Location (grandparent | parent | this page): RodMer Arts Home Page | Rod's Music | SwallowHill Bone Dance Program Notes

If you've already read the program notes immediately below, or want to skip them for now, you can click --> to be taken immediately to the MP3 and MIDI files.

Table of Contents (TOC) of these Program Notes

• The Basics
  • Instrumentation
  • Duration
  • Composition date
  • Commentary
  • Computer performers (when human ones are absent)
  
  
• Structure notes
  
• MP3 and MIDI files
  

The Basics

Instrumentation

Piano
Steel Guitar
Muted Trumpet
Trombone
Bass
Rhythm

Duration

6 minutes

Composition date

1995

Commentary

The "bone dance" refers, of course, not to a danse macabre but to a trombone. Those of us ignorant, as I am, of all the trombone repertoire often think simplistically of trombones as either giving foreboding sonority in orchestral passages (such as in the Commendatore's theme in Mozart's Don Giovanni) or, on the other hand, as simply an oom-pah-pah bass in a Dixieland group. I wanted to play more with the trombone as dancing with the main melody - inspired in part from the wonderful music of the English group Penguin Cafe (who played at Harbourfront in Toronto in 1995 and who have long been a favourite of Merike's).

Computer performers (when human ones are absent)

Like all the MIDI files here, it is in General MIDI form. The General MIDI patches (on the 0-127 numbering system) are:

	Part	General MIDI patch
		name	#
	Piano	Acoustic Grand Piano	0
	Clarinet	Clarinet	71
	Steel Guitar	Steel Guitar	25
	Muted Trumpet	Muted Trumpet	59
	Trombone	Trombone	57
	Bass	Pizzicato Strings	45
	Rhythm	Rhythm	Channel 10

How they sound will depend on your own playback software.

On my own synth I used the following patches:

	Part	Sound Module	Patch
			name	#
	Piano	Roland RD500	Gr Piano A1	0
	Clarinet	Roland JV880	Clarinet 1 from Orchestra Expansion Board (OEB)	102
	Steel Guitar	Roland JV880	Steel Guitar	A 35
	Muted Trumpet	Roland JV880	Harmon Mute 1 from OEB	119
	Trombone	Roland JV880	Solo Tb 1 from OEB	113
	Bass	Roland JV880	Pizzicato 1 from OEB	74
	Rhythm	Roland JV880	Channel 10 Rhythm

These are what you hear on the mp3 files.

Structure notes

Intro
The intro begins with the trombone stating the main theme and then the steel guitar picking up a repeated figure that is mostly Bach-like (but perhaps a little rag-like too).

Theme 1 Section
After the rhythm and bass start in, we move into the Theme 1 Section in C minor (well it oscillates between C minor and C major). It goes like this. First the trombone states the theme. Then the muted trumpet plays an interlude. Then the trombone and its newly introduced friend, the trumpet, do a canon on the first theme. Then the clarinet plays an interlude. Then all three wind instruments play a canon on the first theme - the trombone starting, and the trumpet and clarinet following in order. The canon is not exact and doesn't go on very long. But you can hear the three voices entering and imitating each other.

Theme 2 Section
Now we switch abruptly into a Theme 2 Section in G major, and in a fast waltz time, where the piano carries the main theme with the trombone oom-pahing underneath and sometimes the clarinet embroidering above. In one interlude the muted trumpet carries the main melody - but elsewhere it is the piano that is driving this baroque-type dance.

Theme 1 Section (modified)
We then have a brief guitar bridge and then return to another Theme 1 Section. But it is not exactly like the original. For one thing, it is now playing in a tango rhythm. Once again we have the main theme in the trombone, then a trumpet episode, and then a two-part canon with trombone and trumpet. Now comes the clarinet interlude - but you may notice that the meter seems to have changed. As we return to the three-part canon (trombone, trumpet, and clarinet) we are now playing the first theme in waltz time (well, actually 6/8). And then as the canon starts to repeat we are joined by the piano that insists on playing Theme 2. I hope this sort of sneaks up on you (which it may if you don't read these notes).

Theme 2 Section again
There is a brief trombone bridge and then we move into another Theme 2 Section - which, it seems, is what the instruments really wanted to play all along. We begin with the piano (and trombone oom-pahing beneath). Then there's a brief duet (and then trio) of the wind instruments. Then piano and trumpet. Then piano, trombone and trumpet all loudly together. Then a quieter piano solo. And then the whole tutti frutti gang again. Then just the rhythm and bass. And then the whole gang one final time. Just to remind you who's boss, the trombone plays a brief coda (also reminding us of Theme 1, where it all began).

Well, you don't have to pick up every nuance of this structure as you listen. I wanted the piece to have a generally pop sound and to be easily accessible, but nonetheless with certain classical allusions.

MP3 and MIDI files

Year	Title ... Instrumentation ...... Excerpts	Min: Sec	Complete MP3 files (better sound)** file size	MP3 file extracts (better sound)** file size	Complete MIDI file (not as good sound but quick)**
	The complete piece:
1995	SwallowHill Bone Dance ... for guitar, clarinet, trumpet, trombone, piano, double bass, and drums	6:15	4.2 MB
	How the MIDI file sounds depends, of course, on your playback mechanism. On my computer, MIDI files are played by the QuickTime PlugIn and after much fussing (and a lot of rebalancing of instrument volumes) I've got a General MIDI file that vaguely works but it still won't produce portamenti at the beginning (trombone slides) or a final last note and the clarinet sounds very beepy. But it will give you a general idea. In comparison, the mp3 file (recorded from my sound-module patches) sounds much better and is better balanced. Of course, if you have a synthesizer, you can download the MIDI file and set the instruments to your own preferred patches and rebalance the volumes yourself -- but that's more work than downloading the complete mp3 file.
	Short extracts:
	...... Intro and start of first theme	0:52		0.5 MB
	This mp3 excerpt from the beginning correctly sounds the trombone slides (portamenti), which the embedded MIDI file does not, and generally gives a better instrument balance to the first theme.
	...... 2nd theme	0:46		0.4 MB
	Again in this mp3 excerpt of the second theme the mp3 instrument balance is better and the clarinet sounds more clarinet-like (it's very beepy in the embedded MIDI file).
	...... ending	1:05		0.6 MB
	Again the instrument balance is much better in this mp3 excerpt of the ending and the final note does indeed sound (which for some inexplicable reason it does not in the embedded MIDI file). And again in the mp3 file the trombone slides (portamenti) work.

** If you have a high-speed connection, forget about the MIDI files and just use the MP3 files (better). If you have a dial-up connection, consider the faster (but not as good) MIDI file only if the MP3 files seem to be taking too long to play or download.