Second Life Archive

SL – Thaylon on Hiatus

jjdeprisco

– August 1, 2009Posted in: Second Life

It's hard to be virtual.

August 2009 – Thaylon is taking a break for a while. He needs to make more time for his First Life.

SL – Sonic Poetry Experimentation

jjdeprisco

– July 12, 2009Posted in: Second Life

Screen shot from Phorkyad's side, showing some of the tech

July 12, 2009 – Thaylon Singh and Phorkyad Acropolis team up to collaborate on a new performance; connected via Skype and streaming into SL they experiment with words and improv music. Phorkyad used poetic material from a poem cycle. Thaylon employed his bank of acoustic instruments and electronic gadgets. Some pre-planning on each of their parts, but no pre-discussion. Whatever happened, happened!

SL – World Music Explorer

jjdeprisco

– September 18, 2008Posted in: Second Life

World Music Explorer with Thaylon Singh playlist 9/18/08
Name   Artist   Album
1   BBC RINGTONE 55sec
2   Partisan’s Bella Ciao   Modena City Ramblers   Bella Ciao [Italian Combat Folk For The Masses]
3   Taranta Power   Eugenio Benato   Taranta Power
4   Tu Vuò Fa L´americano   Renato Carosone   Bar Napoli
5   Juke Box   Fred Buscaglione   Italian Cafe
6   That’s Amore   Dean Martin   ”Eh, Paisano! 100% Italian-American Classics”
7   ”Eh, Cumpari”   Julius La Rosa   ”Eh, Paisano! 100% Italian-American Classics”
8   Ballate A Ballu Tundu   Tenores Di Bitti   The Rough Guide To The Music Of Italy
9   Gloria   U. Tozzi/G. Bigazzi/T. Veitch   All The Best from Italy
10   Just A Gigolo & I Ain’t Got Nobody (And Nobody Cares About Me)   Louis Prima   ”Eh, Paisano! 100% Italian-American Classics”
11   Tarantella Murgiana   Arakne Mediterranea   The Legend Of The Italian Tarantella
12   Laura Non C’e   A. De Sanctis   All The Best from Italy
13   Il Centro Del Mondo   Ligabue   Secondo Tempo
14   Fango   Jovanotti   Safari
15   Track 01   Coro di Aggius Galletto di Gallura   Lu Palti no M’appena
16   Tribu Puglia   Eugenio Benato   Taranta Power
17   ”Dalai Lama, Stop Lying”   Western Shugden Society

Thank you for listening!

SL – Orphan Train

jjdeprisco

– September 13, 2008Posted in: Second Life

Saturday, September 13th, 2008 – Multi-user collaboration.

Thaylon all dressed up

Orphan Train Cast

Looking Back: One Year in Second Life

Jeremy

– August 29, 2008Posted in: Second Life, Writings

Thaylon Singh

Friday, August 29th, 2008 - My experience in Second Life (SL) has yielded a number of observations about audiences, venues, performers and music in general. As both a presenter and a performer in real life, I think that these insights may be worth while for those looking to explore SL.

The first thing that a listener in SL notices is the quality of the musical performances, both in terms of musicianship and technical quality of the audio stream. There’s quite a variance. Performers have a wide range of methods to enhance their sound in ways that may not work in an RL setting. So far I have seen people use audio backing tracks, and even MIDI backing tracks – the latter being hideous. There are even a few folks who just DJ their own tunes from CDs or MP3s. As for the material, the majority of performers seem to still rely on cover songs, but originals are still heard (though in my opinion not enough).

My own SL experience as a performer has gone like this: started DJing tracks to expose people to my music, scheduled some shows with combination live and pre-recorded tracks for things that did not lend themselves to live performance (electronica or pieces with lots of parts). In any case, I always noted which pieces were which. My sets have included a combination of covers and originals. I eventually did away with all prerecorded tracks, except for preshow music, and now prefer to do everything live.

Covers or Originals – This is the perennial question, even in RL. Much depends on whether you want to be known as an interpreter of other people’s music, or if you want to be known as a writer. I’m a bit of both in RL, but in SL my goal was to develop a new persona that wasn’t necessarily tied to what I was doing in RL. I was hoping to dust off some of my more experimental material as the basis for a new sound that perhaps would only be available in SL. I wanted to explore the bizarre stuff that doesn’t usually make it on record or into my live performances. This was, after all, my “second” life, right?

That did not go as planned.

Read the rest of this entry »

SL – World Music Explorer

jjdeprisco

– August 21, 2008Posted in: Second Life

World Music Explorer with Thaylon Singh playlist 8/21/08
Name   Artist   Album
1   Amassakoul ‘n’ténéré   Tinariwen   Amassakoul
2   When the Levee Breaks   Albert Kuvezin & Yat-Kha   Re-covers
3   Narigón   Daniel Melingo   Santa Milonga
4   Touba   Issa Babayogo   Toussoumakan
5   Wene U N´ga Yale   Orchestra Marrabenta Star   Marrabenta Piquenique
6   Believe   Ozomatli   Street Signs
7   Samara   Salamat   ”Rough Guide To Africa, Europe & Middle East”
8   One Word   Kudsi Erguner   Islam Blues
9   Salt   3 Canal   Carribean Party Rhythms 5
10   The Bodies And The Knives   Eleftheria Arvanitaki   The Bodies And The Knives
11   Chinito Chinito   Ry Cooder   Chávez Ravine
12   Wrong Foot Forward   Flook   Haven
13   I would never wanna be young again   Gogol Bordello   Gypsy Punks
14   I Put A Spell On You   Natacha Atlas   The Best Of Natacha Atlas
15   Riena (Anathema)   Värttinä   Miero
16   Rock El Casbah   Rachid Taha   Tékitoi

Thank you for listening!

SL – Muse of Fire Gig

jjdeprisco

– July 30, 2008Posted in: Second Life

Thaylon at Muse of Fire

7/30/08 – Thaylon pictured here re-hearsing for his debut at Muse of Fire, a venue operated by Phorkyad Acropolis.

SL – Immaculate Misconceptions!

jjdeprisco

– July 18, 2008Posted in: Immaculate Misconceptions Project, Second Life

Sister Mary Thaylon

Friday, July 18th, 2008 - Performing Immaculate Misconceptions (IM) in Second Life (SL) has added a few additional tasks to our stagecraft that we don’t typically have in RL. For example, my script is riddled with notes to “start guitar animation here” and “teleport backstage”. In RL we had a sound person handling the pre-recorded sound cues, but in SL I trigger those via an iPod. But just like in RL, I still had to turn into a nun, though it was a bit easier this time with a simple drag and drop. The hardest part has been getting everything in the right order, with the right timing, juggling the iPod, keyboard, mouse, instrument and script all at once.

Thankfully, Steve cut the script into three acts instead of two, giving us much more prep time before each segment. All of that will change Sunday when we do all three acts in one night!

Reviewing the script again after two years, it struck me that there were several songs that could have been written or recorded for the CD, but were left out for other reasons. Don McLean’s “American Pie” – a highlight of the third act – was not recorded for the CD because I didn’t feel like dealing with the administrative hassles of recording a cover song. I also didn’t want to become trapped into doing the song as a request at live shows. People were likely to assume (wrongly) that I liked the song and would play it on cue. Since then, the hassle of dealing with covers has been reduced with online tools, so perhaps one day I will release it on IM v 2.0, after v 1.0 goes out of print. But I draw the line there.

We used the same pre-show music that I wrote for the RL shows, but after our first week of performances, I decided they were weak compared to my more recent writing. So for the second week, we are using some pieces that came out of my sideshow writing sessions for our friend Mike. They are short pieces that might not otherwise see the light of day. So in that respect, SL is a bonus for me because it provides an outlet for all sorts of styles and formats.

Another factor this time around is climate, as the summer heat has made it a challenge for all of us to stay comfortable for the show (we have a quiet third collaborator, Megh Woodward who runs some of the SL gadgetry from CA). The noise of my air conditioner is enough to drive me mad without amplification, so hearing it through my sound system with headphones on is not suitable. Instead I’ve been running it for several hours before hand, then shutting it down and using the residual chill for the length of the show. On most days this worked fine, but on one day I forgot to turn it on early and I roasted.

Performing with headphones is almost like a recording session, but not quite. You have to listen more carefully for cues visual and otherwise and it is easy to get distracted by an instant message or group announcement popping up on the screen.

At one point some residual curry from dinner got in my eye, threatening to blind me in the middle of one of the acts, but I pulled through. Yes, this is a strange (virtual) world.

Visit MUSOFYR for more about the experience.