Playing along with my modular

This is a highlight from my 64th show on Brixton Radio, broadcast last Monday.

Sometimes I do play synth keys along with the otherwise 100% modular music on my show and this was one of those times! I'm playing chords in the left hand and an improvised melody in the right.

Also featured in this show for the first time - lava lamp mode! My show is broadcast with video on Mixcloud and on my Twitch channel as well as audio on the radio. And Twitch viewers get some interactive functionality which generally gets added to every week. Last week I added the ability to turn on or off the lava lamp with a command in the Twitch chat (along side the usual controls to change lighting, camera angles and launch all the other fun modes).

You can also see clearly in this clip the copper kettle I have been using as part of the instrument - using it as a source for me to tap to trigger sounds and other changes in the modular.

In other news this week, I played a gig Friday night at an interesting event called üF Beat Club. From the organisers:

üF-Beat club a night of musical adventure, creativity, improvisation and pushing music to the boundaries.
A fusion of multiple musical styles from jazz, folk, rock, classical, dance to electronic and more.

The basic idea was that there were some pre-planned leaders, myself being one of them. Each leading artist or band plays a few of their own tracks for part of their set before then leading an open invitation where any musician at the event can come and join in with them in an improv.

I played 2 modular solo tracks - one similar to some of the music I've been playing lately on by radio show - which I'm calling Beehive. The second was my modular version of my released track "Time". You can see a performance of that I did on my show a few weeks ago via my recent post/video on 3Speak:
https://3speak.tv/watch?v=tdctunes/gdxblrgx

After that I invited Ajay to join me for our improv style track "In the Tower" on his EWI (Electronic Wind Instrument). We created this track specifically for our Electronic in the Tower gig last month.

After that I lead two improvisations, one slow in A minor and one more upbeat in C minor. I was joined at various points on these by:

• A pianist
• Bass player
• Two sax players
• Two singers
• Electric Violin!

I knew my job was to lay down a base of percussion and chords and leave plenty of space for the other musicians in the improvs and this plan largely worked. The only difficulty was giving them any kind of signal to stop as unfortunately I was behind them on the stage!

All in all a fun night. I know they are talking about arranging another one so If you are in reach of North London and like the idea of joining in or just like to listen to a variety of different musicians and styles in one evening this could be for you. You can join the meetup group for updates:
https://www.meetup.com/uf-beat-club/

I'll be back on Brixton Radio and Twitch again this Monday from 9pm UK time - hope to see you there!

Check out my original electronic music via:
https://linktr.ee/tdctunes
❤️ Thank you! ❤️