Last night I made a video recording of myself performing an original jazz bebop tune on the piano. It’s called Ocean Apart and I wrote it last summer while taking a composition class with New York jazz pianist Misha Piatigorsky.
You can view the video on Youtube, Blip.tv, or use the player below.
I tried out my new video camera (a Panasonic AG-DVX100A) and filmed my stuffed animal frog which I bought at the Daiso Japanese dollar store in Richmond, BC, Canada.
The very same evening, I christened my green friend with the name of TonyFrog. So here is TonyFrog’s debut performance on video.
The rather “epic” classical music for this video was composed, orchestrated, and recorded by me, about 5 years ago. I used Cakewalk Sonar and the Edirol Orchestral module, along with my Yamaha P-80 keyboard hooked up to my PC via MIDI. I always intended for this piece to be used in a film, and its time has finally come! The credits music is another song that I wrote, an electronic dance music piece called Birds in the House that I recorded with my synthesizer (Korg MS-2000B) and mixed with some drum sounds from the Roland Virtual Sound Canvas (VSC).
The video was recorded in 60i mode and recorded directly into iMovie on a Mac using Firewire. I used a white balance card to calibrate the color settings (using the AWB button on my camera). I had to increase the Gain Boost on the camera to Medium because of the low light, and used the Auto Iris setting. I used iMovie to edit the footage and pick out parts which would go along with the music. Starting from the beginning of the music track, I edited clips to fit with the rhythmic and thematic changes in the song. I added a few effects such as a ripple and blur, just for fun.
Hope you enjoy the video!!
Until next time,
take care!
-Geoff Peters
Today I wrote a new song: it’s called “Wild Thing” and is inspired by the movie Where the Wild Things Are. Click here to download the song or feel free to use the player above to listen.
To watch me perform the song, check out this Ear Training Video we made, where I explain how to play the Minor 7th interval (a key part of this song!). The performance of Wild Thing is at the end of the video.
My friend Marcus was over for a visit today and he encouraged me to write a song dedicated to the new “love” in my life, my Petrof acoustic piano.
So I wrote a simple folk ballad which I call “Me N Petrof“. It is similar to a Brad Mehldau song I vaguely remember listening to, as well as the American folk song Shenandoah which I played in high school band, quite a few years ago!
I made a rather hasty recording of it, just to get the idea cemented in my mind, and I wrote out a lead sheet on a piece of music notation paper.
Feel free to use the player above to listen to the song, or you can download the MP3 here.
I purchased my piano from Yonatan Torn in Vancouver. Yonatan is a master Steinway piano tuner and technician in the Vancouver area who also imports, rebuilds, and sells pianos (mostly European pianos). You can find out more about his piano tuning and restoration services, and view the pianos currently for sale at his website.
My talented globetrotting singer-songwriter friend, Angela Molineux, dropped by my place today for a visit, and we wrote and recorded a new song, called All I Want To Do.
We originally started working on this song 3 years ago when we were both living in Vancouver. Since then Angela has performed and lived in Italy, New York, and London, has studied opera at Julliard, and has had many other interesting musical adventures.
All I Want To Do is a seductive pop ballad that is full of emotion and desire. The simple, repetitive harmonic structures envelop the listener in a thick intoxicating cloud that can become almost trance-like. Most of the song is made up of the chord progression Ebm Gb Fm, and the second half of the chorus alternates between Ab and Gb.
The song is now live on iTunes. Click the link below for a preview of the song, and the full version can be purchased through iTunes for 99 cents.
This is simply amazing. Lithuanian conductor and composer Mindaugas Piečaitis found videos on Youtube of a very talented, musical cat, Nora the Piano Cat and decided to write a concerto for her.
The concerto, called CATcerto (web site) was first performed by Nora and the Klaipėda Chamber Orchestra in Lithuania on June 5th 2009. The world premiere is available on Youtube (or by using the player below).
It is quite a musical feat to conduct an orchestra along with a cat! Piečaitis writes:
The problems of the performance of this atypical piece became clear during its first rehearsals. It is not very easy to guess what the cat is playing, so that the video material must be studied very closely and be oriented in the accompaniment not only by what the soloist is playing, but also by the movements she makes beforehand. This became a particular challenge for the orchestra.
Nor was it simple to rehearse the nearly minute-long prelude to the piece, in which the main themes of the piece are presented, with the soloist calmly sitting at the piano and »waiting« for her entrance cue. If I started the piece just 3–4 seconds too early or too late, it would be impossible to avoid a collapse. This risk truly raises your blood pressure.
Video material does not »breathe«, so that you cannot exchange a glance with the soloist and must unconditionally adapt to her.
I would like to thank Mr Piečaitis for giving me the opportunity to show the entire world that a cat concert pianist can indeed play beautiful music with an orchestra. It is the mission of every great artist like me to inspire others to create. If I have inspired even one person to write music, or learn an instrument, than I will have lived a meaningful life.
I love this video – it is musically interesting, beautiful, and very creative and inspiring.
It features a really simple hip-hop style bass drum/snare (thanks to the Garage Band Hip Hop Synthesized drum kit and a bit of dynamics compression), a synthesized choir patch from my Yamaha P90 keyboard, a soft pad from the Korg, a few notes of an acoustic piano patch from my Yamaha, and a lead synth line from my Korg (with a bit of cutoff filter controlled during the performance to vary the tone). I recorded all the tracks in layers, live & individually along with a metronome. I also used a Volume automation envelope to vary the volume of the lead line and the choir patch.
I don’t know very much about mastering, but the track sounded pretty good on my Macbook laptop speakers, my Behringer studio monitors, and my Creative Labs computer speakers.
Hope you enjoy it! And please let me know your comments, I would really appreciate them!
Geoff Peters piano
Mark White bass
Greg Murray drums
For more info about the Geoff Peters Trio check out our web page.
Mark White is the bass player shown playing in the park scene in the music video. The music video was shot in Vancouver, BC, Canada. The video was produced by Chris Lacroix.
Quiet Night was mixed and mastered by Alan Wong Moon. The Steinway piano tuning was done by Yonatan Torn. Video also available on Vimeo.
My friend, singer and songwriter Angela Molineux and I recorded another song last night, “Casta Diva”. It’s an emotional song that blends the genres of pop and classical in the form of “classical crossover”.
