Sunday, December 26, 2010

Fading Galaxy (fretless zither)

One of my earliest music performance memories is from my 2nd grade music class. They brought out auto-harps for all of the kids and handed us a pick to strum along to whatever children's folk song the teacher had picked out. And I remember thinking how much I liked the tone of the instrument: celestial and harp-like. But I was simultaneously getting very mad. After all, here was a beautiful harp instrument that you could only strum chords on. And you couldn't even make the chords yourself. Pressing a button was all that was necessary. I truly felt that the strings of this instrument were wrongly imprisoned. The auto-harp was made conventional by the trappings that made it so user-friendly.

Flash forward twenty something odd years and I find myself combing craigslist for strange instruments. I come across a harp-like instrument. The seller had no idea what it was, only that it was gathering dust in his house. He sold the instrument for a meager sum of cash, and I headed on my way. I bought a couple new strings where it was missing them, and I installed a pick-up on it with the help of Terry from Beat Street Music in Manlius, NY. Then I set about figuring out some ways to play the thing.

In the mean time I'd figured out that this instrument was a Fretless American Zither, also known as The Mandolin Harp. This particular one was made in Brooklyn. I researched all kinds of zithers, and there certainly is quite a range of these instruments...not to mention styles in which they're played. Well, having had no lessons on the instrument, I came up with some strange ways of playing it myself. I use a guitar slide on it and a number of percussive techniques.

In the video below are two short songs off of "For the Unforeseeable Future", both played on the fretless zither.



Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Album Credits

Here's a track list and some info about my new album: "For the Unforeseeable Future"
All songs were recorded on a single Stereo Track: one microphone and one instrument input run direct into a USB Mixer and onto my  laptop. I took care of all recording, mixing and mastering duties myself.

Acoustic guitar, tracks 1-7.
Fretless American Zither, tracks 8, 10, 11
Acoustic guitar and Piano, track 9 (Piano played by Benjamin Shearer)
All of the songs were recorded at my godparents' house on the Westside of Syracuse.
All songs were named by my mother, Silvia de la Garza.

1. Chorus for the Dawn of Time
2. The Invention of a Story
3. Daylight Rippling
4. Ballad for an Undecided Sky
5. Are You Listening?
6. Horseback Dreams
7. Rushing to Revelation
8. Intermezzo
9. Following Constellations
10. The Importance of the Dream
11. Fading Galaxy

Thursday, December 9, 2010

Video for "Chorus for the Dawn of Time"

I tried my hand at video-editing and really liked this result. Nature sometimes works in harmony with music produced by humans, and I felt some synergy with this creature.This is Track One off of "For the Unforeseeable Future".

Tuesday, December 7, 2010