So for decades, I have this love/hate thing going on with two pieces of technology that you probably own.
My digital recorder and my metronome.
I can measure my use of them in years, not minutes.
I use my recorder on gigs.
I know I could just use my phone’s recorder but I like having a stand alone piece for recording. After all, I was the kid who’s father gave him a little reel-to-reel so I could record my little piano songs, and then a Wollensak, and then a Sharp cassette so I could record my teaching, and . . . the list goes on.
What I’m saying is that I like having a “thing” that is a dedicated recorder.
I don’t record my practice sessions as much as I used to (I should) – but I usually document my gigs.
My digital recorder is a USB stick with eight hours of recording time so I just turn it on and put it somewhere near the lid of the piano or somewhere near my amp when I play and let it run until the end of the gig.
Listening to playback can be excruciatingly painful. I never can get through listening to a whole gig.
If I could, I would probably quit.
Tick, tick, tick, tick . . .
Like a Geiger counter, like a white, foldable cane, like Captain Hook’s nemesis, the crocodile they call “Tick-Tock”.
Ubiquitous, emotionless, non-judgmental.
My favorite metronome has been MIA for a few years. It has been thrown in anger several times and like a Timex, it took a licking and kept on ticking.
I’m guessing the last time I threw it, it decided to hide.
I now use my back-up metronome.
What am I listening for when I use these two devices?
With the recorder, I’m focused on a few things.
Am I singing in tune?
Is the groove always there?
Is the texture always evolving?
Is the music too static?
Is there a strong element of drum kit in my playing?
Is the melody ALWAYS up front?
Is there a seamless stream of emotional content in what I am playing and singing?
With the metronome, I’m listening to where I am putting the notes in different tempos and feels.
How solid/convincing is my technique sounding?
Do I end stronger than I started?
To me, as someone who plays, bass, guitar, piano, and sings, the notes are all in different places in the beat depending upon the source. Two and four are crucial. If I get them right, everything else usually falls into place.
Am I able to thread the emotional context of what I am singing.
I often use the soundless blinking light so I can avert my gaze to rubato things up when necessary and then revert back to tempo.
Back in the day, my relationship with these two items was love and hate. Sometimes I got it wrong – but sometimes I got it right. And when I got it right, well, you know that feeling.
It’s not that love has receded in this process but rather has morphed into profound appreciation and thankfulness that I can still do musically what I set out to do.
And it never really was “hate”. Usually it was self-pity and frustration.
Age has a way of diminishing those two emotions. You accept more about where you are with an eye on where you still want to be. You develop “work-arounds” and negotiate with yourself to appease your more base and self-defeating notions.
My recorder and metronome have always been a very private matter – no one has ever seen me use them.
No matter my state of mind, they are always emotionlessly sitting there waiting for me, like a perpetual motion potter’s wheel anticipating the clay I need to throw.
And I’m never at a loss for clay.
My digital recorder and my metronome.
I can measure my use of them in years, not minutes.
I use my recorder on gigs.
I know I could just use my phone’s recorder but I like having a stand alone piece for recording. After all, I was the kid who’s father gave him a little reel-to-reel so I could record my little piano songs, and then a Wollensak, and then a Sharp cassette so I could record my teaching, and . . . the list goes on.
What I’m saying is that I like having a “thing” that is a dedicated recorder.
I don’t record my practice sessions as much as I used to (I should) – but I usually document my gigs.
My digital recorder is a USB stick with eight hours of recording time so I just turn it on and put it somewhere near the lid of the piano or somewhere near my amp when I play and let it run until the end of the gig.
Listening to playback can be excruciatingly painful. I never can get through listening to a whole gig.
If I could, I would probably quit.
Tick, tick, tick, tick . . .
Like a Geiger counter, like a white, foldable cane, like Captain Hook’s nemesis, the crocodile they call “Tick-Tock”.
Ubiquitous, emotionless, non-judgmental.
My favorite metronome has been MIA for a few years. It has been thrown in anger several times and like a Timex, it took a licking and kept on ticking.
I’m guessing the last time I threw it, it decided to hide.
I now use my back-up metronome.
What am I listening for when I use these two devices?
With the recorder, I’m focused on a few things.
Am I singing in tune?
Is the groove always there?
Is the texture always evolving?
Is the music too static?
Is there a strong element of drum kit in my playing?
Is the melody ALWAYS up front?
Is there a seamless stream of emotional content in what I am playing and singing?
With the metronome, I’m listening to where I am putting the notes in different tempos and feels.
How solid/convincing is my technique sounding?
Do I end stronger than I started?
To me, as someone who plays, bass, guitar, piano, and sings, the notes are all in different places in the beat depending upon the source. Two and four are crucial. If I get them right, everything else usually falls into place.
Am I able to thread the emotional context of what I am singing.
I often use the soundless blinking light so I can avert my gaze to rubato things up when necessary and then revert back to tempo.
Back in the day, my relationship with these two items was love and hate. Sometimes I got it wrong – but sometimes I got it right. And when I got it right, well, you know that feeling.
It’s not that love has receded in this process but rather has morphed into profound appreciation and thankfulness that I can still do musically what I set out to do.
And it never really was “hate”. Usually it was self-pity and frustration.
Age has a way of diminishing those two emotions. You accept more about where you are with an eye on where you still want to be. You develop “work-arounds” and negotiate with yourself to appease your more base and self-defeating notions.
My recorder and metronome have always been a very private matter – no one has ever seen me use them.
No matter my state of mind, they are always emotionlessly sitting there waiting for me, like a perpetual motion potter’s wheel anticipating the clay I need to throw.
And I’m never at a loss for clay.
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