I also wrote a blog post talking a bit about it. Oh, and here’s a live performance of the title-track:

I think of Minimize as my prog song. As I composed it I was reminded of Discipline-era King Crimson with some Steve Reich. There’s definitely a minimalist vibe to it.

I don’t really remember how the Griot came about, but I remember really liking the melody. The rhythm changes between an afro-beat groove in the verses, and straight-ahead rock in the choruses. I could lie and tell you that it’s a juxtaposition of different cultures or something or other, but it isn’t. It just sounded cool…

So let’s start with the very first song on the album: Build. Here it is, in case you haven’t heard it:

This is one of the first songs I wrote for this album. I had been messing around with a C minor tuning, and I came up with the pounding bass that starts the song.

It kinda just grew from there, to be quite honest. This was one of those rare songs that just write themselves. I don’t remember thinking too much about it…just playing it a lot and letting it grow.

Originally, it was meant to be entirely in 5/8, and it does start the way. But once the melody starts, the rhythms adapt around it, making for a lot of tricky time changes.

Again, I don’t remember thinking too much about it, I was focusing on the melody. I didn’t even realize how complex it was until I had to write it down for other musicians! I guess all those years of listening to prog, Stravinsky, and eastern music finally came through.

The title ‘Build’ refers to the overall structure of the song…I know, not very romantic. But it also brings images of anything that builds up…like the clouds that gather before a storm. I think the song already creates quite a lot of imagery, so I didn’t want the title to be too specific. Better leave it to the listener to give it their own meaning I say…

By the way, this is one of favorite songs to play live. The hypnotic quality seems to really get people’s attention and I always get a good reaction.

When one plays in 4, it’s common to change how one feels the beat, i.e. double-time, half-time, etc. This depends on the groove itself and what makes one more comfortable. For example, once the music starts getting too fast, it’s easier to count in half-time, which usually leads to a more relaxed feel for the musician.

But when you move into odd-times, like 5 or 7, things get tricky because the bars don’t subdivide neatly.

The way I’ve been counting them up till now is by sub-dividing them into groups of 2 and 3, which I think is pretty common. For example in my song We’ll Always Have Siberia, I’m counting 2+3…basically two beats, with the second one being a little longer.

The problem with this, is that the rhythm itself has a very strong momentum and I tend to rush. A lot.

So i started experimenting with counting it in different ways. First, you can count it in quarter notes, which means that what was 2 bars of 5/8 becomes one bar of 5/4.

The advantage here is that your counting straight quarter notes, so it’s easier to keep a solid tempo. You could even go further and count in half notes, which means you have to go through 4 bars of 5/8 before landing back on the 1.

This one is bit trickier, but once you get the hang of it you can really get into the groove. Plus, it really helps when playing in faster tempos.

So basically these are just different ways of feeling and subdividing the rhythm. I’m practicing switching between the different feels while playing to a metronome to really get it internalized. Fun times!

After months of recording, re-recording, mixing and re-mixing, I present to you my newest album: A Work in Progress.

The digital version can be downloaded now, and you can pay what you want, including nothing.

You can also pre-order a CD for 5€ (or more), which will be ready in 2-3 weeks.

I’ll be posting more detail about the album and the individual songs in future posts. For now, I’m just really happy to finally put this out there.

On a not-as-happy note, I was supposed to play a show together with Joe Czarnecki this Thursday at LUX, but it was cancelled. It seems LUX can’t have live music anymore…bummer. We’re looking to see if we can reschedule it somewhere else.

In the meantime, here’s a preview of one of the songs to whet your appetite, it’s called I’m Getting Old:

I’m Getting Old by eschnack

Here’s how the actual CD will look like:

It should be all done in mid-January, but I might do a digital release before that. More soon…
]]> http://ernestoschnack.com/2010/12/17/my-new-album-is-almost-here/feed/ 0 http://ernestoschnack.com/2010/09/07/update-on-the-solo-guitar-album/ http://ernestoschnack.com/2010/09/07/update-on-the-solo-guitar-album/#comments Tue, 07 Sep 2010 15:51:16 +0000 Ernesto http://ernestoschnack.com/?p=516 I’ve been a bit behind with the solo guitar album and haven’t added any new music to it in a while. But I realized that I already have more than enough music for it…it’s just a matter of recording it.

So my goal now is to finish recording the remaining songs by the end of September. That means the album should be done some time in October/November if everything goes as planned.

It’ll mainly be a digital release, but I’ll most likely make some physical copies to sell at gigs and other such things.

I’m thinking of this album as a precursor for another album which I’d like to release early next year. It’ll have a lot of the same songs arranged for more instruments. But more on that later…