Do folks around here use backing tracks to practice? Something with a bit more ‘soul’ than a metronome or MIDI, but a bit more space than a full studio recording? Are there any good sources, or do I have to bribe a competent musician to record me such a track?
Any suggestions gratefully received.
Hi DrPhill,
There are a couple of books that have the tracks with and without the whistle. So on the second track for each song it is only you playing the whistle part. These are the ones I have:
Selections From Riverdance For PennyWhistle by Bill Whelan (way too advanced for me)
Antiquities of Scottish Music by Dona Gilliam (not the most exciting tunes, but not too difficult and ok learning material).
Irish Melodies by Joachim Hohow (haven’t gotten around to this one yet)
What I use most is Jules Bitter’s ‘Irish Beat Conductor’. A CD with Irish beats. Every rhythm in different tempos.
More info on that CD can be found at http://www.whistle-flute.com/?Shop:CDR_The_Irish_Beat_Conductor
And once Spotify reaches the US you can listen to it for free as they have it in their catalogue (as I do).
I guess what’s available depends on what styles you want to play. DrPhill, there may be several ways to practice along with “backing tracks”. Of course it’s probably most often done by using commercial recordings or CD’s as the backing and just play along. Slow down software can help get you up to speed. Then there are the recordings available through the Internet from BBC Virtual Sessions and Comhaltas that give you more of a sessions atmosphere. The Riley School has a nice archive of tunes too. There are probably others out there as well. CD’s are available from the Dan Compton Irish Session class. I have used a couple of other methods myself using pre-recorded loops (ACID, BIAB/Real Band, etc.)and the like, they are useful for music in more common time signatures but not as much for jigs and reels.
Feadoggie
Another option is to get to a session and record some tunes with a little voice recorder. They have gotten so much better in the last few years. Some even have the USB socket so you can get the tunes on to your computer in much faster than real time. Like this one.
It does a fine job on its own and yields very impressive results with a better mic plugged in. I personally like the idea of grabbing tunes from local sessions because if I learn to play the tunes with the same setting, ornaments, inflection, set lists etc, it does quite a bit more for you than just lifting a bunch of random tunes from a bunch of recordings of playing down a tune book to a bodhran track. Just my 2¢.
Thanks all for your thoughts and suggestions.
My preferred tunes are slow airs, and so my sources of backing tracks may be very thin on the ground. Maybe I will have to try bribing some folk from a local session…
Some of the older LPs were laid out in stereo with the accompaniment panned to one side and the melody to the other (Matt Molloy’s first solo record comes to mind). I sometimes wish this was a common practice.
Since you’re after slow airs, my guess would be that accompaniment (or “backing tracks”) won’t be easy to come by in the trad context since airs are typically a solo expression.
I’ve love that Digital Recorder (Sony ICD-PX720). It picks up everything and you can really notice the spatial relation of Stereo recordings. It only has one internal mic, so pick-up a good stereo mic for it.
Yes, that would be very helpful…
I know, but a lot of the recorded airs I come across are not solo, but the ‘lead artist’ is supported by some background instrument. I actually like these better than pure solos. An example I am listening to at present is Natalie McMasters ‘Rev Archie Beacon’. The violin and piano combination works wonderfully. It got me to wondering where/if I could get some (piano) backing tracks to play against. Short of learning the piano, that is 
.
DrPhill, I’ve used backing tracks created with some of the Finale programs (SongWriter, PrintMusic, Allegro). Write out the music in parts – whistle, harp, cello, piano … whatever. You can designate which parts you want to include in the MIDI, or mp3. Canned music and kept to a strict tempo for sure, but not too bad sounding. (A strict tempo is good for practice sessions.) By creating your own tracks, you get exactly the sound you want.
(YMMV … I’m a complete amateur and play only for fun.)
I have used other tools to attempt the same. I think that being able to play a slow air in strict tempo is an important step towards playing it well, even if the finale rendition is a bit more flexible with time.
Theres my problem - I dont get the sound I want, I get the sound I am able to describe 
.
Same here…
I am starting to make my own backing tracks for some of the songs I play and I use modplug tracker to do this, can be found here: http://www.modplug.com/ basically you take instrument samples and make music. If you want to know about how tunes sound on tracker or how they are made, you can download other peoples here: http://modarchive.org/ and play them with modplug tracker. Can take a while to learn how to use the tracker, I have used trackers to make music for about 10 years so have a lot of experience with making music with them.
What I do is make the track with the modplug tracker and save it as a wav file then open it in audacity and record myself play whistle as a second track. Haven’t got the timing down on audacity yet so my whistle playing always seems half a second faster or slower than the backing track. Usually takes a while to learn to make music with a tracker. Here is an example of a latest tune I made with modplug tracker, Mo Ghile Mear: http://www.mediafire.com/?6611cldi6d398bz (Its a WMA file in a zip file) going to use it to record a whistle on it when I can.
I probably could make some backing tracks this way if anyone would want one, depending on what it is.
That is very good - I can practice to that. I do not have the skill level required to produce such a track - I cannot even write a backing track in abc. Still, I will follow the webRef and see what others have done.
If you are serious about taking suggestions, how about:
X:1
T:Urchnoc Chein Mhic Cainte
M:3/4
L:1/8
K:D
A|d4ed|c4A2|G4EF|D4DE|
F3GA2|c3de2|d4c2|A4(3ABc|
d3ed2|c4A2|G2E2F2|D4DE|
F3G AF|G2E3F|D4D2|D4AG|
F2A2d2|d4de|f4ed|dc3A2|
d3ef2|e3ce2|d4c2|d4(3ABc|
d3c AF|G3AB2|B4AG|F4D2|
F3G AF|GE3F2|D4D2|D4|]
It is one of the tunes I am currently practising.
I got this and was blown away by how fast and difficult the songs are. So tonight I went through it again and there are two that are slow (the 2 before the last song) and I could play them along just fine without any practice. The tracks without the whistle are wonderful. Beautiful bodhran & guitar. I love it. I wish more of these CDs exist because it’s a lot of fun playing along with a professionally done track. And if anyone is interested, I think it’s worth buying it just for those 2 slow songs. And some day I’ll work up to the faster ones.
Another source is Blayne Chastain’s lessons website. He has a guitar accompaniment for many of the songs. They’re quite fast for me so I use Transcribe! to slow his guitar down and play along. I wish it had bodhran too but can’t be too picky. 
I thought of getting a cheap bodhran so I could do my own backing tracks. I can do guitar on my synth so I could do bodhran & guitar. But I have no idea if getting to a basic bodhran level on my own is something I can do.
If anyone has any other sources for play along accompaniments please share. Can be styles other than Irish. I thought of trying Aebersold but I’m worried about finding songs I can play without half-holing. This guy plays a wide variety of songs on his whistle, he sounds great. Not sure where he gets his backing tracks though.
Follow up, he uses a few sources:
On my side, I created a BIAB backing track for an air I’m working on and I really like it. If one uses the real tracks they sound great. Maybe a bit “canned” in that it doesn’t adapt to the song but I can live with that.
I stumbled upon this thread and I thought I’d update it. It’s not my thread but it’s an interesting subject so I’d like to keep it going a bit and hopefully others will participate.
I decided that I really need to learn how to make simple backing tracks myself. I dusted off my guitar but I don’t know how to play it. I spent a few hours and decided that would require too much time. So I got a guitar VST for the computer. It’s really cool and has strumming but I’m having a heck of a time learning it and it will require a lot of practice as basically you have to program it with the piano roll of a sequencer and add in extra notes to tell it how to strum, fingerpick, etc. I’m now thinking it may be easier & quicker to learn to play my guitar.
For drums, I watched some bodhran tutorial videos and I’m really interested. I’m going to ask Santa for one for Christmas. I do not aspire to be a great bodhran player but I would like to make some basic beats for my songs.
So that’s what I’m up to. I’m open to feedback from others. I formerly played sax, mostly jazz, and I really don’t like to play by myself.
Cunparis, I’ve done a lot of recording based on loop technologies. So I’ve tilted at this windmill before. Some of the available programs are relatively easy to work with and you can generate basic rhythm tracks quickly. I’ve acidized loops from bodhran recordings and bodhran tutorials too. I’ve purchased commercially produced bodhran loops as well. I also regularly use Band in a Box with Real Band and it beats anything out there for ease and quality of the final product.
Now, and I’ve noted this in the past here, with the exception of building the loops from scratch by yourself, you will not get a compelling Irish feel from these scenarios. In fact to get a compelling feel you will quickly realize that you need to record a huge variety of loops for each instrument you want to portray. It’s a lot of work. And since all of the usual loop based products are generally dependent on common time signatures and they don’t support what we would require for jigs and reels. Band in a Box and Real Band have some limited support for jigs and reels (if you like Lucky Charms style music) which you can fuss with but there is no substitute in my mind for playing in the parts yourself. There are a couple styles in the most recent BiaB / Real Band style sets that do a decent imitation of neo-celtic band styles. So if that’s what you are into BiaB may work for you.
Get a bodhran, learn to play it; dust off the guitar and learn to play it. Then record what you need/want. Or learn to play along with the recordings of other players.
Feadoggie
As always, good advice there Feadoggie. I have an older BIAB before they added the jigs & reels real tracks. I think I can purchase that one separately for $40. My main interest is in playing slow songs, either airs or slow reels. So at least that’s in 3/4 or 4/4. I mean I like to play jigs but for recording purposes I want to do some slow songs. So maybe BIAB would work. I used a country realtrack style to back Si Bheag Si Mhor and I like it. ITM perfectionists would probably shiver but I think it sounds good with a country backing.
I will give the guitar another shot this weekend. The main problem is my guitar has too much action and it’s really hard to press the strings. I may take it to a guitar shop and see if they can lower the action. In any case I should give it another try. I got a guitar sample library and I’ve been trying to figure out how to use it and it’s quite complicated. A bit frustrating cause all I want is some simple guitar strums and finger picking. I try just putting my keyboard on the built-in guitar and playing chords that way but it doesn’t sound like a guitar (surprise!).
The bodhran videos I watched make it look like a lot of fun.
Yes, it will work for that. I have also used a few waltz styles for Carolan pieces too. And some of the slow bluegrass style are nice for other pieces in 4/4.
The sample libraries I have (beyond BiaB) are mostly built for folk, rock, pop stuff too. Slow 4/4 pieces probably would be ok with the fingerstyle samples but much of the strumming stuff is fairly wooden and stiff sounding on slower pieces. The BiaB Real Band guitars for the Folk styles seem to sound a bit better and could be fine for playing along.
PGMusic has been expanding BiaB by leaps and bounds for the last couple of years (and it has gotten expensive too). It’s nice that they are doing all this work for the styles of music that they know best but Irish music is not too high on their priorities list it seems. I know a lot of musicians playing Americana (acoustic Folk, Bluegrass, Old Tyme, Blues) that love it and regularly use it as a practice aid and to build backing track for teaching and recording. It has come a long way since the mid-nineties when I first started using it as a composition aid.
Feadoggie
My BIAB is a few years old, when they first started the real tracks, so I don’t have many. I’ve been debating about upgrading to the latest version or just buying the irish sets. I delay the decision because they’re constantly adding new realtracks. I just took a look at the website and they have a new 2011.5 version that has another irish realtrack set for hornpipes and slipjigs. I may just spring for that ($300 for upgrade).
The thing is lately I’ve been spending more time researching sample libraries, trying to figure out how to use them, and trying to learn my guitar, etc. than I have playing my whistle. BIAB may not be perfect but it does let one create tracks effortlessly and spend their time on their melody instrument. Bodhran + BIAB for christmas. 
One other thing I just discovered, the “The Complete Irish Tinwhistle Tunebook” CDs are panned with guitar on left and whistle on the right. So I’m going to work on this book for a while, should hold me over until I can get BIAB.