Some Cover Version For YouTube

Well I've been a while updating the YouTube channel, but today I had uploaded two new cover versions for listening.

I'm trying to just upload plenty of tracks both of my own and covers in the coming weeks.  I'm trying to worry less about them being perfect and more about actually doing them and getting them up there!

Firstly we have Touch by Daft Punk;

and Man or Muppet by Bret McKenzie from the film The Muppets;

Enjoy!

Testicular Cancer

Well that has got right to the point!  The reason I haven't updated the blog for so long has been due in large part to going through treatment for Testicular Cancer.  Going into hospital to have a tumor removed and then having chemotherapy is not overly conducive to getting other things done.  However, I have had time in between things to try to get some things done but I haven't really done much of anything lately!  Part of that in the last couple of weeks has been due to watching copious amounts of tennis as Wimbledon has been on and I have been cheering on Andy Murray to win!

I had my operation back in April and as a result wasn't that mobile for a while I didn't feel like doing much music anyway.  I'm pleased to say that I feel a lot better now and the wound has been healed up for a while now, however it does still feel a little strange sometimes.  Also strange is only having one testicle now.  But I feel OK about it, after all you only need one.  Last week I had a single treatment session of chemotherapy and that really did one over on me!  But I am hoping that will be all the chemotherapy I need and I feel about a thousand times better today than I did this time last week that is for sure!

So not a lot of music has been done lately.  However I did compose something on the piano when I was feeling very ill last week.  I think that feeling so ill sort of freed up my brain to just play and not worry so much about what I was playing.  It was quite liberating in a way, but I don't think I want to go through chemotherapy every time I compose something new anytime soon.

I think I'm in the process of reevaluating a lot of the things at the moment.  It has been a strange year so far and I'm not really sure what to think.  But I do know I have a lot of music to finish and release and I want to still get that done.  I still struggle to know how to release things in terms of albums or singles or EPs.  I think I might have to just start releasing things a piece at a time and think about how that might fit into a collection afterwards, otherwise I will never release anything!

I shall update again soon, and perhaps even include some new music.  But for now, if you are a man, please check yourself down there right now and if you do find anything don't be afraid to go to the doctor.  I was lucky to find mine very early and it is far better to catch it as soon as possible.  Similarly, if you know a man tell him to check himself!  Once you have been seen by a couple of doctors you soon learn to not be embarrassed anymore.

March Update

I Haven't been updating as much I as I hoped I would so far this month!  However I, after a brief spell of no productivity on my part, I'm happy to say that I'm back and recording again.

This last week I have been working on my vocal tracks and various songs. I may first upload some of these songs in the form of an EP and then release the album later.  I think this way may be better as I can test out how happy I am with the sound of them before committing them to a final album.  I find songs harder to get right than instrumental purely because I have to record vocals and I'm never happy with the way it sounds - both from a performance side and a recording side.  However I have been making progress with both of those aspects this week.  I have managed to get the background noise down on my vocal tracks which is a great help.  I am now fiddling about with equalisers and compressors, as well as experimenting with microphone technique.  So hopefully soon I shall have some semi-decent vocals to upload!

Once I'm generally happy with one song I may upload that as a standalone preview of things to come.  I also need to get back onto YouTube and upload some more cover versions of all sorts.  I have some good ideas in mind which should be quite eclectic and enjoyable I hope.  But now I should get back to work, so I shall say goodbye!

New Beautiful Things

I had no idea what to call this piece.  The original recording was titled 'new beautiful thing' as I found it very soothing to play and listen back to so I thought I might has well call it that.  'Things' are very vague so it allows the listener to bring their own interpenetration to the piece!



I recorded a very rough version of this many years ago on my old Casio CTK-610 keyboard which was the first full sized keys keyboard I bought from the Argos catalogue back 1997 or 1998, not sure which.  It was also the first keyboard I had that was touch sensitive which I had wanted for a long time.  It was this keyboard on which I learnt to really play piano and keyboards by learning all of the chords.  The display had a handy option to show what chord was been played on the keys and I found this very helpful when working out how I would play things and understanding the signifier of each chord shape.  The poor Casio now has a couple of keys broken and taped back on by myself.  I think this reflects more on how much I used the keyboard and probably bashed it about than the quality of it.  It's a good keyboard and I still enjoy going back to it and playing those sounds again today.

But back to this piece!  Although quite a modestly priced keyboard, the Casio had some good synthesiser options allowed you to change things like the attack and release rates.  I was playing around with those settings on a lovely warm synthesiser string sound (If you listen to the album you will probably realise how much I like those kinds of textural sounds!).  Many of the pieces I had written at that point were very chord based and I wanted to try something with a more definitive melody from single notes.  I played some chords on a nice soft electronic piano sound and over the top created this simple melody that rises and falls just as the sound does itself.  I had this recording for years and finally got around to rerecording it with new sounds and adding some new elements to it as well.  This version goes into a third section were a distance synthesiser voice sound comes in to take over the melody duties before culminating with the return of the first string sounds to end the piece.  I thought it made a generated a good sense of relief and tenderness into the piece.

Under the Cherry Blossom

When I came up with the first few chords to this piece I immediately felt like it could sit well in a nice Anime soundtrack.  As such I ended up titling it 'Under the Cherry Blossom' as these are often featured all kinds of Japanese Anime both visually and thematically.

Here in the UK we also enjoy cherry blossoms from trees in the springtime.  Their time is very brief before they fall to the ground, but every year I always notice them when they appear.  I look forward to seeing them this year as they will signal the end of this cold weather!

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February Update

Almost the end of February.  How have 2 months passed already!  I've been a bit busy with other things lately.  However, I'm trying to update the blog, the YouTube channel and Soundcloud as regularly as I can.  I'm going to be uploading some more performances soon both of more cover version and of my own songs.

Speaking of which I am currently working through the many songs I have written over the years in order to iron out some things I'm not so sure about, except this time I'm actually going to say to myself, 'OK that's good enough, it's done!' and move onto the next thing.

I have quite a few songs in a state of almost readiness and have a rough idea of what will be on my first vocal album.  I also worry I won't record the vocals well enough, but I can always rerecord!  I may also write a couple of new songs for the album too.  Either way there should be plenty of material to have a vocal album up on the simonwillis.bandcamp.com page in the near future!  I hope you enjoy what I post in the meantime as I still have a few instrumental tracks from my 'Left Behind' album to post on here and will am looking into what other covers to perform.  I may even take requests!  Drop me a message if there is anything at all you would like to hear me play and I will see what I can do with it.

She's Out of My Life

Here is my cover version of 'She's Out of my Life' made famous by Michael Jackson in 1980 and written by Tom Bahler.

This was one of the songs that, when I sung, I realised I shouldn't be afraid to sing in a higher range.  For a long time I was singing an octave lower than I probably should have for a lot of songs but I eventually came to the conclusion that I should push my limits a but more!  I love this song, it lends itself so well to being sung with a lot of feeling and fragility.  I don't think you can write a song like this without going through the emotions contained within it yourself.

Check back for more videos soon!

Alone

This is a simple piece consisting of just four chords of synthesiser string sounds and a lonely timid synthesiser lead sound providing the melody.

I wrote this piece many years ago and would play it on a piano sound layered with synthesiser strings.  For this version I decided to strip it down to a more sparse atmosphere with the lead instrument timidly exploring the lonely landscape created by the strings.

I might yet do a piano version of this piece as well.  But I do love to experiment with different sounds and I was pleased with the way this interpretation turned out.

Liking You

Here is another piano piece that I recently wrote.  With this piece I tried to create something that mixed a warm tenderness with an gentle uncertainty.


I used made use of a minor diminished chord to create the sense of uncertainty at about 57 seconds in.  I like how this chords sits between the rest of the piece with is generally bright and warm.  The section that starts at about 2 minutes 30 seconds in is then more reflective and melancholic before returning to the main theme.  I felt that the piece reflected those feelings of yearning and uncertainty one feels at the same time as experiencing something wonderful.

Your Song - Elton John - Cover

Here I am covering 'Your Song' by Elton John.  This is has always been one of my favourite songs.  Written by Elton John and Bernie Taupin and released on the album 'Elton John' in 1970.

Elton John has been a big inspiration for me and is one of the reasons I learnt to play the piano and sing in the first place.  Ever since I heard the, mostly, instrumental 'Song For Guy' I was entranced with it.  This lead to me listening to more and more Elton and discovery Bernie Taupin's lyrics.  I think when I first sung I was singing to much like Elton at the expense of finding my own voice.  But that said, I have him to thank for learning to sing in the first place I think.  Since I think I have moved away from that I refined my own voice better.  I think, like any artist, I'm always developing and trying new things.  Whenever I do sing an Elton song though I'm sure some Eltonisms work their way into my voice at least a little!  I remember singing this song an entire octave lower in the past and it took me some time to realise my voice is probably a lot better singing higher.  I think my voice would often get lost trying to sing things too low and not having the confidence to sing in a higher register and putting more power behind the voice.  This might not be the best example of that, but stay tuned to see, hopefully, better examples!

I going to upload some performances of my own music soon, but I thought it would be a good idea to get some covers up first just to get used to filming myself!  The webcam I'm using isn't very good, but I might buy a camcorder soon so I can get some better footage.  I recorded the sound from the microphone and the sound of the piano sound through Cubase and synced those up with the video so it would have much better sound quality than the webcam microphone.

I will explain why there is a Chuck Norris poster for the Movie Top Dog on the back of my door another time.

The Girl Downstairs

The Girl Downstairs is somewhat jaunty 3/4 time waltz piano piece I was inspired to compose after hearing a short story.


A while back I came across the great website called LibriVox http://librivox.org/ which provide free downloadable audio-books of various public domain works.  These are read by volunteers who a great job and I thank them all for the time they put into it.  I encourage you to go and take a look at their catalogue   I've been listening to a lot of short stories lately.  They are to go to bed to and suit my short attention span!  One of the stories I participially enjoyed was 'The Man Upstairs' by P. G. Wodehouse which can be listened to here; http://librivox.org/selected-short-stories-by-p-g-wodehouse/

The story concerns a young woman who writes songs on her piano.  She is disrupted by a knocking on the ceiling from the man upstairs who is a struggling painter.  I won't go into what happens in the story, I suggest you listen to it yourself, but when I thought about the woman trying to write a waltz I was inspired to experiment with a 3/4 style on the piano.  The piece is a mix of sharp stabbed chords with gentle piano sections in between.  I felt like these highlighted the mixed feelings the woman in the story experiences throughout.

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The Lady

This atmospheric piece was inspired by a painting I saw some time ago while in the middle of one of my unscheduled lengthy Wikipedia reading sessions (every article links to another. It's impossible to stop!).


The painting is an 1888 John William Waterhouse piece called 'The Lady of Shalott' depicting the title character from the poem of the of the same name by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.  The painting is very popular and I know it has been an inspiration to many other people.  Living close to London I was lucky enough to be able to see the painting myself at the Tate Britain art gallery recently.

More can be read about the painting and the poem on Wikipedia at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lady_of_Shalott_(painting)

Something about this image inspired me.  The idea of the lady finally making the difficult decision to leave her isolation and travel down the river, despite her knowledge that doing so she was doomed, seemed so powerful.  I tried to express the idea in music with haunting voice sounds and a fragile bell type sound.  The synthesiser-strings then come in as she realises the foreboding fate that she sails towards.  All the while the soft voices and bell sounds highlight her fragility and delicacy.  The piece ends on a major chord as if to express the beauty of the lady that the knight Lancelot beholds as the men find her body in the boat.

Having said all that I'm pretty sure when I recorded it however many years ago I did it without really thinking that much and have only attributed many of those meanings to it afterwards!  But as with all music I encourage you to form your own meanings and interpretations.  But above all I hope you enjoy it!

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First Piece

'First Piece' was one of the first things I played on my then brand new Casio Privia PX-310 digital piano back in 2006.

This was another piece that I kind of just played once and had for a long time on my computer under the temporary title 'First Piece'.  Not thinking of anything better to call it I decided kept the title.  I am often unsure of what to call something, but it is just another detail to procrastinate over!

When I first recorded this I had recently got a job after having come back from university and despite still being needing to pay off my student overdrive I decided it was time to have a proper digital piano.   While at university I had played on several pianos in practice rooms including a grand piano.  I didn't study music, but I certainly made use of the piano facilities!  Prior to that I only really played on non-weighted touch sensitive keyboard keys like those of my then current keyboard the Yamaha PSR-540. 

It was at university that I think I learned how to play a real piano.  At first the piano keys seemed so heavy and I think over the course of my playing sessions my fingers probably strengthened somewhat as they adjusted!  There is a certain expression that comes from those hammer action weighted keys on pianos and digital pianos, and when I got my own digital piano I realised how satisfying they were to play.  Having said that, the other type of keys can be very effective when playing others sounds like synthesisers and organs.

Of course I would love to have a real piano some day.  However, cost and space prohibits me from doing so any time soon!  But maybe one day.

simonwillis.bandcamp.com

Ethereal

Here is another improvised calming track I composed some time ago.  As with 'Calm Sky' I composed this by experimenting with more rich synthesizer pad sounds and found it to be quite pleasant.  So here it is!



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Tokyo Night

I composed this track based off a couple of royalty free sound samples I found on a Computer Music magazine some years ago.  The two chords that repeat throughout the piece and the lady making an announcement over a public address system.  I loved how they painted a picture of a Japanese city busy and dense and yet calming and beautiful.  I played a variety of meandering notes over the top on one another to create an ambient and chilled out feel to the piece.


I created the artwork of the cityscape for this piece pixel by pixel using Windows Paint and then blew it up and applied some filters.

My First Album - Left Behind

Well I didn't know when I would finally manage to have this uploaded but here it is, my first instrumental album 'Left Behind' which is available to download at simonwillis.bandcamp.com  The tracks can be downloaded individually or as part of the entire album.

Below is the last track on the album 'Left Behind (Reprise)' which is a solo piano version of the title track.

I recorded this track to be a bookend, with the main theme both opening and the closing the album.  I have tried to have themes running throughout the album, but feel free to infer whatever meaning you like to the tracks!  I know that music can mean many different things to many different people.  However, I will continue to post the songs on here individually with a few comments as to what inspired me to create them.

The tracks are a mixture of old and newish pieces I have composed over the years.  I'm not sure I'm ever completely happy with what I have recorded, but there comes a time when you should just release what you have and see what happens.  I hope that I will continue to improve in my work.  I may well come back to some of these themes and ideas in the future, but I think it's good to release something and say to yourself that it is done, at least for now, so you can move onto other things.  I already have a concept for my next instrumental album and a few half done tracks which I will be looking at in the near future.  I will also be working on some vocal tracks very soon.  I have a large back catalogue of half finished music, lyrics and all sorts to wade through.  So there is plenty more to come!

Being a massive Lego fan I used two very old Lego mini-figures for the album art.  Additionally I didn't know what else to use.  I think the Lego man at the back has something he needs to say to the girl within his letter.  The Lego Lady figure is from a set called 'Mailman on Motorcycle' from 1984;

As for the Lego man, I'm not entirely sure which set he came with.  However, I now feel compelled to scour the internet to find out which Lego catalogue he might be in!

Calm Sky

'Calm Sky' is a piece I composed some time ago.  I was experimenting with this lovely warm synthesiser pad sound on my keyboard when I recorded it.  The track is from an improvised session with the odd note fixed here and there.  I have always felt that it alludes a little to a something classical piece of music Baroque music someone like Bach might have written on a church organ, but with a different texture and sound of course.  Having grown a greater appreciation of classical music throughout the years I hear the similar style of fast chord changes and descending and ascending bass notes.

'Calm Sky' can be listened to and downloaded in the player below and I hope that it makes you think of a nice calming blue sky too!


For a long time this track was known as 'Clam Sky' on my computer due to either my poor typing or possible dyslexia or possibly both.  A sky of clams is not really the image I was going for.  Perhaps I shall save that image for a future piece of music.

Check back soon to hear another track.

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