C.net Players

[m3838]

Aha!

Glad I steered the surface a little.

I'll do the same.

[John Wild]

.. At the moment we appear to have 1274 registered members.

.. 433 (34%) of those have never posted.

.. 208 (16%) have posted only once.

.. 949 (74%, including the above) have posted 5 times or fewer.

 

 

interesting statistics.

 

At the other end of the spectrum, just 4 members account for nearly a quarter of all posts

( 7,580 of 31,225 = 24.3% ), though these figures will have changed again by the time you read this.

 

John Wild

[Guest]

However I was probably wrong about the motives of people joining forums like this. Most want to "get" information, and less want to "share".

My experience is that C.net is a very generous community when it comes to sharing. As for recordings: not everyone has the technology, equipment or inclination.

 

YMMV

 

Cheers

Morgana

[m3838]

Not that I'm saying "most people are greedy and selfish". What I'm saying is that if you count all the sighned up members as a community, only minority is communicating.

I was thinking of the ways to make others within the "community", the silent ones, to offer their ideas too. And in a music group offering means at least 50% playing and the rest is advicing how to play, fix, hold etc. I mean, ideally.

 

As for the equipment - at least most have concertinas, right? Camcorders, tape recorders, mp3 recorders aren't rare either. All have computers Audacity is free.

So this group of people tends to be on well-to-do side of life, no?

What could be done to higher the motivation then?

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What if:

A group of players agree to play certain piece of music, share notation, some make arrangement and each send his/her part. All is put together and offered as a virtual ensemble piece? No?

[Henk van Aalten]

What if:

A group of players agree to play certain piece of music, share notation, some make arrangement and each send his/her part. All is put together and offered as a virtual ensemble piece? No?

Michael,

Also this idea has been suggested before by Alan Day and me.

[m3838]

Where can we hear the resulting band?

[JimLucas]

But I held European Nordic countries in high esteem in sense of urbanism and technology. Now I stand corrected,...

In general, "we" Scandinavians are avid and intelligent (though not always wise) consumers of technology, from 6-year-olds with their own cell phones to trains where the conductor standing outside can sell you a seat reservation using a handheld computer that tells him what seats are available between what stops and accepts your credit card, and when you reach your seat the display above it shows the from and to stations for which you've reserved it. We have our ombudsmen.

 

But we also have our share of bureaucracies and bureaucrats -- in both government and private industry -- who seem to think that their principle purpose is to prevent people from getting the service that their charters say they should provide. For a company which has a monopoly in a particular area, this can be coupled to arrogance, as when a friend with a small business called the phone company to ask why they hadn't kept their appointment to install a new line, and he was told, "What are you complaining about? So far we're only two weeks late."

 

By the way, I believe that many of both Scandinavians and C.net members don't hold urbanism itself in high esteem. In fact, one reason the Scandinavians have been such pioneers in cell phone technology is the difficulty of establishing wire-based communications in remote, sparsely populated areas.

 

I always felt amused when professional recording artists wouldn't offer a glimpse of their music to promote their CDs. I think it's counter-productive.

I'm with you on that one. Excerpted sound files on a web site are a very effective (and cost effective) form of advertising.

 

However I was probably wrong about the motives of people joining forums like this.

Most want to "get" information, and less want to "share".

I think you're still wrong about the motives. People aren't so easily categorized. Each person has their own, probably unique combination of different things they feel able -- or willing -- to "share". When it comes to learning about the concertina --whether construction or playing, -- probably very few of us consder ourselves competent to teach the others. This is true in just about any field of interest. The number of people using Google as a search engine far exceeds the number who have websites for Google to search.

 

I guess I still have this "vertical" mindset, having come from an Imperial Country with very rigid authoritarian structure. Here we have more of "horizontal" connections, for all it's worth.

An interesting perspective. We also enjoy -- even worship -- our freedom. Those of us who do "share", do so because we feel like it, not because someone else expects us to. And we are also free to choose what we share. Some of us share much more of our non-concertina (or non-music) lives than others. Some share even very little of their concertina expertise (maybe in some cases because if they shared it all here they wouldn't have any time for adding to it). Some share the facts of their progress with the concertina, but not recordings to demonstrate those facts. This we do, and are free to do, because we are individuals, not just "Concertina.net members". And part of being free individuals is that we have no obligation to give reasons for our choices... not even to ourselves. (But we can, if we wish.)

 

Hmm. A bit of a philosophical tangent. But that's one of the things I do, as an individual.

[Henk van Aalten]

Where can we hear the resulting band?

Nowhere

Although some C.Netters were very positive, there has been only one contributor up till now. When you read this thread, you will find the history of this initiative.

[Guest]

Not that I'm saying "most people are greedy and selfish". What I'm saying is that if you count all the sighned up members as a community, only minority is communicating. I was thinking of the ways to make others within the "community", the silent ones, to offer their ideas too. And in a music group offering means at least 50% playing and the rest is advicing how to play, fix, hold etc. I mean, ideally.

In my own (nearly 20 years) internet experience in this and other online communities, there is always a very active minority, and a much quieter majority. There are probably as many reasons for this as there members, some of which have been discussed above. I do think it is great to encourage and invite people to be more active in their participation. However I also think it is up to the individual as to whether they take up the invitation or not.

 

As for the equipment - at least most have concertinas, right? Camcorders, tape recorders, mp3 recorders aren't rare either. All have computers Audacity is free. So this group of people tends to be on well-to-do side of life, no? What could be done to higher the motivation then?

Not rare no, but that doesn't mean that everyone has access to them, or that if even they do, they want to record themselves and post it to the web.

 

I'm not sure what can be done to "higher the motivation" other than to continue to be encouraging and supportive.

 

Alan and Henk did try very hard to get a virtual ensemble happening. I admit that I was one of the people that put up their hand to join in, and I apologise to both Alan and Henk for my lack of contribution and explanation.

Edited December 22, 2005 by Morgana

[Henk van Aalten]

Alan and Henk did try very hard to get a virtual ensemble happening. I admit that I was one of the people that put up their hand to join in, and I apologise to both Alan and Henk for my lack of contribution and explanation.

There's no need to apologise Morgana. I think I also speak for Alan when I say that it was big fun phantasizing about the idea and how the result(s) could be

It was also good to see that our idea received positive reactions on C.Net

Realizing the idea is a less interesting tailpiece

[JimLucas]

Where can we hear the resulting band?

Nowhere

Although some C.Netters were very positive, there has been only one contributor up till now. When you read this thread, you will find the history of this initiative.

As one of the nearly everybody who hasn't (yet?) contributed to this project, I'll offer my own personal explanation:

 

Shortly after the "base" track became available, I actually tried recording a couple of tracks of myself playing along. I really didn't like the results, so I didn't submit them. Sometime in the future I may get around to trying again. I'm not sure. If all my "things to do" were put into one list, I'm not sure I'd have enough paper to print it out.

[Mark Evans]

As far as the C.Net Big Band goes, I just don't feel competent working the sound recording and playing as well. The results were dissapointing.

 

You cats who do it (and well I might add) blow me away. I need to focus completely on the instrument and voice and don't want to worry about levels or mix. A feller's got to know his limits. In fact I don't even want to be told when the recorder is on .

[stuart estell]

Not that I'm saying "most people are greedy and selfish". What I'm saying is that if you count all the sighned up members as a community, only minority is communicating.

 

But that's a bit like real life, really, isn't it? At social gatherings of any kind there will usually be a few louder individuals holding court to some extent, and an audience of listeners. I don't see that the Concertina.Net community is any different from that.

 

I have a list as long as my arm of stuff I'd ideally like my group to get down on tape at some point - and we came up with the idea of doing a podcast as a way of forcing ourselves to record more often. The result? One podcast, and one three-and-a-half minute version of a Christmas carol in nearly six months - a fairly minimal output, really.

 

And I'm sure that one of the major contributing factors to this is that for me, and the others in the group, recording is nowhere near as much fun as either performing or writing (or, even, practising to be honest) - so we simply don't do it very often. The natural thing for us to do, I suppose, would be to record live performances, but that would mean remembering to charge the minidisc recorder, one more thing to remember to do at gigs, and more kit to forget to throw in the back of the Land Rover. So it almost never happens.

[Samantha]

...

And I'm sure that one of the major contributing factors to this is that for me, and the others in the group, recording is nowhere near as much fun as either performing or writing (or, even, practising to be honest) - so we simply don't do it very often...

 

That just about sums up my reason for not submitting a soundfile in a nutshell. I'd rather play, practice and noodle about when I spend time with my concertina than set myself up for a Recording Session.

Samantha

[semaj1950]

America is not homogeneous.

 

I live in Virginia, and not even very rurally, and it's dial-up or nothing. Some times the connection speed is so slow I can't believe it even carries conversation, much less digital stuff.

[JimLucas]

Where can we hear the resulting band?

Michael, where (or is it when?) can we hear your recordings?

[Alan Day]

With a big band like GIGCB with approx 15 musicians it is difficult owing to the work committments and size of the studio to put a big band Cd together, so we decided to create a master track, all record our playing against it. By using different recordings of each artist or groups of artists put an arrangement together and eventually delete the initial master track.This is the idea behind the Cnet Big Band.Even though against the master your playing may not sound great ,when it is isolated it will, so do not be put off just send it in and let Henk do the rest.We do not necessarily require counter melodies and arrangements just straight playing along with the master.I do know the difficulties with this idea and for my recordings I did need to listen to the master a number of times before I went into the studio, but we were mostly playing two tunes in each arrangement so that makes it even more difficult. In three hours I recorded onto about ten tracks ,so it does become easier with practice.This idea opens up possibilities for the future for groups of musicians to put out CDs with recordings done in a number of studios World Wide, so Henk and I are offering the chance here to practice that concept.

I was one of the first with Henk to record MP3s on the tune page and it was mainly due to the reason that so little of my playing had been recorded.I have also reached the age where I was not concerned about any major critism of my playing and that others may follow.The results have been great, many of you have followed up with your recordings and we now have a very comprehensive music page section (again thanks to Henk).I am also very pleased that my initial critism concerns were totally unjustified, far from it, you have all given encouragement to every artist that have submitted recordings,including myself and for this reason alone no one need fear of sending Henk your MP3s.

I am certain that Henk would not include any recordings which you would later feel ashamed of,even though we all know many of us could with time and practice do a better job,so why not support these two sections with your recordings.

Al

[Henk van Aalten]

It might be interesting to see statistics on how many new submissions -- and submittors -- there have been each month since Henk started the Tune Links page. Henk, do you have that information

Jim,

This Link Page started rather spontaneously. I showed a pilot and the reactions were so positive that I continued, without thinking to much about procedures and criteria etc. (that's me ).

However, browsing back through the Links Page thread, I could find some figures:

March 1, 2004: 0 submissions

Oct 6, 2004: 100 submissions

Dec 29, 2004: 150 submissions

Dec 23, 2005: 247 submissions

So roughly starting with 15 entries each month in 2004 and flattening to about 8 each month in 2005. So an estimate of 5-6 / month in 2006 seems realistic (to me).