March 2001
Guild Tidings
The official Publication of
The International Songwriters Guild
Volume 6, No. 3
Happy St Patrick's day!
NEXT MEETING:
5:00 P.M. Sunday March 4th 2001
Officers:
President/Treasurer
Russ Robinson (407) 851-5328
Co-Vice President/ newsletter
Susan Foster-Trewick (407) 679-4017
Co-Vice President/ Member Reception
Matthew Griffin (407) 903-1212
Web Consultant
Asli Walker (407) 359-0506
Meetings are held the first Sunday of each month at
5:00 P.M. The location is 3020 E Robinson St.,
Orlando, Florida. (The American Federation of
Musicians Union Building)
President's Letter
Dear Members,
I'm writing after just having seen the Grammy awards
and feel I'm on a rampage. After a sleepless night
mentally reviewing the format while wide awake. I'm
disappointed with at least 80% of the show. I got the
feeling this showcase had very little to do with
songwriting. If you think about what you saw on the
screen, it was a display in seeing who could get away
with as little as possible in costume coverage. If my
mother was alive, I'd be embarrassed to see this show
with her.
Most every song performed had bad sound balance. The
music often made the voices inaudible. I wanted to
hear the words. Even the winners singing their own
songs didn't have a perfect chance. The sad part is
that no-one seems to know better. I found myself
having to adjust the dial, trying to hear the lyrics.
May I at this point say, our Guild and the songs we
critique put those heard on the Grammy's to shame. I
am at the present time considering sending letters to
publishers and Record Labels telling them this. We
have beautiful songs heard every month. I have ideas
and would like to input my feelings to some heads that
might listen. Maybe I'm thinking my award into WHO'S
WHO might offer clout. Let's talk about this at the
meeting Sunday.
I have discussed meeting hours with both Matt Griffin
and Susan Trewick. Many members are saying they are
not being heard since the meeting breaks up so early.
Starting with March meeting we will stay later. Those
wishing to leave early can be excused.
Best ever.
Russ Robinson
P.S. A new idea will be introduced next meeting.
Let's see how we can compose a song with everyone
offering lines and rhymes and a melody. I think this
should be beneficial to many trying to learn how it
all happens. This gives a chance to both those that
already know and those learning. I believe in one hour
we can turn out a nice song!
How about "We have nothing in common" for the title.
(Even the buttons on our shirts are on different
sides) - the last 4 lines could say it makes no
difference we'll find a way to fall in love. Perhaps
you have a better song title in mind?
Web Chatter cybertoad2000@yahoo.com
Hi again folks, We're still trying to catch up with
the cybermail. Those of you that have e-mails, please
keep us updated. Remember to visit Asli's site at
http:// borrowedreality. com to check up on the
newsletters. I will try to send reminders once a month
via e-mail. (Please e-mail us at I_s_g_2000 @
yahoo.com so you can be added to our address book.)
Rusty Gordon's seminar series in February went very
well. We had 21 people attending the seminars on
Publishing and Audience psychology on Saturday the 3rd
and on the Sunday we had a special workshop for 8
songwriters who all had to submit their songs three
weeks in advance for Rusty to review. She then offered
suggestions for tweaking the chorus to make the songs
more commercial. This was an intensive workshop that
went on for well over 5 hours. There were many short
breaks when we all got an opportunity to talk amongst
ourselves. All the participants were well pleased with
the results, and Rusty was impressed by the level of
talent. She should be back sometime early in June, and
if anyone is interested in participating in the song
workshop, please give me your name at a meeting, or
e-mail me. Numbers are limited. I've already had 3
people sign up for a workshop with a date that has not
yet been decided on!!!
The Open Mic/Songwriter Showcase at Millie's on the
evening of the seminars was a roaring success. We had
about 24 in attendance (standing room only). There
were 16 performers. Of those, the ISG members were
SusieCool, Barbara Ross. Asli Walker, Jeff Mason, Mike
Mac Millan, Lisa Firestone and Jordan Michiels. We did
2 rounds of one song each. We are planning on having
another event like this on Saturday March 3rd. This
time Russ Robinson has promised to be the guest of
honor. Depending on the number of performers, we might
just have to keep it down to only one round this time.
We will also start at 7:00. Hopefully it will run just
as smoothly as the last one.
Using Band-in-a-Box
Part 1
by Matt Griffin
A number of people have asked me recently about the
Band-in-a-Box software package I use to produce simple
demos. I don't intend this article to be a simple
product endorsement; BB has some problems, and I'll
try to point some of them out. But overall it's a
fine program; I've run it for a number of years.
I use Band-in-a-Box because I'm a non-musician, and
need some method to produce music. But many musicians
use it too. Susan utilizes Band-in-a-Box to produce
background music and then records her fine guitar
playing in front of it. Sometimes the music produced
by the software sounds "canned" or a bit monotonous;
putting a live instrument in front of it seems to cure
all ills. The results of this method can be
astonishingly good.
The central idea behind Band-in-a-Box is simple
enough. You supply basic info-a chord progression,
tempo, and playing style are all that's required,
although there's lots more you can specify if you
like-and BB does the rest. If you have a MIDI
keyboard hooked up to your sound card, you can input
chords on the keyboard; alternatively you can simply
type in the symbols. A clever feature allows you to
tap the minus key four times to produce the song's
tempo.
What make Band-in-a-Box really work is the capability
to select song styles out of a number of genres; there
are a large number of Pop/Rock and Country/Folk
styles, especially, but it also has Jazz, Latin,
Ethnic, and even Classical. A couple of more recent
style disks provided some first-rate Praise and
Worship styles. I also like a feature called the
Style Picker. You write a chord progression, then
open the Style Picker window. The window allows you
to select a style and play your progression in that
style. If you don't like it, you can stop and play it
in another style. Unfortunately it doesn't start back
at the beginning but where you left off in the song,
so if you want to hear a number of styles, you
occasionally have to exit the Style Picker and reset
to the beginning of the progression.
The program's output can be pretty realistic
sounding, although a lot depends on the quality of the
sound card or MIDI sound module. If your sound
card/module produces realistic instrument sounds, the
quality of the music produced by many of the styles is
surprisingly high. I've found that the later styles,
especially the acoustic styles, typically sound better
than the earlier ones (they take advantage of newer
program features and have more musical variation).
Actually, I find that the results never seem to be
exactly what I want. So I feed the BB output-the
program allows you to produce a MIDI file-into a
sequencer and move notes around until I'm happy with
the sound. If your sequencer allows multi-track
digital audio input, you can record live instruments
and vocals right on your computer and produce a
complete demo.
Purchasing Band-in-a-Box is a bit of a pain. You can
only buy the program directly from the vendor PG Music
(www.pgmusic.com or 1-888-PGMUSIC), so there's no
price competition. The basic package, including a
starter set of styles, is not too expensive for most
people (I think it runs $88), but additional styles
are rather pricey. And they keep upgrading the
program and charging a lot for the upgrades (in
fairness, many of the upgrades really do provide
significant improvements). I'll bring a PG Music
sales flyer to the March meeting, if anyone is
interested.
Next month I'll go into more detail about the
features and controls provided by the software.
Gig schedule
Rubicon Cafe at Unity Church, corner of
Clarcona-Ocoee and Pope Rd. First Fridays of the
month. March 2nd 7:30 to 10:30pm. Open mic. Approx 2
songs.
Black Cat Cafe at the Unitarian Church on the corner
of Robinson Street and Hampton. Second Fridays. March
9th 8:00 to 11:00pm. Singer/performers are welcome.
Come early to sign up for a 15 min open mic slot.
Rusty Gordon will be visiting Orlando for this
weekend, and she has been invited to attend.
SusieCool and Asli Walker will be performing in the
café at Barnes and Noble on East Colonial Drive Friday
March 16th at 8:00 to 10:00pm. This will be a
songwriters round with Vick DeGiorgio.
Where's your next gig? -Please Let us know, so we can
be there
Welcome New members: Pamela Benton, Stephen Currence
and Annette Hall
February
TOP FIVE WINNERS
Of last month's Evaluation Session
(Members only)
1st Place: So nice to have a friend like you Paul Vernon
2nd Place: I wanna do your will Samantha Eaddy
3rd Place: Evidence of you Bill Frank
4th Place: You Stephen Currence
5th Place: Someone like me Susan Mathis
(Note, only .42 of a point separated 1st from 5th
place)
George Simon by Russ Robinson
Two weeks ago I had a call from the son of an old
friend from the 1950's in New York. I was requested to
fly up for his father's funeral. George Simon had been
my mentor, and helped to start my career both in
acting and the eight years I appeared at the Waldorf
Astoria he helped establish, as my Manager, 2 Broadway
shows and most of all my television career. His family
was like having my own. I always called him Uncle
George.
George Simon played drums with Glenn Miller, and was a
writer was on the staff of Metronome Magazine.
Metronome made him editor-in-chief so he gave up his
regular drumming. He wrote lyrics for Duke Ellington
and Alec Wilder. As a writer he sometimes used the
pseudonym Buck Pincus, and wrote several books on the
swing era.
Mr. Simon won a Grammy award for 1977 best album
liners. His contribution to the collection "Bing
Crosby: A Legendary Performer". In 1965 "The Sinatra
Repost", and 1968 "The Big Bands", 1974 "Glenn Miller
and his Orchestra" were among some of his books
written.
"DUES CLUES"
We are trying to keep better track of dues payments.
You will notice that your mailing label has a date in
the top right hand corner. This represents the date
that we have a record of your last payment. As Russ
has mentioned, this needs to be updated, so if you see
?? Or an incorrect date on your label, please let us
know so we can correct it, and if the Date is more
than a year old, then our "Dues Clues" will tell you
it's time to send that check to Russ again!!! (If you
see "Guest" written there, it means that this is one
of a few complimentary issues we are sending you since
your visit with us. This will give you an opportunity
to see what we are all about, and decide whether you
want to join our Guild.)
Please feel free to contribute articles to the
Newsletter If you have any information that you would
like to see added to the newsletter, please see Susan
Foster-Trewick at the meetings, or you can E-mail her
at cybertoad2000@yahoo.com. Please keep your
articles brief.
Classified advertising may be placed free of charge to
members in good standing in the ISG. For more
information on display advertising and/or classified
advertising for non-members, please call Russ Robinson
(407) 851-5328, or e-mail:
i_s_g_2000@yahoo.com
© 2000 ISG