Lincoln Jaeger, Author at Great Scores Sheet Music Blog

Nile Rogers – An Incredible Career In Music

I recently watched a documentary about the musician Nile Rogers. At this point some of you will be going, WHO? Exactly – I had no idea how this fellow was, and sort of half-heartedly got myself to watch the documentary, until I realised what a fool I was. Nile has had one for the most prolific careers in pop/rock history, but to be fair, a lot of it has been in the (semi) shadows. Yet the groups/recordings he has been involved in make a phenomenal list, at any one point in time he has been involved with Chic, Diana Ross, David Bowie, Duran Duran, Madonna, Sister Sledge and Daft Punk. Wow. And not just as someone who tweeks a few knobs on a mixing desk, but as a full writing partner.

Nile’s rise to prominence started with the soul-funk outfit Chic, which Nile had started with bass player Bernard Edwards. The band had numerous chart-topping hits with tunes such as Le Freak, and Good Times. Then followed the rather small matter of writing We Are Family for Sister Sledge, once again with writing partner Edwards. This was followed by the hit Upside Down for Diana Ross, which would be the last he produced and wrote with Edwards.

Not one to rest on his Laurels Nile then produced the album Let’s Dance for David Bowie – which went on to be Bowie’s biggest selling album of all time. Nile then went on to, somewhat incongruously, work with Duran Duran, producing, amongst others, their hit The Reflex.

But it does not stop there – this was followed by producing Madonna’s album Like A Virgin. And after that the roll-call of famous names continued, and most recently culaminated in Nile’s contribution ot Daft Punk’s most recent hit, Get Lucky.

So, if you plan on making a hit record, give Nile a call, chances are it will turn into a hit, as long as you can afford him!

Great Music Theory Website

I recently stumbled across a very useful site on which you can improve all aspect of the dreaded subject of music theory, whilst having a bit of fun:

www.musictheory.net

Learning to read music can be quite a struggle for beginners, but on this site there are note reading exercises which you can tailor to your own needs. So if you are an aboslute beginner, and only want to practice natural notes in treble clef, from middle C to the G above, then you can set the site to just test you on those notes. If you fancy testing yourself on bass and treble in all keys, or even the more obscure tenor clef, then you can do that, too.

All the way a score is kept, and you get the percentage of correct answers displayed. As someone who teaches, I find this works particularly well for teenage boys, as rather than having to look at tufty old scores, they get to go online, or better still, download an app, and can click on buttons and see a score at the end of it – much more fun! There are quite a number of other exercises you can test your skills on, from key signature, interval and fretboard identification to ear training exercises.

There are also lessons on the basics of music, which are pretty handy (clefs, notes, scales, etc.), to some slightly more obscure tools, such as for building 12-tone rows. You never know, someone might be writing a 12-tone opus on the train next to you.

Most of the time when someone is pushing a site on a blog, it is because of a (monetary) kick-back, but I can assure you that in this case, we have no relationship with this site, we just found it damn useful!

Für Elise Boogie Sheet Music

We’ve just shot a video for our Boggie Woogie arrangement of Ludwig van Beethoven’s classical masterpiece Für Elise.

We have plenty of versions of the original piece, tiered by levels of difficulty, but we dcided it would be good fun to turn this piece into a Boogie-Woogie, as the melody and harmony of the piece lend themselves to the Boogie treatment rather well. The sheet music is available here.

In the video I also go over some of the technical aspects of playing the left hand patterns that occur in the piece (from 1:48 onwards). I actually change between two Boogie patterns in the piece – something not normally done on a Boogie Woogie composition, which usually sticks to one type of left-hand pattern.

If you want more Boogie Woogie pieces, or want to learn how to play in that style check out our Boogie Woogie Licks and Jerry Lee Lewis Boogie Collection, which contatins the piece Jerrry Lee Lewis Booige, as well as three guides: one on Left Hand Patterns, one on Right Hand Patterns, and one on Section Endings.

Virtual String Sample Libraries Round-up

This is not the usual subject for one of our blogs, but we thought we might do a quick round-up of the string libraries that are out there to purchase right now, and which ones you might want to consider if you are on a budget. The list is not designed to be complete, but is designed to really look at the main players in the market. So, here we go:

LA Scoring Strings (LASS)

Pros:

True divisi articulations with a clever engine that will auto-split for you if needed (the only library to offer this)
Flexibility, with Violins 1, Violins 2, Violas, Celli and Basses in Ensemble, First Chair and Divisi articulations
Lite version is only $400 – a real steal. You don’t get the divisi articulations, but as it is always best to blend two string libraries, this is really not much of a drawback

Cons:

Samples are incredibly dry, and can at times leap out at you and be tricky to integrate into a mix, if softer sounds are required
The odd tuning issue here and there, though they are very minor
Con sordino (muted) strings cost extra

Hollywood Strings (EastWest)

Pros:

Great Sound
Available in 32 bit format
Gold version represents a great saving – you really only loose the fact that you have to live with 16 bit samples rather than 32 bit samples

Cons:

East West (the creators) are not known for fixing bugs quickly
Sample sizes are huge, so can put a real strain on your computer
No true divisi

Vienna Symphonic Library (VSL)

Pros:

Great Sound
Many different sample packs to choose from (Orchestral Strings, Chamber Strings, Appasionata Strings, Solo Strings)
Deep interface with many articulation options

Cons:

Pricey when buying all the options
The sound has a certain classical feel to it (slightly cold), rather than a Hollywood scoring feel

8dio Adagio Strings

Pros:

Great Sound
Some divisi sounds, but not as detailed as with LA Scoring Strings
Dynamic Bowing patches sound great
Easy keyswitching to be able to produce minute changes in performance
Many, many articulations available, some unique to Adagio Strings

Cons:

Fairly new, so still has some bugs
Adagio Double Basses not yet available,
Pricey when all 4 sets (Violins, Violas, Celli, Basses) are bought

Spitfire Albion Volume I

This is actually not a string library, but an orchestral ensemble patch library. I mention this however as the string patches are sonically quite incredible. You basically have a choice of Violins in octaves, Violins with Violas, Celli and Bases in octaves or unison, and spiccato patches for Violins and Celli as well as full strings ensemble patches.
Pros:

Incredible sound, recorded at Air Studios in London onto physical tape, giving the sound an unprecedented richness
Great to use for blending with other libraries
Competitive price at £349 + Vat

Cons

Other than that you have not got articulations for each instrument of the orchestra separately (so Violins 1, Violins 2 etc), which it wasn’t designed to have anyway, there are none

Cinematic Strings

Pros:

Controllable vibrato using a MIDI CC

Cons:

Sounds aren’t quite as good as the other libraries

Conclusions:

If you intend to buy any of these either sign up to the companies newsletter, or twitter feed, or like them on facebook, as you will get news of their offers, and these libraries always go on sale at some point (at the time of writing East West have knocked $100 off Hollywood Strings Gold, for example), and truly huge savings can be had. Try to never buy a library at full price.
String libraries sound best when you blend two or more, so ideally you should buy more than one. Both the “lite” versions of Hollywood Strings (called Gold) and LA Scoring Strings (called Lite) offer a great starting point at $499 and $399 respectively. If you have not got a fast system, and the choice is between these two, go or LA Scoring Strings (LASS), as this will put a lot less strain in your computer.
Listen to the demo tracks available on the website, but be aware that these can sometimes fool you a little, as they are really designed to sound as good as possible, using mostly lush legato articulation or short spiccato patches. But often articulations in-between these two are hard to get right, and 8dio’s Adagio package does especially well at catering for these.
Spitfire Albion offers a great alternative, as you also get all the other orchestral ensemble patches for brass, woodwinds and some percussion, as well as some synths, and the sound is outstanding.
Not previously mentioned here, but do not buy EastWest’s Symphonic Orchestra – this was a great product when it first was released, but is now 10 years old, but is really showing its age

The world’s most profitable songs

The BBC recently transmitted a programme (over Christmas 2012) which they called The World’s Richest Songs. In the programme they tried to find the Top 10 songs that had earned the most money ever. Now this is quite a task, and obviously to get really precise numbers is nigh impossible, but the programme was rather interesting, especially in what tunes it found to be the most profitable.

On hearing about this programme my natural instinct was to guess what the top few might be: Candle In The Wind, maybe We Are The Champions, Titanic Theme Tune, I Will Always Love You, maybe Everything I Do, I Do It For You? Basically recent big hits of the last 20 odd years or so.

Well I could not have been more wrong. In fact there was only one song that you could, by a real stretch, be called modern, and that was Sting’s “Every Breath You Take”. That was written way back in 1983, and I was amazed that it even made the list. So what are the top 10 richest songs according to the BBC? Here they are:

1. Happy Birthday to you
2. White Christmas
3. You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling
4. Yesterday
5. Unchained Melody
6. Stand By Me
7. Santa Claus Is Coming To Town
8. Every Breath You Take
9. Pretty Woman
10. Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire

Surprised? Yeah, me too. For a start there are three Christmas tunes, only one Beatles tune and nothing really modern. So how could this list make sense? Well if you think about what makes money, you really need something that will sell all the time, and Christmas tunes sell every Christmas as long as they remain popular. Then, on further reflection, one realises that the older the tune the more time it has had to make money, even if it is only for 4-6 weeks a year (as with Christmas tunes). If you check the history of Stand By Me (written in 1960), that became a bigger hit second time round, as it was re-released to coincide with the movie of the same name it was used for in 1986. Every Breath You Take also had two bites at the cherry, as it featured in the charts in the original The Police version in 1983, and then again with Puff Daddy’s (aka P Diddy, Piddle Diddle, Piffle, or whatever he calls himself now) highly successful cover version in 1997. In fact White Christmas was US No.1 three times: in 1942, 45 and 46. The record was so popular, Bing Crosby had to re-record it, as the master tape had worn out, after so many copies had been pressed from it. Another curious fact is that most modern Christmas tunes were secular in nature (no mention of Jesus Christ, Bethlehem, Mary etc, but instead of Santa Claus, Father Christmas, Rudolph), and were in fact written by Jewish song-smiths.

So how does this list compare to the highest-grossig movies ever? The current list (Jan 2013) looks thus:

1. Avatar
2. Titanic
3. The Avengers (Assemble)
4. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2
5. Transformers: Dark of the Moon
6. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
7. The Dark Knight Rises
8. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
9. Toy Story 3
10. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

So pretty much very different to our Top 10 music list. But if we now recalculate the list, in the only way which is fair, which is inflation adjusted, suddenly we get a similar phenomenon as with our music Top 10:

1. Gone with the Wind
2. Avatar
3. Star Wars
4. Titanic
5. The Sound of Music
6 E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
7. The Ten Commandments
8. Doctor Zhivago
9. Jaws
10. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

So loads of oldies but goldies that had had decades to keep raking in the cash.

Fascinating stuff.

Dave Brubeck – A Tribute

Dave Brubeck, jazz pianist and composer died on the 5th of December 2012, just one day short of his 92nd birthday. With his loss we have had to say goodbye to the last remaining Jazz great from the Golden Age of Jazz.

Though much younger than such jazz icons as Louis Armstrong, Count Basie or Duke Ellington, Brubeck belonged to the generation of Jazz musicians who came to the fore in the 50s and 60s through Cool Jazz. Though he never played with Miles Davis (Davis was born in 1926, Brubeck in 1920), he was his contemporary, and this vanguard of artists were the ones who made jazz a popular art form in the late 50’s and 60′ – a period that can now regarded as the heyday of jazz, when Jazz musicians might be on the cover of magazines, spotted in St Tropez and sought after for interviews.

Dave Brubeck is most commonly associated with the music of his famous quartet, which featured Paul Desmond on Alto Sax, Joe Morello on drums and either Eugene Wright or Joe Benjamin on Bass. The line-up featuring Brubeck and Desmond was active from 1952 till 1968, and the so-called Classic Quartet mentioned earlier was together from 1958 – 1968. The quartet wrote jazz history with the release of the classic album Time Out in 1959, which included the jazz hit Take Five (which was written in 5/4 time). Although Brubeck wrote almost all the compositions for the quartet, it is ironic that the tune they are most identified with, Take Five, was actually penned by Desmond. The album consisted of tunes in odd time signatures, and the label, Columbia, had to actually be talked into releasing the album, as they thought it was far too advanced for the listening public! The follow-up album, Time Further Out, also included the hit Unsquare Dance (in 7/4 time). Brubeck and Desmond were musically, on paper at least, an unlikely paring. Desmond, lyrical and soft, Brubeck rhythmic and, as his critics would point out, at time thunderous and heavy-handed. But opposites clearly attracted and this musical partnerhsip created some of the most wonderful music of the 20th century.

When I started learning jazz, and started playing Brubeck’s pieces, I often struggled playing the left hand – I could not imagine how anyone could play such large intervals. Some years later I went to see Brubeck play (this was in the last 90s) in Frankfurt, and my Dad persuaded the security people to allow us backstage, and I could meet the great man. He was incredibly friendly and courteous, even though endless scores of people wanted to meet him. And I got to shake his hand, and suddenly the riddle of how he could play those patterns in the left hand was solved. Brubeck had the most enormous hands, and had he been English, he would have made a great slip fielder in cricket. He also signed my favourite cd of his quartet: Jazz Themes of Eurasia. My mother said that when she heard that Paul Desmond had died (aged 52 in 1977) she cried – I would have only been two years old, so cannot remember this. But I can recall feeling a similar shock when my piano playing heroes Kenny Kirkland and Esbjörn Svenson died before their time. When musicians are lost to the world far too early in their lifetime, there is a real sense of loss, of what could have been. With Dave Brubeck we can celebrate a lifetime of achievement, and salute and say farewell to the last remaining Jazz greats.

Thank you for all the great music, Dave.

Lincoln Jaeger

Walking Piano Experiment

So this is fun. As part of an advertising campaign a well-known German car manufacturer decided to see if people in a Stockholm tube station were more likely to use the stairs than the escalator, if they made it more fun to use the stairs.

So how do you make it more fun to use the stairs? You make them into a piano (a walking piano). Remember the scene from Big where Tom Hanks plays on a walking piano in the children’s toy store? That’s a walking piano.

The result is rather good fun to watch, and 66% of people preferred to use the stairs rather than the escalator.

Great fun – one thing did strike me, though, which is that this did not look like a particularly busy tube station. I wonder what would have happened had they installed this in a New York or London subway/tube station. Maybe in such busy cities, where people have less time for each other and are always in a rush there may have been the odd dissaproving look?

Anyway, let’s enjoy this cool video:

Gangnam Style Takes The World By Storm

Well how did that happen? Korean raper PSY (real name Park Jae-sang) releases his single Gangnam Style on the 15th of July, and a few months later it is a world-wide hit, taking everyone, including PSY, by surprise. I think it’s all to do with the dance. Remember The Ketchup Song, which had a similarrly catchy dance attached to the song? Or YMCA?

It’s great when you have these global events, when one song or movie or event takes the whole world by storm, and even has tufty world-leaders joining in (see heads of state trying to perform “Gangnam Style”). The tune is in the style of K-pop (Korean Pop Music), and of course we have the sheet music for it here.

But where does “Gangnam” come from. Well it apparently refers to the Gangnam district in Seoul, which is one of the most well-off parts of the Korean capital, hence the references to Gangnam style, i.e. living it up.

Here is the official video:

This video is also quite funny, where PSY is helping teach the commentary team from BBC One’s Formula One coverage the Gangnam dance during the Korean Grand Prix (Former F1 driver David Coulthard, former F1 team owner Eddie Jordan and presenter Jake Humphrey are trying out their dance moves here)