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Looper's Delight
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Has any one ever done what I call a memory remix, or a re-creation
of sounds (ambient and music) that you heard somewhere, but didn’t or
couldn’t record? Every year in Tucson (AZ) we are privileged to have the Yaqui
Holy Week Ceremonies. This is one of the great Carnivals still left in
our time, which used to be more prevalent in the Middle Ages. This year we went to the Holy Saturday ceremony, and all of
the sounds seemed more alive then ever. And they didn’t want you to
record any of it. It’s a Passion drama that goes back to the 17th
century, that combines Native dances and rituals with Catholic Christianity. When we got home, I did such a
memory remix, as sort of a sound meditation, for our own ears only, out of
respect for their wishes. It’s a loop to be played 3 times, the
climax of their Holy Saturday ceremony. This is not telling any secrets,
since it is described somewhat in a small book published by the U of A Press. The action takes place in their village, in a big open
space, with not too much reverb. There are two Societies. You guessed
it, the good guys and the bad guys. One of them fills much of the open
space. They are marching to a beat of wooden daggers against swords,
ankle rattles, and some drums. Near the church is a choir singing the
Gloria, somewhat dissonantly, with a guitarist. The courtyard is filled with many people from the village
and visitors. The ambient sounds are birds singing, babies crying, children
playing and yelling, conversations going on, and overhead, a jet plane from our
local SAC base. All of a sudden, the church bells
start ringing, cannons are fired, there’s firecrackers is the air, and
the marchers storm the Church, only to be turned back. This happens three
times. When it’s all over, people
start to leave, dark clouds are overhead, the wind starts blowing, and some
rain falls here and there, a co-incidence John Cage would have loved. And
there’s the drone of a long freight train slowly crawling towards the yards,
south of the village. What I worked on last night was done
in Reason, using 3 (so far) of their Re-drums. The 1st one
was 10 channels of drum sticks, all tuned differently, each one individually connected
to the mixer. (These play for 64 measures.) This is probably an
understatement, since there were probably forty marchers playing wooden daggers
against swords. My wife played some thick kitchen wooden spoons that
sounded great, so I’ll need to sample them, probably in Cubase SX, or
Ableton Live. But first, I’ll need to add a mini
disk field recorder and some mikes to my setup. All I have now is an
inexpensive Shure mike I got from Radio Shack several years back. In the 2nd Re-drum, I put
two different sounding congas, sounding somewhat randomly, the rattles, and
some birds singing (one shot only). (These play for 60 measures.) I
have a Native drum I can sample later. The rattles are OK. The birds will need to be replaced
when I record the ambient sounds in the back yard, which should capture most of
what we heard at the ceremony, except the babies crying, and those I can record
in the park. I want to record enough to continue playing through the
three repeats. In the 3rd Re-drum, so far there are
only church bells pealing. They start in the 65th measure and take
eight measures for the sound to decay. Then it loops back to the marching
sounds again. I need to find some samples of cannons and firecrackers to
add to the excitement. I used three of Reason’s
effects: delay, unison, and phaser. I’ll probably limit the
project to just this, plus the wind and the train at the end. Any suggestions for any of
this? I’d love to hear them. Thanks, and Peace to all. Tom P.S: Food for thought: According
to some, Holy Week is a time when a lot of tension gets released into the
atmosphere. Not only in |