I have to say that I have been really tardy with this Blog. So much has happened since I was last here updating it. For one we have a new mandolin book "Mandolin Music for Renaissance Faires." It's a terrific collection of early music for mandolin and I think you will enjoy it. You can hear soundclips up on Soundclick and you can reach the link from the book page "Mandolin Music for Renaissance Faires." And in Addition, there is a new Guitar Book available titled "The Balkan Book for Guitar." This is really a rocking book. There are five pieces in 7/8 time and they are killer pieces. There is a link to soundclick from the page above and you can hear many of the tunes. There is not a bad piece in the book. I wish I had this when I was younger. I would have worn it out. I'm so excited about this collection, and we will have one soon for the mandolin. This is really really great music.
House is on the market and when it sells, we will find one in Tucson an move. I have found since moving here that I really like the heat. 90 is just warm for me, but of course it's a bit warm to run. So far 80 is about my limit. I just can't stand the cold and I love the heat. We do have a window AC here, but I don't use it a lot unless it's 100. I don't mind being outside in the heat, but inside working I take advantage of the AC.
Check out our new video of Cantiga 119 for Mandolin at YouTube
Every once in a while we run into an instrument we really think is very worthwhile, and we list it here on our site. This is a really fine Cordoba Classical guitar that I think is a very very good, a worthwhile instrument for someone who is looking for a guitar with good looks and a great sound.
Happy Holidays from the Grynches
We have a new book available for guitarists. titled "The Spanish Collection." This is a terrific new colleciton with pieces the majority of which have never been published. The pieces are intermediate and should be playable by most guitarists. From the beautiful "Berceuse" by Isaac Albeniz, the haunting A "Virgen Mui Groriosa" by Alfonso X el Sabio to the lovely "Danza de Las Tabiernas" this is a collection you won't want to miss. Other than that, it's a bit chillly outside and sort of hard to run in the mid 50s. The weather is going to warm up here, so I hope to get to run perhaps tomorrow. I don't quite know what to do, any warmer than here and it's going to be really really hot in the summer. Aleksandra is doing better with the injury, but it's a very slow heal and she becomes exhausted easily. I wish she could do more, it's tough to watch her when it hurts and she is exhausted
We are working on some Mandolin books now. I really like the combination. We are also thinking of doing a book for mandolin and guitar with the guitar parts being a bit more complicated and also having the guitar parts written out. Our experience is that it won't ever sell as well as the books for Mandolin with chords, but even so, I think it's something we just want to do.
Aleksandra did manage to make dinner tonight. It was a reproduction of a great meal we had at an Italian restaurant near here. Broccoli, Calamata Olives and Pasta with Olive Oil. Yum yum.
Think of this as encouragement. If you don't know how to read tablature, either guitar tablature (also known as Spanish Tablature for lute) or lute tablature, why don't you learn how to do it. There are a few types of tablature for the lute. They are Italian, Spanish, the unintelligible German and the most popular French. French is similar to guitar tablature except they use letters instead of numbers. So learn how to read it, it will open you up to a world of music, and if you know how to read tablature but do now know how to read music notation, then learn how to do it. It all fascinates me which is why I can read all of them, except the unintelligible German of course. It's like doing a crossword, or playing some sort of game. It's more fun than watching TV and keeps your mind active. In addition, there will be many pieces of music you can play that you can't play now. Often when we do a book, we will include tablature for the guitar. The lute books of course are just in French tablature. But on the other hand, it seems to be a waste of paper if someone doesn't want the tablature, and makes the books more expensive to produce. Music is the best game in the world. I started playing it seriously when I was twenty years old, and have never tired of it. What opens the doors for a player would be learning to read both the several types of tablatures and also, learning to read notation. What is interesting is that people that know how to read tablature, tell me they can't learn how to read notation, and people that read notation tell me they can't learn how to read tablature as it's too confusing. Interesting, we are attracted to what we know, when really the way to grow is to be attracted to what we don't know. This is how you can really get inside someone's head (the composer) and it will change you. You will more than likely learn something and at the same time, it will transform you a little bit. Sometimes it can be a little alien to play a piece. Alien in the way that you don't understand it, the tune just doesn't make sense. I remember playing this fantasia for week, and during the week, slowly one part, and then another part made sense, and by the end of the week, the entire tune not only made sense, I loved it. So what happened was that I changed. I think Ray Bradbury had a story about this. A person crashed on Mars, and there was a deserted city. The city tried to take care of him, but the food was horrible, there was a screeching in the background, and he could not breathe the air. He lost consciousness. When he woke up, the food was delicious, there was beautiful music playing in the background, and the air fresh and good to breathe. What happened was the city operated on him and changed him. That is what happens when you learn, you change a little bit at each time you learn.
OK, I have talked about The Essential Greensleeves for Guitar and also Mostly Medieval Music for Guitar and one of my favorites, "Mandolin Music for Medieval Faires. Now, I'm going to speak about listening to them. A few examples of music from these collections is on Soundclick, the problem is of course that these are MP3 files that you hear. There are different qualities of MP3 files of course, but even a high quality MP3 file has only about on tenth of the information in it that a wav file has. And a wav file is what most record companies use make the master, from which they make CDs. What you are missing in an MP3 file are a ton of overtones. A lack of overtones with adversely affect the quality of the sound that you are hearing. When I was young there were many audiophiles. I remember looking in catalogues of amplifiers and receivers by Fisher, Scott and Marantz. I drooled over them and they were obviously out of my price range as a teenager. I loved fidelity. Eventually I bought a system with speakers and an used Scott amplifier, and had that for quite a while. I also had an AR turntable and speakers. Now people are listening to music on MP3 players, and I know that high quality acoustic music with many overtones really suffers. A recording can never replace the sound of a live instrument, but an MP3 is really a degration and with something like a guitar or lute, there is a real difference on a good system between an MP3 and a CD made from WAV files. I really find it hard to believe people are buying MP3 files because they are really not a very good replacement for a CD. Convenient yes, qualtiy... Not for me. Which is also why we don't care to ever sell them.
Our new book The Essential Greensleeves for Guitar is now available. Every possible version of Greensleeves that I can find including Greensleeves by Mr Beck, Greensleeves Pudding & Pie (also known as Greensleeves & Yellow Lace), Greensleeves for Voice and Guitar sung by Kumara Ray and arranged by moi, a Modern Greensleeves, Greensleeves on a Ground (a duet for two lutes arranged for guitar), eleven in all. Also I have included a facsimile of a lute version of the piece and play that with both the guitar and the lute on the accompanying CD. I'm always amazed at the cover art Aleksandra comes up with, and the cover for "The Essential Greensleeves" is really especially nice, even for Aleksandra.
I also can't believe that I'm starting to look forward to my runs. I did 3 miles a day for 6 days, and then had to take a couple of days off to recover. But it's getting better and I'm getting stronger, only been 5 months or so. I think after a year it will be good if I don't get interrupted too much in the winter. Hope anyone reading this is well. - Allan
Ok, so here is another entry into the BLOG and another book. Now we have a new guitar book titled "Mostly Medieval Music for Guitar." I say "Mostly" becuase there are a few Renaissance pieces in the book, but they are all great pieces and almost all have never been published for guitar. You can hear some samples at Soundclick. There are 28 great pieces, almost 50 minutes of music, and the cover the Aleksandra drew a really terrific picture for the cover, and I looked at it and thought, "This is Magic." I can't quite put it in words, but you can take a look at it Here. Let me know if any magic passes your way or if it gives you a similar feeling. I think it's a killer cover, and the music is great. I would write more, but I'm tired and I'm going to bed to read a mystery. I found a good new author, at least to me, his name is "Ed Dee" and he is pretty good.
So we released a new book, "Mandolin Music for Medieval Faires," and it's really a terrific book. There are many syncopated pieces and we have been listening to the CD for days. You can hear some of the tunes on Soundclick. Cantiga 119 is a killer piece. So far the Book/CD has had a great response. We also sell just the CD. It's about 48 minutes and has a lot of great music on it. Aleksandra did a great job on the CD. Aleks is getting better from the accident. It's a slow heal though, man oh man, how one instant can change your life. So now we are working on Balkan music for Mandolin, a book of music of Renaissance Faires and a book of Medieval Music for Guitar. Busy busy busy. I have been running about 2.5 miles a day. It's going well, except it's been pretty warm lately, up to 102 during the day and very humid, so some mornings I just can't bring myself to do it. I know it's warm, but it's better than freezing which makes me insane. So all in all, life is good. Maybe when it gets a little cooler I will be able to increase my run a bit. I heard it takes 2 years to build up running so you are in shape. It was much harder in the beginning than it is now, maybe it will keep getting easier.
I haven't been to a movie for probably 30 years, I just don't find that sort of entertainment interesting. But for the first time in a very very long time, a movie intereted me. So I decided to go see sicko with my wife Aleksandra. So let me say this, GO SEE THIS MOVIE! Everyone should see this. It's the one movie you should see this year. Find out what is really going on with healthcare, find out how Americans are getting screwed. Go See This Movie, you will be glad you did, then perhaps you will also go visit Michael Moore's site www.michaelmoore.com and find out what you can do to fix this broken system.
OK, so I don't update this every week, and sometimes not even every month, but then if I did, I wouldn't have too much to say, or at least that is the way it seems to me. This is a quick note to let you know that if you play the lute, we have a terrific new book titled A Variety of Music for Renaissance Lute There are 33 Great Pieces which you can hear on Soundclick I posted 6 of them, and you have to take a quick listen to Cantiga 119, but I warn you, if you listen, you will have to get this Book/CD. It's one of my favorite collections and I'm very pleased with both the book and recording. There is a lot of "new" material here and for those of you who are looking for some things to play that you don't already own, this is the collection for you. The CD will help you learn the pieces faster, and it's a pleasure to hear. We will also have the CD separate from the book for those who just enjoy listening.
This is going to be a nice week. It's warming up and this is really the reason we moved down here to North Carolina. If New York was warm, I doubt I would have had the incentive to move. But move we did, and at some point this week it's supposed to hit 76 F which is not too bad for February. I just finished the book "8 Sonatas for the Guitar" by Domenico Scarlatti. These are wonderful pieces, many which have not been transcribed for the guitar until now. A few of them are classics you will recognize, but others are new and they are pieces I don't believe you have heard. I am also putting them up on soundclick and they should be there in a day or two. There is a link to them on the link above. The recording came out better than I thought. I always think I'm not going to be able to do it, I guess it goes back to when I was a kid and couldn't do anything. So I'm pleased with the recording and the book. Aleksandra did a beautiful drawing of Scarlatti for the cover. It's nice to be settled in and have some time to do these things. I'm thinking of perhaps doing more in the future, these are really nice pieces.
The Flute book "Music of Spain & South America for Flute" is now available and on our site for sale. It's a wonderful selection of pieces and Wendy Norman gives a great performance on the flute. These are separate tracks so you can fade either the guitar or the flute tracks to play along. The CD is also meant for just listening. There are no counts or clicks, there is an introduction with the guitar for each track.
I'm working on a collection of six Scarlatti pieces. Most of them are very playable, but there is one which I love which is quite challenging, and as usual I feel like I will never learn it well enough to record it. I work on it hours every day and even have it memorized now. The point of all this is not that the piece is hard, which it is... but just that everyone that picks up the stupid guitar has problems, even me. So you are not alone if you get these feelings when you are learning a tune.
Weather has been fairly pleasant here in North Carolina, nothing like the frigid cold of upstate New York. Oh, I told you about Nero Wolfe the other day in the Blog, and if you don't want to go out and buy one, or go to the library, you can try one as someone has written some on line, 3 stories, and they are very very good. I reall wish he would continue. You can read the stories at this link Nero Wolfe. Give them a try for a very enjoyable Read
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We have a new guitar book out there. 12 Rhythmic Dances for Guitar Solo. These are pieces that I have written over the last 30 years. I love the cover art which was done by Aleksandra Alexander. The one thing that draws them together is the fact that each piece has a strong rhythmic syncopated feel. The style of the pieces is quite varied, ranging from the sweet Spanish Style Summer's Waltz to the rocking sound of Danza Ritmico No 9. These are harder pieces that I usually write, but perhaps that is because now I'm trying to make music more accessible without compromising the quality of the music; and by quality I mean how addictive the piece is, because for me that is what music is about. But because I compose I really want more and more people to be able to access the things that I write, unlike Liszt who only wanted himself to be able to play his own music. That seems odd to me, sort of like writing a book and not wanting anyone but yourself to be able to read it. And speaking of books, if you haven't read a Nero Wolfe Mystery, now is the time to take the plunge. Here is a link to a Nero Wolfe data base, all the books that Rex Stout has written in sequence. If you live near a good library, they should have most of these books. I really can't find another writer of fiction that I like more. If you like to read, you owe it to yourself to read about Nero Wolfe, the Fat Detective who lives in a Brownstone on 35th street in NY, never leaves his house on business and grows orchids on the top floor, not to mention his Employees detective and legman, Archie Goodwin and gourmet chef, Fritz.
Oh, back to music. One of my best pieces, the one I am probably the happiest that I have ever written is Danza Ritmico No 10. You can hear that, Danza 9 and others on Soundclick.
Weather here in NC is a lot different than in NY. Let me put it this way, there are no snow blowers for sale. We saw some lawn mowers for sale yesterday when we were out. Two weeks ago I was riding a bicycle in 70 degree weather, today we are going to have freezing rain and it's not going above 40 degrees. But in a day or two it will warm up. Spring should be fun. - Allan
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