New Music, New Year

I hope that everyone had a merry Christmas and are getting ready for the new year. The last of my three blogs for this month will be a toast to New Year's Eve with Auld Lang Syne.

For Lowrey Organs we are going to do a little prep work.

1. Press the Broadway Rhythm style and then select soliloquy. Then set the tempo to 80.

2. Press Rhythm preset 0 and then we are going to memorize it to Preset A1.

3. Press Memorize (under Bank Presets). Press Bank Preset A. Press General Preset 1. On your screen press With Style (until you see Yes). On your screen press With Transpose (until you see Yes). Press the Memorize again (under Bank Presets) and WAIT! When the screen gets off of the one you just were on, it is memorized.

Now for Part 2.

1. Press Category Preset More. Press the Next button, on your screen, until you see Nostalgic. Press Nostalgic on your screen. Press Custom 4 (found on the left lower side of your organ) and touch Lombardo Sax/Brass on your screen (or just preset General Preset 9). Now memorize this to General Preset A2 (follow the same steps to memorize as in #3 above), EXCEPT press General Preset 2 instead of General Preset 1.

Playing the piece; I have included the music (as a PDF file) to make it easier. To get the free PDF file click on the sentence at the end of the blog that reads "Click Here to go to the Music Library" The first page you can play it straight with preset A1. For an intro I press Fade IN and play an F chord to start it. I start on measure two, beat 3 (of the Fade In) with my first note. Start on the upper manual, this is usually when everyone starts singing. On the last measure of the first page, during the rest, press A2. For page 2 I have added some optional chords in parenthesis to make the song sound richer. You will also notice that I put CP10 on page two, which means press Category Rhythm Preset 10 during the rest. I also added a few notes to what you may be used to hearing. Page two, last note at the end of the 4th line is an optional F note instead of the D that is written. To end the song use Intro-Ending 2 for a big finish.

Tyros and Clavinova players can play it this way. I will be giving you the Guy Lombardo version as I noticed it is not in the Music Finder on the Tyros 4.

Under the Style section select Swing & Jazz. Then scroll to 40's Swing Ballad and select it. Press the ACMP and Auto Fill to turn both of them on and set the Tempo to 80. Press Main Variation C and then press Intro II. Next you will press One Touch Setting 4 (this will give you the Guy Lombardo sound).

For Tyros/Clavinova players you can use this throughout the piece and change to Main Variation D before the second verse. Remember you can play with the other One Touch Settings and select and add Right 2 and Right 3 as well as add Harmony/Echo in the voice Effects section. To end the piece the logical choice is Ending II. If you want a very elaborate clarinet ending for Ending III.

Now that my three blogs are over for December I was asked by many people to do a monthly blog in addition to my quick tips and tricks blogs. I would do it at the end of every month to give you time to work on it and explore your options on your instruments. One of the reasons for this is the possible disappearance of Lowrey and the second reason is that I was the last person to do the Lowrey Magic Series. First I would be doing newer pieces from the 1960's and up and second I would try to include rhythm styles for even some of the vintage Lowrey's and the newest A and E series instruments. I would also include more detailed information for the Tyros and Clavinova players as this is a very popular alternative to the Lowrey organs. The next step is that I would do it for free. No costly monthly payments or anything else. Here is the catch! If If I can get 100 people to subscribe to this website, I'll do it. All you have to do is click the Contact button and it will ask you for your name and email and then click subscribe. That's all. This takes quite a bit of work and no, I am not retired. So if you want some fun monthly things to try on your instrument then let me know!

Happy New Year!