Glory Glory Dixieland: Trying to Keep Up with the UGA Redcoats Marching Band on Piano

If you like my version, click HERE for the free Midi file, and HERE for the free sheet music.

   I'm not a huge sports fan, but... living in Georgia, with a bunch of friends and family being fans of the Dawgs... I've become a de facto fan myself.  To the point I take pride in the team, and a certain amount of personal satisfaction with every win.  :^)  

  My brother-in-law is one of the most dedicated fans, and also an amazing musician.  His love for the team, and for the band, inspired me to pick Glory Glory Dixieland as the next song for this blog.  (I also thought Dixieland would be similar to Southern Gospel, just "revved up"... unfortunately for me, it's MUCH more difficult than what I'm used to!!!)

  Julia Ward Howe wrote Battle Hymn of the Republic in 1861, and used the music from the already existing “John Brown’s Body” for the melody. The tune itself existed well before that.  Wikipedia has an in depth article regarding the history of the song [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Brown%27s_Body).  The Battle Hymn of the Republic is in the public domain.  It's not the first time I've recorded Battle Hymn, but it's most certainly the first time I've attempted a Dixieland style.

  This is a tribute to the version played by the UGA Redcoats Marching Band (found HERE on the University of Georgia Website). I've done my best to honor their skill, talent, commitment, but to be very clear... at my age, and declining memory, this song is beyond my abilities.  I'm doing the very best I can to play it similarly to the Redcoats, at least to the point where I can accompany them.  The complexity of their style is amazing, and inspirational.  Considering they're a full band with a team of dedicated musicians and I'm one guy with one piano, there's simply no way my arrangement can possibly match their arrangement... but I feel good about the result.   
  ONE NOTE:  If you're on the verge of getting a song right, but it's just too fast for your fingers to catch up... coffee is your best friend.  :^)

  I play by ear, and don't read sheet music.  Thanks to Audacity's free audio software, it was possible to break pieces apart and slow it down so as to hear the details of the band's music. Just because I could hear it though, doesn't mean I could match it. Did the best I could, and blended my own style into the mix.  It's been an odd experience.  For decades I've played solo, at whatever speed felt fun. Trying to match timing (especially when they play it SO fast) is way out of my comfort zone.  Please pardon my drifting, if you happen to notice the times I got a little behind or ahead of the pace. 
  ANOTHER NOTE:  If you download the midi file, you'll notice at least two places where I missed a key, and one place where my speed got off track.  Call it a personal limitation. After nearly four months of practice, it's the best I've been able to do.  If you play, and upload your version to Youtube, send me the link.  I'll be glad to post it here!

  In terms of matching speed with the band, sacrifices were made. My fingers aren't that agile any more, and maybe never were.  The riffs the band plays are complex, rich, and devious.  I'm used to enhancing a melody by playing notes within the same chords, but not necessarily the exact notes.  Jazz/Dixie takes it a lot further, running though the song like a fox leading hounds on a merry chase through forest, streams, and meadows.  When slowed down sufficiently to hear the notes, it's like they play all the notes above and below, without necessarily playing the exact melody.  It doesn't make any sense, until you hear it at speed.  Suddenly, it makes sense and all I can do is wonder how somebody could figure out how to cram all those notes together and wind up sounding exactly right?

  The final result is more like an "accompaniment" in my own style, than a stand-alone.  Since I specialize in Southern Gospel and Country Music, this isn't pure Dixieland Jazz, but a hybrid between the two styles.  I hope you enjoy it!

Midstream Progress Report - GloryGlory Dixieland is going slow

     Last post was detailing how I use Audible to help learn new songs by ear.  In it, the example was based on the song I'm currently learning, the University of Georgia's "Glory Glory Dixieland", a really jazzed up version of the "Battle Hymn of The Republic" as performed by the Redcoat Marching Band.  (If anybody wants to hear the source material, it's on Georgia Dogs.com - Songs of the Georgia Bulldogs.  Just scroll down to the Dixieland version.)

    I've known the song for years from church, and have always played it in a Southern Gospel style. The song is public domain, and I've already posted a Youtube version in my usual Southern Gospel style.  When I finished learning my last song, and was considering which song to play, Monique suggested this version.  It's been on my mind, because it's fun, and sounds a lot like southern gospel style, just revved up.   All I have to do is learn to play the song like the college band does, on a piano, at the same speed they play it, and record it for Youtube...   :^)

    Okay, maybe not that simple.    With my memory, I have to learn very small segments at a time.  Been working on it since early/mid August. It's now mid September, and I've learned about 45 seconds.  The full song is a bit over 2 minutes.  On the other hand, I managed to match the single-key melody line in the middle, all the way up to where they start singing "Glory, Glory Hallelujah", so it's mostly a matter of memorizing those elements, and figuring out the fingering.

    Another aspect is the speed of the song.  I've always tended to play too fast, but these kids are too much for me.  Either my age or the complexity of the song is too much. I can't keep up.  Dixieland and Southern Gospel sound similar in some ways, but there's a wide gulf between the details of the two styles.  Probably going to have to get the song as good as possible, and settle for the best speed manageable.  It had been my intention to make a video overlaying the band with the piano, to show that my arrangement follows the band's playing properly.  May have to give up that thought.  Haven't decided yet.

    What I HAVE been able to do, is due to Audacity. It's been a Godsend.  I'm trying to pluck a consistent melody line out of a New Orleans style rendition of an entire band playing all at once, to play on one piano, with only two hands.  There's no way I can match an entire band, so it's a matter of following the notes that stand out the most.  At times they're playing way too fast for me to hear individual notes, much less focus on a single melody line.  It's like they're hitting EVERY note except the melody, but so fast that it blends INTO a melody. 
    With Audacity, it's possible to isolate a segment and listen over and over for the dominant melody.  It's possible to slow the song down while keeping the same pitch.  It's kind of like a bionic replacement for bad hearing, bad memory, and slower hands.  Audacity makes it possible for me to learn and play like I used to; just in smaller stages, at a speed I can handle.   :^)

    When I post a new song, I usually print out the sheet music for people who want to learn. In this case, after I worked out most of the song by playing along in the same key the band uses (B-flat), I discovered some band-type instruments are natively tuned to B-flat, but read the sheet music in C.  It felt like I'd put a ton of work into something that may not be usable by anybody who might like my arrangement, and I was depressed about it.

That final complication just got solved a few minutes ago.  Since the band plays Glory Glory Dixieland in B-flat, I've been playing in that key while listening/learning.  (I'm usually key-of-C, but B-flat isn't too far off for me to learn.)  Googled transposition software just now, and found there are two I already have that can do the job:

    MuseScore 4 is free, and does a wonderful job converting Midi to sheet music.  It has two drawbacks for me, though.  First, it doesn't understand all my my playing.  It sometimes messes up on grace notes, which is kind of important in Southern Gospel piano, and sometimes plays the notes slightly out of sequence.  Kind of jumbled together at the wrong pace.  Second, it doesn't retain the Sustain pedal in the Midi files created in Ableton.  It's still excellent software, and free, but has limitations that won't work for me.  In all fairness, maybe my computer's just not keeping up when the notes are garbled, but that doesn't happen in every midi player.  Some players get it right, even on my computer.

    On the other hand, Notation Musician 4 is everything I want, but it's not free:

• It plays my style perfectly. 
• It plays back Ableton's midi files and retains the sustain. 
• It also converts midi into sheet music... and allows you to print the files.  
• And it can transpose sheet music, which I only discovered this morning.  :^)

    It does far more, but these are my requirements.  No free software met all of the first three requirements.  Most paid software was either out of my price range, and/or didn't offer a free trial with the features I needed unlocked so there was no way to test it. 
    Notation Musician was still out of my price range.  But I absolutely knew it worked perfectly for my needs because they have a free trial.  It was almost $100, so I had to wait a few months, but it was worth every penny once I bought it.  And now I know how to transpose with it, so it's even better!

With all that said, I'm still not sure how much longer learning the song is going to take.  Making satisfactory progress (just slow).  But it's been so long since posting anything, I wanted to let all my readers and fans (Hi Monique!) know I'm still here!

Meeting In The Air Southern Gospel on Piano

  

Click to download:
Meeting In The Air Sheet Music

Meeting In The Air MIDI File

     This marks the 2nd new Southern Gospel song posted since re-starting this blog.  Meeting In The Air is an old old favorite.  I loved to sing this in church when I was a kid.  It's one of the songs I can clearly remember from church, from Uncle Freil playing, and from playing it myself.

    The song's original copyright was in 1925, and is currently under the Public Domain.  It was written by Mae Taylor Roberts.  According to Hymnary, the copyright notice originally contained this offer:  "This song may be had in sheet music at 25 cents a copy. Order from Mrs. Mae T. Roberts, 1554, East Washington, Pasadena, California."  Since that was nearly a century ago, I sincerely doubt she's still honoring her offer.
    I've looked for more information or songs from Mae Taylor Roberts, but couldn't find anything beyond the small amount Hymnary has.  If you'd like the lyrics, Hymnary offers 3 verses plus chorus.  I've seen it in the past with 4 verses, but usually consider Hymnary to be the most reliable source of hymn information.

    Speaking of verses, I took the road less traveled this time.  Most of the time, I'll do two or three verses with a chorus between each. This time around, I had an example to follow.  I recently found several decades-old videos of my uncle Freil playing.  This was one of the songs, so I had the rare opportunity to compare my version to his.  For his version of the song, he simply played the verses three times.  Didn't play the chorus at all.  It never occurred to me that could be an option; plus, I liked that a lot, so I'm following his lead and just playing three verses.  

    Also, not surprising at all... his way of playing Meeting in the Air is much better than mine.  I tend to play a very direct melody line.  Freil had a subtler approach.  He wound in and around the melody line, in ways that would never have occurred to me, lending his variations a much more sophisticated feel.

    With some effort (okay, a lot of effort), I listened to his version of Meeting in the Air over and over, working on learning how he did it.  Unless you're very familiar with Friel's style, you probably won't hear the difference.  But for those of us who knew him, it's there.  The first and last verses are my style.  The middle verse is as close to how he played the song as I can get.  The difference blurs a bit, because over time, fiddling with the arrangement, some of  his style blended with mine.  That's fabulous, because I'd love to be able to play more like Freil.

    Regardless, I'm happy with the arrangement.  I can tell what's mine and what's Freil's, and love the fact that even after all these years, I'm still learning from him.  

    The video itself is a whole other story.  I have a new (outdated, but new to me) cell phone, and struggled with the settings.  It has problems with the audio.  It sounds like it's playing underwater, with strangely distorted sounds, and halfway through the video the audio stops entirely.  My final attempt was with the lower resolution setting turned on.  It was the best version I'd played, out of several hours of trying to fix the video.  By that point my hands ached, and I was getting tired to the point of starting to play worse, rather than better.  So I took that final effort as 'best effort' and called it done.  The playing is fair enough, but the lower resolution makes the video itself disappointing.
    I'd like to fix the audio issue, or at least figure out what's going on.  But... the video plays with perfect timing, and I never use the original audio anyway.  I always use Ableton to record while playing, export it as a Wav file, and overlay the Wav on top of the original video's audio track.  It's cleaner than the original audio, with none of the ambient noise, barking dogs, etc.  So, the odd audio isn't an issue in this particular situation.  At least, not for making these piano videos.

        I've been working on this for a couple of months (or longer).  It would have been easy enough to do a simple arrangement in the key of C.  That's always been my wheelhouse.  But for these videos, I try to change up the keys a little, and offer greater variation in each verse.  With age and covid affecting my memory, it takes longer to get comfortable with an arrangement I like, and my ability to play it perfectly is based more on good luck, no matter how much I practice.  So, please pardon any errors.  The style is there, clearly enough that other pianists can take inspiration from the style and arrangement.  Aside from the actual video of me playing the piano... there's also a "how-to" video using Midiano (see sidebar link to Midiano) to play the song at normal speed, and half speed.  

    In addition to the how-to, the Midi file for Meeting In The Air is available on this page for download.  You can download the file, go to Midiano and play it, which comes with a variety of options that will help in learning to play the song.  You don't have to use Midiano, any Midi player is fine, but I don't know of any free player that can do everything that Midiano does.  Actually, I don't know of any better midi player at all, paid or free. 

     If you read sheet music, a pdf file is also available for download.  All the downloads are available for free, on this page.  (At some point I'll consider adding appropriate affiliate ads, maybe a "buy me a coffee" link, but as of this moment, haven't looked into them yet.)    But even then, there's no obligation, no charge to download.   Get the files, enjoy them, but if you share them, please credit me for the arrangement.  :^)

    

Stepping On the Clouds: How to Play Southern Gospel Style

Click HERE to go to the original blog post with free downloadable Midi and Sheet Music.

     In the past week, the final piece of the puzzle dropped into place.  Music Notation 4 was the finishing touch.  In the original Grace Notes, there were multiple elements with each new song:

• The actual video, playing the song on piano (Yamaha DG-640 back then)
• A How To video, with sheet music and animated keyboard showing what keys to play
• A free downloadable Midi file of the song
• A free downloadable version of the sheet music

    That took a full toolbox of software (plus a keyboard).  Over the years, the Yamaha quit working for me, and was replaced with an M-Audio Hammer 88.  It's a beautiful keyboard with a great feel, but has no built-in audio.  Strictly a Midi controller.  It came with Ableton as the DAW.  The main computer was my Swiss army knife, but Ableton didn't play well with the other installed software.  It took getting a dedicated laptop to make Ableton and the Hammer 88 work consistently.  And even then, I wound up needing an external audio driver (Also M-Audio, as are the speakers.)  Ableton creates the initial Midi, Notation Musician cleans it up a bit.
    Originally, I used the Flip line of digital video recorders, and later a more sophisticated digital camera.  Eventually, cell phones improved to the point I now shoot the videos on my phone.  Nothing special, just a slightly outdated Android.  Got a cheap mini tripod from Amazon that has flexible legs.  It can wrap around handy furniture or fixtures so I don't have to worry about getting an odd angle or knocking it off a shelf.  Bandicam was my screen video recording software.  Did a good job then... does a good job now.  I've kept it through at least three computers, and it just keeps on working.
    For regular video editing, I use HitFilm Express.  My needs are simple.  I mainly use it to replace the live piano audio from the original video (with all the household noises, barking dogs, etc...) with a WAV audio file generated by Ableton.  I sync the audio and video by the simply watching my fingers on the piano, and aligning the audio to match the movement.  It's like having my own private sound studio, and easier than you'd think.

    The How-To videos were made using Midi Sheet Music, a freeware program that hasn't been updated in years and isn't compatible with Ableton's exported Midi files.  It converted Midi to sheet music, plus could play the sheet music notation with an animated piano keyboard.  And it divided the single-track keyboard into 2-track treble/clef sheet music.  Those were the only things it did, but it did them all-in-one and was dead-simple to use.  It wasn't pretty, but it did the job.
    Now I use Notation Musician to output PDF files of the sheet music.  It also splits the Midi files into two tracks.  Didn't have to have that feature, but it makes the sheet music look cleaner.  I can play the midi files and follow along in the sheet music onscreen, but lacks the animated piano keyboard.
    Lastly, I use Midiano to actually play the song (with the animated keyboard) for the How To video.  It animates the sheet music across the screen, has a gorgeous animated piano at the bottom, and drops played notes visually down the screen to show which keys are coming up in sequence.  Tons of customizing available.  Absolutely free.  Midiano is a sparkling example of brilliant design.  It's a fabulous learning tool, with more features than you can shake a stick at.  Did I mention free?
    I highly recommend Midiano.  Download my midi file (or any Midi file), load it into Midiano, and you can experience a whole new way of learning piano music.  It even waits for you to hit the next notes, before moving on.  You can see it in action in the video above.

    There's more here and there, but these are the basic tools I use.  Music Notation 4 was the last big piece.  With it, I can include the sheet music, and can replicate everything the old Grace Notes blog used to provide.  Since it's been so long between posting the actual 'live' piano video, and then today doing the how to video, I'm putting the new video here on this page.  Going forward, all four elements will be on a single post, so you don't have to search for every separate piece.

    

Music Notation 4 Sheet Music Print Function, and Making PDF Files Work With Google Blogger

     I mentioned in a previous blog the limitations inherent in Google Blogger.  It's great with images, and video, and linking to URLs.  Other files are kind of left hanging out to dry.  There's a workaround on Google Drive Direct Link Generator.  Makes it just a few easy steps.  I'd prefer that Blogger could natively handle the files, but this is almost as easy.

    With that said, the bigger problem has nothing to do with Blogger.  I've been looking for a way to convert MIDI files to Sheet Music.  I play by ear, and haven't read sheet music in about 50 years so writing my own would be more effort than I really want to do.  For years, I used "Midi to Sheet Music", and it was great.  Super simple, but anybody who wanted to learn my arrangements by music notation could do so.  When it quit working, there wasn't much of an alternative out there.  MuseScore had potential, but I didn't like the way it played the files, and it didn't seem to understand my "southern gospel" twang.  Music Notation played my stuff perfectly, but the free version was crippled so as not to print the notation out.  You had to buy the full program to be able to output the sheet music, and it was $90.  

    That's where I've been stuck for the last two months.  My son and his wife unknowingly funded the project when they sent birthday money last week.  Bought and downloaded Music Notation 4, and spent a few days exploring it.  Does more than I need, but the important part is that it DOES WHAT I NEED, and does so extremely well.  It's absolutely worth the cost.  If you click the link, it will take you to Notation Software's website.  If you decide to buy it, be careful to choose the correct program.  They have two, "Notation Composer," and "Notation Musician."
The former is a more complete program, and much more expensive.  The latter, Notation Musician, is the one I got.  For the record, I have no affiliation with Notation Software, and make no money for recommending them.  :^)

    A few weeks ago I posted my first new piano music video in years, and included a link to the midi file (thanks to the Direct Link Generator above).  Now I've got the sheet music for it:

Stepping On The Clouds Free Sheet Music

    I'll edit the original post with the video, so as to have the video, midi, and sheet music all in the same blog post, but wanted to include it here as a technical example of the link working properly, and how well Notation Musician handles the conversion process.  

    As an added bonus, it splits the left and right hands for me.  Not that I'm reading the notes, but watching what's being played while listening to it, it sounds like a fine job of separating the track into two.  Might not be following "The Rules According to Hoyle"... but well enough for someone to learn the song from it.

One more related link - If I choose to make a "How to Play" video like like the original Grace Notes blog did, Music Notation would work but Midiano includes an actual piano keyboard on the screen, so you can read the music and watch the keys all at the same time.  And speed or slow the playback as desired, which makes a great learning tool!!  
    (NOTE:  Today I figured out how to put an image and link on the sidebar, now you can click on the image and go directly to Midiano!)

Introducing The Singing Chapmans: Just Over In The Glory Land

 

    Some time ago I digitized all the audio from the record album "Introducing The Singing Chapmans."  The album has 12 songs.  It's one of two albums I know of that has my Uncle Freil playing the piano.  (He also did a couple of CDs solo, but those are easier to find.)  I chose to feature "Just Over In The Glory Land" because it's one of my childhood favorites.  Even better, there's a fair amount of interesting history involved with the song.

    According to TraditionalMusic.com, the words were written by James W. Acuff (1864 – 1937), and the music by Emmett S. Dean (1876 – 1951)

    Per Pixabay, James Acuff wrote it in 1906, so the song is considered Public Domain.

 As always, their midi is clear and pure. Nothing fancy or complicated which makes learning the melody much easier if you’re a ‘play by ear’ pianist.

    I can remember Freil Playing and Aunt Elsie Mae singing this song in church.  And through the years, heard Freil play it just about anywhere there was a piano available.  Eventually it became one of my favorites to play myself, not as nuanced as Freil's playing but brash and bold, and full of joy.  (The result of not knowing as many non-major chords as Freil.)  

    Going back to digitizing the record... it was a loan from my sister, so I had to get the songs to computer quickly and return the album.  It was convenient to do that work immediately, with the intention of going back later and getting them onto Youtube.  So of course they languished forgotten on the computer for a couple of months.  Now they're online.  You can play the video above, and click on "play on YouTube" to see the rest of them.  I may feature a few more from the album, but it will be over time, no rush.

    So far, the songs done by "The Singing Chapmans" have not been easy to research.  It's been difficult to find much about each individual song, and discouraged me from doing each and every one.  In this case, "Glory Land" is well-known, with a bit of history, a bit of lore and some confusion about the song's provenance scattered thoughout the internet.  Here are a few of the links and claims:

    Timeless Truths has a nice looking page, and is one of my favorite resources for information about gospel music. But in this case, they’re a bit sparse on information.  They agree it was writtten by James W. Acuff, and specify that it was PUBLISHED in 1906.  They also state that the copyright is Public Domain. They have the words, sheet music, and a midi file to listen to.

    But the end-all and be-all is an extremely-well researched article by Henrik Smith-Sivertsen. I found out much more than anticipated, and far beyond the scope of southern gospel I usually stick to. Smith-Sivertsen writes that “Just Over In The Glory-Land” was first published in the hymn book “Glad Hosannas: A Winnowed Collection of New and Old Songs for Christian Work and Worship”, in 1906. He gives credit for the lyrics to Acuff, the music to Emmett S. Dean, but goes on to name Dean as the editor of the hymn book, and part owner of the publishing company. The fascinating part, and this explains why some websites seem confused about the copyright, is that another publisher, R. E. Winsett, obtained “renewed copyrights” to the song.

    The article in full is worth digging into, and with an extensive bibliography, seems likely the most authoritative and trustworthy document of the song's history.  

    I personally agree with the articles and websites that list "Glory Land" as a public domain.  Especially after this year, because January 1st, 2023 marks the date for everything published up to the year 1927 (U.S. only; other countries have different laws.) There's a wonderfully detailed article by Jennifer Jenkins regarding copyright.  It's a fantastic read and very worth the time if you're interested in the Public Domain.

    As a matter of fact, she mentions that on January 1, 2024, the first ever appearance of Mickey and Minnie Mouse will enter the public domain!  Imagine that... I bet Disney is having fits about it.  Even Sherlock Holmes no longer has copyright protection.  Until 2023, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's last two Sherlock Holmes stories have been under copyright protection.  As of this year, everything Doyle wrote about Holmes is in the Public Domain. If even the Doyle Estate, and even more so, The Mouse, can't keep their characters out of the public domain, there's no reason a song published in 1906 would still be copyrighted.

It's safe to say, out of all the posts I published in the original Grace Notes, this was by far the easiest yet most overwhelming song to research.  Some day I'll post another blog about "Just Over In The Glory Land", but next time... it'll be with my rendition on piano.  I do believe I mentioned it being one of my favorite songs to play.  :^)

Used Laptop for the Hammer-88: USB Problems

     Just an update based on a simple fix for a long-standing problem.  Going way back, I originally had one very good desktop to do everything.  It's 6 or 7 years old now, and still good, but no longer great.  Over the years, some things started conflicting with others.  The usual victim was system audio.  

    This caused the biggest problem with Ableton Live Lite and M-Audio's Hammer-88 keyboard.  Sometimes the audio drivers would quit working randomly.  The  most consistent and annoying villain was when Microsoft did a Windows "update/upgrade."  EVERY SINGLE TIME.  I only know a couple of swear words, but I've used them many many times at Windows updates.

(Warning - Upcoming Rant)
    The problem could sometimes be fixed easily (usually the random occurences.)  Other times (looking at YOU, Microsoft...) it could take days or weeks to get the audio to working reliably.  Sometimes it took so long, another update would come out just days later and we'd start all over again.
    Helpful Hint:  This website provides a link to a trouble-shooter that could fix most of the audio problems in moments:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/fix-sound-or-audio-problems-in-windows-73025246-b61c-40fb-671a-2535c7cd56c8
    Yes, I'm aware it's a microsoft link.  That doesn't make me like them any better, since it was nearly always their OS updates that triggered the problem.  Just the same, this is the first thing I try when the audio stops working.  Click the link on the page and allow the app to test for problems.
    The weird thing is, it always reports "no problem found", and starts suggesting random things to try... but actually fixes the issue, at least most of the time.  So I click the "Open Get Help" button, let it do it's thing, then close the window after it reports failure.  And that's usually all it takes.
    Other times, it's as simple as checking "Sounds", going to the PlayBack Tab, and finding that the update has totally played havoc with speaker output assignments.  For some reason, it would reassign a new random output as the default.  Sometimes it would go to a legitimate speaker, like the one built-in to the monitor.  Other times it would choose options that had no output at all.  Re-setting the correct speakers as the default option will typically fix the audio, but sometimes it has to be reassigned as the default with every reboot.  Eventually it sticks, until the next system update.
    The worst ones... the mystery issues with no reliable fix... were the worst. This is part of the reason I quit playing.  It was so consistent, there were so many times I just wanted to 'play the piano' but couldn't, I gave up for a while.
(Rant Over)

A Dedicated Laptop
    In a final attempt to solve the problem, Monique found a used laptop on an Amazon lightning sale.  It's an older HP EliteBook.  Old enough it was originally sold with Windows 7 installed.  It's running Windows 10 now, but that's pushing things.  I don't install extraneous software.  Primarily Ableton, plus CCleaner and Irfanview.  And my favorite browser, Vivaldi. 
    Ableton 10 Live Lite - dedicated to the Hammer 88.
    CCleaner for it's utility toolkit and easy system cleaning. 
    Irfanview for the times I need a screenshot. 
    Vivaldi mainly because I used to use Google Drive to swap files.
    Our working space is tight, so the keyboard is on a wall-mounted shelving system, right beside the door.  It's easy to bump the keyboard while walking past it, and I thought maybe too many impacts caused the issue.

The Ultimate Fix: A USB Hub
    Eventually I realized the problem was the USB port the keyboard was attached to.  The laptop only has 3 USB ports, one to an external audio driver (the Air/Hub, by M-Audio), one to the keyboard, and one for the mouse. Not enough to go around with one having intermittent problems.  We had a 7-port powered hub.  I tried it, but for some reason when the laptop is powered down the hub still provides power to the Hammer 88 and to the mouse.  I didn't want the keyboard to be powered up non-stop all day long.  Seems like that would wear the electronics out faster.
    For about $15.00, we found a great USB hub on Amazon, by Sabrent.  It's powered, has 4 ports, and each port has a dedicated on/off switch, with a light so you know which ones are on.
    Now the keyboard and mouse are connected through the hub.  I also keep a USB memory stick on one port, for trading files between computers.  And the fourth port, just because it was available, provides power to a VCR-to-Computer converter.  Only the ports in use are powered up.  And when the laptop is turned off, I turn off the hub ports as well.  
    Now it works great.  I can play the keyboard reliably, at any time.  And turn the peripherals on/off as needed.  It's amazing when things function like you need them to!!

    With this setup it worked most of the time, but frustratingly there were still days it didn't.  Sometimes on a reboot, the laptop would not communicate with the keyboard.  Occasionally reconnecting the cable between them, but not always.  I started worrying that after all these years of not getting to use it, maybe the keyboard was aging, connections failing, who knows. 

The Technical Side of Grace Notes: Midi and the Missing Sheet Music

     Still celebrating the first brand new posting of my own piano arrangement (Stepping On The Clouds).  Part One of this "Technical Side of Grace Notes" article dealt with how I learn a new song and the process of creating the finished video and blog post.  Today we'll finish with getting the Midi file on Blogger, and acknowledging the missing sheet music.  Then, I'll have a solid reminder against the future and my failing memory.  :^)

    In the previous post, I explained how to save all three elements from Ableton.  The full SET, so I can always re-create the Midi and .wav files.  Just in case.  Plus, of course, the actual Midi and .wav files.  We already applied the .wav file to the video, for a clean audio track with no ambient noise.

    The Midi file I do for it's own sake, for those readers who want it.  Either just to play with Midi on their own setup, or to use Midi as a controllable process for learning how to play my arrangements.  If you downloaded the Midi in order to learn the song, I strongly recommend using Midiano.com as a teaching tool.  It plays my music more "true" than just about anything out there.  It has a visual keyboard you can watch to see the notes as they fall, and the ability to slow down the playback for easier learning.  Plus many other options.

    Not that I have any illusions about my skill level.  There are a ton of musicians on YouTube that put me to shame.  But as my Mom said, there are also plenty of people who are at the perfect level to learn and appreciate what I can offer.  So I don't let all those better players prevent me from putting my two cents in!  

    I'd call my complexity level simple to middling.  There are at least three sites out there that link to my playing as the ideal way to play a specific song.  One of them is even using my sheet music AND my video (it was for Amazing Grace). 
    They were kind enough to give full credit, and to rate the complexity at "Intermediate".  That's higher than I'd expect, and it's very kind of them to share my music.  It validates Mom's advice.

    The real struggle with the Midi wasn't in creating the file, but in getting it onto Blogger in a way that's easy for readers to download.  On the original Grace Notes, I was paying a... large percentage of income... to have a dedicated site to use Wordpress, which I loved.  It had a lot more versatility than Blogger.  But hosting the site got drastically more expensive every single year.  Now I use Google Blogger.  Blogger itself is free.  And a basic Google Workspace is only $12.00 per month.  I still have my custom url, Crewman6.com, and that's a low once-a-year fee.  

    To get to the point, Wordpress offers many options, and you can easily attach just about ANY kind of file for download. Blogger, oddly, only offers Video, Images, or links to other web pages.  Having other filetypes, like Midi, requires a workaround. So here's the gist of it:

    Put the Midi file in your Google Drive, give access to anybody with the link, and copy the link.  Then go to Google Drive Direct Link Generator.  Follow the instructions there to paste your link, then create a direct download link to your Google Drive file.  This is extremely important.  If you try to link to the URL generated by Google Drive, it will open an entirely new webpage, loading it in OVER your blog post.  Then it will attempt to play the midi file in your browser.  Then it will tell you the browser can't play that file, and offer to let you download the file.  THEN you can finally select to download the file.

    That's a huge pain, and the reader winds up on a completely different page, no longer on your post.  Using Google Drive Direct Link Generator is awesome, and free.  It lets you put the modified link on any text or image in your Blogger post, and anybody who clicks the link will be able to simply download the file.  I like choosing where to save downloaded files, so use the "Save As" option.  You might have your downloads default to a single directory for all downloads.  Either is fine.  The point is, the viewer easily downloads the file, without disrupting their reading.  

    Next up, those missing sheet music pages.  On the old Grace Notes blog, I used MidiSheetMusic to both play, and generate sheet music.  It did a great job, but is outdated now and doesn't work with any Midi generated by Ableton.  (Resaving from another Midi player doesn't help either.)  Now I'm in the process of finding another program that can convert Midi to Sheet music, and allow me to make image files of the sheet music.  Originally, those images were saved into .pdf files and uploaded to the blog for anybody that wanted to download.  That's still the plan, but it's been difficult to find software that does exactly what I need.

    I thought I'd solved the problem with MuseScore, which is free to download, converts Midi to sheet music, and allows printing.  Unfortunately, my play-by-ear style seems to confuse Musescore, and when it plays the music back, it completely messes up the order of notes.  Especially if they're played very close together to accentuate the melody.  You know... kind of like a "Grace Note"...  

    Not sure why it struggles with that, because it's sleek and sophisticated software that I like a lot.  Unfortunately, it's not the only one that struggles with my midi.  So far the rule is, if it understands my playing properly, it either offers no sheet music generation, or the function is only available with purchase of the full software.  All the free players that generate printable sheet music have been unable to play the files correctly.

    My favorite, Midiano, plays my stuff perfectly, but as of yet, has no option to create sheet music.  That's not really what Midiano's about, anyway.  My second favorite is a paid software called Notation Musician.  They have a free version, so I KNOW it can play my music perfectly, exactly as intended.  They also generate sheet music.  But the free version does not allow print output.  Yes, I could do screengrabs page by page, but I want to do this the right way.  I'll save up until I can buy the software properly.

    That said, it's $90.00 to purchase, and our budget is very finely balanced to buy food, fuel, pay insurance and taxes.  There's not a lot of leeway for fun things that don't 'earn their keep' monetarily.  So it may take a while to buy Notation Musician.  When I do, I'll go back to any posts as needed and add sheet music downloads.  For now, you're welcome to convert my Midi into sheet music in any way that works for you.  Again, I recommend Midiano.  It's an amazing learning tool, and one of the few players that interprets my playing exactly as intended.

And that's where I'm at, in terms of continuing on Grace Notes.  The last two 'technical' posts were intended to act as memory storage, in case I forget how to do these steps, but I published them just in case any of it might be useful to someone else.  If anybody other than my wife or my mom read these last two posts in their entirety, I'll be totally amazed.  :^D

The Technical Side of Grace Notes: Creating the Video and Sharing the Midi Files

     Yesterday marked a huge milestone here.  I finally posted my first brand new page of my own arrangement on piano, with a downloadable midi file of the piano arrangement.  It's been months in the process, learning and relearning all the associated elements. Writing this post is both a celebration... and my crib notes on the general process, in case I forget how to do it all again.  :^)

    I use M-Audio's Hammer 88 to play the songs.  I'm a strictly 'play-it-by-ear' type, so there's no music notation, no hours scribbling my music on notes.  Just sounding out different ways of playing, trying alternatives, and bit by bit designing an arrangement that appeals.  Once the idea is in my head, the hard part is memorizing that arrangement, and practicing until I can play the song (nearly) perfectly.  

    I'm in my 60's, and Covid really messed up my focus and comprehension.  It literally took 3 months to be ready to record.  Then stage fright kicks in.  Hours of playing/recording on Sunday.  More hours on Monday.  Tuesday I sat down, did a practice run-through, and the second attempt was as close to perfect as I'll probably ever get.  So that's the video you see.  (The song in this case is "Stepping On The Clouds.")

   Ableton Live Lite 10 came free with the Hammer 88.  So that's how I play and record the music.  Nothing fancy.  Once Ableton was installed and working, and a few technical set-up issues resolved, it was ready.  To record, I click the round "Record" button, start playing.  When I make a mistake, click "Stop", then "Play", then "Stop".  From trial and error, this activates a blue bar on the midi recording track, which I can then click to make Ableton's notation window pop open.  Click anywhere on the notation (inside the window that just popped up).  Select All (hold down CTRL and type "A".)

    Then I hit the DEL key, and for good measure, also hit the Backspace key.  Now it's a clean slate again.  Click the "Record" button again, and start playing.  Once the whole song is recorded satisfactorily, stop the recording, open the notation window and select All again.  
        {Without selecting ALL, the EXPORT features stay grayed out and don't activate.}

Then, under the FILE dropdown menu, first save the entire process as an Ableton Set (.als file).  Next, still on the File Menu, select EXPORT Midi, and save the midi version of the song.  Lastly, STILL on the File Menu, select EXPORT Audio.  I like to save the file in a ".wav" file format.  Mp3 is more popular, but Wav plays back at a constant speed.  It's not compressed so you can reliably count on the bitrate being stable.  I set it at 44000, 32-bit, and select "Normalize."  It's best if you first set your audio levels to not go over 0 decibels.  If the audio levels go into the red zone, it's set too loud.

    If it's time to record the video as well, I like to start recording, and keep playing even when I make mistakes and have to start over. (Tripod tip: Make sure you're pointing at the piano and frame the image as nicely as you can.  Don't forget to remove unsightly elements like the trash can under the keyboard...)
So, don't stop recording the video.  Keep recording nonstop, through every attempt.  There's a clear visual cue because every restart, the Ableton track needs to be stopped and reset before starting to play again.  When a good recording is achieved, upload the video to your computer.  To find the beginning in-point when editing, start at the end of the video, and scrub backwards until you come to the starting point of your perfect rendition.  Delete all the 'bad' footage in front of that, trim the end a bit if needed, to get your perfect video ready for audio.

    I use HitFilm Express to edit.  It's a free video editor, does a good job, and was easy to learn the bare minimum to create these videos.  Having already imported the video and trimmed it to just the 'good' part, now IMPORT the .wav file.  Drag it to the track just underneath the video.  You should see the video track, including the audio that recorded on the video track, PLUS the .wav audio file you just dragged under the video.

    Make sure both audio tracks are active.  Play the video, and see how close the two audio tracks are to playing in sync.  Make note of how close, which one starts first, then DRAG the .wav left or right to align with the video's audio track.  It's like lip syncing.  You may have to expand the visible track range, to give finer control over how much you move left or right.

    Do this until the Video audio track and the .wav audio are perfectly matching.  Then UNCHECK the video audio.  It's a little speaker symbol on the left.  Play the video again.  Now only the .wav audio track should be playing, and it should be perfectly synced with the fingers moving as they play the piano.
NOTE: if the .wav needs to move farther left than the video track will allow, select all and drag everything to the right to give yourself a bit of working room.

    Once the video and .wav are synced and the original video audio turned off, trim the ends again if needed. If both tracks aren't fully left-justified to the 0:00 starting point, select All and drag them to the 0:00 time marker.  Export the video as an mp4 file on your hard drive, and upload the video to YouTube.  On Blogger, it's easy to click the video button and select your YouTube video for insertion on the blog post.

I treat the audio this way to clean the original video-recorded audio.  Audio recorded directly in your video (I use my cell phone) is fuzzy, and picks up all the ambient noise.  Dogs barking, phones ringing, people talking... the .wav created from Ableton is crisp, clear, and clean of ambient noise.  It's like you recorded in a studio, with proper microphones.

This is a good stopping point.  I'll finish up in the next post.  We'll take a look at getting Midi onto Blogger in a way that's easily downloadable.

Midi Sheet Music Stopped Working - Searching for Alternatives

     I'm barely scraping the surface with Ableton Live 10 Lite.  Recently I learned how to export Midi files.  At least, it worked that time.  Now, it's not working again.
    To be more specific, it IS creating a midi file, but my old standby, Midi Sheet Music, can't load the file.  Can't tell what's different, if the song is longer, more complex, has non-standard play-styles... 

    Backing up a bit, I've used Midi Sheet Music (MSM) for years.  The sound is a bit cheesy and the graphics plain, but it's the ONLY stand-alone program I've ever found that:

    A. Creates Sheet Music from Midi files
    B.  Allows you to print the sheet music
    C. Plays the midi file while scrolling the sheet music.
    D. At the same time, also has a piano keyboard onscreen that shows the notes being played.

    It does it all.  I play by ear, creating a midi file while playing.  Load this midi file into MSM, hit "Play", and it's perfect for someone trying to learn the song.  They can follow along at their own pace, watching the sheet music, and/or the piano, as the song plays visually on both.  If I record a video and upload it to Youtube, the viewer can learn to play it in the same fashion I play.  (Southern Gospel... I'm okay, not great, but my songs have a "Floyd Cramer" feel, and MSM let me share my style with people who have the same taste in music.)
    If the person downloads my MIDI file, and downloads Midi Sheet Music, they can practice playing and adjust the pace as slow or fast as they want.  Except that it's no longer working for me.  When I save a Midi file, and load it into MSM, the result is a lot of gibberish that basically says there's an error in the file and it can't play.

    Maybe the problem is just with this one song, some glitch in the file?  Assuming exactly that, I hit Google up for help.  Nothing solved the problem.  Next I tried to find substitutes.  There were a heap of almost-rans.  Surprisingly, they were all able to import and play my midi file.  I guess that means MSM is seriously outdated.  Some did better than others.  Several would have been excellent, except they couldn't incorporate the sustain pedal.  Others played perfectly, including use of the sustain pedal.

     MuseScore 4 solved the problem of sheet music.  It will output sheets as .pdf files, perfect for letting people download if all they need is the notation.  I'm not certain how good a job it does, since I don't read sheet music.  I can figure out enough of it to feel like it gets the gist of the song, but have always heard midi to sheet music translations can be innacurate. 
    The fine details don't bother me.  Anybody who knows Southern Gospel should be able to figure out the rhythm on their own.  :^)
As long as it gets the notes well enough for people to figure it out, it's good enough.

    MuseScore 4 flopped, though, when it comes to playing midi files.  It was one of those that couldn't hold the sustain, and it couldn't seem to understand my 'southern gospel' twang.  Couldn't find any way to fix it, so every MIDI I imported into MuseScore plays in a bad-sounding staccato sound, and with notes often out of sequence or jammed together.  Not just bad, but horrible.  I never found any free software better at outputting sheet music though, so this is my go-to for people who sight-read their music and can't afford to buy professional software.

    The big winner was an online-only solution at Midiano.com.  I dearly wish it could be downloaded to use off-line.  It's supposed to be possible, but I don't know enough to understand how to do it.  I've emailed the programmer, hope he's able and willing to help.  Anyway, Midiano does it all.  Not quite like Midi Sheet Music, but it's actually an improvement.  The piano option wasn't immediately visible, but it's there, and can be selected in the "View" options.  Lastly, it comes with a HUGE amount of choices.  You can adjust nearly every possible option.  With a bit of tinkering in the options, it does exactly what I needed.

    Midiano was by far and away the best result from two evenings worth of hunting.  It's miles and miles ahead of anything similar.  Plus, it looks fantastic.  Best of all, you get all that for free!  Not sure how he supports his website, but the least I can do is let people know how fantastic Midiano is.

   

These Wonderful Broken Years part II (the short-short music clip)

 Yesterday I woke up with an unusually detailed and vivid dream stuck in my head.  Aside from the general dream, there was a Victrola with wood-grained sides, off-white surface, and vividly shiny brass horn/amplifier.  There was one line of music that was crystal clear; I heard orchestral music with wind and stringed instruments, 3 female voices singing the words in gorgeous harmony, the words "These wonderful broken years, wonderful broken years, these wonderful broken years."  It was the ending line of a song I'd never heard before, and when I got up, could not find the song existing online.  

Having such a short track made me curious in the dream, so I picked up the album and examined it.  Most of the tracks were of normal width, but that last track had a very small grooved section.  The record label wasn't entirely clear, but had the song title, "These Wonderful Broken Years".  The title was in an elegant cursive script, and I could clearly read it in the dream.  When I woke, I still had the vision of the album and the melody of that final line in my memory.

After writing the (much longer) blog about the dream, I spent most of yesterday trying to get that track into mp3 form on my computer.  It took hours, because I've had a Hammer 88 for a couple of years, along with Ableton Live 10 Lite, but only learned enough back then to play live piano.  Then I set the whole thing aside for over a year, and only recently felt inspired to get it all running again.  Even the little I used to know was long gone, and the day was a long learning session.

The most frustrating part was exporting the saved melody from Ableton.  Since the input method was MIDI, I thought the export method had to be MIDI.  It took an embarrassingly long time to realize the output was not MIDI, but the other option.  I don't have that computer running at the moment, but I think it was titled "Audio", or "Song"... something like that, but NOT MIDI.

After all that, here's the musical phrase in mp3 format, repeated 3 times, for a total file length of 28 seconds.  Really short. The record album in the video is pretty close to how I saw it in my dream, including the cursive font... but it seemed larger and easier to read in the dream.
     It also has Southern Gospel/Country & Western leanings.  That's my fault - I play by ear, and this is how I play.  In the dream, it was a much purer orchestral music, like Lawrence Welk would have played... These Wonderful Broken Years