Essays-Thoughts

We had a great session! 

Just sharing a discussion had here at the house a few days ago...  Everyone here who knows me knows I am Pro-vibrato while playing; for me turning it off is an effect, but if I am playing, it is most likely on.   Many players (especially those influenced by Gary Burton) since the 70's have preferred to play with it off because it sounds corny to them.   OK.  Nothing new there.  And...

Dreams make a difference.

Dreams Blog:
https://www.pipervibe.com/post/dreams

Supporting vibes players with Good Vibes
https://www.pipervibe.com/post/good-vibes-pipervibe-dot-com

Hi Everyone,

Below is a post by a philosophy professor on what his experience of teaching online has been like during the pandemic year and what he has learned from it. I thought a lot of what he says is equally applicable to music education. So I am reposting it below. Discussion very much welcomed!

http://schwitzsplinters.blogspot.com/2021/06/what-zoom-removes.html

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Thursday, June 03, 2021
What Zoom Removes

Guest post by C. Thi Nguyen

On an earlier post, I suggested an idea of creating Good Vibes at www.PIPERvibe.com by helping other artists. In my years working as a musician and then as a rescuer serving the population of many different types, I learned a lot about myself and what I really enjoy doing. I learned that even when I was the "boss" over my fire crew in Antarctica, I loved to cook, clean, and serve them during down time. It creates good vibes for me while serving others. This translates also to goals in music.

The Coffee hang every Sunday at noon, is a great hang.

This week we talked with Roy Pertchik about the Tri Chromatic vibraphone.

It's a vibraphone with a different layout of the keybaord.

It's pretty cool to see and to try and wrap your brain around it.

To get on our email list for our Sunday 12pm EST, Vibe Coffee Hang, go here.
https://bit.ly/vibecoffeeemail

Probably one of the best things about our instrument is that, when all hell is breaking loose around us, we can retreat to an instrument that is capable of playing very peaceful and soothing tones. It's one of those nights over here and this is one of my mother in law's favorite Christmas tunes, "Mary's Boy Child" by Harry Belafonte.

Thought I'd share it. Been working on some new recording technique for very soft playing as well.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot since this afternoon’s discussion. Truth in advertising: I’m definitely in the “competition is destructive “ camp in spite of my long association with jazz and its deep tradition of cutting sessions. I’m a real fan of those when they are old-school and about having a lively conversation with everyone speaking their piece. In recent decades I have felt a shift in the energy that is more like something I hated as a youngster.

I think I have this totally figured out. Vibraphonist Carolyn Stallard came over and we experimented with the Late Night Mallets (click here for the mallets).

As I wrote in my text re Dave Samuels the day I heard about his passing I remembered that I must have a folder with a few tunes of his he had given me many years ago. And a set of Mallets - there is no imprint on them, they may be very early Malletech mallets - that I paid a small fortune for at the time. They came with bent shafts, almost impossible to play with.