Guitar Circle New England Meeting Minutes

2008-08-04T02:11:00.002-04:00

Began at 7:30, Glenn, Martin and Chris present. Dev arrived shortly after. Unamplified. Warmed up with Askesis and Growing Circle. Moved on to Love is Green, recapping, then working through the rest of the piece. After our first complete pass through, a break. Three more complete passes. Some work on Thrak to close.

GH

march 9 art loft

2008-03-11T13:31:00.002-04:00

dev chris david alex victor elan
we arrived at the new earlier time. after setting up and some quick individual warm up we began our work with elan. we began with some talking about what we were do when we sit quietly just before begin, this gave elan some sense of where we are each at. he presented a sitting exercise and worked with applying the work of the exercise into the playing of the instrument. it was also suggested we take 30 seconds or so at noon to revisit this work during the day. after we finished up with elan we began a 15 minute warm up on the right hand, working at first on the 2nd primary and through the 3 note ostinato variations of the 2nd primary. we began to do section work focusing on askesis with the click track at various speeds. after running into various walls we began to look more individually at what we are doing that makes playing for extended periods of time so difficult. elan will not be at the next meeting but looks forward to a series of ongoing meetings after that.

march 2nd art loft

2008-03-03T08:57:00.003-05:00

dev, chris, glenn, alex, victor

after the successful completion of our performance challenge, we've decided to undertake a short recording project. there was some discussion of practicalities. the pieces on the list are: flying home, askesis, passage, love is green, invention 1, lifelight, and chrysanthemum.

we worked on flying home with the click track. notes given were for bass players to play the last A before dropping down to the dmin section, be sure the first C is good loud, and that the last C is also well nailed and properly muted when returning up to the re-intros. leads should learn to also hear the phrasing of the notes at the bottom of the arpeggios. also, the piece should be easily counted by all.

askesis also saw some click track work. it was suggested to study one's relationship with the metronome regarding time feel. as an experiment we asked the basses to shift to playing slightly ahead of the beat during the 15/8 section. there were a couple of cycles of clear success in this, and it had the effect of moving the bass to the front of the soundstage. there was some discussion of what it might take to develop skill in playing in front of, or behind the beat. there were noticable open string ringing from poor use of the left hand in some of the intro and tricky part arpeggios. it's critical for recording that there be no extraneous noise, especially as we are going to be recording to open mics. again the whole piece should be easily counted by all.

Circle January 06, 2008

2008-01-07T00:58:00.000-05:00

Location: Art Loft, Boston
Attendees: Alex, Chris, David, Martin & Victor

We began the circle around 7:30 with a sound check of the new mixing board and DI. The sound was noticeably cleaner than the old system. We ran through the repertoire for the
upcoming performance on March 16th (Not necessarily in this order):
Askesis
Third Relation
Lifelight
Asturias
Calliope
Flying Home
EoTN
Growing Circle
We too a break and Victor added a sub-woofer to the system which rounded out the bottom end nicely. Victor read a Bennett passage on the Sevenfold Work.
We ran the above pieces again and also Larks Thraak. There was discussion as to which pieces David will play on due to his schedule. Dev is currently not going to be able to play the gig. Victor said we need to bring happiness to our playing on Third Relation . He said this was active engagement without egoism so as to not speed up the piece or conversely passively engagement that slows it down. Victor commented the middle section of Third was not smooth in terms of the melodies for the leads and there was a delay in playing the D that starts (Dm7?) at the beginning of the last descending line in the middle section . The second time we ran Lifelight, we ran multiple sections multiple times. The 2nd A section was decided to be two measures with the bass and mids, and two with the mids ending on the and of four. Victor encouraged Chris to learn IBE. We finished around 10 as Alex had an early day on Monday.

loft, 9-23

2007-09-24T23:03:00.000-04:00

alex, chris, martin, dev, david, victor

we circulated, moving attention through the limbs with each note while we waited for martin.

we made and inventory of who plays what part on 20 different pieces. which has been sent out to the group.

we made a decent tentative arrangement of driving force.

we rehearsed lifelight.

some logistics about attendance.

and that was it....

-v

9-16-7

2007-09-19T11:38:00.000-04:00

loft, david, martin, dev, alex, chris, victor

we spent most of the meeting working on victor's new piece, final form:

C section
2 bars just bass
4 bars w/ mids
4 bars w/ fast highline

A section
2 bars all, bass drops out on the 2nd 6
2 bars highs and mids mids drop out on 2nd and-of-4
1 bar just highs highs end on the 6 mids come with pick up on the 6

C section
4 bars all (high line ends with substitution of A 1str 14 fr, C 2nd str 8 fr, A 1str 14fr for last two notes of phrase plus downbeat of A section.)

A section
1 bar lows and mids (highs drop out on the down beat)
1 bar just mids mids out on 6

3 beat rest from downbeat then

D section basses in on the 1 after the 3 beat rest
highs in with mids on the 3
4 bars 6 (or 2 of 12)

C section same as d (highs and mids hang on their chords over the downbeat of the basses until beat 3)

E section 2 bars of 6 (same deal for highs and mids re hanging)

f# section highs play four note tag (repeating last two notes of their pattern twice) after end of 3 patterns of 6 to slide up half step to join basses on the down beat of the Eb section.
mids come in ont the one with basses on Eb section.

Eb section is now one bar of 6 with everyone beginning on together on the 1, and ending on the 3 except the mids who end on the and-of-3. (which is to say basses and mids play their pattern once.)

we then return to C for 4 bars of 6. basses play an open A 3rd string on and-of- 6 and a low A on the down beat following, holding the 1 sting C from beat 6.

mids play G of the downbeat.

highs play the b on the 7th fret of the 2nd string on the last downbeat instead of their usual E.

we also worked on askesis and talked a bit more about logistics for regular performing.

9-9-7 art loft

2007-09-10T22:39:00.000-04:00

david, chris, alex, victor.

we undertook a survey of how much repertoire we have. played through themes 3-7 and bicycling, asturius, growing circle. this much took 30minutes. currently i am assessing our known potential for regular performing

aspiration
eye of the needle
third relation
caliope
askesis
moving force
bicycling to afghanistan
growing circle
asturius
invention #1
homage to jsb
passage
chrysanthemum

driving force
flying home
victor's new piece
circulations
choose a note
embroidery

all in all enough to get us started if we could learn our parts...

a performance team would have to meet a certain level of competence. perhaps making it through one's part with one or two mistakes at worst, as this would mean that a piece might only have 14 mistakes at most..... hmmm.... well this is another thing to figure out.....

we worked on the final form for victor's new piece. which seems pretty close to done.

July 22 - All Day work in the Circle

2007-07-22T09:38:00.000-04:00

Today we met as a group from approximately 11:30 AM until 7:00 PM at Chez Hughes. There were 8 in attendance: Victor, Dev, Alex, Chris, Glenn, Martin, David, Mary Beth clockwise around the circle.

Three points of view of the day:

Glenn
Alex
Mary Beth (July 26th Entry)

More points of view welcome...

afl

Non-comedic minutes for Sunday, June 24, 2007

2007-07-01T18:45:00.001-04:00

Meeting attendees: Victory, Chris, Glenn, and Mary Beth

We began by singing C major together. Then, did a “sing” of C-D-C-E-C-F, etc. These exercises were done ascending and descending the scale. We seemed to have the most trouble with the E to G range, so we focused on that.

Then, we did C major in four octaves as/des with a few false starts but completed shortly.

We did Victor’s exercises: (1) reversing the direction of C major by playing a note 2X, and (2) reversing the direction of playing the scale ascending or descending by playing a triplet of the next two notes (a turn around pattern). Then we combined these two exercises.

We worked on Askesis. Victor noted that it is important to practice your part with others who play your part. We don’t do this very often in the circle. Also, it’s good to practice plugged in. We played Askesis through once and then did parts.

We worked on triads less successfully. More struggle here. But we need to have this down as part of our prep for the course in August.

We practiced Driving Force parts. We were about to work on Victor’s piece but didn’t because folks need some work on their parts.

Next time: Be prepared to do triads in the middle of the fret board.

Minutes submitted by MBAH, 7/1/07 (had the minutes done last week but it took me a while to find my blogger password)

sunday june 24

2007-06-25T19:52:00.000-04:00

captain spaulding played by groucho, ravelli by chico.

Spaulding: What do you fellas get an hour?
Ravelli: For playing, we get-a ten dollars an hour.
Spaulding: I see. What do you get for not playing?
Ravelli: Twelve dollars an hour.
Spaulding: Well, clip me off a piece of that.
Ravelli: Now for rehearsing, we make special rate. That's-a fifteen dollars an hour...That's-a for rehearsing.
Spaulding: And what do you get for not rehearsing?
Ravelli: You couldn't afford it. You see, if we don't rehearse, we a-don't play, and if we don't play (he snaps his finger) - that runs into money.
Spaulding: How much would you want to run into an open manhole?
Ravelli: Just-a the cover charge! Ha, ha, ha.
Spaulding: Well, drop in some time.
Ravelli: Sewer.
Spaulding: Well, we cleaned that up pretty well.
Ravelli: Well, let's see how-a we stand.
Spaulding: Flat-footed.
Ravelli: Yesterday, we didn't come. (To Mrs. Rittenhouse) You remember, yesterday we didn't come?
Spaulding: Oh, I remember.
Ravelli: Yes, that's three hundred dollars.
Spaulding: Yesterday, you didn't come, that's three hundred dollars?
Ravelli: Yes, three hundred dollars.
Spaulding: Well, that's reasonable. I can see that alright.
Ravelli: Now today, we did come. That's-a (pause)..
Spaulding: That's a hundred you owe us.
Ravelli: Hey, I bet I'm gonna lose on the deal. Tomorrow we leave. That's worth about (pause)..
Spaulding: A million dollars.
Ravelli: Yeah, that's alright for me, but I've got a partner.
Spaulding: What?!

more notes from mary beth to follow.

6/10/2007 Circle Meeting - Art Loft, Boston

2007-06-11T14:13:00.000-04:00

In Attendance: Victor, MB, David, Martin, Chris, Alex

The team arrives, makes the climb up to the 5th floor and sets up for the meeting. Some hum is in the stage-left speaker that Victor can't drive away, so we leave it as is and press on.

After tuning, we begin with an attempt at circulating the C Major scale in 4 octaves. After three unsuccessful attempts, Victor redirects us to a series of games:

- First, circulating up and down in three octaves. At any time, one of the circulators may play their note twice - this will reverse the direction of the circulation through the players. We worked through this fairly well, but it really began to become comfortable when Victor asked that we say the name of the note as we circulated. As we gained facility with this, Victor had us move on to...

- Second, same as the above, with the addition that a player could play three notes, their note, the one above it or below it, depending on the direction of the circulation, and then their note again. This would change the direction of the circulation in the scale, but not through the players. For example, playing an ascending scale, if my note were an A, I play A-B-A, then the next person would play the G below my A.

(Note taker's aside: The second game proved interesting, and there were moments where the exercise and the scale really began to click for all of us as a group. For me, experientially, these two games, while taxing, were very fun. I also witnessed where an intention had a palpable effect - in this case, when a change in circulation direction was indicated, and the guitarist looked as if to change the direction of the players. The circulation halted completely at that moment, not just because the player looked in that direction, but because the intent to go that direction was there.)

Break.

We returned after the break, and circulated in thirds up and down four octaves. We then attempted circulating triads up four octaves, but were not able to get much past the third octave. Victor noted some ways to approach these triads, particularly working across two strings, as a way to expand what is available to us on the fretboard. He also noted that this was likely the most difficult thing we would be doing in this stage of scale work, and that once this became second nature, would make the whole fretboard available. He also likened the awkwardness to that stage where we first learned the basics of the C Major scale.

We then worked some on Victor's new (unnamed) piece, at a bit higher tempo than usual - the singing quality of the piece is now beginning to come through. A (shaky) attempt at Askesis, and an incomplete pass at the Bartók Hommage concluded the meeting.

Sunday, May 6th - Art Loft

2007-05-08T15:27:00.000-04:00

In attendance: Victor, MB, David, Martin, Glenn, Alex

The first half of the meeting was spent with circulating in C Major in 4 octaves, first in thirds then chromatically. The second half of the meeting after the break was spent circulating C Major triads in two different ways.

Some comments/observations made by Victor during this (rather intense) work:

- It would be useful in the moments where we make mistakes to observe and note the "person" that appears in that moment, such as:

The "Gotta Get It Right" Guy
The "What Was My Note Again" Guy
The "Did You Make A Mistake Or Did I" Guy
The "I Can't Have Made A Mistake" Guy
The "You Took Too Long To Pass The Note" Guy
etc.

- Victor noted that there are many "maps" of C Major, all useful, and the more we have immediately available, the less likely we are to get lost. Certain maps, when available, can ease the transition into another map. Some maps (and there are many others):

C Major chromatically
C Major in 3rds, 4ths, 5ths, 6ths, 7ths
C Major triad arpeggios
C Major 7th arpeggios
etc.

- Finally, Victor noted that it would be very useful to understand how we each learn. We spend much time trying to learn in a hit or miss fashion. If we understood how we learned, we could use that to improve the speed and clarity with which we learn something.

afl

april 22nd and earthday at m.i.t

2007-05-04T11:17:00.000-04:00

further rehearsal at the art loft. no terry or glenn but everyone else. running through the repertoire and ideas that might further the length of our 3rd annual show at m.i.t. for earth day.

the show went for the most part quite well, and had an extremely strong beginning. there were some things that detracted, partly personal preparation, partly the lack of consistent full group rehearsals. in an ideal world we'd have 3 full group rehearsals to gel a group. in this instance we had one and it was about 3 weeks before the gig, and one member only made one or two rehearsals at all.

still the show was one of our strongest, and the woman who runs the student center at m.i.t. so likes us that she is looking at having us back for other events during the year as well!

-victor

4/15/2007 - Art Loft

2007-04-20T13:22:00.000-04:00

In Attendance: Victor, Glenn, Dev, Chris, Alex

The team arrives in the deluge of the N'oreaster and begins to set up. Glenn's guitar is not cooperating (bad battery/connection), we abandon amplification and move to a circle.

We begin with some work on circulating C Major. After several attempts, Victor works us through the scale in 6ths (as there are 5 of us...). We attempt a final circulation after this work, and while it is more confident, we ultimately do not manage to get through the whole thing.

Work for the evening on the following pieces, adjusting parts for the members present as needed:

Eye of the Needle - three times through
Third Relation - some mistakes and detail work to be done, particularly on transitions
Askesis - 4 to 1 in favor of the basses, more detail work required here for the sections, and some corrections made for Chris on his part

A break, in which Victor shares a dream...

Thrak - some extensive work here, particularly on the 5 vs. 7 section. A couple of instances where the pattern established itself well, but didn't quite maintain
Asturias - Once through with the team

afl

3-25-07

2007-03-28T09:32:00.000-04:00

alex, chris, glenn, martin, david, mb, victor

warmed up on v's new piece. decided we are doing the earth day show for the 3rd year. worked on eye of the needle (which is pretty much ready), third relation (which needs attention to transitions especially in the alternate ending lines, and attention to appropriate dynamics), asturius (which needs attention in transitions to twinkles), passage which needs to be practiced at home to the midi file) , invention #1 (which needs stronger minds), growing circle (practice), larks (no sprained wrists) thrak (needs personal practice).

we spent some time on cmaj up 4 octaves. and then playing each note as group up and down all octaves in sequence.

3-11-07 art loft

2007-03-12T00:14:00.000-04:00

david glenn martin mb dev victor

work covered: circulation. third relation. loop of alternate ending amin a dmin melodies. invention #1 looped 3 times in a row. passage. growing circles. some points touched. playing on and ahead of the beat. playing lightly though amplified. playing from the center of your instrument's sound. keeping your place in an 11 beat circulation at a brisk tempo. coming in on sections lightly or heavily as content demands.

this work was towards our appearance at the old cambridge baptist church next sunday.

2-25-7 art loft

2007-02-27T09:24:00.000-05:00

david, glenn, MB, martin, victor

we started off doing some click track work to warm up. sections of 3rd relation, first Amin to Dmin with alternate endings, then just Amin then just the Second variation of the Amin section. we started at 78 bpm, but then moved back to 74 bpm.

this was very challenging for the group.

we worked on the new circulation piece, but david didn't bring his sheet for this, and after a time we found that we didn't know the piece well enough to proceed.

we played through invention #1 a few times, there were some good moments, but on the whole we still don't have it in the hands.

we played through growing circle. once slowly and once quickly.

we worked on eye of the needle. there is some ambiguity about where the beat falls. to really clarify how this is we played through with the click track, and then in particular worked on the Dmin section with the click.

we are asked to be able to tap our foot, place the vocal count of the beat, and play the note precisely at the same moment as the wieght of the attack of the click or metronome.

we are not meeting next week, though hopefully will meet twice the week after that, in preparation for the sevice at the old cambridge baptist church.

2-18-7 art loft

2007-02-27T09:22:00.000-05:00

david, victor, and mb...

this was in many ways more of a private lesson with david, though mary beth showed up at the end too. we did discover the importance of holding the pick in the middle of the pick. we also worked some on counting the lead line of askesis as 7 bars of 6.....

2-11-7 art loft.

2007-02-12T21:33:00.000-05:00

david mb victor.

work began with speed drills on the A string and then adding the D string. for a moment we touched on adding a 1234 fingering with the left hand. we worked on 3rd relation. and on askesis. we looked at an exercise involving counting the main melody in 7 bars of 6. we looked at taking numerous sequential approaches to the body and hands in practicing. we worked a little on the new piece. we spent a little time trying to figure out why it sounds so diffent if victor is playing with mary beth and david or not.

from previous correspondence this week:

MB made a couple of comments as we were driving home that I think had merit:

*We should begin each session with some calisthenics, for perhaps a half hour. (My suggestion would be to take turns leading this.)

*We should play each piece of repertoire that is currently "active" at least once per session.

So if our sessions are two and a half hours long: the first half hour would be warm-up, the next hour would be playing repertoire that we already know, and the last hour would be for working on new material, or going back over things that need work.

MB is right for the most part. especially the full group pieces. i pulled us off that track last night because it would be much more productive for us to wait one more week for work martin and i are doing to settle in and it gave us an opportunity to get to your thing. managing the few hours we have together is always a challenge for me as there is so much to tackle. every choice is also an exclusion. while you are gone we will start up preparations for ocbc, and usually my focus turns to the whole repertoire as a performance approaches, (and towards technique, group interaction and currently group specific composition during the in between time). i'm not sure why, but i have a feeling that we are going to be heading into a time where we perform more regularly and possibly in front of more people soon enough. and there is also a performative aspect of preparing for the circulation project.

some nights i have found that we are too tired at the end of the night to accomplish working on new material.

and ideally of course people would show up to the circle having already practiced that day, fairly warmed up....

so generally her suggestion is not far from what i hope to implement depending on what mode we are headed.

at the beginning i look for the piece or exercise that will warm us up for what our state that particular night is. please bear in mind though, that this might be something challenging our interactivity, or ability to hold a pattern in our mind (aspects which we are equally weak at), as well using our hands.

and then to address repertoire or new material as our energy, time and performance commitments necessitate.

my hope and to some extent expectation is that we are keeping these pieces alive on our own even if they are not being played/worked in the group. it is a good idea to have a list and at least a few times a week (preferably every day) be checking to see how everything is. putting the tough ones on the front burner. ideally, there should be no ground lost if, say, we focus on thrak in november and then play it again in february.... also usually, a piece should be focussed on until it is completely mastered, right now the pieces for that is 3rd relation and askesis. (we still have only momentarily played eye of the needle, as our last effort to vocalize the bass line showed us)

unless/until we move to two meetings a week and/or everyone starts coming for regular private lessons, this kind of personal maintenance will be key, especially if we are to take the circle to next level.

another facet of this is that we have rather different weaknesses in our playing. when going through the repertoire we need to be attentive that we are working the thing the group needs us to work on, and not on what our habitual thinking of what that is.

i probably should iterate that there is a shift taking place because of the strides we have made up to now. and it means that the way that we each have worked has to be slightly reorganized. it might mean working more, but also it means just this kind of clarification. our needs are shifting.

for my part it is crucial to get this kind of input. one way or another.....

aspiration
third relation
askesis
eye of the needle
hommage a jsb
invention #1
growing circle
calliope
bicycling to afghanistan
larks/thrak
chrysanthemum
moving force
asturius
C maj up and down the neck.

2007-02-05T00:30:00.000-05:00

2-4-7

the usual 5.

work began on invention #1 until marting showed up. mostly repetition towards competence of parts. when we know our notes it works. further work on the new piece as a warm up, and then work on circulation#1 (working title) again, the larger challenge shems to be continuity of focus... everyone seems quite overworked. we played 3rd relation twice and askesis. glenn presented his approach to fast picking, to a speed of 152 bpm we explored loose wrist shaking, even tapping starting with right hand, starting with left hand tapping side of hand, scraping with the pick, brush picking, picking. afterwards we tried the new piece again , 3rd relation one last time.

1-28-07 art loft

2007-01-29T00:05:00.000-05:00

MB, David, Martin, Glenn and Victor

David and MB worked with Victor on the new circulation piece, and spent a couple of minutes on Victor's new piece. Martin and Glenn arrived and we worked full on on Victor's circulation piece for about an hour and half, almost (well, nearly almost...) working it through from start to finish. we will try to have this for our appearance at the old cambridge baptist church on march 18. for my part it was interesting to see the quantity of frustration vented into the group, but equally moving was the persistence to learn. we worked a moment on the A section of Victor's new piece, with time taken to learn the fast lead line. we worked on third relation twice through, with some attention given to heavyhandedness the second time. we ran invention 1 which seemed to retain the hard work we put in last week and decided to try to start from this place with it next week. afterwards martin and victor stayed behind to work a bit more on third relation.

sunday jan 21 art studio south end

2007-01-22T01:16:00.000-05:00

MB, Glenn, David and Victor.

watched a bit of the caravan show video documentation. but few observations were made.

a long session of embroidery, with the aim for me of having the group get more accustomed to making choices quickly from listening to the whole. at one point i asked people to remember what they were doing, and tried to help mary beth with an additional alternation of her bass line. but having done that we were unable to accurately resume the other voices.

we worked on the first 8 bars of third relation, after first playing the piece. we worked with alternating dropping out for 4 beats and resuming playing. criculating on open a with complete efficiency. circulating on the opening note of 3rd relation with complete efficiency, circulating 1st 2 and 1st 4 note sets of 3rd relation with complete efficiency, adding a focus of keeping the notes even. playing the 1st eight bars with complete evenness, stopping after compentency in this was established and resuming off a count with the exact same competency. we did more of passing dropping out for 4 bars, and then played the piece. there was some uneveness in the picking the second two beats of the A min section observed, but otherwise the piece was much improved.

we worked on the invention #1 circulation. we worked on picking from a physical attitude of readyness in the right hand. we worked on clicking 16th notes as we went. we worked on listening to the note just before and just after, looking at where the pulse sits in relation to the melody, where it sits in relation to our note, and holding our notes long enough.

we talked some about the upcoming ocbc show

we'll meet at 7:30 next week.

Sunday January 14th

2007-01-15T11:30:00.000-05:00

Location: Jane's studio, South Boston
Attendees: Martin, MB, Glenn, David, Victor

First meeting of 2007, after about a month hiatus.

Martin was going to be a bit late arriving. MB, Glenn and David set up the speakers so we could play plugged in. We watched a recording of our gig at Bridge's school, especially the awful Embroidery, which just got worse and worse as it went along. Victor told us to watch for our startle reflexes. Other interesting moments throughout the other pieces. Bach piece had a lot of good moments. Martin arrived, and we re-watched the Embroidery. Victor then put on the Crossroads DVD from Odaiko New England as an example of the type of performance we should be striving for. Discussion about how to arrive at that point. Discussion about future directions with the circle. The need to apply attention more constantly to ourselves. How our interaction with Victor has changed since the early days, and how we might need to recapture some of the early feel as a way to have the necessary attention. Some repertoire work on Growing Circle, Askesis and the Invention. For Askesis, make sure we are not "swinging" the unison section.

DBK

Note: Posting backdated to show up in proper order.

Minutes for Oct 29th

2006-10-30T00:40:00.000-05:00

Attendees: Glenn, MaryBeth, Martin & Victor

The meeting began with V, M&M as we were there from the beginners circle. We began with Askesis and looped the C# section. Martin and Victor began working on Third Relation and after this Glenn arrived. We worked more on Askesis playing through then looping the G# and C# sections. We continued with repertoire working on 3rd Relation, Growing Circle, Moving Force, Hommage a JSB, Larks Thraak, EoTN and Chrysanthemum. We spoke of the upcoming performance requirements and schedule. Victor said we will probably not have circle the night of the 12th as we have a rehearsal at 3rd Life that morning. As we broke up Martin asked a question about dealing with physical irritation during sitting.

Minutes for October 22

2006-10-23T21:27:00.000-04:00

Attendees: Victor, David, MBAH

The meeting began with Victor asking us what we have been working on. David had been working on the arpeggios for the Colrain course. Mary Beth had been attempting to practice for four hours straight. Although she has logged maybe three hours at a time (with breaks) on two occasions, being able to complete four hours has been an elusive achievement. We then played Third Relation. Victor listened to us loop the melody line. Then, Victor gave us some coaching on our right hands. Then, we worked on Askesis and a discussion followed. Victor talked about knowing the map of a song (this includes knowing the counts, patterns, changes, etc). The next stage is to experience the whole song at once so that playing isn’t a linear exercise, but holistic one. In this way, the songs (particularly the repertoire pieces) can teach you things -- such as what the middle of a moment is or feels like. We also talked about the personalities of playing (i.e., playing authoritatively), and about the need to meet players in the middle – for example, a stronger player can soften to blend with a softer player and vice versa. We attempted the Arpeggios but MB was not up to speed. Victor noted that having smaller circles is probably valuable right now as it allows us to work on finer points of our playing for the greater good of our playing as a group.

Meeting Minutes September 17th

2006-09-18T00:29:00.000-04:00

Met at the dojo at 8:45 PM. Attendees: Victor, MB, Martin, Glenn, and Chris P (an attendee of the Free Circle). Another attendee, Armand, stayed and watched. Chris joined us in the circle. We began by tuning. We played a circulation and then Third Relation. This went well. Then, Victor asked us what we have been working on. MB had worked on Third Relation and the Bach piece most recently. Martin is working on a new composition. Glenn has a new composition titled The World Blind. He showed us how it goes, we picked up on the chord progressions for two parts and played them in a loop while Victor tried to work out a baseline. We did some more circulating. Then, played EotN which felt rocky. A break consisted of MB talking about the dance project and going over a recently generated handout. The plans seemed to land with the group who were doing some AT lie down work while listening to the handout review. After this Chris P and Armad left us. We worked on embroidery exercises first normal with more melody from MB and fewer notes from the regular note-rich. Then, some work on rhythm recognition from the player to the left IDed before beginning a new embroidery. Finally, a wonderful circulation I thought. The meeting ended with discussion about new elements. Then, Victor declared that he was choosing to be done, so we were. Post-meeting...Jeff (a Free Circle participant) had left us with pics from ArtBeat and last years Ruby and Billy summer party. We discussed the Lowell gig. Homeward. -- MBAH

Meeting Minutes - Sunday Sep. 10th

2006-09-11T13:25:00.000-04:00

Attendees: Victor, Glenn, David, Mary-Beth
Location: South Boston

When we arrived, the free Beginner's Circle was finishing up a little late. Took a while to get them out and us set up. Discussion about the gig last Friday, the need for a dedicated sound person, what the circle should be doing, what's getting in the way (key point: negative emotions in everyday life and their effect on our playing). Observation how many pieces start out pretty well, then fall apart midway through, in contrast to how we used to play them (though Eye of the Needle still tends to start weaker and end stronger). Worked on the Bach invention for about an hour. Was much rustier than at the performance. Didn't have any mistake-free run-throughs, but improvement as we went along. Eye of the Needle, Third Relation (almost made it through intro without any open strings), and an aborted Bicycling to Afghanistan. Discussion about the possibility of a 6-day intensive retreat for "just us" followed by a series of performances next year (end of summer, or maybe earlier). A lobster walks into a bar joke.

Labor day at MB&G's 9/4/06

2006-09-05T01:44:00.000-04:00

David K was the first to show up for guitar circle. He let himself in, and I found him standing in the foyer. I said "Am I on time?" Martin and Victor arrived not long after. We were working on Hope when MB returned. Where is Alex L? Joshing around. Gus sits in the center of the circle. Lark's Thrak, Eye of the Needle (which Victor thought was quite good), Askesis, Third Relation. Growing Circle. People took a little break and Victor and I ran Chrysanthemum. MB showed us the "belly dance glute isolation workout" video. Discussion about the gig on Friday. We are to be there around 6 PM, earlier if possible. Bartok, Bach Inv. 1, Bicycling. And so on.

Circle Meeting at MB&G's

2006-08-07T00:44:00.000-04:00

Victor forgot the keys to the dojo, so, meeting at MG&G's. I was already there, David arrived next, followed by Martin. Some socializing. Victor and MB arrive. Circle in the dining room.

Some talk about the "Free Work" project, the ideas for the course at the Round House, and the possible visit by the founder of GC.

Victor asked us to be thinking about our relationship to the principals of Guitar Craft, especially those related to playing guitar, and what questions we might ask of the founder.

We ran through the repertoire that we will be performing at the luau next week. Quit a bit of work on Invention 1.

Victor would like to to pay more attention to our ability to tap our feet while playing.

A break for snacks. Then more work.

Sunday July 9th Roslindale,MA

2006-07-10T00:36:00.000-04:00

Meeting
Sunday July 9th VMac's Roslindale
Attendees: Alex, David, Glenn, Martin & Victor

Alex was seated in the back yard when I arrived, awaiting Master Bridges falling asleep, Glenn and David arrived shortly thereafter. MB was away. We retreated to the studio and plugged in using circulation and 3rd Relations to sound check.
We started with the Bartok Hommage and ran in twice. I had a brain glitch in the middle and there was discussion that the leads should retard a note later. We then ran Calliope and then mentioned the stops in the “Cowboy” section. We moved on to Third Relation and ran from the last lead variation through the end and then ran from the Ist lead variation through the end. Victor commented that the last four chords should be brought down as by the last chord the song has already ended. We moved on to Askesis, with an aborted first attempt, but after looping the first two sections we played it through and took a short break..

We finished working on Askesis then Growing Circle, Where Victor said the bass chords could be more forceful and Glenn mentioned the leads should bring it down in the middle section where all are arppegiating. Moving Force was run with some concern for the base synchronization., Thraak was run a couple of times with Martin getting a note on high string ring and lagging in the poly rhythms, Victor was working on the 5's and commented the overall feel was good. We ended with Victor and Glen working on Chrysanthemum and running one section with some tricky notes.
At the end we spoke of gig logistics and Victor addressed the focus and attention brought by the performers during the whole performance, before during and after. He spoke of only necessary talking and appropriate behavior, and the necessity of warm-up/prep and not becoming and audient when MB is dancing. It was agreed to meet at least by 1:00 at the performance space.

July 7th gig at Third Life

2006-07-07T23:29:00.000-04:00

GCNE + Shawn

- Set One -

Circulation (GCNE)

Eye of the Needle (GCNE)

The Ides (CoFD)

Moving Force (GCNE + Shawn)

Bartok (GCNE)

Third Relation (GCNE)

Bicycling to Afghanistan (Victor, Glenn, David Shawn)

Lodestone (CoFD)

Poly - Jam (GCNE + Shawn)

Asturias (GCNE)

- Intermission -

- Set Two -
Growing Circle (GCNE)

Askesis (GCNE)

Dr. Evil (CoFD)

Calliope (GCNE + Shawn)

Invention 1 (GCNE)

Branding Iron (CoFD)

Hope (GCNE + Shawn)

Chrysanthemum (CoFD + Victor, MB Dances)

Intergalactic Boogie (CoFD + Victor, MB Dances)

Thrak (GCNE + Shawn)

---

June 25th meeting plugged in

2006-06-26T00:54:00.000-04:00

Attendees: David, Victor, Glenn, MB
We were plugged in tonight to a “homemade mixer” -- as described by Victor. Started with some circulating. Then, got started on Invention No. 1. Some struggles but finally we got the first page. Then, work on Askesis, Third Relation, Eye of the Needle. Some discussion on getting the rhythms to sync up. Progress made but still a ways to go. In all cases we need to work on making the quality of each note even (so no notes pop out as different than the others in volume or tone). Of course the spacing of notes needs to be even too.
Other songs worked on for our upcoming July 7th performance: Thrak, Growing Circle, Moving Force, the Bartok piece, Bicycling to Afganistan, Asturius,
We ended with another round of Eye of the Needle and some more Invention No. 1. To continue our work on Invention No 1 for the 7th, we four decided to meet at David’s place on Thursday, July 6th from 9:30 to 10:30 AM. The big news of the night...it was David's 40th Birthday day! We really need to get the Happy Birthday song in our repertoire for such occasions.

South Boston Meeting 6/18/06

2006-06-19T01:03:00.000-04:00

Victor, MB, David, Glenn

David arrived just as we were getting settled. Some work on the 16 bar exercise, then Third Relation. Then Askesis. Victor addressed some "hand issues." We talked about near term goals: Rehearsing for our gigs in July, some communication he has had with RF lately, possible performance venues (an art gallery in JP has offered us their space for ongoing use), and what to do with the Roundhouse in November. Victor said that he's at a point where he really needs to work on technical mastery. He also had some comments on the sort of "modeling" that can take place when one spends time with someone who has achieved that level. Eye of the Needle. With my new place in the circle, I find that I must pull my volume way back, because Victor and MB need to work out timing. Thrak, which was pretty good. MB had to leave early for a BD gig. David Victor and I worked on Intergalactic Boogie and Bicycling.

Meeting minutes - Sunday, June 4th 2006

2006-06-05T13:36:00.000-04:00

Attendees: Victor, Glenn, David, Martin, Mary-Beth
Location: South Boston

We began by playing the 16 bar exercise at a fairly fast tempo for about 15 minutes. We put our guitars down and did some cat-pose yoga stretches and crawling around on all fours. We then did about 20 minutes of work clapping Thrak (the entire piece, with some concentrated section work); reminders given about pushing the 4 during the rock-and-roll section, and keeping the feel of the 16th note pulse. We put our guitars back on and played Third Relation, and then Larks Thrak twice. Then we played Growing Circle and The Moving Force. Next was Askesis at a fairly fast tempo and it sounded pretty good. I made the comment that I felt like we have mostly shown steady progress on this more than any other piece. We then ran Calliope, spending a little extra time on the leads playing accent picking vs. alternate picking. We then worked on Eye of the Needle a number of times, spending time working on getting the leads and burbles all locked in together. Victor had MB and Glenn switch places in the circle. After another try, Victor said to listen to the lead for the downbeat, not the basses. The final piece we worked on was Bicycling to Afghanistan. We tend to slow down during the course of the piece; Victor suggested we should increase the speed through the course of the piece by about 3 bpm (but not 10 bpm). There followed a little discussion about the possible upcoming Keith Emerson gig, and the gig with Shawn and the need for extra mid-week practices; everyone is to get their upcoming schedules to Victor.

DBK

Sunday May 28th Meeting

2006-05-28T00:28:00.000-04:00

House of Victor Jane and Bridge: I arrived at about 8:05. Victor and I sat outside and dusk fell. He played a good chunk of Moto Perpetuo for me. We played through Chrysanthemum a couple of times. I suggested Victor write a second part to a piece of mine entitled Loadstone. We worked on that for some time. In trying to reactivate the motion-sensing light I almost hit Victor with a stick. We moved back inside and continued working. Eventually we recorded our efforts using DP and the built-in mic on Victor's laptop.

Sunday May 14th Meeting

2006-05-14T00:26:00.000-04:00

Mary Beth and Glenn's house: Victor arrived just after 8. We worked on Chrysanthemum. MB showed up a bit later. Mostly talk about "Tuning the Air" and where the circle is going, or might go. Third Relation. Askesis. And, another run through Chrysanthemum. Victor talked a little about a Nova special involving tracing the wanderings of early humans via the genetic record.

April 30th meeting

2006-05-01T23:53:00.000-04:00

Attendees: Victor, MB, Glenn, David, Dev, Martin
After a brief quiet, Victor had us take off our guitars for some body beat work. This involved double-time hits on the torso to the right-left foot work and then doing a drum line with bops. During the fourth measure, we were "tacit" until the last beat when we all said "bop." Pairs of us did drum solos during the fourth measure. For the next round of this, we began on the and of 1. This was hard and I didn't get it that I was aware of. If I did it was an accident.
After this, we did a pretty good embroidery and circulation. Then, there was work on Growing Circle. The important outcome of this work (a note for the OCBC performance) is for the baseline to retard the last three notes. Then, we worked on 3rd Relation. We repeatedly played the melody lines while marching around the room.
Victor then talked to us about performing with the take home message being to talk to him personally about our thoughts on our own directions and how that matches with what we would like the group to do. Our group ailment seems to be finding time to practice enough so that we are consistent when we play. Right now, we are inconsistent more often than not. This isn't to say we shouldn't make mistakes, but that it would be nice if mistakes only occurred due to unforeseen circumstances rather than unforced errors.
After the talk, things brightened when we realized that a small subset of the group could play Calliope (a quartet). Bach #1 was tabled. Glenn and Victor decided to work on Glenn's composition Crysanthemum for the OCBC gig. We will also do EotN. The set list will include: Third Relation, EotN, a circulation, Calliope, Crysanthemum, Growing Circle, Moving Force (and maybe Bach #1).
For the week: Victor and Glenn will meet to work on Crysanthemum, Victor would like us to talk to him personally about where we are at with practice, performing, and the circle, we are performing on Sunday at OCBC and need to plan our weeks accordingly to play well. Sleep the night before the performance is a good idea to store our preparation work. It isn't a good idea to cram the morning before the performance.

Meeting minutes: 4/2/2006

2006-04-03T13:23:00.000-04:00

Who: Victor, Glenn, David, Martin, Mary Beth
Where: South Boston

Victor, David and Martin began the meeting by looping the A section of Third Relation. Glenn and Mary Beth arrived and joined in. We played looped the section for about 15 minutes. Some discussion about thumb and wrist positioning. Then we looped the first descending section, then did some short exercises based on the 2-3-1 fingering. Went back to playing the descending section (sounded better now), followed by playing the whole piece. We then took a short break.

We then ran through the rest of our repertoire for the EarthDay gig: Bartok piece (best we've ever played it, IMO), Eye of the Needle (this also sounded strong), Larks Thrak, Asturias, Moving Force, Bicycling to Afghanistan, Growing Circle, Bach Invention #1. Glenn was showing Victor the lead for Growing Circle as David and Martin left.

No meeting next week. Victor, David and Martin to meet 4/16, Victor, David, Martin and Mary Beth to meet 4/23.

DBK

Meeting Minute 3/28

2006-04-02T01:57:00.000-05:00

Attendees: David, Glen, Martin, Mary Beth and Victor
Locations: Victor's House, Roslyndale

David, Martin,and Victor began practice by looping the bass descending part to Growing Circle. Glen arrived and we continues to work on this piece. We ran the repertoire for the MIT gig, Bartok, Moving Force, Larks Thraak, Askesis, Third Relation. Victor commented to Martin to not worry about the phrasing during the C# bass section of Askesis and similarly the 1/4 in the R&R section of Thraak, that was not pushing the 4 enough. During the trio running of BTA, there were various mistakes and stops and starts. At one point David was laughing and Glen
said he would not accompany laughter. The last run thorugh of BTA was much improved. Mary Beth arrived from teaching a belly dancing class and the Bach Invention 1 was run. One execution was quite good but fell apart toward the end. David left and EotN was run and sounded quite qood.

3/19 Repertoire and Choreography

2006-03-25T10:43:00.000-05:00

Location: Dojo South Boston
Attendees: David, Glen, Martin, Mary Beth and Victor

For most of the meeting we worked on repertoire for upcoming performance. Started with an embroidery, then (not in order) Askesis, BTA, Larks Thrak. Moving Force, Hommage, Asturias, EotN and circulation. EotN seemed much better. Older repertoire was rusty. Worked on Third Relation. We then took a break and MB showed us some parts of the choreography. Quite fun. After the break Victor, Glen, David and MB worked on the Bach Invention #1. A honorable effort with a fairly complete run through. David left on time while the rest worked on Third Relation. A nice chat after before we left for the evening.

3/5 trio and 3/12 quartet

2006-03-13T01:02:00.000-05:00

Last sunday, 3/5, the attendees at Victor's were Victor, Martin, and MB. This meeting was enhance with some tea and a short viewing of the oscars. The rest of the time we worked well -- mostly on the parts of Third Relation and getting the fingering and focus on trouble spots. Victor emphasized that the fingers should hold their position moving up and down the fret so that they fall on a single fret when they land. We worked on that moving from place to place in Third Relation. Toward the end, Mary Beth asked a question about burbling. Victor had a good response. The key is to try to have the burbles not sound compartmentalized into groups of five notes. There was some discussion on playing loudly and tightly holding the pick.
This Sunday, 3/12, the quartet of Victor, Glenn, David, and MB worked on Invention No. 1. It felt like hard work. Prior to this, we did a circulation where each person played three notes in C maj and then in a follow up circulation each person played two notes. In each case, the person to the right played their notes beginning at the second note of the person to their left. It sounded odd. The two note circulation sounded better than the three note. Then, long work on Invention No. 1. Some targeted work on the second page. Some working backward from the final chord. We played it through (but far from perfectly) two or three times. Then, Mary Beth began work with the group on the Dance/GCNE project. There was a short warm up to musis by the Baobab Orchestra followed by teaching of the begining of a choreography to Holiday by Green Day. The choreography was a way to jump into learning combinations. Everyone picked up the steps quickly. The intro bits need revising, but the group was patient with
the piece as a work in progress. Next, week, slower targeted movement will be the focus. We finished up by talking about the Earth Day performance on April 24th (I think). We have only three circle meetings before Glenn and MB go to Argentina. We talked about the set list and Victor said he would send that around.

Feb 26th Meeting

2006-02-27T00:46:00.000-05:00

Dojo, South Boston. Victor, Glenn, David, Martin MB.

We began with an exercise where 4 of the 5 of us was pedal on a note (forming chords) while the fifth person soloed. Then circulation, with music jumping out here and there. We worked on Third Relation for some time, first running it minus MB, then working more slowly including her (she just learned the two main lines this last week, without much time to practice). I had mis-taught her the fingering of the first bit. We looped the re-intro with 4 bars of the main melody.

A short break. We talked about how a definitive recording of Third Relation remains illusive.

Next, Martin went in the next room and did some personal work on the Hammerhead exercise, while the rest of us worked on Invention 1. David Victor and I all had the experience of the piece seeming to have rearranged itself since the last time we worked on it. We worked through most of it in sections, but still have not been able to make it straight through without train wrecking.

We played Eye of the Needle and Askesis through a couple of times. And one more time through Askesis with David listening. Some talk about upcoming gigs. David and I are both out of town next week, but Martin and MB will have a lessonish sort of meeting at Victor's house.

Minutes for January 29th, Chinese New Year

2006-01-31T00:10:00.000-05:00

Attendees: Victor, David, Martin, Glenn, and MB
We arrived in good time. David and Victor were having a lesson. We settled in and began with three octaves in C major. We tackled this task three times. The first time—to get it ascending and descending—took a while. As usual, its an exercise in addressing self-placed stress and deflecting frustration. The second time took about two rounds. The third time was completed on the first attempt – assisted by a pre-time of concentrated joke telling. Victor suggested an attempt at four octaves, but MB didn't know how to do that.
After C major part 1, we worked on EofN. Multiple plays and work on getting the down beat of the rhythm in the right place. Burbles get off track easily. Then, some Askesis and Third Relation. Askesis sounds not half bad but maybe “a third” bad.
We spent time discussing upcoming events…
We will have to wait to plan to play at the Montesorri school; we will play on May 7th at OCBC; we need some more info to apply for the improv performance at Third Life studio – with that info, we will apply to play on May 5th. Dev will be in town during May hence the May dates. We talked about Mary Beth’s art project. She gave a brief overview. Looks like the second or third week in Nov will be the performance date. As Victor pointed out, there is a lot to think of to get it all organized. Then, we worked on the Bach piece which is harder than first thought especially for certain parts. We made it through the first page and then two bars. Martin was a prone, mid-circle audient.

sun jan 8th, 2006

2006-01-09T20:16:00.000-05:00

at the dojo. martin, david, mb, glenn, victor. we began with a 5 part improvisation in 5/8 which lead into a circulation. then victor called for a choose a note piece in the c symmetrical scale, with notes to be played using the principles we study in the circle. we worked on eye of the needle and after a brief bathroom break by victor where glenn declined to tell an amusing anecdote we worked on doing a light march while we played eye of the needle, and then more specifically the f# section of eye of the needle and then the whole of eye of the needle again. we played askesis, and we surprised at how well this sounded given the state of eye of the needle, and then after joking about eye of the kesis and ass needle we played askesis again. glenn recalled that in atlanta they worked on third relation for 15 minutes straight for two days and that helped his hands give up working too hard. we ran the Ab and Db sections of askesis for 10 minutes straight. we played eye of the needle again, but still it was a struggle. we worked for over a half hour to be able to play slowly the first page of bach's invention #1 as a 4 seat circulation. we played a 5 part improvisation in 3/4. and then at glenn's request played third relation to stay in touch with it.

Meeting at VMcS's Jan 1st 2006

2006-01-02T17:09:00.000-05:00

Attendees: Victor, Glenn, David, MB and Martin

We began with a five part inprov in C (or there abouts). We then played and worked on EotN, repeating and clarifying the ending and looping the first 4 chords. Then we moved onto Askesis playing through the piece and then looping the C# through the descending cords before the tricky section repeating the last 2 measures of the tricky section. Following a Glen question on the release of the right hand, we did a release exercise.
We then took a break for a lovely apple crubble pie courtesy of MB and tea courtesy of JM.
Many things were discussed related to schedules, upcoming gig possibilities, group focus and needs. Victor made some points as to the groups functioning and how he has a sense that our work is very important as it relates to the bigger picture and a major turning point in the world.
Victor spoke of Tony Blake the enneagram guy and the Bennetts.
We finished with G,D,MB and V running the first few measures of Invention #1 and then
Askesis, Third Relation and a final Circulation.

Meeting at VMcS's Dec 19th

2005-12-19T23:58:00.000-05:00

Attendees: Victor, Glenn, David, and MB (Martin was unable to attend)

While waiting for David to arrive, Victor and Glenn worked out some IGBE details. Then, David arrived bundled and prompted Victor to say "Shackleton" outloud. V and MB talked about Shakleton (MB from the book and V from the IMAX movie). Then, silence.
We started with a four part improv piece that seemed to go well. We started at the same time and in C major. Then, EotN. A good run I thought. I felt very relaxed (perhaps due to sleep deprivation). Then, Askesis and some work on getting things more regular.
We discussed Victor's thoughts on opening guitar craft and inner work with guitar to a wider audience. Then, back to Askesis and working on the mirror part for David. Back to EotN for quarter note foot tapping in the intro for MB. Difficulty with the 1th, 12th beats. Some talk about doing a cable access appearance soon (but no details right now) -- Glenn will look into this. Some talk about performing at the Charles Playhouse. Regarding pieces, Victor handed out Bach Invention No. 1 in C major piece for a quartet. We are to have the first page memorized by the next time we meet in January. Victor also handed out St. Pepper I think. Then we adjourned.

Dec. 11, 2005, Sans Guitars

2005-12-11T23:58:00.000-05:00

MB & G's house. MB, G and V in attendance.

This is the third week in a row that the Circle has failed to meet for work with guitars.

Victor arrived around 9:20. Tea and hanging out in the living room. We talked about a project that he's going to run beginning in January: A free beginner's circle, with a time slot just before our regularly scheduled Circle meeting. Our Circle meetings may be slightly shorter as a result. In the announcements for this course, there will be explicit mention made of the inner-work aspect of what we do. The three of us discussed the above from several different angles. It was agreed that this was a good idea, and if successful, would help support the work of the Circle. The only immediate action item, is that Victor needs to write the blurb, and get it approved by Robert and Curt. As Victor stood in the door to leave, I put on Igor's re-master of "Get Crafty." My comment was, the players back then had more precision than we do now.

Sunday, November 20th

2005-11-29T09:12:00.000-05:00

Location: South Boston
Attendees: Victor, Glenn, David, Mary Beth plus Mary Beth's friend as a guest

We began with some circulations, including one at a fairly brisk tempo. Some very musical moments. We next worked on the main melody of Intergalactic Boogie Express, with counting. in groups of 7, then in groups of 4. We moved on to Askesis, spending extra time on the section in 15. We next moved on to some marching and polyrhythm clapping, with our guest joining in. We moved back to the stools, and worked a bit more on Askesis. We then worked on improv, and some talking about how to approach it, especailly with the different skill levels in the circle. The improv after talking was better.

sunday 16th oct

2005-10-25T00:36:00.000-04:00

MB, Glenn, David and Victor at the sbsdapc dojo.

We spent a good bit of time opening with a basic sensation exercise, filling the body with sensation from foot to head. We focussed a bit on eye of the needle and time, and then going over parts for askesis. We put down the guitars and stood facing each other marching in step. we then clapped the 3 voices of the rock section of thrack for 4 bars each in succession. when we could do this we moved divided the 3 voices among the 4 of us and rotated the voices every 4 bars. Some time was spent discussing the upcoming course. The meeting ended a little early because everyone was so tired.

Sunday October 23rd 2005, Circle Meeting Minutes

2005-10-23T23:40:00.000-04:00

South Boston, Guitar Circle (New England) meeting. Victor, David, Martin, Mary Beth and Glenn present. We worked on Askesis, running the piece a couple of times. Victor asked if everyone had a good mental map of the piece. We did a verbal walk-through of the structure. After running it again, MB said that the only way she could approach it was by feeling she was happy playing the piece. Victor said that, as you might be enjoying driving, knowing where you were going (having a map sitting on the seat next to you), would actually help you enjoy the drive even more. Thrak. This was improved from where we were a couple of weeks ago. There was some discussion about playing ahead of, or behind, the beat. We moved on to Intergalactic Boogie Express. Victor asked me to learn the lead part. David MB and I stayed in the main room to work on the lead, while Victor and Martin went next door to work on the bass. I worked with a bit with David and MB on the main 7 note pattern. MB went off to work on it on her own while David and I worked on counting. I got a drink of water. We all moved on to working at the 'Spriglet' rhythm. This was very good work, and I felt we made significant progress. Victor came in and played the bass line along with our clapping. Martin returned as well, and we all circled up, working through the first three sections of the piece. We are all to look at our tab for next time. Another run of Askesis. Some talk about the upcoming course.

Past two Sundays

2005-10-03T00:12:00.000-04:00

Sunday, 9/25
Attenddees: Victor and Mary Beth, so the evening became a lesson.

Highlight: Victor led exercises in how to learn music quickly. He uses three strategies: (1) seeing the pattern on the fret board, (2) hearing if the notes are low an high, (3) getting the pattern by grouping the notes in 2's and 3's.

He played me (MB) a series of notes. I had to determine the groupins. I got better at doing this with practice.

Minutes for Sunday, 10/2:
Attendees – Victor, Martin, Glenn, David, Mary Beth, Terry.
Place – Victor’s basement studio

We circulated for a while.

Then, started with EotN for Bridge before he went to bed. Moving from that, we played Growing Circle. V suggested that MB learn the lead line but not for the event on Oct 8th. We played the following songs to go over what we can play for 10/8 – the Bach piece, Third Relation, Bicycling to Afganistan (with Victor, Terry, and Glenn), Moving Force. We also played worked on Thrak. Rhythm trouble led to clapping exercises. We did four sets each of clapping on 1 & 4, then clapping on 1 & 3, and then clapping to 2 & 5. This exercise led to some improvement. Then we went back to playing Thrak. V made the very helpful comment about keeping up the count even when you are not playing. Otherwise, the song drags.

We talked about a three-week circulation course. This would be led by Victor and have a format of 8 hours per day of work with participants staying locally in houses.

We may or may have an official meeting next Sunday.

Meeting Sunday Sep. 18th

2005-09-23T09:06:00.000-04:00

Attendees: David, Glenn, Martin, Mary Beth, Victor

We begin with an Embroidery, then move on to a circulation of 8 "rounds" each of D pentatonic and C pentatonic. Next we work on Askesis, looping the intro and main section. Victor asks us to tap our feet and if we are able, to count out loud as well. We attempt the same thing with the section in 15. Victor would like us to try and have the piece ready for the performance on Oct. 8th. We then move onto an "any note" fast circulation. We then stand up and do the Thrak polyrhythm with marching, slowly at first then speeding up the tempo. Victor then hands out magic-ish chords and beats to play them on in 5. After quite enough of that, we go back to our stools and discuss some of the logistics of promoting the upcoming New Standard Tuning course . Glenn hands out nice flyers for us to put up in various places.

DBK

Saturday Sept 10, Wedding Gig

2005-09-13T23:53:00.000-04:00

MB and I were the first of the ensemble to arrive at the church. Dev arrived next. Martin called to say he was on his way. Eventually Victor and Alex arrived. We got the PA going, and did some sound checking. Around 10:50 we began playing... pick a note (D Maj) C Pent/D Pent circulation, Eye of the Needle. The bride and groom had not yet made an appearance, so five of us did some circulating in G while Victor soloed (this wasn't quite successful, to my ear) Calliope, Moving Force, and then Invocation, which morphed into Growing Circle for the groom's walk down the isle. One pair in the wedding party didn't seen to want to walk to that music and waited until it was over. We did some circulating to cover their passage. Sat for ceremony, which was very nice. We played Hope for the 'recessional' music, which worked quite well, and then Third Relation, which worked a little less well.

Standing around unplugged outside, we played Moving Force again and Bicycling to Afghanistan. Martin declared we were done, so we were. We got held up a little loading our stuff out of the church, because they were taking pictures in the front, and there was no rear entrance. Eventually we were set to go. There was a big group shot arranged. We stood on the church steps and played Asturias as things were being organized.

Martin headed to the reception, the rest of us headed to Crazy Burger, a popular little restaurant in Narragansett.

Thursday September 8th, Wedding Team Amplified

2005-09-09T00:39:00.000-04:00

Victor's basement
the wedding team: Victor, Glenn, Martin, Alex, MB, Dev

We ran through our repertoire for the event. Growing Circle, Hope (lots of Hope), Aspiration, circulation in C Maj Pentatonic, and D Maj Pentatonic (alternately), Third Relation, Eye of the Needle, Moving Force. At one point we took a break, and Victor gave us some ice-pops. At the end of the evening, after talking through some details, we recorded a quick version of Growing Circle, so the groom would know how quickly to walk.

Meeting Sunday Septmber 4th, 2005 (Wedding Performance Team)

2005-09-05T12:53:00.000-04:00

Sunday September 4th - at South Boston
Attendees: Alex, Dev, Glenn, Martin, Mary Beth, Victor

Victor and I arrive at about the same time, and set up six spaces (in the hopes that Dev will be able to attend). Victor and I begin to look at Invention #10. We work through the first page with some successs, and begin the second when Glenn and MB arrive. They set up and we work a bit more on #10 when Martin arrives. Finally, Dev arrives and the team is complete for the evening.

We begin looking a the available repertoire for the wedding:
Eye of the Needle
Hope (now available with Dev for fast circulations and backup arpeggiating)
Invocation
Growing Circle

We take another look at Invention #10, and split into sections for more concentrated work. After rejoining, we try again, and pare down to a quartet, and finally to a duo. It seems that this piece will work well as either a duo or a circulated piece, but does not seem to work at the moment as a group piece played in this manner. It is still noted as good work to do.

More potential repertoire run:
Third Relation
Moving Force
Circulations: In G; G, D; G, D, C; F, D

We ended the meeting with some discussion of Ben Bennett, which led to some observations and notions about a Leader and the Group, the hazards of the Leader projecting onto the Group, or the Group taking on the processes of the leader. Also, some possible ways to avoid this. Some notions offered about Teachers and Students, and how while some may have been more in contact with the Whole, they were still human, as well as the idea that the Teacher's path is their best guess at the time, and that the best teachers will not usually say "the way I got here is the way you must travel", or "here are the six steps you must take", but through their experience will help the Student make some guesses that work for them.

Some final thoughts on how the sense of pride in accomplishment can destroy the accomplishment (and the true Joy at its heart), as guilt can destroy progress. Perhaps the idea that when we miss a note, that instead of guilt, when we truly feel remorse at the missed note, we might be headed in the right direction.

Meeting Sunday August 28th

2005-09-04T16:55:00.000-04:00

Sunday August 28th at South Boston
Attendees: Alex, Dev, Glenn, Martin, Mary Beth, Terry and Victor
Visitor: Victor's nephew, Abel

We began by in a semi-circle with Able as the audience. Victor called some repertoire,Circulation, Eye of the Needle, Bicycling to Afghanistan,Third Relation, Bartok , Growing Circle, Bach Invention #10, Larks Thrak, Asturias and an embroidery. We took a break, and then everyone but me worked on Askesis running sections then stringing them together. The we ran Invention #10 a few times. There was discussion of the wedding performance and the team for that and the NST weekend. We discussed the role the GCNE is playing at the course and I think it was good to talk it out. Victor spoke of the role of discipline and it's relationship to freedom. He mentioned that the Muslin world views freedom much differently than we do, gaining freedom within a much more structured and disciplined system, where our system based on full personal freedom. Victor said neither was more correct just different.

Recital Performance in Newton Highlands

2005-08-31T00:40:00.000-04:00

Sunday August 28th the home of John and Bevie Bavicchi,
Newton Highlands
Attendees: Alex, Dev, Glenn, Martin and Terry

I arrived late at the T station in Newtown Highlands for a quick run through before the recital. Glenn, Terry, Dev and Alex were already there. We ran Homage, Asturias, Growing Circle, and BtA (which was not up performance that day).We all headed over to the Bavichhi’s. John is a teacher at Berkley and quite a Bartok expert! We met Jun with whom Glenn has been working and some of the other students and friends of Jun. Dev knew John and another student from Berkley who was there as an audient. We helped move furniture and then put our guitars and tuned up in the dinning room, for the green room.
Jun got things started; the turnout was a little less than expected. Glenn, David and Terry performed Glenn’s new piece (Terry and David just learning their parts that day) “Ides”. It was very different than the recording, much better live. Then there was a Russian woman, a friend of Jun’s , a painter, but played a Shumann piece and another
who’s composer I don’t remember. Then a student of Jun’s played a very complicated piece by Alban Berg
(It looked like the “Black Page”) Jun said it was just learned and would get better but I thought it was marvelous
atonal in parts yet parts that had an almost jazzy or “Gershwin” feel. A teacher of Jun’s played 4 pieces by Ravel she was very good, but I felt she seemed rushed and glad to get it over. We took a five minute intermission as it was hot in the house (hardly any windows open!) and came back for the second half. Jun played a lovely 4 part original composition about children in the afternoon, I really liked the last pieces about children watching the clouds and the last section a traditional Japanese song in the right hand and a boogie woogie baseline Then Glenn and Jun played “Freedom Jazz Dance” a jazz improv,. I wondered if Glenn was going to step out as Jun was such a talented player but about 2/3rds of the way through, Glenn did some really nice lead work.
The GCNE minus our leader, for the first time in performance, finished off the program. Glenn directed and we played :
Circulation (A Harmonic m)
Eye of the Needle
Hommage a JSB
Asturias
Growing Circle

Ending with Growing Circle was great, very up beat! The audience and the hosts were very complementary and gracious and we were treated to sushi, munchies and drinks after the performance. We stayed and had a good chat, were shown John’s homemade bar in the basement and then we bid adieu and headed for South Boston

GCNE meeting August 21

2005-08-22T01:35:00.000-04:00

Meeting attendees included Victor, Glenn, David, Martin, Mary Beth, and Terry.
The meeting started a little late because MB was having a lesson with Victor. Also, once the waiting crew--Glenn, David, and Terry--were let in, V went for beverages. After he returned Martin arrived. The lesson continued into the meeting and we focused on a practice statement: if you can play something seven times in a row perfectly then you know it. We attempted to play Bach's Invention No. 10 perfectly. While G did a quick refresher on the song (he is now playing his third role on this piece), V talked about his plans for us to perform in the latter part of the fall. We will need to focus our efforts to make this work. G returned to the circle and we played the piece. After a few attempts, Victor had us look across to our fellow player who shared our time to play. Victor looked at Terry, Glenn looked at MB, David looked at Martin. This task seemed to help us play better. Then, we just looked at each other's right hand...again, this seemed to help our playing (but I'm speaking for myself mainly). Then, Glenn and I switched seats and we gave that configuration a try.
When Victor made the statement that we were going to keep playing it until we got it, we seemed to make more mistakes. But, Victor commented that we played better under this more stringent rule. We took a break to do the following...say a task outloud and then do it (we did this all together which made for interesting chatter), then say two tasks and then do those in order. We returned to Bach but didn't get all the way through. We then worked on Thrak and marching.
Our task for next week...work on the Bach piece and Eye of the Needle so that we will be able to play these through next week without mistakes. Our challenge for next week will be to play these two songs without mistakes next week.
The meeting completed at 10:30 PM.

Meeting minutes - 8/14

2005-08-14T23:45:00.000-04:00

Attendees: Victor, Glenn, David, MB

The first part of the meeting was spent discussing arisings from the Luau performance; what we could become, what was necessary to get us there, etc. Victor suggested a series of 8 performances in two weeks would give us the opportunity to see where we really are as performers; sometime after the NST weekend most likely. We also discussed the name of our website.

We then ran through Eye of the Needle, with MB moving to the bass burbles for the coda. The rest of the time was spent going over Askesis.

Luau performance - August 13th

2005-08-13T23:45:00.000-04:00

Players - Victor, Glenn, David, Alex, Martin, Mary Beth, Terry
Martin's place - W. Greenwich, RI

We spent some time before the gig in the attic going over various pieces, especially the Bach piece since this configuration hadn't performed it yet. We set up the equipment on stage, then used the living room as the "green room", and then we went on. We played most of our available pieces, inlcuding an embroidery leading into Asturias to finish off the performance. There were some really good moments, and some really bad moments, but it felt like the good outweighed the bad And we FINALLY had nice weather for the Luau!

8-7-05 Meeting Notes (Victor's house)

2005-08-08T01:29:00.001-04:00

Terry, Martin, Victor and myself in attendance, supplemented by Alex L (who will be known from now on at the Big Lahoski, or simply "the Dude" from now on) later in the evening. Bdg was lying on the floor when I arrived, listening to Martin sing a song. We played 3rd Relation for him, and then he went off to bed. We worked amplified: Bicycling, EotN, Growing Circle, Asturias, Lark's Thrak, Moving Force, Calliope, Hope, Circulation (same pattern as last week, but with 5 of us rather than 7), "Embroidery." When Alex arrived and was getting tuned up and amplified, I helped Jn move their bed so she could get at the dust bunnies. Terrible intonation issues. Before Alex showed up, I was the only Ovation in the circle. I wonder if, as circles become more diverse in terms of the makes of guitars represented, intonation problems will also increase. Some talk about the possible NST Weekend and the venue that Martin looked at. Headed home around 11:30.

(transplant from G's diary... feel free to augment.)

7-31-05 Meeting Minutes

2005-08-01T01:19:00.000-04:00

South Boston, and an NEGC meeting. Victor, Glenn, David, Alex, Martin, Terry. We worked on playing the first few bars of Third Relation without mistakes. Same with the intro to Calliope. I thought it was a very good thing that Victor pushed us in this way. MB arrived around 9:30, and we switched to working on a circulation pattern (skipping none, 1, 2, 3, etc.) then clapping. We got better at it as we internalized the pattern. The whole evening was a little strange for me, sitting in a new location in the circle (next to Victor). We worked on other repertoire. Hope, fast circulations giving us some trouble. We split into two groups Terry MB and Martin staying put to work on the Bach piece, the rest of us going in the next room to work on Askesis. David picked up the rest of the lead line. Terry MB and Martin played the Bach piece through a couple of times for us. Work on more repertoire. Victor enjoined us to be the circle we could be. I noticed a sign on the wall of the dojo with a similar message. Victor said he was going to get me a Xena poster for my practice room. Talk about the gigs that are coming up. Then just talk.

(Note, this is just a cross-post from my diary. If anyone wants to elaborate, I won't be offended. GH)

Minutes for Sat/Sun July 23/24

2005-07-25T01:51:00.000-04:00

Guitar Circle New England on Sunday, July 24th.

Roslindale party gig (Saturday, July 23rd) went well. We were on our stools and ready to tune at 2:59 PM. There was an element of feeling rushed. No real quiet to begin. The circulation was clunky at first but got better. It seemed part of the trouble was getting used to hearing ourselves amplified in that enviroment. We then did EotN. A rocky start but it got better. When we ended, someone whooped in the audience. That really helped me relax for the next pieces. I had been concerned about playing for a mostly musician audience and was glad to be shielded by Terry. After EofN, we played Bartok, Bicycling to Afganistan, Thrak, and finally Asurius. We got the high sign to wrap up after Thrak. But, then Victor requested that we do one more song. I think that was it. The audience was appreciative and asked questions afterward. We introduced ourselves as Guitar Circle New England and that led to comments and a little confusion and on-line discussion the day following. After our set, we circled up to complete our work.

Tonight (Sunday, July 24th) we were a line as that’s what two points make. It was just Martin and Mary Beth. Terry was stuck in traffic in Ipswich and couldn’t get to us in time. All other GC members had other things going on. Since we were at the Hughes home, we were able to electronically fill in for Terry on the Bach piece using the MIDI files. Martin and I set a goal for playing the Bach piece through perfectly one time. I believe we did it about 2 times at least. After one perfect time. we worked on other pieces including EotN, Bartok, Asturius, Thrak, some Israel. It was good to hear EotN with just me on my burbles part and Martin on bass. Martin uses cues from the other parts for his line, especially during the long period of burbling. I hadn’t heard his line on its own before. We played Bartok 3x and it sounded strong. We both needed practice with the cross picking on Austurius. We worked on the transitions. We worked on matching up our parts for Thrak. We refreshed out memories for Israel. Martin mentioned that we should practice Israel at the next circle meeting. Martin showed me his new song with “Nightshade” in the title. It was very nice and suitable for circle work. He says there is a composed bass line out there somewhere.

7.17.05 New England Guitar Circle Meeting Minutes

2005-07-19T00:35:00.000-04:00

Attendees: David, Glen, Josh, MaryBeth, Martin, Terry and Victor

Everyone was early, not realizing (or checking) that Victor was already there. Josh B joined us from the Chicago Circle and will be joining us through August.
We began with two circulations the first in Cmaj, the second in Cmaj then any note of your choosing. We then worked on repertoire for the upcoming gig on July 23rd. This included:

Growing Circle
Eye of the Needle
Asturias
Third Relation
Calliope
Homage a JSB
Third Relation
Moving Force
Larks Thraak
Bicycling to Afghanistan

Glen, MB and Martin attempted the beginning of the Bach Invention Bassline, then we spoke of the gig details. The gathering will start at one, and we should be there by 2PM if possible to begin around 3PM. Victor will send out directions.

7.10.05 New England Guitar Circle Meeting Minutes

2005-07-17T16:26:00.000-04:00

attendees: Glenn, Mary Beth, Terry, David and Victor

Meeting began with a couple of variations to the circulation excercise. One was to choose any chord from C major and circulate the chords around. Another variation was passing a note in a certain directions but after three complete cycles, the direction has to change and anyone in the circle can initiate the change.

We also visited a couple of the repertoires such as 'Eye of the Needle', 'Third Relation', 'Moving Force', and 'Thrak'. We worked on the "rock 'n roll" section of Thrak at different tempos. Victor began showing the group the first 2 patterns to 'Askesis'. Each individual also chose their parts in 'Askesis'.

sunday, 3rd of july, 2005, south boston dojo

2005-07-08T18:03:00.000-04:00

glenn, david and victor were there. victor introduced the tremelo exercise to david and glenn, the 4 bar right hand exercise which is the lead up the 28 bar exercise. we looked at some important priciples this exercise brings into focus. we spent well over an hour looking at some of the ideas that have come up in our work with ben, partly to bring david up to speed.

June 26. 8:15 PM. South Boston Dojo

2005-06-28T00:17:00.000-04:00

MB, Glenn, Alex L, Martin and Victor

Circulation exercises:
First exercise: Pick 4 notes. Repeat in sequence.
Second exercise: Pick 2 notes, then do the 'cascading' pattern of the last couple weeks, skipping the person that began. Once everyone is on the second note, a 'turn around' reflecting past the end point, then beginning the pattern in reverse, with a reverse turn-around at the other end.

"Pair Share" exercises:
Take turns, one person talking, the other person listening.
First exercise: Describe in detail an event that happened during the day where a process was brought to completion.
Second exercise: Explore what it is you want (wish for, desire...) in life.

Repertoire work:
Eye of the Needle
Moving Force (needed to work out bass-line)
Bicycling to Afghanistan (quartet [2 basses, 1 lead, 1 mid])

Discussed upcoming gigs.
Repertoire to be working on:

Probably:
Moving Force
Third Relation
Bartok
Asturias
Growing Circle

Maybe:
Eye of the Needle
Thrak
Bicycling to Afghanistan
Aspiration

Probably not:
Invention 10
Flying Home
Calliope
Hope
Israel

6/19/05 meeting minutes

2005-06-24T08:39:00.000-04:00

South Boston
Attendees: David, Glenn, Mark B (visiting), Victor

We began the meeting without guitars. We sat for about 15 minutes. We then discussed what would be required of us to support Robert on his upcoming shows. This lead to an explanation by Victor about the "four worlds" - body, spirit, potentials, and the world that is indescribable.

We then picked up our guitars and worked on circulating C Major up and down in three octaves, and then circulating the first 5 notes of each mode of C Major up and down in three octaves. This proved particularly challenging, especially doing the "around-the-corner" turnaround.

Finally we did an "any note" Circulation, which had some incredibly musical moments to it, seemingly as a result of the work and effort we had put in on he C Major challenge.

DBK

Sunday meeting

2005-06-13T10:58:00.000-04:00

Meeting attendees: Martin, Victor, Glenn, MB
Victor began the meeting by asking who would do minutes. MB volunteered. It was noted that the karate kids must have been breaking boards because there were bits of wood on the floor. We had a mat out for Terry, but noted that he may not be coming. Some fun talk about Bridge's birthday party and the Beatles cover band.

Guitar work began with a circulation of C major in three octaves that did not take long. Then we did an exercise in circulating C major that was divided in 5 note intervals. The beginning person played the first and fifth note of the interval. The next person then played the next note in the sequence. The first person played both C and G, for example. Then, the next person started the next interval, playing both D and A. Etc. Martin, Victor, and G caught on to the pattern quickly. MB got stuck. Some help with visualization from Victor. Major hint about playing by learning that I would play my second note 5 times in a row before having to play my next note. We did this exercise ascending and descending. Only Victor's agile brain had a handle on the pivot point of switching from ascending to descending. He explained what happened and some understood, I just knew I had to keep playing B, then I got to play all open strings!

We then played EotN about four times. Foot tapping was emphasized for the better of the piece. A note about practicing the song while listening to a metronome set to the off beats was interesting and helpful for all. Some improvements were made hopefully. Work on Thrak and playing the rock and roll over and over. I experience frustration over trying to get my hands to hit the chords. Very annoying problem that compounds being on with the rhythm. We talked about maintaining quarters for R. Fripp's upcoming performance in the New England area. The NEGC will be the main support for the performance in a couple of venues. The most important thing is to be still and supportive. V says the rest will be okay given that we will create a space in which bad behavior is obvious to the senses of all and not welcome. Interesting story about T. Redmond. He did something simple that prevented someone from taping a show. I think he pointed to the fact that one action affects many even if that action doesn't physically harm someone and is done secretively. Victor strongly encouraged more effort and practice in daily sittings to prepare for R. Fripp's performance support. We talked about upcoming gigs and setting up an intensive time together. Upcoming events: performance at Martin's wife's school (TB planned and TBA), July 23rd party in Roslindale, August 13th Luau, September 10th ...a wedding performance for Martin's friend.

OCBC Peformance Minutes May 15th

2005-05-16T18:08:00.000-04:00

Location: The Old Cambridge Baptist Church, Cambridge Mass
Attendies: Victor, David, Dev, Martin, Terry, MaryBeth and Glen

The Old Cambridge Baptist Church is on Mass Ave just before Harvard Square. Its as a lovely space and the pews have been removed to allow for more freedom in using the space. The ceiling is a high barrel vault with a large stained glass window opposite the altar/organ. I arrived just before 9:30. Glenn, MB, Victor, Terry were already there. MB and Glen were having breakfast, and Victor and Terry were setting up the PA. We set up and David, and Dev arrived. There were chairs set up and people started arriving. Victor had us play Third and BtA (awful!) to sound check. We did a circulation and then ran through the Bach Invention 10. The service began and we played Eye of the Needle, Bach Invention No. 10 in G and a circulation skipping every other person. The service was for Pentecost and the story of the Tower of Babel, the Confusion of Tongues was spoken of. The minister spoke of the need for people to reach out and have human interaction and be part of the community in this increasingly impersonal age. This spoke to me a I related it to the feelings that I had been having lately. During the collection we played Asturias and the did a circulation skipping two people and ending with a straight circulation. Asturias was particularly effective in the space. The service ended and we mingled. People were very complimentary and wanted us to come back. We packed up and headed out.

5/8/05 Meeting Minutes

2005-05-08T23:32:00.000-04:00

South Boston Dojo. Glenn, MB, Terry, Martin, David, Victor.

Terry was back tonight after a bit of a hiatus.
Circulation patterns, including 'the bat wing.'
Repertoire for the OCBC gig. Eye of the Needle. Eye of the Needle with just MB and Terry.
Asturias. Third Relation. Calliope.
Terry will pick up Méli's part for Invention 10.
Israel. Victor Glenn me some pointers for his solo in Israel.
Bartok.
Discussion of logistics for the OCBC gig.
Some processing of Friday's gig at the Montessori school.
Circulation (again) (Chime, Double trio, 3 Bat Wing, Clockwise around)
Moving Force.
Glenn asked a question about division of attention.

MIT Performance Minutes, Thursday April 28th 2005

2005-04-28T17:06:00.000-04:00

Performers : Victor, Dev, David, Meli, Martin, Mary Beth & Glenn.

This performance was part of the Earth Day celebration at MIT and took place in the Stata Center, which is a very nice and inspiring building. I thought that our playing wasn't the best but that the music was there, created in part by the attentive audience, great people, cool kids!!!

We started with some circulations and then Third Relation... I can't remember the exact order but we played Growing Circle, Moving Force, Eye of the Needle, Calliope, Asturias, Hope, Hommage, Invention #10, Larks/Thrak, Israel, Bicycling and closed with Aspiration.

The people who put the event together were really pleased and the crowd seemed to enjoy it, kids dancing around us :-) We packed and some left for work while others had the day off...

MGF

NEGC Meeting Minutes April 24th, 2005

2005-04-25T11:28:00.000-04:00

Attendees: Performers : Victor, Dev, David, Meli, Martin, Mary Beth & Glenn

We began the meeting without Dev working on a specific cirulation pattern: a "normal" once-around, then the person began, now passes a note to each person in turn, with them passing a note back. When the final person has passed their note back, the person to the right of the one who began, begins the next cycle (with a "once around", then ping-pong). Dev arrived and we did it again with him.

Then the rest of the meeting focused on repertoire for the upcoming gig at MIT Earthday on April 28th. We will not play Flying Home due to Terry not being available.

We plugged into our battery-powered amps and worked on:

Third Relation
Growing Circle - to achieve a better balance while Terry is gone, David is to learn the lead and Martin (or was it MB?) is to learn the bass, but not for the Earthday gig
Eye of the Needle - agreement to play the outro using all downstrokes, but being aware of the "feel" and not overplaying
Calliope
The Moving Force
Bicycling to Afghanistan
Hommage
Invention #10 - after splitting up into two groups to do some review work
Larks Thrak
Israel
Hope - spending extra time working on the "fast circulation" section
Asturias - running through a few times trying to get the feel right for when the final twinkly should come in, with various pieces of advice offered

We will also likely play Aspiration at the gig, and possibly embroidery.

A full 3 hours of solid work.

DBK

NEGC Minutes

2005-04-17T23:17:00.000-04:00

Attendees: Victor, Dev, David, Meli, Glenn, MB

Victor began meeting by asking for a minutes volunteer. This led to some minutes discussion. MB volunteered to do minutes.

Circulation in C major. We eventually completed three octaves ascending and descending. Then we worked on circulating the C major pentatonic scale, three octaves ascending and descending, and skipping the start person each time around. This was frustrating work...lots of wrong notes and confusion about the skipping. But, we did it. When we did it...it was a cliff hanger...but, we all seemed to be in each other's head conjuring the next note to make it work.

Third Relation times two.
EofN. MB burbling alone. Work on "D" section and marching. Seemed to get a groove here but Meli and Glenn identified a place to work.
Bicycling to Afganistan ...some change up of parts. Glenn will do a different part for next few weeks of performance.
Growing Circle refresher.

Practice with the right hand-left hand jive thing. 12 beats in this. We all got the pattern, only some of us can count the measures and do it at the same time.
The pattern: both, R, L, R, R, L, R, both, R, both repeat starting with R, L, R, R, L, R, both, R both.

Discussion about energies:
Automatic energy: chatter, body systems, metabolism
Sensitive energy: "prana" and "chi"
Conscious energy: "all energies" ..."unitive??"
Creative energy: this "happens" to people, but you have to be in perhaps the sensitive or conscious state to catch what is happening.

Each energy can be further described by its associative center: the centers are the physical, intellectual, and emotional. For example, there is a emotion sensitive energy.

Glenn asked questions about all this. Everyone should feel free to add to this part of these minutes. I'm sure there were many insights and this discussion seems very important.

After centers/energies talk, we chatted about what we need to work on and upcoming performances.

To work on:
Mostly, we need to spend the next three weeks focusing on the repertoire.
Regarding practice: Before beginning, think about which energy state you are in.
The Invention subgroups should each try to meet outside of the Sunday meeting.
Victor is teaching Dev Moving Force.
Meeting of Dev, Victor, Glenn, David at his (David's) house at 7:30 AM on Tuesday, April 19th.

Upcoming performances:
Earth Day, 10 AM, Thursday, April 28th (MB will confirm)
Bridge's school, 9 AM (arrive 8:20 AM), Friday, May 6th
OCBC, 10:30 AM (arrive @ 9:30 AM), Sunday, May 15th

Minutes respectfully submitted by MBAH

NEGC Meeting Minutes April 11th, 2005

2005-04-11T00:55:00.000-04:00

Attendees: David, Dev, Glenn, Martin, Victor

We arrived and began by tuning. Guitar were then remove and we worked with the rhythm introduced last week. We began with the basic pattern in the hands then went on to marching (8th notes) and accenting the count (16th notes). Victor showed us a 6th note pattern as well but this proved more difficult. We sat and went back to the original pattern and added variations such as counting 4, keeping the left hand going and varying the beats accented by the right hand etc.(If anyone cares to add more detail to this feel free, I was having enough trouble with the basic pattern!)

We move on and split up to learn the first bars of IBE. Glenn, Martin and Victor on lead and Dev and David on base. We merged back together and Dev and Victor played the lead and bass parts together. Glenn will provide tab/chart.

Victor spoke of the importance of the pattern to learning IBE and hearing the
16th note grid “musically”.Circulation work:-Cmaj scale, three octaves, asc and dec. We did this once then failed to repeat it a second time. Victor the added skipping a person after every fifth note (there were 5 of us). We failed and tried varations, just counting, saying the note names, counting and playing. We almost made it with some sketchy notes, but not with confidence. Discussion of the division of attention when skipping ensued.

-circulating the C Maj pentatonic scale. We did this asc and desc, then with a star patterns and it’s reverse and finally the reverse of the asc, desc initial sequence.
We spoke of Askesis and Victor told us some history of its origins at Claymont. Comments about 4ths and 5ths led to Victor showing us an alternate Calliope.

Minutes submitted by MGB

NEGC Meeting Minutes

2005-04-04T03:28:00.000-04:00

April 3rd, 2005

Attendees: Victor, MB, Glenn, Martin, Dev

After the rhythm work, we discussed minutes and the importance of writing them. It was decided to keep the minutes to basic notes about the work we need to do. We also accepted a plan for who does the minutes each week. Each week’s minutes scribe is responsible for finding the scribe for the following week (even if they will not be attending that meeting). Glenn is retiring from the honorable but thankless (until now) position of being the sole person who acts on finding a minutes writer each week. Thanks Glenn!

Rhythm:
-Beat clapping on the 1, 2, 3, and the “ands” of 3, 4, 5, 6
-Right hand, left hand work pattern: both, R, L, R, R, L, R, both, R, both
-to loop the right hand-left hand pattern, the last “both” of the pattern because the “1” for repeating the pattern: both, R, L, R, R, L, R, both, R, both, R, L, R, R, L, R, both, R, etc
-Also, work on counting this pattern in 4/4

Circulation work:
-Cmaj scale, three octaves, asc and dec. We did this twice in not too long a time
-circulating the pentatonic scale (each person with one note in the scale); we did this with skipping/star patterns, as a sequential circulation, and as a sequential circulation where the start of the sequence shifted by one person after each complete sequence

Individual work:
Dev and G doing circle of 5ths scales…3rds, 4ths, triads, 5ths to octaves
Martin and MB are still working on the C major scale 3rds, 4ths, triads, 5ths, 6ths, 7ths, and octaves.

Note from last week:
We should probably be playing two hours a day to make progress. Something to strive for.

Minutes respectfully submitted by MBAH

March 27th minutes

2005-03-28T11:04:00.000-05:00

These minutes were written by Victor. I am posting them for him, and edited the date of the posting so they appear in order.

March 27, 8:15pm, at the Dojo in South Boston. Martin, MB, Glenn, Dev, and
Victor.

The meeting mainly focused on what might be the upcoming focus for the
circle, and checking in with where people are at now that the course is
over.

It's looking like there will be a few new directions. One is that of a team
that meets outside of the regular Sunday meetings to work more intensively.
Possibly in the mornings. There are at present possibly three subcircles.
One of people whose participations is limited for one reason or another, one
who are focusing on the mastering the basics, one who are ready for
intensive work. There are possibly a few other types of connections which we
might need to stay available to; for instance a number of people have
expressed interest in coming in from out of town, and it is possible that we
won't always have such a fully committed team.

It is probable that for those who can't come to all the meetings the work
will focus on repertoire to help in the performances. The subgroups will
focus on circulation, composition, and mastering the basics.

We are going to undertake learning askesis and intergalactic boogie express,
and though it is clear that mastering the triplet grid will take some work,
it is seen that this will be appropriate common work for everyone at this
time.

Victor is going approach Ben to move to having meetings with him with
dinner, perhaps once a month.

After much talk, we looked at two exercises. Approaching Cmaj in the first
position in intervals, 3rds, 4ths, triads, fifths, sixths, sevenths and
octaves. With the intensive team undertaking this throughout circle of
fifths in all intervals. This is to help get a handle on some of the common
permutations which one has to address in circulation of scales.

We then undertook Cmaj sequence up and down in the 1st position after 5
minutes we came within one note of completing it and it was time to go home.

2.28.05 Meeting Minutes

2005-03-10T17:28:00.000-05:00

New England Guitar Circle Meeting Minutes

Present - Victor, Dev, David, Meli, Martin, Glenn, MB, Terry
Where - THe Hughes' Basement
When - 7:30pm

At 6:15pm, the Bach high-line team, (Victor, Dev, David) met to go over their parts as a group. Plenty of clams, but good work. Dev also taught the group the bass part to Growing Circle.

At 7:30, we began the electrified rehearsal of the NEGC in preparation for Friday's performance at the Brewery. We worked on almost every piece we knew, except Aspiration. Lots of work on Thrak, especially the rock and roll sections. We played Invention 10 many times, often playing other pieces in the middle and then going back to it. Growing Circle was played together as a group for the first time. We played it a few times with things coming together nicely. There was some rearranging done with the bass line to Israel, but the result was the return to the original notes. Bicycling was taken quite fast. A good meeting that lasted over three hours, despite the raging snow storm outside. The meeting completed around 11pm.

2.27.05 meeting minutes

2005-02-27T23:26:00.000-05:00

Present - Victor, David, Melisande, Martin, Glenn, Mary Beth, Terry
Where - Hughes' residence

The meeting tonight was to prepare for the upcoming show at the Lowell Brewery Exchange this Friday night. Tonight we played with amplification.

We began with Third Relation which was like dusting off the shelf. It was not our best but it was certainly an honorable attempt. Eventhough the Circle had played this piece for more than a year for some, we still miss a note here and there. It begs the question for me whether I really "know" the piece. The circle then worked on the Bartok piece which we simply trying to clarify our parts. Next we visited Flying Home. There were certainly rough spots here and there similar to Third Relation. Then we went over Eye of the Needle. I had quite a difficult time with this for some reason. Notes were missed and fingers landed on the wrong frets. Glenn stresses the importance of the trasition note the chord changes. This is a similar rough spot with Flying Home for the lead section. Calliope presented another dilemma that some people in the circle have...how to begin the piece. Glenn pointed out his difficulties in getting the right feel for the first note of the piece which was similar to David's experience. Victor pointed out that the trouble with beginning a piece may have to do with finding the right tone to go with it. It could also be that the first note had been given more importance than the notes following it which may have contributed to such dilemma. Lark's Thrak was the final piece that the circle had visited tonight. We worked mostly on the rock & roll section and trying to get a consistent pulse to happen. this piece requires a constant feel of the 16th note pulse.

the next meeting will be at the Hughes' residence tomorrow night

TT

Small group meeting

2005-02-25T22:55:00.000-05:00

Where: 40 Sargent, Somerville MA
Who: Méli, Glenn, Terry
When: 6:35 to 9:15

The three of us worked on Growing Circle, Glenn showing the others the lead line. Tea.
Next, brushing the cobwebs off the bass-line, in circulation, of JSB Invention 10. After getting the notes more or less right, we worked on dynamics, and then, on speed.
Around 9 PM, we switched gears back to Growing Circle, for a recap.

Minutes for Tuesday Feb 22nd

2005-02-23T01:03:00.000-05:00

Where: The Hughes Residence, Somerville
Who: Glenn, Mary Beth, Martin, Mellisande, David, Victor and Dev

We began minus Dev who showed up later. We commenced the meeting counting 8th notes and looping the first section of EoTN. The basses were unable to count and so they just played. We added in the first bar of four, then finally the opening with the first 4 bars of four. Then we played the entire piece.
We then worked on the embroidery exercise once at a slower pace then at a faster rate of passing/changing. I felt the faster one was a improvement (And there was much rejoicing, Yeah!)
Dev arrived and we continued with work on Asturias, Israel, Larks Thraak, BtA and Third Relation. Victor and Glenn discussed Glenn's guitar action and related playing/guitar.
We ended with play a note/notes , trying to apply a balance of hands, head and heart.

Minutes for February 20th

2005-02-21T11:10:00.000-05:00

Where: The Hughes Residence, Somerville
Who: Glenn, Mary Beth, David and Dev

Glenn, Mary Beth and I worked on the 16 bar exercise while waiting for Dev. Once Dev arrived, we worked on various pieces that MB knew. We worked on the Bartok piece, with Dev and I clearing up some things during the diminshed section. We moved on to Eye of the Needle, followed by The Moving Force; especially to clarify the bass in order to play it without being so dependent on Dev's cue-ing. We then worked on Asturias, mentioning that the "high" twinkly needs to wait "an apropriate amount if time" before coming in, as it signals the re-entrance of the main melody. We concluded the evening with some circulations, which I thought were quite musical at times, and also had a firm tempo to them.

DBK

(Note the date of this entry has been changed so that it shows up in the right order w.r.t. the other entries. It actually was posted on Feb 28th).

Minutes for February 13th

2005-02-13T03:06:00.000-05:00

Attendees: Victor, David, Dev, Martin, Meli, Mary Beth (Terry and Glenn were out of town)

All there minus two. We did some Victor-led twisting and swaying, then he guided us in the Eye of the Needle meditation, I think. I nearly fell asleep on my stool a number of times…but that seemed to be a good thing. I needed some brain rest.

Then, we practiced the beats to thrak with clapping and feet (standing up). Then, with guitars, also standing up. Victor built on the song for me since I didn’t know all the parts. Breakthrough for Martin. Some progress for me. Ideally, with thrak, your feet tap at the right times AND you play at the right time. I could do the feet and rhythm standing rocking from one foot to the other, but not while sitting and just tapping my foot.

We all did pretty well. I was glad that I had listened to thrak in my car all week.

Toward the end of the meeting, we gathered and talked briefly. We tentatively set up practice and rehearsal times to get ready for our March 4th gig in Lowell. Maybe next Sunday, probably Tuesday 2/22, and then Sunday 2/28, 3/1, and 3/2.

After a long break

2005-02-06T23:15:00.000-05:00

Where: South Boston Dojo
Who: David K, Dev R, Glenn H, Martin B, Mary Beth A H, Victor M, Terry T
When: Super Bowl Sunday

We began working on 'body beat' exercises. We were in two groupings, taking turns on and off the beat, making our way through all the 8th note sub-divisions within a 8 beat phrase.

Then, we gave play-throughs to most of our current repertoire. We were not able to play the Bach circulation, since Méli was absent. We saved working on Bicycling for another time.