Friday morning at ten, Bill Barrett gave his masterclass to a group of between 10 and 15 attendees. I was the official translator but although Bill and I had planned for him to fill me in on the contents of the class we never found the time to actually do it, so I only had a marginal understanding of what it was going to be about.
Bill started by explaning that all the techniques he was going to demonstrate were inspired by other instruments, from bagpipes to accordions to banjos and classical guitar. He had a little booklet in front of him with pages upon pages of exercices written down, which he generously offered to photocopy for whomever was interested.
The masterclasse proper started then. The first topic was drones, also called pedal notes, and how they can be used as a simultaneous accompaniment to a melody. Bill explained his thought process of planes on the chromatic whereby every note in the blow plane, blow lever in plane, draw plane or draw lever in plane can be played simultaneously. A melody over a drone therefore has to use notes in the same plane as the pedal note.
Bill was then asked about his tuning and explained the differences between the be-bop tuning he uses and the standard chromatic tuning. However, he pointed out, all that he was going to explain in the masterclass was applicable just as well to diatonic or standard tuned chromatic. The be-bop tuning just gives him more options to do what he liked to do musically.
We then moved on from continuous pedals to simulated pedals, whereby the pedal note is not played continually but played in between each note of a melody. Reverting to the pedal note thus gives the illusion of continuity. Using the chromatic's repeated notes as the pedal notes expands the number of notes that can be played at the same time as the pedal. For example, using the two F notes on a C chromatic as the pedal allow you to access both the "blow lever in" and the "draw "lever out" plane.
This also works on diatonic using either 2 draw or 3 blow, but of course there are a lot more possibilities on chromatic. That being said, the relative dissimetry of the diatonic layout makes for interesting diads (or intervals). In general, the less symetric a note layout, the more opportunities for exciting intervals it provides.
All through this there were various examples taken from bagpipe, organ and balkan accordion music. There were some scientific terms behind each of the specific examples too, but I can't remember them now...
Some of the stuff Bill was displaying by this point was already pretty amazing, although he confessed to not having "rehearsed" the exercices as much as he should have. In thruth, he often did mess up on the first attempt but got it right by the second time!
The level kicked up a notch when Jean-Michel, the guitarist who was to accompany Bill on Saturday night showed up. With an accompanyist, Bill was able to showcase some of the techniques more efficiently. He demonstrated banjo rolls, some classical guitar techniques and then showed how to adapt Montunos to harmonica. A Montuno is a kind of tune in latin American music that usually feature a melody that is alternated with a chord, and Bill has transcribed and adapted dozens of these to the harmonica, as showcased on the track Montuno VI from his Gutpuppet CD.
Before he moved onto what he called "advanced chromatic techniques" (and maybe should have called "avant-garde chromatic techniques", Bill played some transcriptions of piano ragtimes with the bass line played on one side of the tongue and the melody played on the other side. By this time, everybody was absolutely baffled!
The advanced techniques were pretty wild. Bill demonstrated playing with the slide out, ie. how to unlock the CX-12's slide out mid-solo and what to do with it then (sliding it widely while blowing or drawing produces an odd coughing note). He then discussed moaning into the harmonica and what to do with it, creating intervals between the voice and the note sung, varying that interval, etc.
Altogether it was a very dense and amazing class, the kind that sends you back not dispirited but rather full of ideas on things to explore and practice on the instrument. I know this report nowhere near does it justice, but hopefully, I will be able to work with Bill on getting some of these exercices to you on this very blog. We have started discussing this, and I'll keep you posted.
Oh, and if you're interested in hearing some of these techniques in action, Bill's CD Gutpuppet is the one to get, available on his website. Not the most accessible music ever by far, but very interesting to analyse and take apart. It's available on Bill's website at www.billbarrett.net.
Hey Ben,
I would be very interested in seeing how Bill handles montunos and banjo rolls as I've been looking at the former recently, and the latter I love too. If you have any exercises written out or photcopied, they would be much appreciated.
Can you send me a mail if you are notified of this comment? Otherwise I will mail you directly.
Eugene
Posted by: Eugene | May 04, 2007 at 12:52 PM