Posts by mcmullin@musicians.today
(DIR) Post #AtrKa87BlNyhmSV6I4 by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-05-06T02:00:35Z
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@elsemusic As to the “all major chords” idea, it’s already been pointed out that open-fifth power chords with no 3rd aren’t necessarily major. But aside from that, it also wouldn’t have been such a novelty to use all major chords: a bajillion folk, rock, punk and other musicians have made whole careers with just major triads I, IV and V.
(DIR) Post #AtrKaALRTMZGhFBVmi by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-05-07T17:27:01Z
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@nigelharpur @elsemusic But what I played was clearly better than anyone expected, including myself. I noticed other players exchanging looks, like, “where is this coming from”? The director turned toward me and made a face I’ll never forget, with his mouth hanging way open. When the tune was done, he said “I think we found our new soloist” and for days afterwards people asked me when and how I learned to do that. I didn’t know, and still don’t.3/n
(DIR) Post #AtrKaDV7jp5wU8jmnA by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-05-06T02:01:37Z
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@elsemusic But if you go much farther afield than that and maybe V/V (major II), music made from all major triads starts to sound pretty strange. (One of David Rakowski’s piano etudes is based on that idea, I think.)
(DIR) Post #AtrKaFjjQTy5Q1aTq4 by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-05-07T17:32:07Z
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@nigelharpur @elsemusic But now that I was actually going to be playing solos in public, I learned to read the chord sheets.And this did not make me better at all. On the contrary, by the time I figured out what this chord was, and what notes were in it, and what scales would fit with it, that chord would be a few bars behind us already. I had no understanding of why one chord would follow another, just that they all went by in milliseconds. 4/n
(DIR) Post #AtrKaLtWWzMkW8DNw0 by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-05-07T17:37:13Z
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@nigelharpur @elsemusic Now I understand a lot more, but I’m still impressed with even just the basic skills it takes to think that fast.And now I also understand that what we played that day was a rhythm-changes tune, and that despite all those chords on the sheet (diminished 7ths! major 13ths! altered dominants!) coming every 2 beats, all they’re all doing is elaborating the tonic. So you can in fact just play in B flat the whole time and that’ll sound fine.5/5
(DIR) Post #AvQfLqfloGe1w0BCwS by mcmullin@musicians.today
2022-12-27T22:30:23Z
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I’ve been fortunate to know a lot of people who are really smart. And I’ve known a lot of people who can’t stop telling me how smart they are.They’re not the same people.
(DIR) Post #AwyFW1Jufv4KunPgbQ by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-08-08T19:01:41Z
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@sknob But you don’t get any exercise playing with it.
(DIR) Post #AwzisqZHuOYE3cnkUC by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-03-03T12:18:32Z
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When I hear “content” I think: The bottle exists to carry the wine.The wine does not exist to fill the bottle.From: @someonetellmetosleephttps://elekk.xyz/@someonetellmetosleep/114096283629250040
(DIR) Post #AxOxyjHyF3JZTzxkNU by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-08-21T17:41:45Z
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@futurebird I don’t know if “childhood” is a modern invention, but adolescence certainly is. And there’s definitely a clear pattern to who has to be an adult at 12 and who gets to be adolescent til they’re 50.
(DIR) Post #AxYqGwdwTNgy3p0ucS by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-08-26T12:02:28Z
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@futurebird Not a lawyer but my understanding is that the truth provisions in immunity deals serve two purposes: 1, so the government still has leverage if they don’t get what they want; and 2, so when the testimony so obtained is later challenged in court, they can say “no it says right here it has to be true or they don’t get anything.”
(DIR) Post #AxjGKRcGJUX3NZ9lWy by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-08-31T12:41:33Z
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@futurebird What do you mean by mid-mid-Atlantic? What I think of as the mid-Atlantic accent isn’t the newscaster one. It’s a relic from a century ago, when upper-class Americans tried to sound half British. Like Margaret Dumont in the Marx Brothers movies, or in her own way, Katharine Hepburn. (Cary Grant maybe too, but really no one else talked like that.)
(DIR) Post #AxojAEWO0tREKcgtpw by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-09-03T03:58:16Z
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@futurebird I find this a hopeful thought. I remember when Real Men(TM) wouldn’t use seat belts. Somehow they got over that eventually, and most people today don’t think twice about it and may not know it was ever controversial in that way. Maybe one day we’ll be able to protect ourselves from COVID without controversy too.
(DIR) Post #AyVUnn8R3o6B6leOSe by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-09-23T19:09:45Z
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@futurebird I voted for what I imagine is the most significant of those four, but none of those comes close to being the most significant ever. (Not that I think that’s what you meant either.)
(DIR) Post #AyVW5wi2Io4Jy7WUK0 by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-09-23T19:24:26Z
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@futurebird I’d distinguish between two factors here to explain why calling it fascism doesn’t have much effect. First, the American left and right have been calling each other fascists and commies since at least the 60s, so there’s a bit of a boy-who-cried-wolf effect. To many, that’s just what liberals always say, so no need to take it seriously. More ominously, others don’t care what you call it, because they know it’s what they want.
(DIR) Post #B05Ov73UI8HTYzFRmS by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-11-10T00:27:25Z
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@reillypascal @futurebird Next, cabbages...
(DIR) Post #B05Ov7mVakIFocJOxE by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-11-10T00:29:36Z
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@reillypascal @futurebird (Waiting to see if that needs explaining…)
(DIR) Post #B05Ov96key51vgn596 by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-11-10T00:32:55Z
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@futurebird @reillypascal “The time has come,' the Walrus said, To talk of many things:Of shoes — and ships — and sealing-wax — Of cabbages — and kings —And why the sea is boiling hot — And whether pigs have wings.'”https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43914/the-walrus-and-the-carpenter-56d222cbc80a9
(DIR) Post #B05Ov9eQdl1Dc8Xydc by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-11-10T00:35:29Z
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@futurebird @reillypascal My dad used to quote this line and it stuck with me. I have no idea if it’s common knowledge or just a thing he likes.
(DIR) Post #B05PKlQ9Ln9tzi4zqq by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-11-10T00:50:23Z
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@futurebird @reillypascal I haven’t read the whole thing in ages, and the bit about shoes and ships and sealing wax, cabbages and kings, was all I heard regularly growing up. I think my dad just liked the wordplay and the absurdity of the juxtapositions, as do I. I completely forgot it’s part of a story where anyone gets eaten. Sorry for being inadvertently ominous!
(DIR) Post #B12hAr5CQ9uLAINPPc by mcmullin@musicians.today
2025-12-08T15:18:03Z
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@futurebird Related thread, from a while back. Using generic LLMs for science is terribly irresponsible, because they cannot integrate new evidence or evaluate the merits of new arguments. They only know what's been said more often. The glory of science is its ability sometimes to demonstrate that what everyone has always said is wrong, and a new idea is better.https://musicians.today/@mcmullin/115113940243762269