BigBro on the Web

Listen for yourself...

Recorded at my home Studio

Track Title Description

1. The Moving On Song
(2004-09-11) Written by Ewan McColl, this powerful folk ballad has been a staple of Christy Moore's performances for a long while. I've recorded it using a pair of C3000B's on a Tanglewood guitar and a AKG4033a for my vocals.

2. Slipjigs and Reels
(2003-12-27) I first heard this on the mi:da:za album of North Cregg (Buy it - it rocks!). Their version is a lot better than mine, but it's such a great song I had to give it a try. Recorded using the pickup on some one of my guitars, and a Shure SM58 for vocals. Apologies for the quality - I will rerecord it some day with decent mics.

3. Guitar Blues
(2003-01-25) This is really just a gratuitous helping of blues guitar widdling, put together to test my new Mackie D8B mixing desk and its synchronisation with my ADATs, rather than any particular musical goal. I laid down the basic blues riff using just the pickup on my Tanglewood and the tracked a second guitar bit on top. Just to round it out a little I stuck on a simple bass line using a Yamaha EX5 synth. All the effects are onboard the D8B - all my computer was used for a topping and tailing and converting to Ogg Vorbis format.

4. Variation On A Theme
(2003-01-17) This is a more exploratory piece - I really only recorded it so that a friend of mine in Ireland could take a listen and see if he wanted to do some tracking on top of it. It's recorded straight on to PC from my Yamaha EX5 and is some sort of exploration of a rather grandiose theme that I shall undoubtedly incorporate into a more interesting and well crafted piece of music at a later date. There are many mistakes, bum notes, failed resolutions and so forth, since I was making this up as I was playing it - Again, no effects (bar the Reverb on the EX5 itself), mixing, mastering or anything else has been done to this (and it shows... ;) )

Things are finally coming together and my studio in Cambridge is beginning to take shape (I've got photos.) I got some microphones to test over the Easter weekend so I recorded one of my favourite pieces, SummerTime! This was done late at night after a gig, I was recovering from a horrible cold and the whole thing was done in one take... So please forgive the inaccurate pitching, wrong piano notes, etc :)

Recorded at the Boat Race

Track Title Description

1. Summertime
AKG C3000B This is the AKG C3000B mic. I've put hardly any EQ on the vocals and only a tiny amount of light reverb to pull the piano and vocals together a little better - but it should give a fairly good impression of what the mic can do. The hissing noise is actually from the keyboard cabling which I have now fixed... Sorry!
...with apologies to all those truly gifted blues singers out there ;)

2. Summertime
AT 4033a This is the AT 4033a mic. Again, I've put in a tiny amount of reverb and no EQ at all this time. A little less transparent than the AKG C3000B, but I think it's a little more complimentary towards my vocals (which need all the help they can get...)

3. Improvisation
Piano & Strings - 7 Jul 2001 Recorded using my Yamaha W7 and Yamaha EX5, a mini-disc recorder and a sustain pedal. Mixing consisted of varying the volume faders on the keyboards themselves and mastering is something I will almost certainly never get around to doing with this track. Just here to demostrate my more ambient side?

Francis Kiernan (a great flautist and whistle player) and I (a fairly average pianist / guitarist / keyboardist) have just finished making a CD which I have named "Finland, Here We Come" mainly because he wandered off to Finland to do a Ph. D. in something or other. The CD was recorded in one night in the Digital Recording Studio here in the University, and I engineered it in the same studio. Please excuse the clipping in some of the tracks. I was pulling stuff straight from DAT to a Mac without actually being able to hear it, and the VU meter on SoundHack(tm) was behaving particularly badly that evening...

Anyway, if you'd like to take a listen to any (or all) of the tracks, here they are for you in MP3 format. If you need a player, you can download WinAMP for Windows and if you're using the far superior Linux, why not check out X11AMP .

Finland, Here We Come

Track Title Description

1. Danny Boy Danny Boy, often known as The Derry Air, is an old Irish Traditional piece. Francis played flute for this piece and I backed him on the guitar.
2. Traditional Set This is a traditional set played by Francis on the Tin-Whistle (a very traditional Irish instrument) and myself on the guitar. If you want to hear more, check out any pub in Ireland of a Friday evening - you might even find me playing there. :-)
3. Carrickfergus A slow air; an Irish lament. Played on Flute and Keyboard.
4. The Lonesome Boatman Another Irish slow air. This is played on Flute and Keyboard, but I have a version of the two of us playing it on flute and piano (a real one) which I think sounds a lot better. I might even put it up on this site sometime...
5. No Frontiers This piece was written by Jimmy McCarthy from Cork, and is probably best known due to the singing of Mary Black, sister of Francis Black. It's a beautiful melody but if you get the chance, have a listen to the words. To this day there are few lyric writers as gifted or as talented as Jimmy McCarthy.
      "Heaven knows no frontiers,
      And I see heaven in your eyes..."
6. Limerick, You're A Lady This song is the official anthem of the county and city of Limerick (which is where I am living) and extoles the wonders of the city and the Shannon river which flows through it's heart.
      "Limerick, you're my lady,
      The one true love that I have ever known..."
7. Ride On Ride On is another Jimmy McCarthy song, but this time made famous by the great Irish ballad composer and performer, Christy Moore.
8. An Cúalann This piece is one of my personal favourites. It is an old Irish slow air and is only a melody; it does not have any lyrics. Francis plays this as a flute solo and does a pretty good job of it too. ;-)
9. The Fields Of Athenry This song is known the length of breadth of the country and is often sung in, on, near or about bars and public-houses. Set in the time of the Potato Famine in Ireland, it recounts how a couple are split up as a result of the young man being imprisoned for stealing corn, "...that the young might see the morn'..." Penance for his crime was exile to Australia on one of the many 'prison ships' and hard labour in Botany Bay.
10. The Mountains of Mourne A Percy French song originally, it has been sung and performed by any number of Irish and international musicians.

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Track	Title	Description
1.	The Moving On Song (2004-09-11)	Written by Ewan McColl, this powerful folk ballad has been a staple of Christy Moore's performances for a long while. I've recorded it using a pair of C3000B's on a Tanglewood guitar and a AKG4033a for my vocals.
2.	Slipjigs and Reels (2003-12-27)	I first heard this on the mi:da:za album of North Cregg (Buy it - it rocks!). Their version is a lot better than mine, but it's such a great song I had to give it a try. Recorded using the pickup on some one of my guitars, and a Shure SM58 for vocals. Apologies for the quality - I will rerecord it some day with decent mics.
3.	Guitar Blues (2003-01-25)	This is really just a gratuitous helping of blues guitar widdling, put together to test my new Mackie D8B mixing desk and its synchronisation with my ADATs, rather than any particular musical goal. I laid down the basic blues riff using just the pickup on my Tanglewood and the tracked a second guitar bit on top. Just to round it out a little I stuck on a simple bass line using a Yamaha EX5 synth. All the effects are onboard the D8B - all my computer was used for a topping and tailing and converting to Ogg Vorbis format.
4.	Variation On A Theme (2003-01-17)	This is a more exploratory piece - I really only recorded it so that a friend of mine in Ireland could take a listen and see if he wanted to do some tracking on top of it. It's recorded straight on to PC from my Yamaha EX5 and is some sort of exploration of a rather grandiose theme that I shall undoubtedly incorporate into a more interesting and well crafted piece of music at a later date. There are many mistakes, bum notes, failed resolutions and so forth, since I was making this up as I was playing it - Again, no effects (bar the Reverb on the EX5 itself), mixing, mastering or anything else has been done to this (and it shows... ;) )