27. Let Go
SAMPLE this Track
Listen to it all for FREE on Spotify
Free Song Sheet PDF
Download
buy this track/album
Use 'BUY' in the top menu. The album can be found on all digital stores including Apple, Amazon, Google Music.
about
The music inspiration for this had hung around unchanged for years purely as the instrumental piano piece at the end. When considering putting it on the album, it was just too short and had no obvious melody. So I thought it might make a good break in a new song so I started noodling around with the same chords (key of C#m on piano) but in a different order and eventually found something to which I could hum a melody and get full circle back to the start chord.
C#, G#, Eb, Bb etc are horrible chords on guitar for me because I can’t get a full resonant sound as there few, if any, of the open strings (EADGBE) in those keys. In addition, full bar-chords have never been a strength of mine and, even using a capo, many of the weird piano chords just didn’t translate easily. So I left this as purely piano and played it in that way into the computer.
Changing MIDI notes/keys is simply selecting all notes and mouse-dragging them the required semitones up or down. So I brought the piano down to Am for ease of singing. And the new key also allowed me to provide a chunk-a-chunk ‘scruffing’ background rhythm guitar in the coda using the easier and fuller chord set.
I would love to have recorded this on my upright Dresden piano for both tone and touch, but I would need to be able to play REALLY accurately all the way through ... much too tough an ask! But I DID record the closing chord using my stereo Zoom H1 Handy Recorder and let the natural overtones ring through their long decay. I’d never even have thought of this if not for the famous closing chord in “A Day in the Life” (Sgt. Pepper). Amazingly it didn’t need to be pitch-shifted even a fraction despite the piano not being tuned properly in approx 10 years. I used only ONE piano and TWO hands (vs. ALL the Beatles plus a few others) ... but I’m sure that multiple pianos fade just as fast as one. The natural fade (without any volume boosting) on my recording could have stretched for even longer, but was overstaying its welcome. The increasingly quiet ending makes for a nice ‘palate cleanser’ for whatever track comes next.