This section of the site contains various musing on the subject of music. Playing and singing has been a life-long joy of mine, yet I remain, at best, a dilettante. A happy one who finds joy noodling and attempting to improve. This section is dedicated to sharing some of those efforts.
I started my musical journey by playing trumpet in our school’s cadet band. We had a band unit of 12 trumpets and 6 or 8 snares and we drilled, and marched, and did a few Anzac Day parades, and stuff like that. I learned how to play, got hooked on Herb Alpert, and then stopped when the Cadet Corps was disbanded. I taught myself how to play the flute (thanks Ian Anderson!) and only started relearning the horn this year. And it’s fun to blow!
This section of the site contains some musical experiments, mostly in the realm of cinematic scoring.
As an exercise in actually doing something possible, I decided I’d challenge myself to write short-shorts for cinematic scoring, typically of no more than one minute. There is no specific clip associated with any of these piece, more they are an attempt to create a mood typically associated with a genre scene. I’ve created them all using material to hand, including sound clips where I think that will enhance the mood. Being quick pieces, I’ve not spent a lot (any?) time in mixing, beyond some basic levels, certainly I have done any major production on these pieces. All that to say they could sound better if I put some basic work into them…
Here are some videos with scores I have created, because nothing say practice like actually attempting to put your mouth where your music is at.
I have not, for the most part, created any of the films or videos used here. I have sourced them from various places on the understanding they are either public domain, Creative Commons Reuse, or educational course material. I have used these images for educational purposes and no copyright infringement is intended. However, if you believe there is conflict, please send me an email asking to have the video removed from archsys.net. And please note I have no intention of monetizing any of this content but provide it solely for enjoyment and education.
Here are some examples of me attempting to jazz. Not so great, but I have a fun-time playing along and attempting to find a voice. I hope you may find something you like here (eventually).
The backing tracks come from a variety of sources including the excellent Jamey Aebersold series, the Hal Leonard Jazz-Play-Along, and some are Band-in-a-Box renderings. The copyright for the first two lies with their owners.
Summer 2023 and we–my wife, my brother-in-law, and myself–are down the South Coast of NSW for a much-needed week of rest, sun, and surf. And I have my laptop, my tenor, and my microFreak synth; my brother-in-law has his ax; and my wife her voice; and we noodle. Then we notice that the local miner birds have this very cool call that reminds us of the classic “Black Coffee” so I start to make a track. And this is the result. Fun times indeed!
This page contains pictures of a few of the instruments, other than basses, that I’ve built over the years.
Taken from an idea of Bart Hopkin, the Boos is a take on a tuned tongue drum. For me, this design has some decided advantages to a traditional multi-note tongue drum in that it can be made quickly and easily in my workshop, and second, I can tune each note quickly and accurately, without lots of complicated interactions from other notes.
Some material related to singing in the Choir of St Francis of Assisi Paddington.
Practice material for this mass. These are computer-generated from the score. Clicking on the link will play the .mp3 file in your browser; right-click to save it.
Here is the decoder for the .mp3 files
FULL means all parts are at equal volume
_SOP _ALT _TEN _BAS these parts are more prominent (the others down 9dB)
This page contains links to various lute music I have worked on or am interested in. Possibly best to tag this not of general interest. If you do choose to download and hopefully play any of this music, please do let me know if you find any errors (there are bound to be some!). Thank you!
Last update: 04 Sep 2019 (rev 0.9.6)
This is a performing edition of the Stahlhammer manuscript (S-Klm ms 21.068) found in the Läns Museum, Kalmar, Sweden. It is an excellent collection of tunes, mostly French, collected for a Swedish semi-noble at the end of the 17th Century. Many of the pieces are known from other manuscripts but there are a number of unique tunes in here. Best of all, they are playable by someone without virtuoso skills.
This page contains various music related stuff I’ve worked on, including scores by various authors, not jazz related.
Over the years I’ve been singing, Nicola Vaccai’s Methodo Practico di Canto Italiano per Camera (1832) or Vaccai’s Practical Method for short, has proven an invaluable companion to my singing. So much so that I’ve created my own edition (twice now). This time around I’m releasing the work under the Creative Commons Licence (BY-SA 4.0) for all to use and modify.