budaful music

Today is John Williams’ 77th Birthday. Happy Birthday Maestro!

Over the past winter break, I went home to WI and spent time with family. But with both of my parents working much of the time and Finale choking on the 700 MHz CTR eMac I had more time on my hands than I anticipated. Then I got this bright idea while browsing old LP records at a thrift store: Why not convert several favorite records that I already have at home. So with the help of my dad to set up a computer at the media station in our living room, a USB record player, and a freeware audio app called Audacity, I got started on “importing” the “big CD’s” onto the computer hard disk.

It was tedious work but I am happy with the result. 27 records, nearly 1 gigabyte of mp3s, were created, most of which are records that will never be brought to the digital age and all of which cost nothing to create, save the investment of time. It took the length of the LP to record plus about 25-35 minutes to edit each record.

Here’s how I did it: First I selected the records to import. Figuring out which LP’s are worthy of digitizing is not always easy, is it worth your time or can you buy a CD online of the same exact recording? Do you see you self actually listening to what you want to import after you are done? Second, after setting up the computer with the audio interface (a converter is needed for this to work) I did a sample recording with Audacity (This program is all you need apart from iTunes) by playing the record and hitting record in Audacity. After seeing the audio waves of the recoding I new that I got it and then proceeded to continue with the rest of the record. I recommend recording the whole thing all at once and then separating them and exporting them as mp3s later. It takes less time and you can enjoy the music as it plays. Third, After recording the whole record, I used some polishing tools found within Audacity. Tools like pop and noise reducer, and fade in and out. I divided the song tracks (or bands ) and named them. Be sure to put the track number first, like what iTunes does in the directories of music files, this helps you keep them organized. Fifth, after naming each track of the newly imported LP and exporting them as MP3s, I imported them into iTunes where I edited the ID tags and put all the desired info such as album, artist, genre, and track numbers, etc.

I am really exited with some of the recordings that I now have: Sacred music of Ovid Young, Sour Kraut Band (OK, not to trilled about that one, my dad made me do it ), Hale & Wilder recordings, Baroque trumpet music, some older “poppy” Christian music, and some old BJ records as well. I also reminisced with my old Patch the Pirate records, I have all 4 of the first original LP’s (including the classic and really cute “Goes West” front cover!!” Though, I already have them on CD and so didn’t bother to re-import them.

It takes time to accomplish but the result is well worth the effort especially when you have such good music to listen to during the process and especially afterwards.

Last semester I had the privilege to arrange a song for a new recording put out by Scott Aniol of Religious Affections Ministries. The CD is called “God Himself Is With Us“. It is a good recording of newly set hymns. The website for the CD is quite nice. The track that I had a part in is the song “Let Us Give The Lord Our Praise,” a new hymn written by Scott Aniol. Samples of each track can be heard at the site, as well as lyrics and hymn sheet music.

My friend ERP, over at pumpkinankles.edublogs.org (see blogroll to the right), recently posted a hilarious happening about game that a group of friends and I got together and played recently. The game is called story, where you write your fragments of a few sentences on several different pieces of paper with your friends (She explains it better and more entertainingly on her site, along with some of the best of the results). We played the game this past week and it was a blast. I look forward to many good times ahead with that inexpensive and mind challenging game. I also learned (and mastered) the art of making CC cookies exclusively out of eggs.

Lots of things have been happening lately, mainly being back home in WI and starting a new semester…wait, starting my last semester in grad school. Wow, that felt strange writing that.

One main thing of importance is that my recital has been transported from my mind onto paper. Yes, now I begin the long (but not too long) stage of editing and practicing the music for performance in March. I’ll be sending parts to my performers soon, of course, my music is almost guaranteed to change after the first couple rehearsals but that is a given.

Other things of interest are that I am composing music for a short film for a senior project. I am genuinely  exited about this as I get to delve into my favorite type of music in the soundtrack genre: soft drama.

Also on the to do list is a cello choir arrangement that I am putting together for performance at BJ’s own Bible Conference. I am arranging the old hymn tune: EVENTIDE (Abide with me)

Such a round number. 100, a number which here translates into the amount of days left until my recital on March 21. One hundred days from now. I have written the music and now am feverishly perfecting it and trying to find people to perform it, which is turning out to be more of a headache than I anticipated. People don’t seem to be as worried about it as I am. I’m just glad to have the initial stage of composition done. There’s still a long way to go though…

As the recital date draws closer and as things become more set in stone I’ll reveal more information about various aspects of the recital. Here’s a part of what I have planned:

A part of the recital will be centered around the topic of death, I’ve set several secular poems that have various philosophical viewpoints about death (ie, hopelessness, despair, uncertainty, grief, and solace). The recital will be book-ended with two sacred choral anthems, one of which is, “It is not Death to Die” which reminds us as Christians of our hope of eternal rest; where we”ll “reign with Him on high”. This poetry struck me the moment that I saw it, which doesn’t usually happen to me. The text is available on www.cyberhymnal.org or you can read it here:

I actually wrote this several days but haven’t posted until now. Today, Dec. 5, I’ll be accompanying on the piano for the Help @ Home live show hosted by BJ Distance Learning, making this my 3rd (technically 2nd) appearance on the show. It takes place at the same time as the BJU lighting ceremony on the front of campus, so I’ll have to miss that event.

I’ll be accompanying a soprano called Kera O’Bryon who is traveling to Greenville from Washington D.C. Her father will also be speaking for the bulk of the show. Kera will be singing O Holy Night as well as a medley of Christmas songs arranged by myself: O Come, O Come Emmanuel, I Wonder as I Wander, and Away In A Manger. We practiced this morning and I was impressed by her beautiful voice. I’m playing by ear, so who knows, one day it might end up in a future arrangement that I compose.

Looking forward to the show. It starts in 2 hours…

This past winter/spring, I had the privilege of composing the music for a video put out by ShowForth videos. I’ve posted an audio file from the score in a previous post. I wrote 23.5 minutes of music for the documentary which has a timing of approximately 35 minutes. It would be a fine video to show in a school class room, in church for sunday school, or even for home viewing.

The Great Awakening: Spiritual Revival in Colonial America was release on 11/20 and the BJU Collegian that same week wrote an article about the video. I’m glad that it is finale released. I have already heard good comments from the producers and even received my own complimentary copy of the DVD.

You can watch a video trailer on the BJU Press website which also features music written for the video.

My good friend at Zwei Augen zu veil has just revamped his site. You can find an updated link to the site in the blog roll to the right. He has this cool playlist embedded into his site from www.seeqpod.com. I need to learn how to do that.

In my previous post I mentioned that I accompanied for a violin recital and performed one of my own arrangements. Well the recital was recorded and I have been graciously given permission by the performer to post it here. I have played this arrangement several times for weddings and special occasions. If you’d like to play it for your special occasion just contact me from the commissioning page. Violin, Viola, and Cello transcriptions available.

Fairest Lord Jesus