Writing new

I was thinking of a good title for this blog. I also wanted to organize this blog better. Neither of these happened to my expectation. Finally decided to use the domain name I registered couple of years ago but never used. With that, I guess, I'll get a good title for my blog and will organize better.Ok here you go : http://blogs.ragadb.com. I'll not discontinue this blog. Thinking of keeping this as such.

Recording

Recording might look like a manual job. But it is one of the most critical and creative task too. We've passed the days where all instruments and vocals would be recorded at the same time. Agreed that recording an orchestra live is more organic way of producing music. However, with more audience with better music knowledge and more ears looking for more detailed and fresh sounds, demand for sound quality has raised many times. With more crisp and sonic quality of sound expected at every corner of your music, it has become essential every single instrument needs to be recorded with more focus and dedicated effort.

So every musician / recording engineer would figure out his/her own process of recording to render the music with great detail. When it comes to me, I've come up with things that work for me. I record one instrument at a time Or one voice at a time. This helps to work on each instrument/voice with more focus, dedication and passion. To me, vocal recording is the most critical recording in your music. Get it right everything else would follow.

When it comes to vocal recording, you can pull out a lots of technical tips all around the web. Here are some basic non-technical tips that I use for my own self.

* Before recording, understand the lyrics completely.
* Try to sing without seeing the lyrics.
* While singing, keep your timing and be in the pitch. And then just focus on the lyrics. Don't listen to additional music.
* Use minimal BGM tracks for recording (may be simple percussion, chord & bass tracks). More tracks on headphone could diverse the focus.
* Sing as if you sing a solo song in front of your best audience ever.

There could be many more. I would add them as I get them.

Fahrenheit

Recently I started working on select-songs from my collection of compositions.

I usually work on the flow and never much worried about naming or write ups. But this time, since I would mostly be working remote, I thought it would be good to name it and and explain what I want to do. Hope this would help all interested people and friends. So here you go.

I don't compose music on regular basis. Just do whenever I get something in mind that sticks for a while with a good feeling (Tamil and English). Now I have handful of compositions. Some of them are ready to record. Need to write lyrics for some other songs. So I'm looking for lyricists and singers (male / female) who would be interested.

In a nutshell, I want to give life to select-compositions. I want to consider this as a project (just like in work at office) and want to name it to help referring to. Since I started this project this summer I wanted to name this project as "Fahrenheit" (some name related to heat / hot, and the name of our first western band). And this is not to create an album or something. This is a non-commercial project.

So I'm looking for people who have passion for writing or singing. I can share my compositions on request, and if you are really interested in some, I'm looking forward to work with you for lyrics or recording your voice.

If you (or your friends) are interested, please feel free to reach me at jsjerald@gmail.com

Looking forward for this interesting work.

Guitar Processor : Line 6 POD X3 Vs BOSS GT-10

Recently I upgraded my guitar processor to BOSS GT-10. Before deciding on GT-10, I reviewed couple of processors. And I ended up comparing just two processors for my price range.

1) POD X3 Live (X3L)
2) BOSS GT-10 (GT-10)

There are many sites you can get reviews of these processors. You can also find many demonstrations in youtube. I'm just compiling my comparison for the reason that it could help somebody who needs a quick comparison.

Pod X3 Live

Pros :

* Good online experience. Find many new tones from other users online.
* Gear Box software for recording. You can also edit effects using Gear Box.
* You can connect your microphone for vocals.
* You can simultaneously play guitar and sing vocals in microphone.
* You can simultaneously apply two amps and models for a single instrument. Or simultaneously play two instruments with different effects and processors.
* Good for recording purposes.
Jack of all trades.

Cons :

* Harmonizer, Whammy and Detune are missing
* Bass effects are not satisfactory / professional.
* The foot peadals seems to be weak.

GT-10

Pros :

* Quality of tones is great.
* Good for live performances.
* Phrase loop (you can record and play back loops upto 38 secs).

Cons :

* No software bundled with GT-10.
* Boss effects are not that good.
* When playing overdrives, sometimes the buzz and the finger tapping sound that the guitar pick-up, sends to the processor are getting amplified. There are two level of noise gates and I haven't explored them in depth. So I cann't conclude anything now. Not sure this will be the same case with X3L.

Conclusion:

POD X3 seems to beat GT-10 in many features and seemed to be Jack of all trades. One significant area where GT-10 beats POD X3 is the quality of tones which is the biggest reason I fell for it.

Below are the reasons why I did not go with X3L

* I got enough DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) softwares (open source as well as commercials) so I was not looking for a DAW software to accompany my guitar processor.
* Practically I may never plug a microphone. I already got an amp. Any effects I can apply by DAW.
* Practically I may never play two instruments together with this processor.
* I badly need whammy effects (harmonizer & detune are not big deals for me).
* I don't know if there is any time limitation with respect to phare looping in X3L. The lengthiest phrase i've ever needed to loop was never more than 10 - 20 secs. So the 38 secs of phrase looping in GT-10 is more generous for me.

Thats it. Take it with your own pinch of salt. If tone qualities are not a big deal, and you need many features of X3L then X3L would be a good choice. Also I've never owned X3L. So all I tell about the quality of tone in X3L are what I got from several online materials, discussions and reviews. If I'm wrong on quality of tones, POD X3 Live seems to have all.

I guess, I've given an unbiased comparison of these two processors. See what you need and decide. Hope this helps.

Harp

Yesterday we went to a children's museum (ImageinIt) in Atlanta. My daughter enjoyed it well. There were lot of toys, play areas, costumes, events and more, thrilling the kids. In one of the event they conducted, there was a special guest, a harpist. She, the harpist, first introduced the instrument (Harp) to the kids and then she was playing some melodies in her harp. She explained to the kids, how the harpists entertained the Kings in earlier days. And the she played some 3 tunes. One in very slow pace, to create peaceful mind, when the King feels so lonely, and others, in a medium and fast paced rhytm, to be create happy modes when the King is very happy. The harpist played, like a piano, the main melody in the right hand and the supporting melody and the bass in the left hand. This is the first time I saw a harp being played in live and it was very great.

This remembered me another event, Saarang '06, where in one of the guest performances, a celtic music performance, Chapmanstick was played. It was the first time for me to see a Chapmanstick played. It is really interesting and exciting to listen to such rare instruments and instrumentalists.

Below is a snap of the harpist when she was playing it.

'Mundhinam Paarthene' Guitar chord

I like the songs of Vaarnam Aayiram very much. After a long time I took my guitar and tried the chords for the song 'Mundhinam Paarthene' (music composed by Haris Jeyaraj). Ok here is the chord sequence I played.

Pallavi
-------

Mundhinam | Paarthene ...
|  E  |  E  |  A  |  A  |  E  |  E  |  A  |  A  |
|  A  |  A  |  G  |  G  |  D  |  D  |  A  |  A  |
|  E  |  E  |  A  |  A  |  E  |  E  |  A  |  A  |
|  A  |  A  |  G  |  G  |  D  |  D  |  A  |  A  |

Vaanathil...
|  E  |  E  |  Bm |  Bm |  E  |  E  |  Bm |  Bm |
|  E  |  E  |  Bm |  Bm |  E  |  E  |  Bm |  Bm |

Ippodhe ...             Vandhalenna
|  E  |  E  |  E  |  E  |  Am |  Am |  Am |  Am |
|  E  |  E  |  E  |  E  |  Am |  Am |  Am |  Am |


Saranam
--------
Thulaa...
|  A  |  A  |  Bm |  A  |  A  |  A  |  Bm |  A  |
|  A  |  A  |  E  | F#m |  E  |  E  |  Bm |  Bm |
|  A  |  A  |  Bm |  Bm |  A  |  A  |  D  |  D  |
|  A  |  A  |  Bm |  Bm |  A  |  A  |  D  |  D  |
|  C  |  C  |  E4 |  E4 |  E  |  E  |  E4 |  -  | 

update:

i) Modified the Em chord in the last line of the saranam to E
ii) Tried to record playing the chords. Below are two versions of the same.

Recently I listened to the songs of 'Vaaranam Ayiram'. As usual, in all the songs, there are loads of obvious Harris patterns. But these familiar patterns, didn't stop me enjoy the songs, after listening couple of times. Mundhinam, Nenjukkul and Anjala will be my top list. Composition, recording and singers selection speak for the professional excellence of Harris Jeyaraj. You can see many acoustic guitar preludes / interludes in his composition. In that sense, 'Mundhinam' and 'Nenjukkul' are the songs pulling me with the acoustic guitar. Support of rhythm guitars, may be 12 Strings?, is sweet.

But beyond all these, it is the voice of Naresh Iyer, Hariharan and Karthik that duck me to turn them on while driving. Though Prashanthi, in 'Mundhinam', seemed to me, like false voice on high notes, still her voice is a bait. Though, I usually don't like songs like 'Anjala', this song is an exception for me. If I carefully listen to this song, I really enjoy the variety of beauty added by Karthik, from the pronunciation to the 'gamagam'.

Hats off to the work.