Notes from the Farm

 (photo courtesy of David Cavagnaro)

The Kitchen Waltz (mp3)(pdf)

Following production of the Mandolin Tunes CD my Contratopia colleague Erik Sessions and I got together in December to record our first duo CD, Notes from the Farm. This was done very much in the spirit of this blog, recorded in a very simple way with no overdubs and fancy digital editing. We set up a couple of mics in Erik's living room, turned down the furnace for quiet, and played a bunch of tunes. Some we have been playing together for years and some were relatively new to us.

There are 15 tracks with 23 tunes. Seven tunes by Goodin, three by Sessions, two by the great James Oswald (a mandolin/violin duet version of The Junquill from his Airs for the Seasons) and eleven traditional. As you can imagine we are both excited to have completed this project and we encourage you to check out our page at CD Baby for more information.

In addition to being available from CD Baby the new CD should also be for sale soon at the iTunes store, emusic, Rhapsody, Napster and the other usual suspects.

The Kitchen Waltz has been around for a few years now and we often play it with Contratopia. I wrote it on the guitar but in the band I usually play it on mandolin while Patrice Pakiz does her piano magic. So this recording is a rare opportunity for me to play it on guitar. It's one of the tunes that I almost didn't write down because it seems so simple but, over the years, it has developed more character. The mp3 here is the version that appears on the new CD.

Speaking of Contratopia, we'll be playing at the Tapestry Folkdance Center tonight for a contra dance. Stop by if you have the chance. We'll have plenty of copies of Notes from the Farm available.

Mandolin Tunes CD

I believe that this is the first posting on this site that doesn't include a link to a new tune. Instead, this is a PR blog (marketing not being one of my strong points) to let readers of So Many Tunes know that I have put together a collection of tracks from this blog and created a CD that I've titled Mandolin Tunes.

The CD contains 23 of my favorite tunes from the nearly 100 that I've recorded so far for the blog. None of the tunes appear on any of the three Contratopia CDs and they were all recorded here at my house using a no-frills approach. I didn't re-record anything but I did go back to the original wave files and remix a few things. So, if you invest in a copy (either physical or digital) of Mandolin Tunes you won't be buying the product of a high end studio recording environment.

When I started this blog I didn't intend to ever offer these particular recordings for sale. The idea has always been to feature the tunes in a simple way. The standard approach has been for me to record a basic guitar track and then play the melody, without much embellishment, two or three times through so that the listener might be able to learn the tune if he or she finds it interesting. Some of the tracks have harmony parts and once or twice I play a short improv bit.

Why a CD now? Well, last summer the idea of collecting some of my favorite tracks just popped into my head. I enjoyed the process of picking out the ones to keep and putting them together in different orders. I also wanted to experiment with doing a low budget CD production with an eye towards a couple of other projects that I have in mind. I also know there are a lot of folks who have no idea that this blog exists who I thought might enjoy this music.

The companies that manufacture CDs these days, especially Oasis and Disc Makers, have a variety of less expensive options and I chose to have Mandolin Tunes produced in a small quantity as "Pro CD-Rs" rather than more expensive replicated CDs. Pro CD-Rs are duplicated at 4x rather than the 24x (or faster) rate that you and I might use when burning a CD-R at home. This theoretically creates a product with virtually no errors. (So far, no one has contacted me with any playback issues.) I also chose to have the CDs packaged in full-color jackets to lessen the carbon footprint and to take up less space in my house.

Eventually I'll get around to writing some more formal notes about each of the tunes but for now I just wanted to let readers know that the CD is available.

Available where?

CD Baby
Amazon
iTunes
emusic

CD Baby is the best place to order a physical copy (unless you want to contact me directly) and it looks like emusic has the best mp3 price of the bunch. I also like the way that the emusic page also links to some YouTube video performances of some of my other music.

Of course you could just look up each of the 23 tunes here on the blog and compile your own CD. I guess it depends on how much time you want to spend. Feel free to comment here or, even better, leave some reviews at the various online vendor sites.

I'll get around to posting some more tunes one of these days. I've got a bunch waiting their turn.

Trailer in the High Grass

(photo courtesy of Horia Varlan's public photostream)

Trailer in the High Grass (mp3)(pdf)

This simple tune in E minor comes from earlier this summer, written during a brief visit to lovely Bayfield, Wisconsin and nearby Madeline Island. The "arrangement" is just mando and guitar on the first pass joined by a second mando playing an octave down on the second time through. Another guitar is added playing the melody on the final round.

Dodge the Plow

Dodge the Plow (mp3)(pdf)

This tune comes from sometime last winter when there were plenty of snow plows out keeping our roads clear and safe for travel. I added a bit of harmony on the second time around and overdubbed another mando playing the melody (mostly) an octave down on the third pass.

The Old Basement Piano

The Old Basement Piano (mp3)(pdf)(harmony pdf)

Most of my life there was an old upright piano in the basement of my parents' house. It was very much like the one pictured above, although it was painted a different color. I was always told that it had been waterlogged in the historic 1937 Louisville, Kentucky Ohio River flood and that, as a result, it was not very good. But it sounded great to me.

I never spent much time trying to learn how to play piano, I was too much under the spell of the guitar after the Beatles, but I certainly spent many hours picking out little tunes and learning how chords are made. One of the pieces of sheet music that was always on that piano was a simple version of "Sugartime", composed by Charles Phillips and Odis Echols.

The opening measures of this new tune of mine are very similar to the tune of "Sugartime." I noticed this almost as soon as I started to play the melody but I thought I would go ahead and see where it led. I'm glad I did because I've enjoyed playing this new tune quite a bit. The 8th notes are meant to be bouncy and not straight as you can hear on the recording.

I don't know where that old piano is now but I sure hope that it's bringing pleasure to another generation of budding musicians. Maybe that tattered sheet music is still with it.

A Northern Exposure

A Northern Exposure (mp3)(pdf)(harmony pdf)

Back on June 15 we here in Decorah were treated to a visit from the new Finnish-American duo Kaivama and their Finnish touring partner, the legendary Arto Jarvela. A brief "northern exposure."

In the afternoon Arto led a workshop for about 20 fiddlers, mandoliners, guitarists, bassists and a pennywhistler. Being a big fan of Arto's work, both as a player and a composer, I was very happy for this opportunity. It was, as I expected, both educational and inspirational.

After a short dinner break Kaivama and Arto presented a great concert with some solos, some duos and some trios. They even invited the workshop participants to come up and play one of the tunes we had worked on that afternoon! This was my first chance to hear Arto play in person and he was great. I was also very pleased with Sara and Jonathan. They featured great playing, beautiful tunes and expert arrangements. The trios with Mr. Jarvela were especially strong. I highly recommend the new Kaivama CD and Arto's new Cross-tuned CD as well.

The highlight of the night for me was when Arto played my old blacktop Gibson mandolin on one number during the show. I've never heard it played better.

I will benefit from this exposure for years to come in terms of inspiration but the immediate payoff came the next morning when today's featured tune popped out of wherever tunes come from into my fingers as I played my mandolin. I'm guessing maybe Arto left it behind when he played it?

Waterloo Polka

Waterloo Polka (mp3)(pdf)

This tune comes from a train ride back in March of 2010. I decided to treat myself to sleeping car accommodations on the Capitol Limited from Chicago to D.C. to join up with Contratopia for a short weekend tour. It was my first time on an overnight train and I discovered that train rides are great tune generators. This one appears in my notebook with "Waterloo" scribbled beside it so it must have been at least partly written while we made a brief stop in Waterloo, Indiana.

The mandolin featured here is an old Gibson snakehead A-jr. and the guitar is a recently made Martin 000-15M.

In the Shape of a Pear

 

Deer Tracks Suite No. 1

1. January 22, 2011 (mp3)(pdf)

2. December 26, 2008 (mp3)(pdf)

3. February 2009 (mp3)(pdf)

4. August 31, 2009 (mp3)(pdf)

Last Wednesday, March 16, I was honored to be a contributor to the Music in the Shape of a Pear concert, titled "Etudes", presented in the Noble Recital Hall at Luther College. For the occasion I combined four of my short Deer Tracks pieces into Deer Tracks Suite No. 1 and played them on my old Gibson A model mandolin. I also performed my piece The Autumn After, dedicated to Alison Stephens, on octave mandolin as a distant, belated contribution to the memorial concert that had been held in her honor on March 11 in London.

The Deer Tracks recordings presented here are not from the concert itself. In fact two of them have already appeared in earlier entries of this blog. I recorded the other two (nos. 1 & 4) yesterday here at home. I figured I would post them all together so you could get an idea of what they sound like as a Suite. When I get a chance to hear the concert recordings I may post them as well although my recollection of my performance tells me that there are some mistakes that I might not want to share on the web.

The concert itself was a wonderfully varied program of fun and interesting music thanks to the vision and hard work of Luther College's composition professor Brooke Joyce. It began with a Polyrhythmic Etude for carillon by Wim Franken, performed by Dr. Joyce on celeste. A short electronic piece by Pierre Schaeffer, Etude aux Chemins de Fer, followed. My section came next and then we heard Brooke's own piece Prairie Etudes for electronics and English horn, accompanied by projected images. Luther professor Heather Armstrong played the horn part beautifully. I had the good fortune to hear the piece twice (once in rehearsal) and I look forward to hearing it again someday.

The featured piece on the concert was Exotic Etudes by Stephen Paulus, written for the uncommon combination of solo viola with a quartet of piano, violin, viola, and cello. Luther professor Spencer Martin led the ensemble of Luther students with his viola and both the piece and the performances were inspirational. I was disappointed to learn after the concert that the piece isn't available on a commercial recording. It features some truly beautiful passages. 

Between each section of the concert a small group of Luther College student singers performed newly composed Canons I-IV composed by Brooke Joyce. These were wonderful short pieces and were sung from locations around the hall while the stage was being reset for the next performance. I hope to hear these performed from the stage at a future concert. In addition, local composer Steve Smith presented his new work graphicScore, an interactive piece of software for computer + computer user in the lobby before and after the concert. Six or seven laptops with headphones were available for concert goers to experiment with this graphical approach to sound creation.

Amateur that I am, I was a little nervous when I learned that Stephen Paulus would actually be at the concert. I'm usually very comfortable in less formal performance situations but playing my own modest compositions before a major American composer was a little daunting. Not surprisingly Stephen was very friendly and complimentary and I managed to enjoy the whole event a great deal.

In other composer news I should mention that on March 13 I had the pleasure of playing with my friends in the Minnesota Mandolin Orchestra at the winter weekend of the Minnesota Bluegrass & Old-Time Music Association in Plymouth, MN. The MMO premiered the mandolin orchestra arrangement of my Off to Minnesota tune that I created for them and we had a great time. I'm hoping that I'll get a chance to play with them again this summer at one of their outdoor shows.

November Duo, 2005

November Duo, 2005 (mp3)(pdf)

It's been a while since I found the time to put together something for this blog but last Saturday morning I had a chance to do a little more recording. This time I'm offering another duo from my Midwestern Mandolin Duos collection, one which defied all my attempts to think of a colorful title.

I've not been idle since the last post. I've completed two mandolin orchestra commissions: The Pleasant Peninsula for my friends in the Kalamazoo Mandolin and Guitar Orchestra and Poets in Time for the remarkable Fretworks group that Doug Back leads at the Baldwin Arts and Academics Magnet School in Montgomery, Alabama. I had a great time working on these pieces and they both will be premiered in the next few months.

In addition my Telemann for Mandolin book has been published by Mel Bay and I've received a lot of positive and friendly feedback about that.

Mandolin Orchestras Coast to Coast

The Pittsburgh Mandolin Orchestra

Easter Waltz (mp3)(pdf)
Highlandville May 14, 2004 (mp3)(pdf)

Last month, just as I was preparing to head to Seattle for the CMSA convention, I received an email from Kirk Morrison of the Pittsburgh Mandolin Orchestra. Kirk's message included these recordings of the group, under the direction of the esteemed Charley Rappaport, performing these short arrangements of two of my tunes for mandolin orchestra at a concert in early October. These are great field recordings of a real American mandolin orchestra (nearly 40 members strong) at play. I'm very pleased that the PMO is willing to share these performances. If you live in the Pittsburgh region, especially if you play mandolin, guitar or bass, you should look them up and see about joining in on the fun.

You can find the orchestra parts for these pieces under the collective title Another Late Spring in Iowa at my Mandotopia website, along with a brief descriptive note. "Solo" versions of each tune have also appeared in this blog and you can find them using the alphabetical list for this site.

Today there are dozens of mandolin orchestras in the U.S. and Canada. One of the best is the Seattle Mandolin Orchestra which took on the exhausting task of hosting the 2010 CMSA convention. One of the highlights of the convention for me was the chance to sit in with the orchestra during the Friday night concert when they performed my Heavens On Earth suite.

Earlier that afternoon I had learned that the group would be without a guitarist for the evening show and I volunteered to play the guitar part on my piece. Even though I had never actually played that part with a group before I was pretty sure I could manage it. So I borrowed a fine old Gibson guitar from the good folks at the Greg Boyd booth and went up to my hotel room to practice. The Seattle folks were willing to take a chance on me and we had a brief rehearsal that went well. I was a little surprised when I realized that each of the three movements of the piece begins with the guitar setting the tempo but, with the help of excellent conducting, things went very well indeed.

As "composer in residence" of the Seattle convention I gave a brief workshop on my background and adventures as a mandolin orchestra composer and, best of all, I had the honor of hearing the convention En Masse Orchestra rehearse and perform my new piece Antonina (dedicated to CMSA founding member Antonina "Toni" Nigrelli). It was a tremendous pleasure hearing the piece come together over the course of four days and equally fun participating as a member of the 2nd mandolin section. The premier performance of the piece at the Saturday night concert was wonderful. Everyone in the orchestra played their hearts out and I think the audience enjoyed it too. A million thanks to my old friend, conductor Jim Bates, for all of his work in getting the orchestra to play so well.

Thanks again to the Pittsburgh Mandolin Orchestra for sharing their performances!

Midwestern Mandolin Duos

Six Duettinos, Summer 2006, no. 2 (mp3)(pdf)

As mentioned in my last post, I've been working for a while on a new book. This time a collection of duos for two mandolins. After some pretty terrible title ideas I've settled on Midwestern Mandolin Duos, 29 easy to intermediate pieces for two mandolins.

The book contains 50 pages of music in standard notation and the music falls into three general categories. One group of around ten tunes are simple arrangements of some of my waltzes and fiddle tunes, these pieces include chord symbols as well. The book also contains a number of pieces that I think of as either medieval or 18th century in style. These include the Six Duettinos, Summer 2006 which have long been available from my Mandotopia website. The final category includes pieces that are a little more formal and "classical" in nature. I will have a few of these books in Seattle at the Classical Mandolin Society of America annual convention this week and I would love to not have to bring them all home with me.

If you will be at CMSA be sure and check them out. I will also have a few copies of my 31 Waltzes for sale. If you won't be in Seattle this week and you would like to purchase a copy of the new book ($12, postage paid in the US, or $5 for a PDF via PayPal) just send me an email or comment and we'll work something out.

September 2010-2 (Palmer's House)

Palmer's House (mp3)(pdf)

I've been working on a new book, tentatively titled Mandolin Duos: 28 easy to intermediate pieces for two mandolins, with a goal of having it ready in time for the Classical Mandolin Society of America's annual convention that is being held Oct.13-17 in Seattle. "Palmer's House" is one of the pieces that I intend to include in the book.

The 2010 CMSA convention promises to be a great one. We'll have the amazing Mike Marshall as one of our featured performers and workshop presenters. He will be joined by young mando wizard Josh Pinkham during his two concert appearances. Classical and jazz virtuoso Chris Acquavella and his guitarist partner Nate Jarrell will be featured in concert as Duo LaRe. Chris and Nate will also be presenting workshops. The always amazing Evan Marshall will be a third featured performer and he and CMSA stalwart Marilynn Mair will present still more high quality workshops.

I am especially honored at being chosen this year's "composer in residence" and the convention en masse orchestra will rehearse and perform my new piece "Antonina" as well. It's going to be a great time. If you are in the neighborhood you should stop by and check it out. 

"Palmer's House" was written a few years ago while I was attending a conference in Chicago and staying at the modern Palmer House hotel. As presented here the music is AA,BB,CC in form. However, if you try to follow the music while the recording plays you will catch me reverting to the original form of the tune during the second time through. In keeping with my "demo concept" approach to the recordings on this site I decided not to spend this afternoon creating a more perfect version. You can play it in any form you want!

September 2010-1 (Jaunty Ted)

Jaunty Ted (mp3)(pdf)

September already? Where does the time go?

This jig was written on Friday, recorded Saturday morning and posted today. See what you think...

May 2010-1 (May Frost)

May Frost (mp3) (pdf)

A busy last few weeks, highlighted by a visit to Texas last weekend to hear my Louisville Suite performed by the Dutch mandolin orchestra ONI+. My new friends from the Netherlands did a wonderful job of playing my piece and even allowed me to sit in on mandola for one performance. I was also treated to an impromptu acappella rendition of the theme from the "Shakertown" movement of my Heavens On Earth suite as we were riding in the van late one night.

Another recent highlight is the award that my friend Tom Bourcier received on May 1 from the Iowa Motion Picture Association for "Best Original Music Score". Violinist Paul Docken, Tom and I, under Tom's direction, created some improvised source music that Tom then used to craft the score for this fine film. You can read about Tom's "Iowa Oscar" here.

"May Frost" was begun back in September but was only finished a couple of weeks ago, not long before our final hard freeze of the so-called Spring. We actually had a very mild April this year which made the recent cold, rainy weather all the more unpleasant. I've included the harmony part I made up today so you can play this with your friends!

April 2010-3 (Quack the Goose)

Quack the Goose (mp3) (pdf)

Suzy the dog has a toy goose that, when squeezed in just the right way, emits a friendly quack. Here she is proudly showing us all who's the boss.

In any event this is a fun tune to play. It's written out here as a 16 bar tune but it is perfectly OK to make it an AABB tune instead. The recording features the first use of my new bottom-of-the-line Taylor guitar. It sounds good to me and is a real pleasure to play.

April 2010-2 (Deer Track, December 26, 2008)

Deer Track, December 26, 2008 (mp3) (pdf)

On the day after Christmas in 2008 I found the time to follow this particular crooked musical path. It could be called a Gigue I suppose. "St. Stephen's Gigue" perhaps? I played the piece a long time before I got around to recording it and I've always enjoyed the playing. Give it a try yourself.

April 2010-1 (King's Landing)

King's Landing (mp3) (pdf)

King's Landing Historical Settlement in New Brunswick is one of my favorite places. Whenever we travel to Maine we try to work in a visit up to this beautiful spot on the St. John River. The photo below was taken in August 2009 in the garden of the large white house in the picture above.


If you find yourself anywhere near Fredericton, NB, especially during the summer, you really should pay a visit, maybe even have a bite to eat in the King's Head Inn.


This particular tune is at least 10 years old and I found the recording on a CD of demos and such from an old multi-track recorder that I no longer own. It's meant to go pretty slow.

March 2010-1 (Seed Savers Waltz)

(Contratopia at Glen Echo Park, photo by Margie O'Loughlin)

Seed Savers Waltz (mp3) (pdf)

Two weeks ago Contratopia was enjoying a short weekend tour out East. On Sunday March 7 we played the afternoon Waltz Time dance, always one of our favorite gigs. Near the end of the dance Patrice, Erik and I played a recent tune of mine that I've titled the "Seed Savers Waltz." (Pat was taking a brief dancing break.)

This is a simple tune but Patrice had never played it before, she is sight-reading on this recording. There is a moment in the first few seconds when I repeat the first A section without warning her in advance and she quickly moves from the B minor chord that is written at measure 17 back to the A major chord of measure 1. She proceeds to give a beautiful demonstration of how to accompany a barn dance waltz on the piano along with a nod to the playing of the legendary Floyd Cramer.

Erik plays an inspired solo during the fourth time through the tune after putting up with my sloppy tremelo chords earlier in the piece. The mandolin in question is my old Gibson A and the remarkable Jamie Platt gets it to sound just the way I like it. The recording itself is Jamie's soundboard recording and we thank him for generously sharing it with us. If you are looking for high quality sound reinforcement Jamie is the man.

Every summer Decorah's world famous Seed Saver's Exchange holds a mid-July Annual Conference and Campout. On Saturday night there is a barn dance and Erik and I have played for this dance the last several years. This waltz was mostly written while noodling around before the dance last year.

February 2010-4 (Deer Track February 2009)

(Palisades Park, Decorah, Feb. 26, 2010)

Deer Track, February, 2009 (mp3) (pdf)

This has got to be one of my favorite Deer Tracks ever. It's a little harder for me to play than most of them and I've recorded it several times trying to get a version that is good enough to share. Some have been slower, some faster. They all have little mistakes.

I even played this piece during a short lunch hour performance at the Classical Mandolin Society of America's annual convention in Dayton last October. I remember I stopped in the middle to back up and play one of the higher passages better. (You can do that kind of thing at the CMSA lunch performances, everyone is very forgiving there.) That performance will probably eventually appear on the "members only" section of the CMSA website someday. It's a great resource for many hours of live mandolin performance.

On a separate note, my friends in Louisville's Keltricity have recorded a studio version of their jig set that includes my tunes "Books and Ladders" and "Why Ted Flies". You can hear it on their MySpace site. Or you can go hear them live at several Kentucky and Indiana venues in the coming months.

Next weekend, weather permitting, I'll be playing several dances with my buddies in Contratopia out in the DC area (Glenside, PA on Thurs., Glen Echo Park, MD on Friday and Sunday, Shepherdstown, WV on Sat. night). I'll have the great pleasure of hearing, and playing, many of my tunes for large groups of excellent dancers. I'll also have some Contratopia Tunebooks and copies of my 31 Waltzes collection, if you are in the market.

Please stop and say hello if you are at one of the dances.

February 2010-3 (Deep Pockets)

Deep Pockets (mp3) (pdf)

I'm dipping pretty far back in the old tunebag for this week's entry. The copyright notice says 1999 but I'm thinking that this tune was around for a few years before that. It's a fresh recording though, from yesterday morning. Just two mandolin tracks, inspired partly by the beautiful playing on David Surrette's recent CD, The Green Mandolin.

Contratopia has played "Deep Pockets" a few times over the years but it really doesn't seem to work that well as a faster tune. For a while we included it as a third tune in our half-speed "Cement Donkey" set, but then it was too slow. You can play it at any speed you choose.