ClassicalCode

I was at home with my parents and my girlfriend Chelsea, and my dad was singing “Take Me Out To the Ball Game” off by one word. He then proceed to sing it again off by TWO words. Eventually the evening was reduced to repeating the song over and over and trying to shift the words one note back each time. We soon realized that this was a sort of phase music. If the number of words is one fewer than the number of notes, the words shift father and farther from their original position in the melody creating various interesting word stresses and pairings.

I decided to take this idea to it’s logical extreme and found a short enough song that, within a reasonable period of time, it can be repeated enough times that the words eventually make the full journey back to their original position. Here is a video of me singing “Row Row Your Boat”:

In order to actually sing this, I had to create sheet music for it.
Here it is: row_row.pdf

My girlfriend is sick, so I arranged and recorded her a song. I hope this helps you feel better Chelsea.

For Chelsea:

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This is my first doo-wop arrangement, and the first full song that I have multitracked. Unfortunately with five tracks at once, the noise on the recording becomes rather annoying. If anyone could help me reduce the noise, I would greatly appreciate it. I plan to write up the arrangement in the next few days (as an exercise) so you can expect to find that soon.

Update:

I typeset the arrangement using Lilypond, a wonderful open source program for engraving music. Here are the results:

The arrangement as a printable pdf: earth_angel.pdf

The Lilypond code: earth_angel.ly

In an attempt to record something for Chelsea (she has been away for almost a month now) I decided to record one of my favorite love songs, Everything I Have is Yours. I believe that only version of it that I have heard was a Bing Crosby recording that had been doctored to sound like it was on a really old phonograph for a play.

I have never had any faith in my ability to come up with harmony parts by ear, I always need a piece of paper and a pencil for that, so I decided to challenge myself.

Apparently my ear harmonies are possessed by Lord Satan.

The aftermath:

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Chelsea and I have been dating a year and six months as of today. If she had been dating a real singer, he probably would have written her a sweet love song by now. But, for reasons I still don’t understand, she chose me instead. So instead of a whole love song, she just gets a barbershop love tag.

I love you Chelsea. Thanks for putting up with me and my nerdy ways for a whole year and a half.

Written and recorded for Chelsea:

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