August 28, 2005 Duo

August 28, 2005 Duo (mp3) (pdf)

Here's another tune from 2005 that I've turned into a duo. There may be a few more of these before I get tired of digging through the tune archives.

May 3, 2005 Duo

May 3, 2005 Duo (mp3) (pdf)

I've been thinking about creating a series of short duos using some tunes and melodies I have stockpiled over the years. Like some of the shorter pieces in my Midwestern Mandolin Duos book.

Today I had a little time to indulge in that sort of thing and I had fun playing around with this piece from May 2005. I played the tune using the melody only on the first pass and then added the harmony part on the second time through. See what you think.

Mother's Day

Mother's Day (mp3 - live version) (pdf)

I noticed today, Mother's Day 2014, that my waltz, Mother's Day, hasn't yet appeared in this blog. Contratopia recorded the tune as the opening track of our Ballroom Echoes waltz CD over a decade ago and we've played it many times since. Often we have used it as the opening tune of an all waltz session.

I believe this recording was made on the Sunday morning of the Spring Dance Romance weekend in April of 2003 and I believe it was the first tune we played that morning. So it's a little ragged as we settle into our seats and loosen up our hands but it's a nice example of Contratopia at play in a relaxed mode. Somewhere in the middle I play the tune in the upper octave of my mandolin and there are a few humorous moments where I am clearly trying to figure out where the next note might be in that less familiar region of the fingerboard. Still, the good notes make up for the bad.

The Triangle Country Dancers hired us to play for their great weekend which was held that year at Camp Sertoma, near Danbury, North Carolina. I remember the whole weekend as being great fun.

Since this tune was recorded back in 2003 important mothers in my life have passed away and, very recently, new children have been born, creating new mothers in the process. This tune received its title without much thought but I think it has grown, over time, into something worthy. The pdf here also contains the music to Rose Island, another nostalgic waltz, because it is printed on the same page in our Contratopia Tunebook.

Hope you enjoy Erik, Patrice and Pat making my tune sound good. Best wishes to mothers everywhere.