Posts Tagged ‘#Michael s Kennedy’
Fall Colors with Halloween Twist
Posted: October 26, 2022 in PhotographyTags: #autumnpictures, #Cincinnati, #fallcolors, #Halloween, #Michael s Kennedy, #midimike.com, #nikon, #photographer, #photography, #Spring Grove Cemetery
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Personal Touch conclusion
Posted: July 27, 2021 in Live Sound Reinforcement SeriesTags: #12string, #DollyParton, #forthosewhowait, #KennyRodgers, #Liveband, #livesoundreinforement, #Michael s Kennedy, #michaelskennedy, #Midi, #mididrums, #midimike, #midimike.com, #musician, #original songs, #ourbodiesmove, #ovationguitars, #recording, #ricahlers, #songwriter, #sound, #Yamaha, #Yamaha DX7, #yamahaRX7
As mentioned in the first post of this series, we played original songs in each set. Here is the only recording I am aware of for the song “For Those Who Wait”. We were touring in Corpus Christie Texas and I met with Ric in the afternoon to do a little practice and system fine-tuning. After we were settled he said, ‘hey, whip out the lyrics you are working on. I have a few chords I want to try. We worked for about half an hour going through his chords and arranging them into a song.
In very short time I came up with the melody and we were able to finish the song enough that we performed it later in the tour. I programmed the Yamaha RX7 Drum machine to fit the arrangement. Ann and I sang the lead vocals and Ric did everything else. In the picture above you can see the two silver discs on the lower section of Ric’s guitar. While playing guitar, he would touch one of the silver pads to make a cymbal crash sound from his drum machine and the other one triggered a pre-programmed drum fill pattern for each time he hit the pad. He also kicked bass pedals and triggered string or piano sounds. Pretty amazing when two out of three are just singing to get all that sound.
This is easily the best song I have co-written. Years ago I posted lyrics and said that I wrote this duo for existing country stars at the time. It was my hope to have Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers do this song. I think it would have blown the charts for the time. But who knows. I think we sounded pretty good.
“Not Now” put to music
Posted: June 6, 2020 in Midi Series, MUSIC, music technology, My TunesTags: #acoustic, #acoustic guitars, #bandLab, #Cakewalk, #guitar, #lyrics, #Martinguitars, #Michael s Kennedy, #michaelskennedy, #microphone, #Midi, #midimike, #midimike.com, #mixing board, #mixingboard, #music, #original songs, #poetry, #recording, #recordingstudio, #singer, #sonar, #vocalist, lyrics, original music, originals, poetry, singer song-writer, singing
I mentioned experimenting with an on-line jamming program. It became the clipboard for a few guitar sections I created while waiting for one thing or another to work. I titled each as verse, bridge, chorus, etc. I had to give it a project name to save the clipboard and I came up with “Not Now”.
I used those short pieces and assembled them into a song arrangement. Once the chords and arrangement were in place I naturally started thinking of lyrics (as I have a tendency to do). The file was named Not Now so I kept it as my Cakewalk (BandLab) project name. So it becomes the theme of the lyrics. In one hour they were written. Getting them to match the odd rhythms and sparse instrumentation became a challenge. It took me a few days to come up with the melody and then practice it enough to get the rough tracks down. To all just joining; I get things down to rough tracks and then write another song, poetry, lyric or instrumental. When I was young I hoped some band would do my songs correctly in a studio. I am not young now.
Here is a rough mix of “Not Now”. I used a Martin Acoustic/Electric guitar for the guitar track. Using my MIDI keyboard I pulled up a plug-in for drum sounds. I imported the original noodling guitar parts I did from the clipboard but they were not recorded to a metronome or drum pattern. I listened and figured out the tempo of the segments and set Cakewalk to match. That way I could listen to the short guitar segments as I created the basic drum parts and arranged all the segments in order. I pulled up a bass guitar sound and played the MIDI keyboard to generate the bass line.
Next, I Muted the original guitar tracks and recorded a new track to replace it. The song seemed to cry out for strings but that is usually just me. I like good sounding strings in various styles of music.
Lyrics were posted here: https://midimike.com/2020/06/01/not-now/
I gave a link to BandLab above. Full disclaimer this is not a commercial and I do not get paid for anything I do here. However….. if you are interested I used to pay hundreds of dollars every year or so to keep this great recording program updated. They now offer the program and all updates for FREE. No kidding.
I hope you enjoy “Not Now”. Each time I listen to it I like it more. Again, this is just me as each new song I write becomes my newest favorite.
If just for a little while.
MidiMike 