Hey my fellow vibes players,

I'd like to share with you an indiegogo campaign I am running to raise money to build a recording studio in Cali, Colombia. This studio would be built at the residence of Diego Obregón, an important Colombian marimba player. I was introduced to him by Edmar Castañeda, and I had a chance to study with Obregón last August while I was in Colombia. I will be going to Colombia in January of 2020 and spending two months there, studying and collaborating with Obregón and other Colombian musicians.

igg.me/at/cali2cali

In time, through all modes in C.

Recently I had the opportunity to learn to use Logic Pro X. If you are like me and haven't dived deep into the world of music software programs and MIDI, it's definitely a lot to learn, but could be worth it! One of the aspects that made this program most useful for me as I began was the ability to import an mp3 track and change the bpm to match the project tempo, meaning I could import a song to learn, slow it down to play along, then speed it up little by little without losing the quality.

Last month I was talking to Tony about non-jazz music on vibes. I listen to a lot of traditional Canadian folk music, especially Québécois and Acadian tunes, so I decided to transcribe one for vibes. Here is an Acadian piece called La Fougue des Fées ("the passion of the fairies") by the band Vishtèn, from Prince Edward Island in Canada. This was sometimes hard to figure out the best sticking and which ornamentation to keep, but it was a lot of fun! I hope to learn another one soon :)