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Huge thanks to Andre Stepanian - who let me 'tweak' his wonderful guitar/improv composition (credits below):

Original improv composition for guitar by Andre Stepanian -
"Night Sessions 4" on his YouTube channel.
Embellishments by these artists: (live players; no synths!)
bass: Steve Peavey
percussion: Alexander Fox
duduk: Ilia Mazia (airgigs.com)
cymbal swells & mandolin: Peter Rahill

Cool track! One question: What region of the world would you say it most closely identifies with? It has a lot of sounds from different places. It leans mostly Latin but not all the way, has some Middle Eastern elements.

With world music, one of the most important things is the track being immediately recognizable as from a specific geography. Other than that, it's very lovely. I'm wondering if you would be better taking out instruments and making the Spanish guitar the focal point against a rhythm and hence all the way Spanish/Mexican/Latin. But get a lot of opinions!

Best,
Casey

Casey H wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 28, 2022 12:33 pm

Cool track! One question: What region of the world would you say it most closely identifies with? It has a lot of sounds from different places. It leans mostly Latin but not all the way, has some Middle Eastern elements.

With world music, one of the most important things is the track being immediately recognizable as from a specific geography. Other than that, it's very lovely. I'm wondering if you would be better taking out instruments and making the Spanish guitar the focal point against a rhythm and hence all the way Spanish/Mexican/Latin. But get a lot of opinions!

Best,
Casey

It's a blended* hybrid... but, its roots are Armenian.
It's CanadianArmenianNashvillishFloridianIsraeliFornian.
"...and, LOVING IT!" - Maxwell Smart

*Maybe I should've labeled it "Whirled Music"

Casey H wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 28, 2022 12:33 pm

Cool track! One question: What region of the world would you say it most closely identifies with? It has a lot of sounds from different places. It leans mostly Latin but not all the way, has some Middle Eastern elements.

With world music, one of the most important things is the track being immediately recognizable as from a specific geography. Other than that, it's very lovely. I'm wondering if you would be better taking out instruments and making the Spanish guitar the focal point against a rhythm and hence all the way Spanish/Mexican/Latin. But get a lot of opinions!

Best,
Casey

Hi Casey,
Thank you for the compliment on the piece, I have to give a lot of credit to Peter Rahill for taking this piece to another level.
Duduk which is the main instrument is one of the oldest instruments dated to 2000 BC made from an apricot tree which are plenty in my country Armenia which is part of Europe. The scales used are mostly phrygian and harmonic minor which makes it sound Spanish, middle eastern which the roots date back to the largest migration and settlement of Gipsys(BOSHA) from India, Egypt to Armenia.

This instrument was popularized internationally by the master Djivan Gasparian who played duduk in the movie score for 'The last temptation of the Christ" , "The Gladiator" and many other movies.
If interested and can find this award winning movie from the early 90's is "Lacho drom" which shows the migration of Gipsy music(the beginning) from India to where it ended in Spain.
cheers.

funsongs wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 28, 2022 11:17 am

Huge thanks to Andre Stepanian - who let me 'tweak' his wonderful guitar/improv composition (credits below):

Original improv composition for guitar by Andre Stepanian -
"Night Sessions 4" on his YouTube channel.
Embellishments by these artists: (live players; no synths!)
bass: Steve Peavey
percussion: Alexander Fox
duduk: Ilia Mazia (airgigs.com)
cymbal swells & mandolin: Peter Rahill

A huge thanks to you Peter for even thinking of doing this and taking it to where it is at so far, I just did some noodling on the guitar and then this happened.

Honestly - EQUAL PROPS go to each of the artists I called on to come up with something to fit Andre's tune...
I feel fortunate to have had access to the whole ensemble of creative musicians. They had 'fun' doing this one.
I got to put the pieces of the puzzle together:

Embellishments by these artists: (live players; no synths!)
bass: Steve Peavey
percussion: Alexander Fox
duduk: Ilia Mazia (airgigs.com)

It all depends on one's goal for a track. A track can be great but possibly have more trouble getting placed in Film/TV. But that's not everyone's goal. If you did a piece that truly featured the duduk as Armenian music such as at around 3 minutes into this video, it would be a very unique niche world track and I think music libraries would grab it. https://youtu.be/X8CWEiK6PkI

JMHO, FWIW, YMMV... And I claim zero knowledge or expertise regarding this instrument or Armenian music.

Best,
Casey

Casey H wrote: ↑

Sat Jan 29, 2022 7:29 am

It all depends on one's goal for a track.
Best,
Casey

The goal is in the name: fun.

funsongs wrote: ↑

Mon Jan 31, 2022 9:00 am

Casey H wrote: ↑

Sat Jan 29, 2022 7:29 am

It all depends on one's goal for a track.
Best,
Casey

The goal is in the name: fun.

And there's nothing wrong with that. As long as people are honest with themselves and other as to their goal, it's all good. A long time ago in P2P, we used to ask people what their goal was for a track because that meant a lot as to how we would comment. In recent years, everything has been focused on sync or not so we assume that's why a track is posted.

Goals can be just for fun, for your own gigs, for my own streams/CDs/downloads, to be a label artist, to get an artist to record it, or sync. I've heard lots of songs that would be great at live gigs but probably would never sync because of specific lyrics or other things. When you are selling your own music for streams/downloads, there are no rules, it's whatever you want to sell. Just examples.

Keep on having fun.
Casey

CTWF wrote: ↑

Mon Jan 31, 2022 3:24 pm

funsongs wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 28, 2022 11:17 am

.

Great track, Peter and Andre! I am less concerned than Casey about pinpointing location, as it feels exotic enough for a travel show, while relaxed and with a hint of melancholy.

The only thing I would reconsider is the end, which simply seems to fade out (or am I getting this wrong?).

Tom

I'm the first to admit I don't know everything and could be wrong. As a matter of fact if you ask my wife, I'm definitely wrong!

Casey