The standard EVI Mouthpiece

But some of these modification involve changes to the physical instrument itself.  These require  more of a permanent commitment and so I tend to procrastinate longer before taking the plunge.  I started with a few simple aesthetic changes (replacing chrome hardware with black, etc.).  The first major upgrade was to add a variation of the embouchure sensor originally developed by Matt “Patchman” Traum.  The first photo shows the original version of the EVI mouthpiece.  While Matt’s design has the sensor above the mouthpiece, I decided to try placing the sensor below the mouthpiece.  It just feels a little more natural and then I don’t have to deal with the whole mustache issue 

The Modified EVI Mouthpiece

I’ve programmed the new controller to add growl to  VL70m voices.  This was sort of an obvious first experiment but I’m also starting to experiment with some of the other patch parameters – scream, throat formant, tonguing.  As with most things, you start with the changes that provide clear in-your-ear audible feedback and then progress to more subtle (musical?) controls.

Bottom line – I’m enjoying the flexibility of the extra dimension of control.  And I’m approaching this as discovering new subtleties within an existing instrument rather than treating this as a whole new instrument.

One of the joys of being a brass player was being able to play in a brass choir – a small group  covering the range of brass instruments from trumpet to tuba.   My favorite composer of music for brass choir was always Giovanni Gabrieli.  But alas it’s difficult to find opportunities to play this type of music if you’re not a full-time musician or  associated with a college music program.  I decided to try an experiment and use the EVI to record a couple of phrases from a favorite Gabrieli piece.

In this case, the music was written for a double choir.
Choir 1:  2 Trumpets, French Horn, Trombone
Choir 2:  2 Trumpets, Trombone, Tuba

I wanted to keep the feel as “live” as I could so I set a goal to record all eight parts within an hour.  This was a little ambitious, but I did manage to get all parts recorded within 90 minutes.  I spent another 30 minutes mixing the tracks and decided to add a cathedral-style reverb.  The recording isn’t perfect (like a live performance) but I’m encouraged and plan to go back and record the entire piece.

I hope you like it.  Comments welcome.

The sound work was generally  good. There were no credits in the program for either sound design or sound ops.  Surprising.  I’m guessing that the sound work was done by Wheaton College students.

All the lead actors were mic’d with wireless rigs and they were well balanced.  But the mic’s were not not dressed particularly well and in a couple of cases, took away from the overall aesthetics of the excellent costumes.  A little more time and a little more tape would have made a big difference.  There were 4 stage mic’s across the from of the stage.  These worked well capturing the ensemble’s sound.  There were 2 overhead mic’s hung at center stage but I couldn’t tell if they were for recording or reinforcement.

The few sound effects (basically gunshots) were miscued and so didn’t really provide the extra tension in a couple of scenes.  Having been in this situation myself a couple of times, it’s worth fighting for a little more tech time to getting the timing of critical sound effects nailed.  The other aspect that I found surprisingly distracting was that the gun shots were coming from the main speakers above the stage.  Having worked on a couple of shows that made use of additional, localized stage speakers I really appreciate the extra bit of realism they provide.  It’s something I will push for when I get a chance to do some sound design (hopefully this spring).

The music.  As I mentioned in my previous post, there was an excellent 11-pc orchestra.  They were un-mic’d (at least as far as I could see).  The Musical Director (David Renoni – music teacher at Coyle and Cassidy High School in Taunton) created a nice local balance of the band in most cases.  There were only a few situations where I felt like the band over-powered the singers

My take-aways from the band are:

Mic the French Horn – I love this sound and it tends to get lost without a little help.

A band should always have a bass.  This one didn’t for some reason.  Bass is definitely in the original show orchestration and the bottom end was definitely missed in the overall mix.

Trumpet players play too loudly.  As an ex-trumpet player, this is hard for me to admit.  But it ’s really true.  I actually heard a couple of different folks from the audience mention this as we were leaving the theatre.  And I don’t think this means amplifying the rest of the band to match the trumpets – the MD needs to work on getting them to listen harder and play softer.

That’s it for this show.  A fantastic show, talented performers, an excellent band and a few tidbits for me to remember/use in the future.

OK back to last night’s performance.  The cast was very talented and it showed in the acting and singing as well as in the choreography.  Ted Nesi as Lt. Frank Cioffi and Amanda Nelson as producer Carmen Bernstein were wonderful.  Writeups from other sources refer to them as Wheaton Alumnists (is alumnist a word?)  but you get the idea.  Other Wheaton students star in the production – Katie Anderson (Niki Harris), Pete Rizzo and Lauren Bamford (writing team of Hendricks and Fox).  Another standout was Diana Puccio (Bambi).  It’s unclear to me how the combination of Wheaton College and the Triboro Musical Theatre works and there’s a surprising lack of information about this collaboration (hint hint).  The Triboro’s web site is just a splash page at the moment.

I love the old show-within-a-show template and Curtains does this admirably.  So some of the numbers are about reworking the show and the others relate to the characters and the arc of whodunit.  “Show People”, “Coffee Shop Nights” and “The Man is Dead” were a few of the standouts among the dozen or so tunes.  The show ran almost three hours (including a 15 minute intermission).  It was genuinely enjoyable and I highly recommend getting over to Wheaton College for the second show.

The eleven piece orchestra (!) was excellent under the direction of David Renoni and the sound was reasonably well done.  Now that I’m into the music and sound side of theatre again, the other side of my brain wants to get a little more analytical about what I saw/heard.  But I’ll save that for the next post.

“I am not a music critic, nor historian nor archivist.  I cannot tell you where Bruce Springsteen falls in the pantheon of the American Songbook.  I cannot illuminate the context of his work or its roots in the folk and oral history traditions of this great nation.  But I am from New Jersey.  And so I can tell you what I believe.  And what I believe is this.  I believe that Bob Dylan and James Brown had a baby.  Yes.  And they abandoned this child, as you can imagine at the time, interracial, same-sex relationships being what they were.  They abandoned this child on the side of the road; between the exit interchanges of 8A and 9 on the New Jersey Turnpike.  That child is Bruce Springsteen.”

Stevie Wonder

John Legend was introduced and proceeded to do a gorgeous version of Mercy Mercy Me.  I originally saw this set as part of the 4-hour recording.  This tune was not included.  Luckily when they rebroadcast this in two session they include the tune.  Legend that sat in with band on piano.  Stevie moved on to Michael Jackson’s You Turn Me On.  He actual broke down and cried during this tune but recovered nicely – it was a genuinely touching moment.

Next up was B.B. King (inducted in 1987) doing his signature The Thrill is Gone.  Stevie sang a verse in his inimitable style… a nice touch.  The classic blues tune was an enjoyable addition.  Then it was time move on to some more Stevie classics… like Higher Ground .  And freakin’  Sting joins the band playing bass!  Interesting having two basses.   Sting then does Roxanne with the band.  He and Stevie share the vocals.  The instrumentals on this tune were just great and looking at all the faces of the band members, you could see that they were seriously enjoying themselves.  The band then transitioned back to Higher Ground.  Sting’s voice added a nice new color to the tune.

Almost time to go… Sting leaves the stage and band fires up yet another classic – Superstition and Stevie introduces… Jeff Beck … no really.  I’ve always thought of this as an instrumental tune and the band was absolutely  rippin’ (and smilin’).  Some very tasty guitar work from Mr. Beck.  A tremendous build to the end with the signature horn lick and the backup singers.

And then it was time for the Metallica set.   Yeah whatever…

It was structured in “sets” anchored by A-list groups acting as the house band for a number of performers.The show itself opened with an introduction by Tom Hanks which was nicely poetic and then jumped to Jerry Lee Lewis doing Great Balls of Fire.  It was impressive that the man can still play and a tribute to R&R’s roots but it was honestly hard to listen to.  And I was hoping it wasn’t an indicator of things to come.  It wasn’t… it definitely wasn’t.

Crosby Stills and Nash anchored the first set and it was absolutely inspired. CSN opened with a wonderful version of Woodstock.  The harmonies were right on and Stills’ guitar work was great.  It was nice to hear this song sung with a new rawness that comes from the age of the performers.

David Crosby introduced Bonnie Raitt, who performed See You Again.   It was a beautiful, poignant performance (the woman can sing) and again, the harmonies with CSN were gorgeous.

Graham Nash introduce Jackson Brown.  He did one of his signature peices, The Pretender with CSN harmonies and Stills playing guitar.  The band mix here was great – nice bass work and the B3 provided some tastey additions.  Visually, I was distracted by Nash who was a bit over-dramatic for my personal – just sing man.

Nash then introduced James  Taylor (and the crowd goes wild).  The hat was a nice touch – interesting watching all these musical icons age (and lose their hair).  The band then jumps into Love the One You’re With – the opening guitar riff followed by that B3… nice.  Taylor’s voice doing the verse was outstanding and the 4-part harmonies for the hook gave me tingles.

It was a great set and a good opener for the three and half hours to follow.

Up next – the Stevie Wonder set.

Anywhooooo… I choked down the fear and learned a few things about backing up MySQL databases and WordPress files.  Bottom line – the upgrade directions were straightforward and the “operation” went off without a hitch.  I haven’t even found a need for any theme-level tweaks… yet.  And the editor now works so I’ve lost any excuse for not posting.

One of the best weekly shows is All A Cappella – it’s on 2-5pm ET Saturday AND Sundays and provides my weekly dose of enjoyable vocal music.  Lots of collegiate a cappella combined with “commerical” a cappella material. Although WERS does not provide podcasts of their shows, you can catch the realtime stream.  And all the individual show pages include links to their playlists – present and past.  A nice touch.

As – Stevie Wonder

Africa – Toto

This piece is freakin’ awesome!  It starts slowly/quietly – be patient… the opening is very clever and dramatic.