#play-by-ear

Like I’ve said in an earlier  post, I can’t read music, but I can play, and I can compose.  I just can’t write it down.  It never has been a problem, as far as me being able to play them whenever I want, because once it’s there in my brain, it’s there for good.  I don’t forget how to play it.  And yeah, lines and dots don’t mean music to me.  Nor  does “math”.  

I have a buddy who says he can’t stand to hear Bach because he just sees numbers in his head.  I can safely say, I’ve *never* thought of numbers when I’ve heard Bach, nor when I play.  It just comes out...music is totally based in feeling and spirit, not math, for me.

I got a sense of timing, and a sense of arranging early on, back in ‘65, when I was six, when I heard Herb Alpert & the TJB’s “Whipped Cream & Other Delights”.  Yeah, they were cheeze, but they were TIGHT!  And the arrangements...I learned how to “layer” voices/instruments with that record.  I played it over and over as a kid.  I learned to appreciate a good arrangement through that record.

I wrote these “Three Tiny Pieces” back in 1987,  They just sorta came out one afternoon.  They’ve never been written down, ever.  They are just etched in my brain.

I’ve loved classical music since I was in college back in ‘78, when I discovered Vladimir Horowitz and Guiomar Novaes.  These three little pieces were inspired by Novaes’ Chopin recordings, which I still cherish.

The three movements are 1. Prelude, 2. Mazurka, and 3. Lullaby

This was recorded in 1998, in the same session as the previous tracks I’ve posted.  I would love to be able to re-record these, 21 years later.  On a REAL piano.