone (books, camera, writing with a neat little folding keyboard, even maps) then bring power stick and a charger that will let you do both at once.



Then there's a few other things that haven't quite made Three Rules level:

4. Learn "Hello" and "Thank you." This isn't always exact or plausible...getting the courtesy's out in Greece could be a race, Italy has way too many nuances of greeting and good-byes to easily memorize, and Japan is such a politeness-driven country it is well worth learning a variety of thankful and apologetic words (mine were Ohio gozaimasu, konbanwa, ano, dozo, ii desu....but if you learn nothing else, arigato will get you a long way.)

5. Watch people. This seems obvious. And like above it isn't always possible. I came close to getting on a bus in Athens before I noticed nobody was using cash...instead they flashed a card and there was a beeping sound. So then I started asking around where you bought that ticket. In Japan, there is a very clear understanding of which staircase goes up and which goes down so watch the crowd before you try to plunge Up the Down Staircase. A little watching of when and what the locals are doing will make you look a lot less like an Ugly American. (My counter-example in Greece was trying to figure out the correct way to drink coffee. I couldn't find anyone doing it, and asking was no help because in the places I was, the staff had long decided the crazy tourists were right no matter what they did.)

6. Adjust. I really shouldn't have to say this. If you want bed your way, burger made your way, toilet the way it is at home,  then why are you traveling? If you really can't deal and just want to look at the sights then there are options. There are package tours that shift you from Western-Style hotel to Western-Style hotel in the air-conditioned embrace of a tour bus and the comforting arm of a tour guide. Or just stay home and watch the movie. I've witnessed far too many travelers who couldn't re-adjust to their expectations that coffee would be free with the buffet in Berlin, that there would be chairs at a noodle shop in Tokyo, that they could pay with American dollars in London. Instead of taking a step back and realizing "this is different here...so what else is different that I could be enjoying the benefits of?" they start arguing with the server. For food, for beds, for all sorts of things, my advice is try it. If you don't like it, then no shame on you and you'll find something you like eventually. If you do, though...that's something you've learned and might even take home with you.

7. The two-week rule. I've failed on this as often as I've followed it, but the idea is you want to stay at a place long enough to get past the "we have to climb the Eiffel and visit the Louve and Notre Dame..." Actually, you'll never visit everything in Paris. Point being, the first week is rushing around doing the typical tourist spots and the must-see's. The second week is when you can relax and take in the place. Sit in a cafe and people-watch; the pressure is done. Around a week is when you slowly transition from visiting to staying; you know the street layout, which buses you usually take, the place you like to eat at. Where to buy paper and do laundry. And this goes both ways. To the locals you move from "today's tourist" to "that quiet American with the crazy beard who's been coming in here every day."

##

With all the above commotion, though, I'm actually making progress on the novel. Have a draft now of the key moment when my protagonist puts on the mask for the first time.

Checked some more geography and I still haven't tracked down any Roman ruins or active digs in the Bad Münster area. Not that it matters for the plot; a medieval well is just as good for me. I did, however, discover a nice Roman mine that's about 50 km Northwest of Frankfurt. So far I've been honest with geography and although I may be adding a few things that aren't quite right (like transplanting the torchlight parade from another medieval fair to the one at Bad Münster) I haven't actually...lied.

Checked up on taking a train from Frankfurt to Venice. One day (or an overnight), a few hundred Euros. Depending on what times I plug in, though, the route planner either runs me through Switzerland or an Eastern route through Austria. Which possibly touches Salzburg (I've spent a couple days there). And also passes through München. That is, Munich (where I've also been, but only to change trains). And the story is set in October.

Oho. Thing is, the end of the shoulder season is late October and Oktoberfest actually ends on the first Sunday in October. My protagonist is also taking the latest flight she can before the prices go up and for me that was the 28th. So...move the shoulder earlier, or move Oktoberfest? Oh, yeah, and there's Ohi Day on the 28th, although the people I talked to in Crete didn't seem to think it was that much of a deal, an Athenian might disagree and in any case would play perfectly into what I want to say about the history of Greece after the Classical Era.

Sigh. I should have done something other than Germany. Kept the story in Greece, maybe included Crete. The thing about the German detour is that the way it is currently plotted she's going to be exploring around the Rhine and the Stein, into Bavaria and then to Austria, through the turned-cuff of the Italian boot and to the city of Venice (possibly stopping in Padua or Verona first), and then take a boat down the Adriatic. She'll be a seasoned -- well, semi-seasoned -- traveller by the time she gets back to Athens, and a lot of the first-time-out-figuring-stuff-out stuff I'd plotted was in the Athenian setting.

Four points define a plane...r

I have this theory that sometimes you just aren't in writing mode and it is time to do music instead. Or you aren't in either, and it is time to build something.

But then I have those times when everything feels right (and there's no time to do any of it.) I finished my problem-solving just in time to go back and hack out revised paragraphs of the Art Gallery Reception scene before the weekend ended. I'm still searching for the character voice, trying to find the right combinations of amusing, informative, self-aware, inexperienced... But at least I'm writing again.

Then when I broke for a grocery run I spotted a girl who was exactly exactly right. Black hair, which was unexpected, but everything from the utilitarian clothes to the not-exactly-flawless complexion to the features was spot-on what would work for my protagonist. Not that I could exactly walk up and take a picture, though. Most of it was in the less-tangible anyhow; body language, attitude, etc.

(Don't really have a term for that particular kind of face. Pixie-like? Sharp jaw, large mouth, wide cheeks...Andromeda's Sara Ryder has that look, but other than that, only strong example that comes to mind is....Gadget Hackwrench!)

Simultaneously, music jumps up. While brushing my teeth this morning I dreamed up a better approach for the Terminator cover which has not been working. Instead of trying to follow the patterns of the original introduction closely, go for the strengths of the instruments I have. And go a lot faster and more energetic. And rather than the bare harmonies of the original, reharmonize to something with more defined changes. The chincello is going to be key on this.

But, yeah, still going with a second verse in a rather different style. And that's going to be tough. Basically it is a jig done with more idiomatic bodhran, guitar, fiddle. And penny whistle and pipes (rather, crumhorn or maybe I'll spend on a chanter) for the melody. But it all sounds good in my head. Time to get it into a MIDI rough and see if it works.

All the work I did with the new (Bach 5C) mouthpiece seems to have helped and I'm stronger on the C above the treble clef. There's a false partial up there (it falls right between pitches) so you have to leap two slots to land on that High C. And worse, the next partial above that is a mere half-tone away.

And then this afternoon a co-worker told me he was going to start bringing his own trumpet. And give me some tips (he plays with a band...big band style, I believe.)

And I'm building. A bit. We have a MiniMax Lab300 at work now and I finally got around to hooking it up and setting the jointer-planer. There was a bunch of leveling and shimming before that all looked right. 

My engineer says he'll have some new stuff to machine in six weeks or so. Good timing, as I'll be mixing a show over that interval. Means it is probably time to talk to TheShop.build and figure out something more sensible than continuing to pay for access over all those months I'm not using it.

Block

Writer's block is a symptom, not a disease. Sometimes it is symptomatic of something happening in your life...depression, life distractions, whatever. Other times, it is because something is actually wrong with the story and you need to go back and fix things. And that's a good instinct to have.

Yeah, so basically a core conflict in my novel isn't working for me. Either I haven't figured out how to use it right, or it is broken, period. There's maybe three central conflicts going on that might be just different aspects of the one. So it is possible that this isn't just an internal character thing that's not working, but an overall theme that isn't working.

At the heart of it, I still can't stomach some of the baggage of pseudo-archaeology. This book came out of trying to do an end-run on that by using a fedora as a lampshade.

And now I'm trying to understand what it means to the character who is choosing to don it.

##

I've been working on it all week and I seem to be making progress out of the hole. I think, though, it is less that I've found better approaches, than I'm becoming resigned to the ones I have.

There's still so much I don't know about my protagonist and of course I'm in the big opening scenes here. Is she tall? Shy? Blond or brunette? Most of what I seem to know at this point is a list of what I don't want to do.

The female equivalent of Indiana Jones is a smaller reference pool but there are aspects that occur frequently enough to annoy me. So no martial arts background, reliance on or even particular skill in fisticuffs. Doesn't hold three degrees and speak six languages. Isn't wealthy, or even financially secure. Is pretty much in agreement with academic history and standard archaeological practice. Isn't drop-dead gorgeous and doesn't run around in a halter top. Or safari wear, for that matter...no pith helmets need apply.

Add to that list: yeah, she flirted with acting, and she totally could come at everything from the perspective of a theatre person. But I don't want that. Similarly, I refuse to believe a modern young person hasn't played a lot of video games but I also don't want her referencing that constantly. It's old and worn out. The natural voice for characters like this is First-Person Snarky, and that's fine as far as it goes, but can we leave the far-too-topical pop references aside?

Unfortunately for me I'm trying to take her -- especially in this introductory adventure, basically an origin story -- as far from an experienced traveler, and a relative neophyte to history as well. Not to say there isn't always more to learn in the later! But connected to this there's a way I want to both play fair with the reader and make the inevitable lectures less annoying; if a historical fact is going to be important to the story, the reader will learn it as she does.

But that means as tempting as it is, she really shouldn't be name-dropping historical figures and amusing factoids all over the place. Which certainly leaves out a lot of options of stuff for the internal voice to go on about!

##

I've almost closed in on how to handle those critical first scenes. It's still my dangerous three; first a student film that is full of bad history but all in good humor, then a presentation about the Acropolis of Athens, then pretending to be an archaeologist through party chatter at a gallery opening. All three of these scenes throw the problem of how she relates to history -- and pseudo-history -- in sharp relief.

And right at this moment I am tired of it all. I know - well, I hope -- the sense of fun will come back and I'll want to do it.

I'm in the ramp-up for a new show, I'm making progress again on trumpet, and basically a lot of my mind is elsewhere right now. Which is not a good thing. This is the time to get some of this stuff written down so when the crush of other responsibilities means I have to put it down for a while, I'll be able to come back to something that makes sense and that I can continue.