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Neo-Baptist has fast become one of my favourite blogs for challenging and intelligent commentary on churchy stuff. In recent months the blog has rally found it’s voice in terms of humour, criticism and encouragement. Today’s post, on Learning To Love Generation F, really got me thinking. The point really isn’t about Facebook, per se, but rather about how online “community” is challenging our assumptions about real world community. For a long time I was a critic of what I saw of local (Baptist) church culture because it reflected and to a large extent aped, the corporate world. However, that’s something of a historical anecdote, but the corporate world today has, in many ways moved well beyond what we see in churches, with a lot of business leaders exhibiting a greater sense of the importance of relationships, self-reflection, education and critical thought. I’m not saying that everybody’s working life is a haven of human flourishing, but many workplaces embody a culture of openness and collaboration that for sheer scope of freedom put our so called “free” churches to shame. The 12 work-relevant characteristics of online life that are cited just highlight that. Consider, for example, Hierarchies are natural, not prescribed. For a long time I was puzzled by the way some church leaders reacted to the web and social media. There was a rush to dismiss websites and then blogs and even the compliments handed out to online communities were backhanded. At first I thought it was simply because these media allowed alternative voices to be heard and present themselves as challenges to the status quo. Now I wonder if these new media, present a more fundamental challenge not just to power structures within church life but to the core of some kinds of ecclesiology. Increasingly I’ve come to wonder if churches are, to some extent, analogous to record labels and newspapers. The latter two business built their limited resources and high barriers to wealth; printing newspapers and promoting hit records is an expensive game. But, the craigslist, blogs, DAWs and MySpace have become deal-breakers - especially if you don’t lay awake at night dreaming of wealth and a home in the Caribbean. Both record labels and newspapers created wealth through the way a resource problem was answered and structured. You needed a label to get your music out, now you don’t. You needed a newspaper to create a PR buzz or post a classified, now you don’t. This truly is a blessed time for those for whom doing is a reward in and of itself, regardless of the rewards. The way of doing for the “ordinary” person has changed, if they are really focussed first on the doing. How does this relate to church? Forgive me for waxing economical, but to me church is a kind of resource problem (or collective action problem). We “do” church because there are things a Christian just can’t “do” by themselves. In a way, ecclesiological power was like the power of the record label or newspaper in time when access to theological education and resources was scarce and expensive. A lot of theological education is still built on that model today (Matt Stone has been blogging on this topic lately). There was a time where possession of a Bachelor of Theology degree put your near the top of the educated within a western society. But, today it is usually very unlikely that a pastor would be anywhere near being the most educated person in their congregation in most churches. Moreover, the explosion of christian publishing means that theological resources are more available than at any time in the history of the church. And, it doesn’t stop there, the possibilities for mentoring, retreats and spiritual direction are no longer confined to clergy and their professional development. Which brings us back to the online thing. The open, flat, collaborative, fluid dynamic that marks out online culture is a place that problematises a lot of the assumptions that feed the church as answer to scarce resources model. Put simply, we no longer need that kind of church or the denominational structures that were built to support it. If anything, that kind of church is becoming more an more repulsive to people of my generation and will be totally alien to digital natives. That’s not to say that there are no more collective action and resource problems because there are. But, they have largely changed from problems of access to problems of choice. Or, to put it another way, the economics have shifted from a problem of scarcity to a problem of abundance. We still need wisdom and to some extent leadership. But, there’s no question we need a different kind of church, different habits and to be blunt, different leaders. A few days back an important anniversary date for our family passed by without much celebration. Three years ago, we left Delhi for Hong Kong. Six years ago, we left London for Delhi. Two huge decisions and important decisions. Add to that the anniversary from earlier this year - ten years since leaving Sydney. I guess that’s the life of a “global nomad.” There’s plenty of pain mixed in the the joy looking back on those moves. I’ve learnt some important lessons in that time, like living with less, travelling lighter, focussing on work that is portable and learning to adapt to different cultures. But, moving in the expat world we have been in, at least for the past six years has not always been a smooth ride. Compared to our home cultures in Sydney (or London, for that matter) the expat world is still very patriarchal, traditional (in the sense of men work women change their name and stay home) and all to often very parochial and downmarket (a world of rubgy tops and Rod Stewart concerts). I miss friends, I miss family, I miss knowing, at least in part, what my future would look like. I’m much better at being productive on a day to day basis, but I still struggle to get my head around big projects. I certainly don’t want to stay here in Hong Kong too long. This town is not without some charms and a lot of conveniences. But, I long for a city where I can walk, where there is a real and vibrant choice of things to do besides shop and eat and where, to be blunt, I can keep two guitar cases open at the same time. In fact, surprisingly, the lack of space is perhaps the most tiring aspect of life here. We have, by local standards, a very comfortable apartment; although it is staggeringly small compared to anywhere else we have ever lived. I’m accustomed to smaller working spaces, but that has usually been traded off with decent storage and some sort of “workshop.” All of which, is a way of saying I’m becoming quite clear about things I would like when we we leave this town, wherever we settle next. OK, time to move the old song idea to the next stage. We’ve brought it back to life, then added some markers as a way to create the arrangement and make it easier to navigate. Now it’s time to focus on new content, specifically, some rhythm guitars. This is the basic rhythm guitar part I started out with. It’s kinda funky when you play it on guitar, but the MIDI part from the original version is pure cheese. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. Of course, it sounds better played on guitar. However, when handled by one guitar it’s a full and busy part and after a while on the track fatigue starts to set in. Oftentimes it is better, when faced with this sort of thing, to break the progression down into two, three or even four parts. This not only gives you a more interesting sound, it also gives you a lot more flexibility at the mixing stage to create interest by altering the balance between those parts create a changing sense of dynamics and intensity. I could write a long essay on why guitarists are so often unimaginative in their approach to rhythm playing, but I’ll save that for another day (or the comments section). For now, let me say that breaking a rhythm up into smaller parts and thinking on a bar by bar, phrase by phrase level is a powerful creative tool. If you haven’t done it much, try to think of each part coming from a different guitarist, with a slightly different vibe and playing a slightly different pocket in the groove. I find that works for me, when I create something that “percolates,” rather than sitting there washing over the mix. Often I start out with a single line motif. This time I worked out from the rhythm of the original part, with a light, slightly AfroPop vibe. The part isn’t perfect, but that doesn’t matter yet. At this stage go for groove and mood. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. Next, I added a part that comes from the top notes of the original, in a staccato style. There is a bit of tension and pull here that has a lot of potential to keep a listener interested and would not have come from a single rhythm part. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. Finally, a third guitar adds the 9th Chord stabs from the original part to the end of each bar and balances the rhythm out a little. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. So, how does that sound in the context of the song, with drums and bass chugging along? Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. It’s kind of getting there now. These parts are interesting, could be mixed a number of different ways and certainly pop and percolate well. However, there’s an interesting workflow stage to consider here - do we now “perfect” the rhythm part with better recordings and performances, or do we press onto the lead/head part of the song? There isn’t really a right or wrong answer to that question. Either move will progress the song forward and we have to do both eventually. This time, I’m going to opt to jump to the lead guitar parts. My feeling (and it’s only a hunch), is that if I spend too long perfecting the rhythm, it will make the timing of the head and lead more predictable. I’d rather trying playing the lead guitar over this slightly loose rhythm, then, in turn, play the rhythm responding to the lead. That approach is no guarantee of creative success. But, it sometimes leads to more “happy accidents” and forces me to perform more in the sense of creative stress. So, next time, so lead and melody playing. Oh dear, it’s Wednesday already. I feel really busy, but I’m not sure I’m accomplished much so far this week. Sometimes you have just to stop, take a look around and get some perspective. I’ve been working on the next stage of the old song idea I blogged about here and http://fernandogros.com/?p=1442. The song is progressing really well and there are some basic guitar tracks (three for rhythm and one for lead). I’ll band together a blog post later today on that. I’ve started playing with Audio Boo. It’s an interesting site, with the potential to become a kind of audio Twitter. For musicians it is a great platform for sharing clips. You can find me here and listen to my first test recording (of Hong Kong traffic noises). My plan is to use Audio Boo in two ways. First, to record one minute clips of ambient street sounds from around the world. Second, to record short, clips related to my studio work, finding guitar sounds, tweaking effects, that sort of thing. YOu can see some of the potential of AudioBoo in this explanatory video. You can even subscribe to my Boo’s via this iTunes link! Today I fixed an old post on extending a compositional idea (the audio links were broken). Moo are one of my favourite companies and right now I’m working up some stuff to send them, suing their sticker and business card formats. I like that you can now send images direct from your computer. A few months back I revisited the topic of Theology and Film, by looking at a draft outline for a Master’s module I proposed while at King’s. This week I stumbled upon another draft, which was a suggestion for a longer programme on the subject. I’ve started writing that up and should, hopefully, appear here next week. Another recent post I’ve been pondering was on different approaches to parenting. I don’t think of myself as much of a role model for good parenting, but it is a topic I’ve been thinking about a lot over recent months. There are practical issues about how we manage ourselves as parents, what I think of as “comportment.” There’s also relational issues about trust, love and respect. Moreover, there are conceptual and ideological topics, like authority and power where my thinking has shifted a lot over the last 20 years. I’m not ready to write any more just yet, but this is a subject I want to come back to soon. Although the June edition of Atlantic has yet to arrive here in Hong Kong (the may edition only made it last week), I’ve been enjoying Joshua Wolf Shenk’s interview on NPR on the subject of Happiness. I’m fascinated by how important some exposure to tension, stress, pressure and loss is to not only finding happiness, but also developing the personal skills required for sustaining happiness. Moreover, that happiness is seldom concomitant with seeking approval. My experience is that the contemporary church does a really poor job of talking about happiness, or modelling it for that matter - maybe this is because there is too much of an obsession of approval and “belonging” and there is little desire to really embrace the darkness and tragedy of life? Finally, I’m continuing to slowly evolve the new blog design. This is moving slowly, but I have made some changes to colours, added more header images and (slightly) narrowing the page width since the initial upgrade. More to come… Twitter rocks! It’s a great platform - or not. While the initial buzz has worn off, I’m still finding Twitter useful and manageable. However, we are well into a season of backlash as some question of value of the value of the 140 character format (e.g., 19 Reasons You Should Blog And Not Just Tweet). Interestingly, my “followers” on twitter are skewed far more heavily towards music and culture than “churchianity,” which is giving me a lot of food for thought. You can find me at http://twitter.com/fernandogros. However, you can stare at that page all day and not really “get” why Twitter has become so popular or why, for example it trumps Facebook for so many users. David Pogue, writing in the NYT, highlighted the poly-valency of Twitter, Twitter? It’s What You Make It
To “get” Twitter you have to participate - sign on, follow some people, engage in some conversations and ask some questions. But, Twitter is not an unalloyed good and John Stewart was right to highlight the way Twitter can promote the more destructive (and narcissistic) aspects of multi-tasking. In fact, there’s probably good reason to suspect that we are doing ourselves long-term mental harm by trying to multitask and, in particular, living with constantly diverted attention. As Sam Anderson writes in the current edition of New York Magazine,
Frankly, I’ve struggled over the years to control the hours I spend on the internet, particularly the random and unpremeditated minutes. I have no real interest in going to back to a world of facsimile machines, snail mail, catalogue shopping or closed information networks. In a way, the internet is not unlike television. I’m sympathetic to people who chose to not have a TV and one day I might join them. But, that move feels too excessive, too Spartan, too riddled with necessary explanation and worthiness. Put simply, we don’t need to go that far to control our urge to channel surf. Perhaps there’s an analogy with the marshmallow experiment (see the recent piece in the New Yorker, or this TED talk). The internet is yet another test of our ability to defer gratification and by extension to choose productivity. The problem is not so much that sometimes tune into the internet and use it, but that we so often chose to be partially tuned it while partially tuned into other things and thus not really tuned into anything. Last time I was just about to add some guitars to an old song idea. If you recall, the project started out in Garageband and was re-opened in Logic. One strength of Logic is that it can open and play Garageband files without much fuss. However, if you want to really work on a project, it can quickly get messy, since Garageband (like any “producer”) has it’s own way of routing the signal chain. And, it isn’t an approach to routing I like to use. I’ve learnt the hard way that it is sometimes quicker and more effective to just start a whole new project from scratch, laid out the way I like, and copy over all the assets (MIDI, samples and audio files). One advantage of this approach is that it gets you thinking early about the structure of the song and for me, that involves laying out markers. Markers are a powerful tool that Logic gives you to visually identify the arrangement of the song and also to navigate from one section to another within it. You can use markers to denote verses, choruses, solos, whatever you want. There are a number of ways to create markers. Perhaps the quickest is to create markers from regions. Select the region you want to use for marker, then press shift and k and you have a marker.
One of my favourites is to create markers from cycle regions. Just drag in the top part of the bar ruler to create a cycle, then with the mouse drag that down into the marker track and you have a region. The nice thing about that approach is that as you drag to create the cycle, you get a little pop up window telling you how long the marker will be.
One powerful feature of markers is that you can create multiple alternative marker maps.
I like to use this because early on in a project, it makes sense to have lots of markers, especially when you are working in detail on MIDI or recording lot of takes to comp together later.
But, once a project takes shape, I tend to think of the song in larger, more cohesive sections, so a simpler marker map is quicker and easier to navigate.
Marking up a song really engages your imagination and makes you think about the overall structure. Typically I write out arrangements in Sibelius, so marking is simply a matter of laying out the sections I’ve already created. Occasionally there are songs like this, where I’m coming back into a project with fresh ideas and the markers can act like placeholders for future recording and arranging - solo here, bridge there, maybe a breakdown in the middle - that sort of thing. Once you’ve marked up a song, there are some powerful navigation tools that come into play. You can quickly audition whole sections, for example. Open up the marker list (look for the “lists” button), then command click on the name of a maker in the list and hold the mouse button down. The song will play till you release the mouse. You can scroll forwards and backwards through the arrangement by using Control and Command plus either the right or left arrow key. Moreover, if you have a the cycle area active, it will move to match the length of the marker you navigate to. This really speeds us the laying down and editing of parts throughout the song.
As always, the way to speed up your workflow is to learn and use the key commands. In fact, I have a wireless Apple keyboard attached to my music stand, so when I’m recording I can navigate through the song and manage the transport control without having to go near the desk or computer. I’m starting with a tune I wrote back in July 2007. It’s one of the classic examples of where my workflow falls apart. The tune was written, complete with sections, breakdowns and even a sketched out solo in less than 48 hours. Then, I failed a few times to bring a recorded version to life and forgot about it. On a recent hard-drive trawl I rediscovered the tune and thought, “there’s some potential there!” Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. OK, so it sounds cheesy as all hell. But, the basic bones are in place - an idea for a groove, a melody and a “vibe.” The song was originally written in Garageband, which is nice for quickly drafting out a tune. But, it presents a few problems that have to overcome quickly. First, the sounds are less than best. Second, the arrangement, when opened in Logic, looks pretty uninspiring and one dimensional.
Third, not all the sounds and plug-ins activated correctly in my current setup.
A quick way to address this is to go the rename the track and label it BROKEN - followed by the name of the plug-in. This makes it easy to see that work is need here. I also like to colour the regions something obvious and glaring, like bright red, to show they need some attention. Hopefully, after a few hours work (and a couple of blog posts), this will look and sound very different! The first step to that is to save the file as a new Logic project. Here you can see me creating a new folder for the album project as well.
With that done, it’s time to tackle some of the sound and arrangement issues. I usually start this in one of two ways, either to map out the arrangement with markers and regions tied to the markers, or to nail down the groove of the song with the basic rhythm section instruments. Since this is a groove based tune and I am imaging some basic changes to the arrangement, I’m going to start with the groove. I always like to start with the Bass, since the kind of music I like is usually built on a strong bass groove. Immediately, I can sense a problem here, since the bass groove is weak and unfocussed. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. Since I will come back to the bass line, once the whole song is assembled, at this stage I just want something with a more live sound and a little bit of groove and variation, rather than this obviously monotonous idea.
I loaded a Kontakt bass instrument (Pop Bass), added the Logic Bass Amp plug-in, copied the basic bass riff to a new region, then altered the timing a little, to being some beats ahead and behind the groove. The result is not perfect, but a lot more interesting to play a long with. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. Next up is the drums. If I was tracking a live band I would never bring the drums in this early in a production. Recording drums too early in the process can lead to very stiff and unadventours takes. However, when programming MIDI it can pay to bring the drums in early, since synchronise micro-timing issues upfront can make the workflow much faster as the song develops. Moreover, you can always come back and loosen and re-edit the drums later to given them a more real feel. Right now, the drums kinda suck. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. So, I Loaded up EZ Drummer, with the Jazz Kit preset and found a groove that worked with the tune. Again, I’ll come back to this, the main issue right now is to find a better groove. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. Finally, I want the drums and bass to lock a little better. Right now they feel like MIDI from two similar, but unrelated songs. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. The problem is the MIDI for the drums is following a different groove, or pattern of being ahead and behind the beat than the bass I worked on earlier. The image below shows one the views I return to time and again in Logic.
In the Piano roll editor I’ve set the view to Region colours, so you see all the bass MIDI information and all the drum MIDI information in different colours. Here i then go through, note by bass note getting an approximate match. What I immediately noticed is that I had altered the Bass part to play behind and in front of the beat in different places than the drums, so aligning the two a little created a tighter groove. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. So, how are we going? Well, the drums and bass are sitting a lot better and the whole thing is starting to sound musical! The next step will be to de-cheese the rhythm guitar and start thinking about some lead sounds for the melody. See if this sounds any better to you. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser. I’ve been thinking about this for a while - how to use the blog to help me finish my solo album. Today I’m starting something different. Truth is I’ve been in a funk over the album for two reasons. First, I lost sight of why I was doing this collection of tunes in the first place. That’s what happens, I guess, when you start a project in one place, then try to finish it somewhere else, with a few dramatic moves and changes of career in between. I’m pretty poor at getting things done when I lose sight of the big picture. I need a sense of how tasks fit into the grand scheme of things to stay motivated. But, my reasons for wanting to out out a solo album are very different now to what they were in 2003. Perhaps, in a perfect world, I would have already had one (or three) albums out by now, but there’s no point waiting for the perfect world to arrive. What transpired was this - the vacuum left in this project by my changing circumstances became filled with the old bogey of all my musical projects - fear. I love music, I think I always have. When I finished High School, the only clear vision I had for my future was a desire to play music and work in music technology (building guitars and effects). Of course, I’ve taken a lot of vocational paths, but music has been a constant, something I keep coming back to. That’s rather telling because I’ve had some crushing defeats and disappointments in the musical world. I’ve seldom felt encouraged or supported in my music and I’ve wasted a lot of time over the years trying to win the favour of people I thought I had to please. There’s a lot of negatives there that I still struggle to overcome on a daily and during some sessions, on an hourly, basis. Of course, that’s only part of the story, since music has brought me some great friends, filled my days joy and given me an outlet to express emotions and ideas that can only really find form in the mix of rhythm and melody. In recent months I’ve been able to focus more clearly on the these later positives and I am committed to carving out a greater space in life for them. Thinking about that has helped me clarify what this album project is really about - something I will blog about when the songs are assembled. For now, I’m going to focus on blogging my way through the fabrication of the album. For the next couple of months I’m going to write my experience of re-arranging and re-recording each tune for the album; starting today. Hopefully that will lift the lid on where I am up to, explain a little of what is involved in this kind of solo project and maybe even pass on a few things I’ve learnt about working with Logic Pro, Sibelius and Reason. Today I’ve stared tackling some blog redesign tasks. I’ve settled on a new theme, the nicely named Atahualpa theme from Bytes For All. What I like about this theme is the easy customisability. So far, I’ve made the following changes, - new header images The layout is far from complete, but I’m pretty happy so far with the direction this is heading. Two bits of entertainment related news that are worth tracking in Hong Kong right now. It seems that local government has, in its wisdom, decided to close down dining in public squares in the Central district. There are a few restaurants that have outdoor tables (with appropriate permits) and they are now being shut down. One that is at the centre of the controversy has the nicest urban outdoor eating space I’ve yet found in Hong Kong. Hong Kong has, for its size and the diversity of its food culture, a surprisingly small number of outdoor tables and and even smaller number offering upmarket, or even mid-market, quality food. That’s an obvious deficit, compared to other global cities. This isn’t a “tourist” issue, but also a local quality of life issue. When a city is committed to it’s “street” culture - not just eating, but walking, shopping and socialising - then there can be a lot of things that flow from that, in terms of planning and development that work towards protecting the human scale. Another bit of news is the soon to be implemented city-wide ban on smoking in eateries and entertainment venues. Most places saw a partial ban come into effect two years ago, but an extension was granted to some pubs and venues. However, the extension runs out on July the 1st. As far as I’m concerned it can’t come soon enough. Musicians shouldn’t be forced to suffer the long term effects of second hand smoke in order to have a career playing live. Full stop. Of course, there are some protests, with the old hoary economic arguments being thrown out - if the ban comes in, bars will close, people will lose jobs, etc. But, the experience from other cities that have such bans doesn’t fully support that. Here in Hong Kong the percentage of the adult population that smokes is less than 12%. Think about that. Not all those smokers will, en masse, stop going to pubs and bars because of the ban. Then, think about the other 88%. How many don’t frequent pubs and bars because of the smoke and might now change their habits. Well, here’s one. As much as I love live music, an act has to be pretty special for me to endure a night of second hand smoke. I’m looking forward to the ban and to seeing more live music and enjoying more of Hong Kong’s creative scene. Monocle will soon update their global quality of life survey. Sadly, I don’t have any inside scoops to report. Like everyone else I’ll be waiting on June 18 to read it in the next edition of the magazine (picking up a copy while strolling through the chaos that is Heathrow airport would be rather fitting I think). But, there are a few things I’m looking forward to. I expect Copenhagen will rank well again. There’s no question the city cast a spell on us. Barely a week goes by that I don’t try to imagine myself living there, or least visiting again with a nice stay at the Hotel Nimb thrown in. Hong Kong doesn’t deserve to make the top 25. But, given recent features in the magazine and discussion on Monocle’s podcast, I wouldn’t be surprised if the city attracts some comment. Quality of life is a great category for cutting through some of the marketing (or is that propaganda) that commercially success cities hide behind to mask the structural problems their residents face. I’d love to see Monocle give Hong Kong some of the same kind of critical analysis they put into London’s woes. It’s taken a while, but Monocle has finally started to ask its correspondents to report from other parts of Australia, rather than the inner city districts of Sydney and Melbourne. Of course, both cities will probably fare well again in the rankings. But, in all honesty, it surprises me that Sydney ranks so well, given Monocle’s aims with the survey. The downtown areas are a triumph of cars over pedestrians, the rail infrastructure is sub-third world and property prices have risen brutally over the last 15 years. It’s time for Monocle to spring a “down-under” surprise on it’s readers. Any bets on Adelaide at least getting a mention? London won’t make the top 25 again, either. As much as I loved my years in London, the passing of time has made me question my desire to move back there. In so many ways London has become a less attractive city to live in than it was ten years ago. I’m looking forward to my visit in a few weeks, partly as a tourist, but mostly as a former resident. I’ve no idea how India’s cities will fare and, of course, infrastructure problems (and to some extent, climate) make it hard of any them to really score well on a quality of life index. But, if points were given on potential, the things would be different. What fascinates me is the prospect of western designers and creatives opting to rethink India as more than just a place for outsourcing, but actually as a prospective location - especially given India’s own local design and creative community. I’ll be interested to see how the quality of life index, as a concept, evolves - especially in our post-crisis times. Thankfully, the index has focussed on a lot more than just consumption and consumerism. Personally, I’d like to see it pay a little more attention to places where it is easy to start and develop a small creative brand and where it is easy to network with other people in creative industries. Technorati Tags: Monocle, Quality of Life Index There are some good intentions behind the proposals for the new West Kowloon Culturual District. Hong Kong does need more venues, especially a larger venue for Ballet and classical concerts and a large auditorium for touring pop and rock acts (who often bypass Hong Kong all together). Hong Kong also needs to diversify it’s economy with more support for arts, design and eduaction and is lagging behind as an Asian destination for cultural events in general. Hence the plan to convert 40 hectares of waterfront land in a giant cultural hub. The potential is dizzying and it has inspired a lot of local debate. Not surprisingly, there are some who see no benefit in the focus on arts and want more retail, commerce and typical tourism (merchandising, maybe a new ocean terminal, lots of hotels, etc) to crowd the space. But, thankfully, they represent a minority. There are also some who feel the development, will, in and of itself, solve all of Hong Kong’s cultural problems - that it will, somehow, magically lead the city to the centre of Asia’s arts and degisn industry. That isn’t going to happen. To do that, HOng Kong needs to rethink the role of design and arts across the whole metropolis. It needs to rethink eduaction, rethink housing, rethink retail, rethink the proximity between where people live, owrk and socialise and it needs to rethink manufacturing. If Hong Kong wants to become a design and arts hub it needs to become, again a place where people make things, in every district, not just a place where people speculate on the “value” of things. Arts policy has to start and focus on the level of neighbourhoods and communities. What WKCD can tackel are a small set of the bigger strucutal issues. A showpiece museum, a big auditorium and high end auditorium could be put together in a globally attrractive package, something that would be HK’s own version of Sydney Opera House, or Guggenheim. But, the important thing to remember about the Opera House, apart from the controversy that ssurrounded its construction, was that it took a long time for the site to really take off as a cultual venue and for the city to “love it.” In fact, the Opera House “area” many tourists take for granted is actually the product of thirty years of development along the shoreline, together with a learning experience for tthe City of Sydney in how to use the space - what you have today did not emerge overnight in it’s completeness and was neither the product of a comittee, or of one visionary. West Kowloon could become a showpiece cultural site for Hong Kong over time, but to fill the venues in a meaningful way er the next 20-30 years, Hong Kong will have to expand it’s citywide commitment to arts, culture and design from the grassroots up. Only then will it have a sufficiently large pool ot talent and collaborations to make the new site anything more than a circus for visiting acts. Thanks to the review on Create Digitial Music, I’m been walking on clouds all morning. The reason is the release of an upgrade to Sibelius, the music notation programme. Put simply, I’m very excited by the new features and improvements. Over the past few years, Sibelius has become a central part of my daily working routine. Like every application, there are some things I would love to see changed or at least improved upon. Thankfully, Sibelius have tackled five of my key areas of interest. DAW Intergration - Currently, there is no intergration between Sibelius and Logic. So, to hear a Sibelius arrangment in Logic I have to export the MIDI, import to Logic and create instruments. Frankly, creating arrangments for exisiting audio this way is convoluted. Now, Sibelius will run in ReWire mode, so you can hear the Sibelius arrangment in Logic without importing and exporting MIDI. This is a huge bonus for loop based composition, arranging to film and, of course, arranging to exisiting tracks/audio. Moreover, you can now export individual Sibelius instrument arrangements as audio stems, which adds even more flexibility. Fretboard and Guitar Chords One feature I miss from the old Sibelius G7 product is the fretboard. It made a nice change as an input device, was useful for checking voices and helped a lot in creating chord diagrams. Thankfully, Sibelius 6 brings back this feature, together with some improvements in how chords and chord diagrams are handled and the ability to make above the stave scale diagrams. Layout Alignment Sibelius is unparalleled in terms of the layout, engraving and publishing control it gives to music copyists. However, some layout issues required a lot of discrete fine tuning, compared to the magnetic object layout we see in other apps (especially from Omni group, for example). Now this has been improved, which will make it much faster to manage the layout of lines, staff text, expression markers and lyrics. Version Comparision I don’t like saving multiple versions of the same file because it quickly clutters harddrives and folders. But, when composing and arranging, it is sometimes helpful to compare different versions of a tune, especially when working on complex pieces. Sibelius now has a feature to compare versions, complete with editing notes. Jazz Markers Sibelius already gives you the ability to add marks like falls and droits, as well as create “real book” style repeat bars, but it’s less than intutive. These features are now much easier to use and available direct from the keypad. Also, you can now use half stems to indicate rests on beamed groups of notes, which is my preffered way of notating funk rythmns. The Hong Kong waterfront is a paradox: a dynamic working harbour and a fantastic city skyline whilst also being one of the most inhospitable harbourfronts in the world. Parks and seats would help, a buffer from the relentless highrise would help even more and some good food and entertainment would complete the picture. Sadly, the current plans to develop the Central harbourfront have too little of this. Part of the problem is a government mindset that considers 10 story buildings “low rise,” that doesn’t really understand how walking can be joyful, that people might like to eat outdoors, or that some existing vistas and aspects of Central could be enhanced by the development (and may already be “world-class). The development proposals and ideas coming from the government don’t function on a human scale. All to often the cave into real estate rhetoric (whatever we do, we need to increase retail space and office space), or petty politics (IFC built out some vistas, so it’s time to build out some of theirs). But, a more telling place to start would be with people, with the human proportion of the development. Put a person, one person, in front of the under construction pier 10 on a hot day and ask what does that person feel and experience? First off, they will feel hot, because there’s no shade - there’s just concrete. They will feel dwarfed by the highrise that encircles them, but somewhat relieved that it is at a distance. They might like to sit down, maybe have a nice drink or something to eat. They will also be assaulted by the noise, of course it is construction, but traffic noise in general, especially in the high rise noise traps that make up much of this city, is well beyond human comfort levels at most times of the day. If the noise can’t be totally blocked out then some entertainments would be nice. The planning should start from there - comfortable walking, shade, easy distraction, good food and drink and relaxation are no public commodities that are available everywhere in Hong Kong, but they could be part of the Central Harbourfront. In fact, if they were this would be one of the great world waterfronts - seriously. |
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