For the first time in four years, I’ve finally written and debuted a new song! “1001 Arabian Nights” comes from some recorded ideas I’ve been sitting on for years, but I finally worked everything out and added some new verses.
Tag: original work
Open Mic Adventures XL: “Parada”
I’ve just got a couple of more open mic nights before I get into my school year schedule and become a slave to the grind, but I’m going to do my best to keep pumping out the goods. This time in two weeks, I hope to have a new song uploaded for your delectation; stay tuned.
In the meantime, I’m continuing my deep dive into my obscure deep cuts, songs that I’ve never managed to get recorded in a studio. Some of these songs are very good; some need some polish. Whatever the case, I’m realizing that I have enough material for another EP, and I might need to get back into the studio.
This week’s feature is “Parada.” I wrote “Parada” in 2015 during a particularly fertile period of open mic attendance. The Spanish word “parada” roughly translates to “stop” or “bus stop/station” in English. I wanted to capture the notion of lingering in a moment—stopping a poignant moment in time, trying to freeze it in place as long as possible.
Open Mic Adventures XXXIX: “(I’m in the) Business of Love)”
After a brief hiatus, I’m back with more tasty jams. I’ve dedicated this summer’s open mic excursions to performing my “deep cuts,” which is a bit of a misnomer, as most of these tunes have never been “cut” to a recording at all! Fortunately, I need constant content to feed the insatiable appetite of the YouTube beast, so it gives me a good excuse to play these forgotten pieces.
I wrote “(I’m in the) Business of Love” back on 7 February 2019, one week out from Valentine’s Day. The song is about the woes of a “beta male provider” who is just looking for a little “transactional romance.” Is there any topic more tragically postmodern than that of the “nice guy” finishing dead last in the reproductive sweepstakes? This song is a humorous exploration of that phenomenon.
Open Mic Adventures XXXVIII: “Quasi-Date”
It’s been refreshing to get back out to open mic nights and to do some live performances again. In the spirit of getting back out and playing again, I’m digging deep into my back catalog and playing some really obscure originals.
My mind is also percolating for the first time in years with ideas for new songs. Here’s hoping I have some time to sit down at the keyboard and do some actual writing and composing. Sure, I’ve been composing a great deal of instrumental music lately, mostly for the piano, but I haven’t written a proper song since about 2019.
That said, at last week’s open mic I decided to pull out a really old piece, one I wrote way back in 2010, called “Quasi-Date.”
Open Mic Adventures XXXV: “The Rings of Saturn”
Last week I wrote a short post about Saturn’s (extremely slowly) disappearing rings. In that post, I referenced one of my songs, “The Rings of Saturn,” which I wrote way back on 7 August 2015.
Naturally, that got me thinking: I should record that for Open Mic Adventures! “The Rings of Saturn” is one of my personal favorites of my original tunes, but I wrote it after the release of Contest Winner EP, and I’ve never made it back into the studio. It didn’t help that my life and work grew exponentially more demanding in those years, but I also went through a long spell of creative dryness that never fully relented.
That said, it was time for “The Rings of Saturn” to make its official Internet debut (and its YouTube debut).
Open Mic Adventures XXXIII: “Spore Song (Mushroom Dance)”
I found myself with a rare bit of free time last Thursday, 18 May 2023. It was Field Day at school that afternoon, and while the kids were frolicking in the rain (yep, it was raining steadily yesterday), I slipped inside for a few quiet moments. I found myself at the piano and, staring down a blank sheet of manuscript paper in my music journal, I decided to compose.
While I didn’t name it right away, the result was “Spore Song (Mushroom Dance).” I’d been wanting to compose a piece named “Spore Song” after reading Stacey C. Johnson‘s post “Spore Song” at her blog Breadcrumbs.
The more I listened to this airy, atmospheric piece, the more I realized that this was “Spore Song.” Because it’s mostly in 3/4 time (with two brief measures in 4/4), I added the parenthetical title “Mushroom Dance.”
Open Mic Adventures XXXI: “Carousel”
Last week Ponty asked for more open mic material, thus proving the heavy burden of talent—the fans are never satisfied. I’ll note that Ponty has a significant backlog of requests, all of which I’ll get around to approximately whenever I feel like it (or, more accurately, when I have time to learn the pieces—they’re quite challenging for a hedge-pianist like myself). Perhaps I should ask him to favor us with some of his guitar repertoire.
I’ll certainly get back to the “true” open mic material soon. Summer looms, and I’ll finally have the time and energy to get back out to open mic nights on a regular basis. In the meantime, I’m continuing to experiment with short piano compositions, and wrote this little ditty, “Carousel,” between classes on 2 May 2023.
Open Mic Adventures XXX: “Chorale for a Sleepy Wednesday”
Yes, it’s Tuesday—the traditional day of the week for Open Mic Adventures. No need to check your calendars—or to question my sanity.
I wrote this piece, “Chorale for a Sleepy Wednesday,” last Wednesday, 26 April 2023, during one of my planning periods. I thought it would make a fun sightreading exercise for my Middle School Music Ensemble, and we spent class that afternoon sightreading this piece and “Song of the Bigfoot.”
When I write chorales (as I’ll explain in the video), I tend to do it as a music theory exercise. I used to write them with the idea of sustaining one or even two notes for as long as possible, and always keeping notes within stepwise motion of one another. That stepwise motion is largely maintained, with a few exceptions, in the manuscript below.
The Portly Politico 