Brazil music trip.

Well, hi there,
In my last post I explained a little bit about the plans that Matthias and I have. Next year in october and november we are going to travel to Brazil to film and record rhythms and techniques from Brasil.
Our focus will be on the rhythms from Bahia and the beautiful pandeiro.
In the past weeks we have practiced our camera work and working together. So we filmed a choroconcert in Rotterdam, which was fun to do! The purpose is working as a team and learning how our camera's work. So when we arrive in Brazil we are not only good percussion players, but also a good filmteam!
Working together with camera's is completely different then in music. Music for Matthias and me comes naturally. We found out that camerawork takes a lot of preparation. To get the same colors, volumes and shots is difficult. I think we made many mistakes, but it is good to see those silly mistakes.... We still have a lot to learn.

We are also trying to do some crowd funding and this is new for us too. Okay, it is important for our project to succeed and here we have to learn too. Let me explain what we are going to do with all the information we get in Brazil.
Matthias and me are both teachers. Matthias teaches on EPM Holanda and I have a percussion school: Sambalanço. We both give workshops on schools and to groups (amateur and professional).
We are going to make 2 different e-books with music, audio, film and music notations. The good thing about e-books is that it is easy to download and to spread all over the world. We will write it in different languages, so it becomes easy to understand.
There will be coming a book about the pandeiro. There are many styles of playing like samba, coco, forro ect. All are with different techniques! So we will travel from Pernambuco to South Brasil to visit the masters on pandeiro with their rhythms and styles.
The other book will be about the Bloco's Afro. The rhythms that are played by: Ilê Aiye, Olodum, Timbalada, Malê Debalê ect.
In both books we will put background information about the history and the development.
Of course Youtube will also be important to share our information and to let people all over the world know what beautiful music is made in Brazil!

We are happy with all the help we can get. If you want to support us you can donate on my website: http://www.michaeldemiranda.nl/tutorials-contents-eng.htm. If you note that it is for the Brasil music trip, it will be fine.

We will keep you informed about our developments! Thanks!
Michael de Miranda.

Samba music.

It was 2 months ago that I received a mail from a producer in Brazil. The producer first gave me some compliments about my Youtube channel and I'm always happy when people enjoy my video's! That's why I make the lessons...
Anyway, he asked me if I could make 6 arrangements for samba in different styles. He mentioned samba schools like Mangueira, Salgueiro, Mocidade ect. The duration of the compositions had to be 4 minutes.
I was really surprised that he came to me with this, because he is living in Sao Paulo and in Sao Paulo you have lot of composers, percussion players, batucada groups and studio's! So why me? Of course I was really glad that a Brazilian producer came to a Dutch guy to ask him to record Brazilian music. But it funny if you think about it.
He gave me 2 weeks to complete it! So, for 2 weeks I lived in my studio, writing, recording and mixing samba!! The first 4 arrangements came quick, I had enough ideas to make nice music, but the last 2 (when you ran out of ideas) were more hard work! I was looking in books, watching youtube and so on, to get ideas and making the last pieces. In the end I even put berimbao in samba music! And it sounded great!
After 2 weeks I couldn't hear any samba anymore and this was during the carnival!!!!

It was a relief when I finished the job. I send the music to Brazil and luckily the producer was very happy! At this time he is making dance video's of it, which will be posted on websites. He will send me the end result and perhaps I'll post it here!
Now it's time for some Cuban percussion!!

Percussion promo video.

Last week a good friend of mine and a great percussion player, Nils Fischer called me. For the ones who don't know him, he was playing in Drums United with Lucas van Merwijk and a lot of other great drummers. Nils also made his own CD a few years ago with his group Timbazo. He re-arranged the beautiful music of Joe Cuba! With his group he turned the music of Joe Cuba into nice, modern timba music.
Anyway, we know each other, because we have studied at the same school and we live in the same city (Rotterdam). Actually, our kids are in the same school too!
He called me, because he needs to make video too. Nils is sponsored by Pearl (percussion and drums) and Pearl wants to make a promotional video. Most of the artists of Pearl may play 8 bars at a tempo of 108 beats per minute. Pearl will put all the video's together and it will probably be a nice film with all kind of different drum grooves and instruments! I think it is a nice idea!
Nils is also following me on my Youtube channel, so he knows my way of filming and recording. I am glad that he likes the way my video's sound and that I may record him!
The piece he is going to play will be with timbales, bongo bell, shekere and he will play on 5 congas. Knowing Nils a little bit, it will be latin with timba influences and of course a small solo. It all has to fit in 8 bars, so there's not much time..... But Nils is a very virtuous percussionist, he can put a lot in there!

For me, this is the first time that through Youtube I got a job that is different being a percussionist myself. Now I'll be a kind of director, producer! I think it will be fun to do.
When the video is done, I hope I can share the end result with you all!

Michael. 

Merengue lesson

Last week I had invited 2 of my good friends to make a nice lesson about merengue. I've played some merengue in my live but I am not a great specialist in this rhythm from Santo Domingo. My 2 friends, Wigbert and Alfredo have much more experience on this subject. So they came to my place to help me out!
I had prepared my living room (my wife is always very glad when I occupy the room.....) with lamps, microphones and instruments etc. It takes me 1,5 hours to prepare the room.
When my friends arrived, we have to talk a lot because we don't see each other that much. Of course we start talking about the old days and have a laugh about the things we did back in that time. But finally we start recording and for me it is a busy day. I take care of the audio and video and I have to take care that it will be a good lesson.
During the recordings I found out that Alfredo and Wigbert are still very good players, but explaining the rhythms and techniques is a different story. Wigbert has some problems with the english language and Alfredo is having difficulties with the camera.... He is looking away a lot and he is talking to Wigbert instead of the camera.
It is surprising how much effect a camera and microphone can have on people. It can take a while before you get used to recordings and get comfortable with lamps and everything around it. Of course I am a musician and not a film producer or director. So I can make people comfortable in making music, but not with video recordings......
Anyway, when we played merengue together the 3 of us were enjoying it! Now I'm editing the movie and I'm very curieus about the responce. I think a lot of my subscribers will notice what I described, but I hope that everybody will enjoy the percussion lesson. The information that we gave is still very interesting and you can surely see the joy that we have playing together!
The next time I'll invite friends for making a lesson with me, I have prepare it better. And I got a new idea for youtube!! Perhaps I'll start a new channel in which I'll just play the beautiful rhythms with friends. There are so many nice drum rhythms I would like to share with you all. No lessons, just good percussion arrangements!