non compartmentalized

the title pretty much says it all; rather than having blogs for art, music, photography, yard work, garden work, home, travel, etc. AS I HAVE DONE & ALREADY DO HAVE, this will be virtually "life as i live it"... day by day... non compartmentalized

Sunday, August 28, 2011

the swiss garage lab

my ancient kawaii synth found at the brockenstube- antique Mac G4- [and boxes of vintage/antique slides/dias in boxes on the shelves, in the background; which i bought thousands of [in junk stores] to use in art/ videos and or books] -and voila,. again, meine schatze, the Burger & Jacoby upright 


[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

Saturday, August 27, 2011

waking and thinking- music and life

i did two solo piano sessions again yesterday, maybe 8 'songs' per session or more. i am purposely not doing what would come naturally. it would be too easy [and boring] to do normal 'structured' r&b, soul, blues, etc. i could sit and play blues and such all day long, like riding a bicycle. and after all, MOST songwriting is basically math w/ or w/o lyrics. a certain amount of bars for verses, for bridges, for choruses, ad infinitum. having been a songwriter all my life, i know that for fact. 

and i really get tired of words. as wordy as i am- and as wordy as i am when i write lyrics. i used to get irked when i would hear 'songs' with lyrics that didn't rhyme correctly- still do; and really get irked when i hear songs that are just commercial fodder- like almost everything on radio- with NO REAL soul or message- and the majority of pop music today is so PLANNED so programed to be banal, solely made to sell to the masses, total MOR-  as one of my favorite quotes goes "in the middle of the mainstream lies mediocrity" - and i loathe anything mediocre.

this last part of 2011 is my turning point [as far as writing and recording] or returning point. back to experimentation and musical discoveries. i'm not saying that i am now doing things so profound as to be the greatest thing since sliced bread, but for me, i am making musical breakthroughs and finding things deep within me that i had lost touch with. As Jesus said,

“If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.(Gospel of St. Thomas)”


one of my favorite movies is "Tous les matins du monde" ["all the mornings of the world"] which IS about 'what music is'- or should be- and for me, it seems more relevant than ever. as i said in a face book 'comment', it [when i am creating music] is my holy communion, my salvation. in the film, depardieu plays Monsieur de Sainte Colombe- who builds a shed and goes there, alone to play and write. i relate. rather like Mahler having cottages built to write in. they went deep within themselves and brought forth the music. [i AM a hermit monk] but before St Colombe begins to play, he pours a glass of wine, and lays some wafers on the table. in my case i have a cup of coffee, and roll about 5 cigarettes, so as not to stop during the recordings.

i am not concerned about making a 4/4 pop song of 3 minutes to sell. i am about moving with the spirit, working with the spirit, and making ART. taking things to a deeper and more meaningful level... for me, anyway. thus, i have written no lyrics for any of these 'pieces' and might not. there again, there might be several of the solo pieces [and even some of the synth symphonies] which lend themselves to having lyrics- but some of the stuff is 10-12 minutes long or longer- but considering everything that has happened this year, each word in a lyric should be chosen with care. 


as i have ranted about before/forever, i was brought up listening to blues and rock and roll at home; i discovered classical music early on, which was a big influence; then in the mid to late 60s i discovered a lot of jazz [when all the jazz musicians were obviously eating acid, or becoming buddhists or krishnas] blues and folk. the British invasion wiped out American music even though they were only recycling it- but i do remember tripping to John and Alice Coltrane, Miles Davis, Ravi Shankar, classical music, mostly non vocal [except for the Doors etc lol] - and i realize now that classical and jazz are as much my roots as my louisiana/mississippi delta roots; closer to mose allison or nina simone than dr. john.

although i said a while back that i was not making anymore physical cds for sale, due to the fact that they are a petroleum product & bad for the umwelt/ecology- thousand /millions end up in landfills every day- i have reconsidered- any work that i record that i can and will perform live- i will put on physical cds in small batches for sale at gigs- everything else- music i will never perform, or cannot perform live- will go to cdbaby[who distributes to amazon, itunes rhapsody, etc] for digital download. the majority of this new music- hundreds of pieces- will be going online for digital download only; because, having written/recorded them, i will never play them again... ever. 

during the sessions yesterday there was an amazing HUGE storm that lasted all day through the night. for me, it was wonderful; the wind howling and crying. i sat at my much adored antique hand made piano, fingers doing 'automatic writing' as the universe and my soul were exploding and raging in harmony.

[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

Friday, August 26, 2011

too busy to blog

i haven't been blogging much- just like i haven't been facebooking too often- since i have been in manic music mode- recording various cds from solo piano, to electronica, to psychedelic space jazz. i've also edited our 2 mahogany hall sets, made youtube videos of 2 of them, which took days also, and have been posting them, and the info on my newly released album TRADITIONAL
in between all this 'in house' musical work, we [the doug duffey international soul band] have been doing concerts- so my idea that i would rest, relax & recuuperate while here [switzerland] between shows has not happened. i feel too driven to create, which is my holy communion, my salvation. my way of coping with a lot of things


i've made probably a million photos- because every time we go out to do any shows, or anything, i come home and download the photos to my laptop and there are easily hundreds to 1k each time; absolute insanity- but i plan to use a lot of the black and white fotos as cd covers, and even as stills in slideshows/videos over music... especially the non vocal stuff.  

some photos of moi & the band are in the two videos i just made for youtube "spoonful" and "i just want to make love to you"- as with my solo music, we are moving more into simpler/sparser blues/jazz/folk/gospel w/more improvisations/jams which can verge on psychedelic [like late 60s/early 70s jazz]- I'm digging this new direction. good thing youtube now lets you upload videos OVER 10 minutes.

AS ever, being in Europe i have different inspirations and different artistic ideas, and more time to DO them- and the tools to do them[see next paragraph]. i plan to do a lot of editing and 'mixing and fixing' when i get back to louisiana. its important that i do the raw work here and now. 

i absolutely love playing my vintage upright piano- improvising and recording as i go into 'automatic writing' 'stream of unconsciousness' modes- and even the Mac G4/ audacity & old kawaii synth have yielded some unexpected treasures. plan to get some of my old vintage synths & such out of storage when i get home and add to some of the stuff i already have, or start new projects. creating the psychedelic space jazz stuff [very trippy] has been a revelation/epiphany. have even been considering doing some ballets from some of this plethora of material.  

We went to our friend Annette's chalet in the woods in the Jura -short drive from here- yesterday afternoon to celebrate her & friend Hedy's birthdays- had wine & dinner outside. it's an amazing place- no electricity [solar panel], the water is from a cistern- more like a 'holiday house'- absolutely fabulous. "i could live there" to quote my nephew. i went upstairs to one of the bedrooms, at one point -after prosecco & before dinner- opened the shutters, windows, laid down, staring at the sky and fell asleep on the bed. such peace. no noise. only nature and sky. absolute heaven





 




Jackie & I are going to Dresden, Germany [which was completely destroyed in WW2 and REBUILT] for 3 days to chill, have a change of scene, and get away from computers and phones, machines and keyboards etc. I'll probably make photos and maybe even some videos, write some texts, do some sketches, etc. i cant be still. i suggested we just stay in the hotel for 3 days and order room service [sounds like the time ron strasner, chris, lorna & i went to palm springs in the 70s- R&I staying in the room the whole time, me reading 'interview with the vampire'] but nooooooooo... we'll do a city tour then decide what we want to spend time seeing. i'm excited to see Dresden and even walk across the bridge at Gorlitz into Poland.

although we did the american bar b que @ the park hotel [watch video] in Weggis- we arrived at night after our show @ the Film Festival in Rheinfelden so i saw nothing- but my room- [my Andara Suite was incredible] but when i woke, when room service rolled my breakfast tray in, and i opened the curtains and windows and walked out on the balcony, the view blew me away- mountains, lake, sky, plus the hotel grounds- too beautiful to describe- "i could live there"- [well.... NOT, unless i wont the lotto]...but 1 day there was not enough... Guess i should add a lot of scenic fotos  in my "travelology" blog...

we had thought of going to the condo in italy [which has just as almost beautiful a view] before i return to Louisiana BUT it's a little warm down south- and i have had enough summer [from Louisiana] to last me forever. 


but today... i am going to go play/record my piano...  and drift away
[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

Thursday, August 25, 2011

TRADITIONAL- released

TRADITIONAL [CLICK LINK]  is finalized and available for download or physical purchase via cdbaby, i Tunes, Amazon, Rhapsody, and all the usual online outlets. Since the back cover is not included on the cdbaby page, i am posting it here. Please stop by and check it out [and better yet, dowload or order one] -and tell your friends. lol. Many thanks. Doug

 

[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

Friday, August 19, 2011

musique conrete- solo improvisations, etc

1st of all i THINK i need to explain that the 'new' music i am doing now is not something new to me- to my audiences yes- but,to me not. i've been creating experimental music for as long as i can recall. 

solo piano:

when i was in my pre/early teens and finally had my piano [after having tried french horn, trombone & sousaphone in school band] and began taking classical music lessons, i also started 'just playing'; rambling from here to there on musical journies and discoveries on the piano; going with the flow; going with the spirit. nothing planned- just playing! its unfortunate that i have no recordings of those days. [there may been a few on reel to reel]- i also did this, during the 60s a lot, mmm hmm, starting from one point and ending up at another hours later. as if i'd been dreaming. astral projection or totally one with the spirit.

i also began [early teens] experimenting with piano over other sounds, using an old 2 track reel to reel tape recorder that my aunt vera gave me. i remember one such piece- done around 1969 or 1970 of my playing over some of the LP [vinyl] sound track of Fellini's SATYRICON -recording bits of it in sections- playing stuff backwards. really crazy stuff. sapling in the 1960s? well, that was going on way before.... as in musique concrete. etc.

social influences on music art literature film photography

for some reason i always instinctively & intuitively KNEW things. but i also hung out with college students when i was in high school. they were more interesting. of course the 60s was such a period of exchange of ideas, a wealth of information passed around- like mental internet- cosmic consciousness. AND tv news and life/look magazines as mentioned in an earlier blog. whatever horrified america, like allen ginsberg & the beat scene- picasso/pollock& abstract expressionism, musique concrete, john waters & underground film, yukio mishima & jean genet, coltrane/davis's crazier psychedelic years- of course the whole hippie thing & psychedelic music- it all seemed very intriguing to me; and i wanted to be 'all the way' up in it. my music like my art, poetry & photography have changed over the years- but it depends on the year. the roots are always the same. even through all my days of songwriting, writing songs with lyrics, i also experimented on the side with abstract music.

musique concrete:

as said, i had begun years ago experimenting with tape machines of all sorts- using two or three reel to reels, bouncing tracks, doing this and that. with the advent of cassette recorders i used them with the others, and even other cassettes decks with cassette decks to sample/ and 'multitrack' via bouncing. 




with classical influences mixed with parental musical influences [john lee hooker, jimmy reed, slim harpo etc] and the music of my time, 

the older i get and the more serious life gets, the more i want my ART [in all its forms] to go deeper- as deep as it can go- and be as serious as .









[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

Friday, August 12, 2011

dream/sleep/music therapy- switzerland 8.12. 2011

August 12, 2011- did solo sessions August 5, 6, 8, 10,  & 11. but have not listened back to anything but the 11th [yesterday] sessions. began editing some of those  tracks, burned a 'proof' cd- and jt and i had tea and listened last night; i got some nice surprises. i am doing experiments in minimalism; leaving a lot of space [which is just as important as a sound]. might possibly use some of the tracks & add lyrics/vocals, but that is really not the purpose or point. i get tired of hearing words.

by editing: i am mainly cutting out the 1st trial bits where i begin & wander into something, then if  i screw it up, stop, then begin again and expand on it- sometimes the 1st takes are better, even with an occasional blurb- but i dont edit those out. i just play: no thought involved- just auto pilot. fingers guided by spirit- not thought.

i'm using my tascam DR-1 portable digital recorder, which has a good stereo mic. i'm using NO reverb or any effects- using the natural reverb of the concrete wall behind the piano in the garage- which has a a very deep rich mellow tone. i let the recorder run non stop as i improvise one song; stop; do another & another, until i get fatigued, then stop- transfer the 1 long file to my external hard drive; then take the file into sound forge & separate the songs into individual files; save the raw files; then edit/normalize the individual tracks.

tools of the trade: cigarettes, my crystal ashtray, coffee in a soup bowl & the notebook where i write down the ''take" # & what key i am about to 'play' something in, then commence
my beautiful burger & jacoby piano [in the garage] made in Biel in 1800- es ist meine schatze

the artiste as the artiste- pre session- Switzerland 2011

still life- stille leben- a vintage broken crucifix, my vintage mandolin, & various junk on vintage velvet sofa in my bedroom- want to try some things w/the mandolin even though its missing strings, out of tune, & i dont know how to play it.

the crazy thing is that i did this same recording trip in 2009- and did 60+ songs then! but have not done anything with that music yet- so have decided rather than trying to title each cd, will just title each cd by date- i.e. as yesterdays:  improvisations 8.11.2011 etc. make 1 cd of each session, for digital download only, place it with cdbaby- which gets them on amazon, i tunes, rhapsody, etc etc etc- i feel this work is valid, and healing- i am immersing myself  in dream/ sleep/ music therapy, here in la belle suisse, meine zweite heimat.many thanks to jacqueline.

now for more coffee and new sessions... my piano awaits me
[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

Monday, August 8, 2011

SOLO MUSIC SESSIONS AUGUST 2011 SWITZERLAND

studio boudoir a' suisse: mac G4 -toshiba laptop- tascam DR1- ext HDs
moved this old kawaii synth from the studio boudoir to the garage

due to jet lag mixed with whatever maladies i dragged over with me, i have been dealing with really screwed up sleeping patterns- waking at 4 or 6 AM- doing some music- then sinking in the afternoon, going back to bed to nap at dusk, then waking at midnight, and then trying to go back to sleep. so... i have been dealing with it the best i can.

i started 'music therapy' by working in Acid on my laptop- when i 1st got here; doing various weirdness [euro techno stuff] and did about 8 new loop based tracks to either add vocals to or not. then decided to get the Mac G4 hooked up & working- since its been sitting in my room for months- i never used it- dragged out the old kawaii to use w/the mac to make samples, OR long synth recordings which i can multi-track into orchestral type/jazz pieces...keyboard over keyboards over keyboards... alice coltrane meets professor longhair on acid in a back street goth club in Berlin. 

but decided to eliminate overcrowding, since chaos is not conducive to creativity; so have moved the G4 & synth into the garage to the BIG desk there... and have not set it up.i downloaded Audacity to the G4 which i will use w/it & the synth, and possibly even do some things with the Dr1 as a MIC into it, try the piano and some percussion instruments [matzuki's congas & bongos?] BUT...

i instead began solo recordings of improvisations on my old Burger & Jacoby acoustic upright piano, built in Biel in about 1800. its a beauty. it lives in the garage. Jacqueline had the piano tuner come the day after i arrived- so before it loses tuning- i need to get busy. have done 4 days of playing/improvising/recording using my Tascam Dr-1 portable digital stereo recorder, set  behind the piano to get bounce back from the concrete wall. it sounds great. has a very warm tone.

i do a few takes of whatever comes into my head and then edit/eq/ it in Sound Forge or Acid 7; but considering i haven't played or sung a note since my Mother passed away in April, i find I'm a bit out of practice; and tend to stick with slow stuff in dark minor keys [but that's not unusual for me]- she always said she liked "rock n roll & jump n jive"  so guess i need to 'pick it up'... do some rockin' blues

i have my 1st European show tonight- so, i will spend the day playing & recording everything for possible 'solo piano' cds, or even solo piano tracks which i can eventually add lyrics and vocals to. might even do a few vocal & piano tracks today to warm up- maybe more traditional folk, blues, jazz & gospel tunes.there again might rent a Sennheiser or Neuman & plug it into the Mac- although the DR stereo mic sounds fine.


 

 

thank god the weather has been wonderful [for me- BUT NOT FOR THE SWISS] since i arrived: cool to cold and dark & cloudy [so the garage is naturally air conditioned] everyone is complaining that they had no summer... i have had more than enough summer for the whole of switzerland, thank you. i am not feeling the summer... and just as i wrote that the sun came out.... merde! but the good news is that we will play outdoors if the sun stays out. just hope dey aint no heat widdit.
[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY