Reggae

Reggae music originated in Jamaica in the 1960s.  However, it became a popular music style internationally first in the 1970s, mainly in Britain, the US and Africa. Reggae originally came from the style called “ska" that was a very popular form of Jamaican music. Reggae music is four-beat rhythm with accented second and fourth beat. The rhythm is often played syncopated. The lyrics are usually expressing the pleasure of living in the ghetto but it can also address social and economic justice. A very important player within the reggae music is Bob Marley. Marley was born February 6^th 1945. He was a Jamaican sing-songwriter. He mainly played early ska, rock steady and reggae. He was the person to make reggae music popular around the world. During his teenage years Bob Marley lived in the neighbourhood called Trench Town, which is depicted in many of his songs. He mainly sang about the poverty and cultural influences of Trench Town. In the 1960s he made a band with some of his friends called the Wailers. With this band Bob became the voice of the poor in Jamaica. After his death on May 11 1981 his songs became even better known and they are still popular today. After his death an album called “Legend” was created with his best songs and this album is the best selling album of all times.

Our Unit:

At the beginning of this unit we got a starting point. This is what it said:

A reggae band gave you a call. On a certain date they have an important gig, but one of the band members is moving abroad and they need someone to replace the lost member. They asked you to fill in and of course you couldn’t say no to that challenge…

We had to perform two songs at the end of the unit on two different instruments. Before we started practicing we needed to know what instruments we were going to play. I am playing piano in “No Woman No Cry” and bass in “I Shot the Sheriff”. These are the instructions I received for the two instruments.

I Shot the Sheriff – Bass:

No Woman No Cry – Piano: 

We also received the song sheets for the two different songs. Both of the songs are played with the time signature of 4/4, meaning that there is four quarter notes in each bar. Here are those papers:

Below I will describe how to play those songs:

I Shot the Sheriff – Bass – Simple:

For the verse it tells you to play each chord and hold it until the next one starts. On the bass you only play the root note of each chord. So, in order to do that, we need to know where to find those: C, B and E (the minor is not relevant since only the root note is played).

If you look at the diagram below you can see a diagram of a fret board on the bass. Refer back to this diagram whenever you want to see what it is that I mean.  String 1 is the thickest string placed at the top when holding the bass. In the picture below you can see how the different frets and strings are named. Open string is when you don’t hold on any fret.

Here is another diagram but this one with the different notes on it.

When you play the bass you always want to play the note in the lowest octave possible. Therefore you follow these instructions when looking for the note on the bass.

•        Look at string 1, the open string and the first four frets and see if you can find it.
•       If you cannot find it look at string 2, the open and the first four frets.
•        If you cannot find it look at string 3, the open and the first fret.

By following these instructions we will find our C on the second string, third fret. We will find the B on the second string, second fret. The E is on the first string, open string.  The diagram below shows the different notes that we will be playing for the verse.

If we now go back to the song sheet for the verse we can start playing it.

This means that we have to play the C for two beats, then the B for two, then the E for four. Then we have to play the C for two beats, the B for two and then the E for four. Notice how there are symbols at the beginning and at the end of this line that look like this:

These symbols mean that anything that is in between them has to be repeated once.

Once we have repeated everything that is in between them once we need to play the next line. The next line starts with a C that is played for two beats, then a B that is played for two and then an E that is played for four.

After this it says N.C. If we go back to the instructions it says “Where it says N.C just play Em and hold it for two bars.” So we play an E and hold it for two bars, which is equivalent to holding it for eight beats.

After the N.C part notice how the time signature changes to 2/4. This means that in this bar there can only fit two quarter notes instead of four. In this bar there is a half rest meaning that nothing is played during the two beats. You have now finished playing the verse.

For the chorus it tells you to play the chords with this rhythm:

However we first need to locate the notes that we are playing. In the chorus we play the E and the A. By using the instructions from previously we will find the E at the same place as before: the first string, open string. The A is located at the second string, open string. The diagram below shows where they are on the fret board.

The next step is to focus on the rhythm. To start lets put out the beat numbers under the bar. The first note is a quarter note which means it is played on the first beat and played for the whole beat causing the second note to be played on the second beat. The second and third notes are eight notes. Eight notes are played for half a beat, which means that you play the second note and the third note both within the second beat. The next thing in the rhythm is a half rest. That means that nothing is played for two beats or in this case the rest of the bar. Here is the rhythm with the beats written out under it:

Since one note is not played on the beat, we will add & signs to make it easier to know when that note is played. So, instead of reading 1, 2, 3, 4 we will read it 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &. This is the rhythm with the & signs written out.

Now it is easy to see that we play on the first beat, on the second beat and on the second &.

Now, lets go back to the song paper to see what note we will play this rhythm on.

This tells us that we have to play the rhythm fist on the E, then the A, then E and then another time on the E. The symbol in the fourth bar means that you have to repeat the same thing that was in the previous bar. Notice that after that we have the same repeat symbol as before. However there isn’t one at the beginning. If there isn’t one at the beginning it means that you have to repeat the whole thing from the very beginning. However in this case the E is the very beginning. So, we play the rhythm on the E, the A, the E and the E one more time. Then the chorus is finished.

At the bottom of the song paper you can find the order of, in which, the chorus and the verse should be played.

This means that we start by playing the chorus then the verse then the chorus etc. We play the chorus a total of five times and the verse 4 times. Notice how it says outro at the end. However in the instructions there is nothing about the outro. This is because we are aloud to choose for ourselves what we want to play as the outro. My group decided to play the N.C part once at the end so on the bass it would just be playing an E and holding it for two bars.

I Shot the Sheriff – Bass – Advanced:

When playing the advanced version you have a different rhythm of different tones that you have to play on the Bass. This is the rhythms and the tones.

Instead of playing E you would play E, G, B and E with eight notes. Instead of playing the A you would play A, C, E, A. Lets find these on the Bass. Lets start with the Em chord.

The E that you play is the same E as you played previously. It is found on the first string, open string. The G is found on the first string third fret and the B is located on the second string, second fret. This are the tones on the bass.

For the Am chord you play the same A as you have played previously. It is found on the second string, open string. The C is also on the second string but the third fret. The E that you play for the Am chord is different from the E that we have played previously. If you look at the tones in the rhythm above you can see that the E that we are playing for the Em chord is located further down on the staff (the 5 parallel lines that sheet music is written on) than the one that we are playing in the Am chord. Therefore we need to play an E in a higher octave. We find the E on the third string, second fret. This is what it looks like on a fret board diagram:

Lets look at the rhythm and add the beats to it. The notes that we have here is eight notes, which means that there are two notes played evenly spread out in one beat. Therefore we can add & signs on the half beats to make it easier to play them evenly spread out.

Now you can see that you play on the 1, the &, the 2 and the &. However on the 3, &, 4 and & there is a half rest so nothing is played.

Just like for the simple version you will then play this rhythm and tones when it says that you are playing that chord in the song paper.

When you are playing the advanced version of I Shot the Sheriff the verse is exactly the same for all parts other than the last the bars (the N.C). Instead of just playing an E we are actually playing the rhythm that is written out on the instruction paper.

The reason you want to play the rhythm on the instruction paper and not the one on the song paper is that on the instruction paper it is written in the bass clef while on the song paper it is written in the treble clef. The reason for this being important, is that it determines the octave that it is played in. On the bass you want to play it in the lowest octave possible, which means that it has to be written with a bass clef. Lets start by putting out what tone each of the notes is supposed to be.

The reason there is no letter below the 4^th note (not including the rest) is because there is a curved line below it connecting it to the one before. That little curved line is called a tie. A tie means that the values of the two notes should be added. Basically you don’t play the second note but you keep the one it is connected to for the value of both. The same line is shown between the two last notes in the second bar. This is where the notes can be found on the bass:

Lets look at the rhythm. I am going to start by putting the beat numbers below the rhythm. As you can see this rhythm is quite complicated and you are not always playing on the beats at all. In this rhythm it is even more important to add the &s. However the first two notes in the first two bars are not even on the &. The little dot right after the note indicates that you play the note and add half of the value to it. In this case it is a dotted eight note. You would normally play an eight note for ½ of a beat however when it is dotted you need to add half of it to ½ therefore ½ + ¼ = ¾. Therefore you play it for ¾ of a beat. In order to show this under the rhythm you would say “1 e & a”. Basically what you have done is that you have split the 1 into four words. When you say it, it will also take up the same amount of time as if you were to only count normally. Here is the rhythm:

In this rhythm I have made only the numbers/letters/symbols that are played red. This makes it easier when you want to play it. For the first bar you would play on the 1 and the a, not the two but the &, not the 3 but the &, 4 and &. In the second bar you would play on the 1 and the a but not the 2 but the & and hold it for the rest of the bar. Notice once again how the time signature changes for the last bar and you only have two quarter notes.

The order for playing the verse and chorus is the same as for the simple version. However for the outro you would actually play the rhythm of the last three bars of the verse, instead of only playing E and holding it for the two bars.

No Woman No Cry – Piano – Simple:

The instructions, for the piano, tell you to play each chord and hold it until the next chord throughout the whole song, except the verses. It tells you to pause during the verses. The chords that we need to know how to play is C, G, Am and F (in the papers it says G/B but the B is for the base). These chords are repeated through out the whole song. Lets take a look at how to find the chords on the piano.

The picture above tells you the name of each of the keys on the piano. The red keys are the ones that are most commonly used for the right hand on the piano. The middle C is the C closest to the middle of the piano and is often used as a reference point.

If you look at the diagram to the left you can see that the red “square” marks are showing three white keys that seem to make a group. However the blue “square” marks are showing four white keys that seem to make a group. The red circle shows two black keys that are one group while the blue circle shows three black keys. The white key the farthest to the left within any red area would be a C. From that C you can figure out any other key.

Notice how all of the chords we will play are made up of one letter except for the Am. This is because they are major chords. The Am is a minor chord. The difference between them will be shown when we are creating the chords.

For any major chord you would first locate the root note, the note the chord is named after. From that note you would count 4 keys including both the white and black keys. The fourth key will be the next key you will play. To find the last key you will count 3 keys and the third one is the key you will play. The formula you use is “root note + 4 +3”.

However when you want to make a minor chord it is slightly different. You want to find the root note but instead of counting 4 you would count 3 keys. Then you would count 4 keys to find the last key. The formula you will use is “root note + 3 + 4”

The difference in sound between these is that the major chord sounds quite happy while the minor chord will sound quite sad.

Lets make our chords starting with the C. We have our root note C. If we then count 4 keys we will end up on the E. Then we count 3 and we land on the G. Therefore the notes that we have to play is C, E and G.

In order to find the G you need to count 4 keys from the G and you land on the B. Then you count 3 keys and you land on the D. So to play a G chord you need to play a G, B and a D.

Lets find the Am. This is a minor chord so we would follow the formula for that. We have the root note of A. from that we count 3 and we end up on a C. From that we count 4 and we land on the E. So the notes that you have to play are A, C and E.

The last chord that we have to find is the F chord. Our root note is F then we count to 4 and we have an A. Then we count to 3 and we end up on a C. That means that the notes that should be played are F, A and C.

Now we know how to play the different chords. This is the order to play them in for the chorus:

This means that we have to play a C chord for two beats and then change to a G chord for two beats. Then in the next bar we would do the same thing. We would play the Am chord for two beats and then the F chord for two. The same goes for the rest of the bars. At the end of the line it has a x2 symbol. That means that you have to play the whole line twice.

For the verse the instructions tell you to pause. However you still need to count so that you know when to start playing again. This is the verse:

The verse has got a x4 symbol at the end meaning that you should play the whole line four times.

The third and last part of the song is the bridge. For the simple version the bridge is played in the same way as the chorus but with different chords. The chords are:

Just like in the chorus you would hold each chord for two beats and then change to the next one. The bridge is repeated twice.

This is the order that you have to play the different parts in:

For this song you have an intro, which is the same as the chorus. However the for the intro the chorus is not repeated, it is only played once.

No Woman No Cry – Piano – Advanced:

When you are playing the advanced version, you want to move around the chords so that they are easier to play. When we talked about making the chords earlier the root note was always the key farthest to the left. However the order of the keys does not matter as long as you play the right tone. I chose C as my starting point and then I moved the other chords to be as close to C as possible. Below are diagrams of how to move the chords around to make it easier to play.

This is how you would play them with your fingers.

The instructions also tell you to add an extra root note with your left hand if you are able to. I did this but I don’t only add one I add two. However in order to do two you need to have quite big hands so that you can reach a whole octave.

Here is a diagram showing the left side of a piano. The middle C is the C that is just out of sight. The keys with red letters are the ones that will be used.

These are the keys that you will play with the left hand:

These chords should be played with your thumb and pinkie. This is how it would look like:

The order that the chords are played in is the same as for the simple version. However at the last bar of the chorus has changed. Instead of playing C and then G for two beats each you play a C for two beats and then you play a rhythm with the right hand.

Lets put the note names under the notes and then also the beat numbers:

The red circle below shows where you will find the G, A and B on the piano.

Just like for the simple version you pause during the verse but you still need to count so that you know when to start playing after.

In the instructions it tells you that you have to play on the off beats during the bridge. That means that you will play on the &s instead of playing on the 1, 2 etc. Normally you need to play each chord once and hold it until the next one starts, but when you are playing off the beat then you need to play it twice.

The order off playing the whole song is the same as for the simple version!

Bibliography:

Cooper, Carolyn "reggae." Britannica School. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 2014. Web. 13 Apr. 2014.

White, Timothy " Bob Marley." Britannica School. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 2014. Web. 13 Apr. 2014.

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November 12, 2013

Today was the first lesson that we spent on practicing for playing in bands. I spent this lesson practicing “No Woman No Cry” on the keyboard. I found it really easy to play even the advanced version. Even though I started learning it this lesson I finished it already.

I think one of my strength when learning to play the piece on the keyboard is that I have played piano for 7-8 years so I find this piece really easy to play and learn. I got confirmed this summer and we preformed a piece called “Let It Be” on our confirmation. Everyone was singing but I played piano to it. The chords in the song is C, G, Am and F which are exactly the same chords as in “No Woman No Cry”. I think that helped me as well, since I already knew how to play the chords when they are moved around to make it easier to play.

During the first lesson I did not get any feedback from anyone.

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November 19, 2013

Since I had already finished learning how to play “No Woman No Cry” on keyboard I moved on to playing “I Shot the Sherriff” on bass. I found it quite easy to play it on the bass since you only played the root note of each chord. I moved on to learning how to play the advanced version where you play all notes in the chord after each other and then the root note again. I didn’t find this too difficult either. The bit I found the most difficult is the two bars at the end of the verse since you are playing a melody. However once I practiced it a few times I got the hang of it.

I think the fact that I have played piano for so long helps me with learning other instruments as well. I already find it really easy to read music so all I needed to do was to learn where to find the notes on the bass. I think that is one of my strength when it comes to this project. I also really like music, which I think helps when learning new things. If you think it is fun you learn a lot faster than if you think it is boring.

I played alone this lesson and therefore I got no feedback from anyone.

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November 26, 2013

Since I have already finished playing both the keyboard part and the bass part and no one else was ready to play together with me yet I decided to help Noemi with the singing. We went into the small room and we figured out how to sing the song. After a while I played keyboard to when she sang.

I think it helped Noemi a lot to practice with me since she now knows how it is supposed to sound together with the keyboard. I also think that practicing with Noemi helped me since there was a purpose to play the bars over and over again, the right amount of times. Before when I was learning it I basically just played through all the bars from start to finish as they were written on the paper without the repeats.

I think the fact that I am used to playing together with others (when they are singing) is one of my strength. Because I am used to it, I don’t get nervous and mess up when we are practicing. Even though I am used to it I still find it hard sometimes to know when I am supposed to play (the beat). However when we were practicing it was not too hard to figure it out with the help of Noemi.

I did not get any feedback this lesson.

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December 3, 2013

Both Noemi and I had finished practicing both our parts before today and had nothing to do. Therefore we decided to practice for the concert at the end of this year where we are going to play “Breathe” together. I am playing the piano and Noemi is singing. As we were playing we tried new things of how to make it sound better together.

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December 10, 2013

Today a few people from my group were ready to start practicing in bands. It was Noemi, Hampus, Andreas H, Simon and I and at the end Ludvig joined us. We played the song “No Women No Cry”.

I think one of my strengths today was that I have played music together with other people before. When I was younger I had to play “4 hand on the piano”. Basically it is two people playing at the same time on the same piano. In the beginning it was a bit tricky but you got the hang of it. That meant that when I came to play in bands today I already knew how it was to play together with other people and I can quite easily listen to what they are playing and play accordingly.

We found it quite difficult to keep the beat when we were playing today since Ludvig, who is playing the drums, did not come until later. Today it was all keyboards except Noemi who sang. I think that also made it more difficult for us to play together since we were all playing the same thing. A few times Philip came to help us and played the drums and then we found it a lot easier. We were actually able to play most of the song in the end when we had a drummer.

Today Philip told us that it sounded really well at the end but that we still needed to practice a bit on keeping the same tempo.

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January 21

          Today we practiced in bands again. However this time we played "I Shot the Sheriff". We had planned on playing half of the song, chorus, verse 1, chorus, verse 2 and chorus. However we only managed to play the chorus. I think we could have worked a bit more efficiently especially when setting up the instruments even though some people were playing around on their instruments while we were trying to practice. That caused us to have very little practice time. However I think that in the end we managed to play the chorus very well.

          Today I got feedback from my teacher as we were playing in the bands. He told me I was playing too slowly. Instead of playing eight notes I was playing quarter notes. However that was easy to fix. The next time we played it I played it faster and it sounded a lot better. I really like the feeling the bass gives to the song when it is played with eight notes.

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January 28

        Today we decided to start of by running through the chorus of "I Shot the Sheriff" once more. Then we wanted to start practicing the verse. We split the verse up into two parts: the verse without the last three bars and the three last bars of the verse. However we did not manage to get to the last three bars. I think the main reason for that is that most of the people in our group had not yet practiced that part and therefore it was hard to practice that all of us together! However I did practice it a few times with Simon. I honestly do not think I developed a lot today. The part that I am supposed to play on the bass is very easy. It is a C for two beats, then a B for two beats and then an A for four beats. And this is repeated five times for the verse. Because it was quite easy it was not hard to play it together with my band.  I think that the hardest part today was to get everyone to play at the same time. Since the bass was playing on the beat while the keyboard and the guitar are playing off the beat it was quite challenging. It was not that hard for me but it was hard for the group overall to get it to sound right. Today Simon was also playing the saxophone but in comparison to last lesson this time it sounded good. I think that last lesson he was a bit unsure of what to play and therefore it made it harder for the whole group. However today I think it sounded great with the saxophone. 

          I think that today the setting up went a lot faster than last time so we got more practice time. I also think we spent the time we had more efficiently. Last lesson some people were messing around on their instruments playing the demo versions of songs on them. However this time there was a lot less of that and more efficient practice time. I think the quality of the work we did this lesson was good. Now after this lesson we can really play the chorus and the verse without the last three bars together and with flow. I think we really got the hang of how to play the two together now! For next time I think we should do our time planning a bit better. I think that was better this time in comparison to last time but we could still improve that. I think that if we get better at that we will not be as rushed when we are practising and we will get better results out of the practicing. 

          Today I was talking to Simon about how to play the last three bars of the verse. We both played it but when we played it we figured out that we played it slightly differently. He told me that I was playing one part of it slightly too slowly and another slightly too fast. The last three bars have got one part where you are playing eight notes and that one I was playing sightly too fast wile the part where you are playing dotted eight notes I was playing slightly too slowly. 

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February 4

        Today we continued playing "I Shot the Sheriff". We actually finished playing it today. We had planned to practice the last three bars of the verse and then to go through the chorus and the whole verse together. Previously the singer in our band has been sick so we had to practice it with the singing as well. However as mentioned we managed to get through the whole song with the singing and everything. Today was the first time that we actually managed to do everything that we had planned to do and more. I think that we are getting used to how to plan our time now to make it more efficient. I also found that we worked a lot better when we managed to do everything that we had planned. I don't think we felt rushed at all and we never got the feeling that we had to move on even though we could have done with some more practice time. 

        I found it quite challenging today when we practiced the whole song together with the transitions. I am really used to playing the parts individually but when you come to play them together you have to change between notes that you are not used to changing between. Other than that I think todays lesson was easy. I think that as the lesson went I became more used to changing between the new notes and my playing became better. The part that was the trickiest to change between is the verse and the last 3 bars of the verse. Since the last 3 bars is a melody it makes it harder. I also found that all of us are waiting for each other to start for a little while. That means that there is a small break that should not be there. However I think that we can quite easily fix that with some more practice time. 

        I think the quality of my work today was good. I felt that we practiced very well together and got a lot done. I don't feel like it was a wasted lesson but we actually got something out of it. I think that I can improve the quality of my work even more by running through what I am supposed to play prior to the lesson. By doing that I am already used to what I am playing when we practice together. I think that if everyone in my band were to do this, our practicing would be a lot more efficient. However we do not want this to take away time from us practicing together so it would be good if as many people as possible could run through it a few times at home the night before or on the same morning. By doing this we could get right into the time where we are having good practice time instead of us having to get used to playing for a while, taking time away from good and efficient practice time. 

        Today our group stopped half way through the practicing to give each other feedback. I really liked this because by doing that we made sure that everyone got feedback and will improve to make our playing better. However I think we are getting to the point in our practicing where it is hard to give each other feedback. Since we have rehearsed the song so much we know it very well by now and there is not that much we need to improve. However the feedback my group gave me was that I need to improve a bit on the transitions between the different parts. Therefore I will practice at home in order to have that nailed before next lesson. I have a guitar at home so I can use that to practice even though it is not perfect but it works. I think that if I practice the transitions at home I will be able to play it a lot better next lesson. 

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February 11

        Today our teacher was sick but we had a substitute so we were still able to practice. We had homework for music that some people had not yet completed so they got out some computers to finish that. However once they had finished they stayed on the computers playing games instead of practicing. That meant that we were only four people practicing from my band and none from the other. The people in my band that were playing decided to work on "No Woman No Cry". We wanted to get through the whole song a few times since we only practiced that a few times in comparison to "I Shot the Sheriff". I think that even though we were not the full group we accomplished a lot in the time we had. We managed to play through the whole song multiple times without any trouble. However all the people using the computers were watching us practice which made it harder to concentrate. 

        The thing I need to practice is to not play during the verses. We have not had any guitarist playing with our band yet so I have been playing during the verses so that Noemi (our singer) had something to follow. However I am so used to that now so I need to practice not playing at that time. I did try today and I found it hard to know when I was supposed to start again. Also after the last verse there is the bridge and that is played off the beat. That means that you have to go from not playing to playing off the beats immediately. This is a thing that I feel I have to practice for next time. 

        The feedback I got is pretty much the same as I said I had to improve. I have to work on the transitions between the verse and the other parts. To improve this I will just play the part that is before the different verses and then the verse (only counting and not playing) and then what comes after the verse. I will do that for all the different combinations there is. So I will play: chorus, verse, chorus and chorus, verse, bridge. If I do this I think it will help for next lesson. 

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February 25

        Today we were recording the songs at the end of the lesson. We are not completely finished for performances yet but this is how it sounds so far!

"No Woman No Cry"

"I Shot the Sheriff"

"No Woman No Cry"

        I think that this practice went very well. We could have finished the whole song but as we did not have time to continue we had to stop half way through. I think the whole group played it together and it was not just a bunch of people playing all at once. The one thing that I think we found the hardest today was that the keyboard players are not supposed to play during the verses. That makes it hard to know when to start playing again. What I do is that I keep on counting even though I am not playing to keep track of where we are. However I found it quite hard to not mess up and skip parts as I was going. When you are counting but not playing it is hard to remember what chord you are supposed to be playing. So, when you come to the end of the verse and you are supposed to start playing soon you have to make sure you are in synch with everyone else. What I found helped was that you move your hand according to what chord was supposed to be played at that time without playing it. By doing so I was able to not skip any chords as I was counting. Another thing was that some people did not know when to stop playing for the verse and kept on going. It is not a huge problem and is quite easy to fix but it is important to know when you are playing and when not. The thing that I should practice for next time is to try to play the song with both hands on the keyboard. I know how to do it and I am able to do it for the first chorus but then I start to mess up. Before next lesson I should practice that more so that I can play the root note with the other hand. I would like to be able to play it so that I play two keys with the left hand, so, the root note in two different octaves. When I tried this previously I found it a bit challenging since in the right hand I am able to change the chords around so that I do not need to move my hand around too much. However with the left hand there will be no difference if you move the notes around since it is equal distance between them whatever way you do. I have done a similar thing in the past where I played the root note with the left hand but then all of the root notes were #'s. That meant that I was only using the black keys and it makes it a lot easier to hit the right key.

"I Shot the Sheriff"

        I think it went quite well when we were playing this song today. However if you look at the video you can hear that after the melody at the end of the chorus there is supposed to be a drum fill in but it is not there. While we were playing I could just not figure out why it did not go as well today as the last time we played this song. Last time we were able to play the whole song without any trouble. However I found that this time I had  a hard time to know when to start playing after the verse. From looking at this video I realised that it was because we are missing the drum fill in. Because of that I was waiting for that but everyone else kept on playing without it and therefore I got lost. I managed to get back on track eventually but it bugged me that I kept on messing up. I think this is something we should keep on practicing. Except for this I think our playing was very good. In this recording you cannot really hear the bass very much. This was also a problem as we were practicing because I could not hear myself very much when I was playing. The reason we stopped at the end was because the singer started to sing too early after the verse. We were supposed to play the melody at the end of the verse but he started singing the chorus so we had no time to. Even though there were quite a few mistakes I think they are quite small and easy to fix, we just need a bit more practice before we are able to preform.

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March 4

        Today we played both "I Shot the Sheriff" and "No Woman No Cry" and both went very well. We wanted to be able to play through both songs completely at the end of the lesson but especially practice with the drum fill on "I Shot the Sheriff". Therefore we spent more time on that one than "No Woman No Cry". I think we got a lot out of practicing today!

        Last time we completely missed out the drum fill on "I Shot the Sheriff" and therefore we had no idea of when to start playing the chorus afterwards. However today we included the drum fill and it went great. We all started at the same time after the verse and we were able to play the whole song without any trouble. Last lesson I mentioned that I wanted to be able to play "No Woman No Cry" with both hands on the keyboard, the left playing two rote notes. This lesson I was able to do just that!

        I still need to improve on when to start playing on the offbeat after the second verse of "No Woman No Cry". It is better than last week but I still need to work on it. I think we are getting so good at playing it now that it is hard to find areas to work on. However as we go we find new things that we have not thought of before.

        I got feedback from both Simon and Noemi today. Simon said just what I was thinking and I wrote above: I need to practice the transition between the second verse and the bridge. I feel like that is something that all the keyboard players need to work on but we need to do it together. It is very hard to do something individually since without the other people in the band it is very hard to know when is on the beat and when it is off beat. When you are counting in your head hand you do not have a drummer it is quite challenging to practice the verse when you are not playing and then the off beat. It is very hard to improve by doing that since you can easily change up the beat to fit your playing without even thinking about it. Noemi said that I need to practice on the melody. I can play it but I feel that sometimes our group starts playing it a bit to early and then I find it hard to follow along. If one person starts to early everyone else in the group will have to try to follow that person and I find that quite hard. This means that I sometimes play during the melody and sometimes I do not. When I do not I try to get back and I sometimes start playing half way through it. I think this is something our group will have to practice next lesson as well as the transition between the second verse and the chorus in "I Shot the Sheriff"!

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April 29:

        Today we spent the whole lesson practicing “No Woman No Cry”. We knew at the beginning of the lesson that we were going to have the song recorded at the end of the lesson and the previous lesson we performed “I Shot the Sheriff” on the stage. Therefore we thought it would be good to perform the other one today. We decided to play the whole song all the way through since it is soon time for the performance. I think that it went very well today. You can really tell that we have practiced this for a long time now. We managed to play the whole song from start to finish without any problem and it is starting to sound very good now.

        The feedback that my whole group received today was that in order to make the song sound more like the original we have to syncopate the rhythm of playing the chords slightly. Every first F in the chorus and all of the F’s in the verses has to be played on the 2& instead of on the 3. I found that it was not very hard to play it on the 2& but when we have practiced for almost half a year with playing it on the 3 it has become a routine to do that, which is hard to break. We started to play it using this rhythm but we did not have much time to practice this since we were told at the end of the lesson. Another feedback that I received was that on the first G in the chorus the root note is B and not G. I have been playing G for the whole time but I found that it was actually easier to play with the B as the root note. It is more logical when it is this way since the B is right next to the C (which is played right before) and the A (which is played right after). The reason why this only applies to me is that none of the other keyboard players play with their left hand. That means that they never play the root note and they do not need to know this.

        As mentioned, at the end of this lesson we performed this song and it was recorded. There was no sound on the recording and we were not on the stage but it did not matter since we were only looking at the actual stage performance. We did not get to look at the performance afterwards but we will hopefully get to do that next lesson. However it was nice to just perform it since we got to practice how it was when you stand up and play the keyboard and also when you move around and have energy on the stage. Usually when we practice we are sitting in a circle, facing each other but now when we were performing we were all facing towards the “audience” (we did not actually have an audience).

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May 6:

        Since today is the lesson before the performance we decided to practice both songs so they were ready to be preformed. We started with “No Woman No Cry”. We managed to get through the whole song without any problem the first time we practiced. We played the whole song again and this time it was even better. We managed to get through the whole song again and it sounded good. Last lesson we were told about how the first F in the chorus and all the F’s in the verse should be played on the 2& instead of the 3 to make it sound more like the original. As mentioned last lesson we managed to do it but this time it sounded even better. We were all in synch when doing it and we all did it at the right time. After playing it the second time we played it a few more times with a similar result. Once we had done that we moved on to “I Shot the Sheriff”. I think that this is the song that we needed to practice the most. The thing we have the most trouble with is knowing when the song is over. We can play the whole song without any problem but when we get to the end some people, including myself sometimes, keep on playing because we accidentally counted the wrong number of verses. However I think that this problem is very easily fixed. We just need to learn when the song ends.

        The feedback that I was given today was more of a feedback given to the whole class. In the beginning of class we watched the recordings from last music lesson. In the videos you could see that many of us were very stiff and it did not look very natural on the stage. Basically we need to practice on our stage performance. The song recorded last lesson was “No Woman No Cry” and for that song I play the keyboard, which I find quite easy. That means that I do not need to look down all of the time to see what I am playing. Therefore I think it is quite easy for me to improve my performance. I think the same goes for “I Shot the Sheriff” that I am playing on the bass. I found that I do not need to look down all of the time when I change chords so I can look up and “perform” more. I feel like I need to look down when I am playing the melody and when I am changing from the chorus to the verse and vice versa.

        Today we also got to know that when we perform next week we have to play the song multiple times to enable the people who are more than one per instrument to perform one at the time. For one of our songs we have three keyboard players and for the other one we have two. That means that for “I Shot the Sheriff” I have to perform it twice. The other one I have to perform without the other keyboard players. I think that it would have been good if we had been told about this slightly earlier so that we could have practiced it alone. However we will get some time next lesson before we perform so we can practice it one by one.

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