Diane says she’s ready to sing! She’s having trouble getting logged on to the forum, though, so she hasn’t been posting. Mreiz, can you fix that?
Netgrass: Hard Times
Here is a Mp3 file with me playing the rhythm over and over a few times out of C for those interested in using it as a backing track to work on a break or for vocals. I put in vocal cues so one would realize where they are at in the progression.
Is just something for folks in or out of the project to practice with.
Once Dianne gets on here she can suggest a different key and what tempo she wants and I will do a scratch track of that.
Oldhat
Here’s a video of DianneP and her husband performing Hard Times. She’s purty good! This should be a fun project.
[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GA1_pBx-Cn4[/video]
I think your demo sounds good, Jesse. I like the tempo and it’s a nicely recorded, too. It’ll be helpful for working out the lead lines.
I “grassed it up” a bit with the tempo. Is a “sad” song and when played real slow it is really sad, when you bump it up to around where I have the tempo, it’s “neutral” to me in terms of leaning toward the sad or “more up beat side”.
Will be interesting to see if Dianne wants it this fast or not when comparing it to her version on your tube. Also need to know we are gonna put that turn-around /bluegrass measure in after the chorus each time in the actual song.
I figured we gotta play this at an up-beat tempo if we are gonna try and keep this under 5 minutes…with 4 verses, 4 choruses, instrumental break and if we put the turn-around in after each chorus then it could be 6 minutes long if we go slow!
It is a sad song, but sad and slow don’t always have to go together in bluegrass.
I kind of like a faster tempo, but even at the speed Claire Lynch is playing, it would take 5 minutes or so to squeeze in all the verses. If we need to drop a verse or two, that’s okay with me, and as far as the turn around is concerned, I’ll leave that to your discretion, too.
As creator of our base track, you’re going to have to make some executive decisions, and we’re just gonna have to live with 'em. 
Haha, I am gonna leave it up to Dianne to be the composer of this…she can lay it out the way she wants!
I will say that we should rotate some voices in there if we are gonna cut out the turn around after the chorus…this will help shorten our time and with the change of voice will mix it up a bit. 4 verses would equal Dianne doing 1 and 3… 2 and 4 could be done by any of the males (or other females if there are any others here?).
Just my $0.02 worth
Learned something I did not know:
A dirge is a somber song or lament expressing mourning or grief, such as would be appropriate for performance at a funeral
— Begin quote from "ldpayton"
Diane says she’s ready to sing! She’s having trouble getting logged on to the forum, though, so she hasn’t been posting. Mreiz, can you fix that?
— End quote
Hey Larry,
I am out on the road this week. I didn’t have much time to look at her settings (not to mention I don’t know much about it), and it looks like she should be able to post a message. If she is still having problems later in the week, I look into it further.
It looks like it’s getting off the ground. Glad to hear it.
Hi there collabbers
I have finally found where y’all stuffed yourselves up the hollow log of a new thread!
Been checking the forum lots and couldn’t understand why noone was posting. Only found out because Dianne told me about it today and I just checked and found it.
Still trying to make time to get different bass tracks down, trying to make it happen asap.
… but sadly not today - just started putting a new water pump in my car and two rusty bolts snapped off 
Don’t have any screw extractors (and 50 k’s from town) so trying to make one out of an old drill bit :mrgreen: …
…hard times indeed…
— Begin quote from "ozicaveman"
Hi there collabbers
I have finally found where y’all stuffed yourselves up the hollow log of a new thread!
Been checking the forum lots and couldn’t understand why noone was posting. Only found out because Dianne told me about it today and I just checked and found it.
— End quote
Oh man, you found us! Now we got to hide again. 
I told Mike to name this section, “Don’t Look Here, Ozi”, but he didn’t listen.
Hope you get your car going again. It sure is frustrating when a simple job gets unexpectedly complicated. Especially since it’s so far for parts. Guess that’s the price you pay to live in a beautiful place. I googled Wee Jasper today. It looks like a nice place, and I see that you even have some trout fishing. If I ever make it to Australia, I’m coming to visit you!
I am back home again. Did Dianne say what her problem with the forum was? I looked at her profile and it looks ok to me. If she forgot her password, it looks like it can be reset.
Well I was kinda hoping Dianne would chime in before today so I could lay down a rhythm scratch track as I am heading out of town for 2 weeks. Me and my military buddy in Cleveland Ohio are gonna hang out for a few days so I am flying up their tomorrow, then we are heading over to Baltimore for a week after that we will be heading back to Cleveland for a few days, then I will fly home to Nashville on March 1st. I will not have a guitar with me so I am “out” for 2 weeks and will not be doing any playing…will have my laptop though.
Until next time!
Oldhat
— Begin quote from "mreisz"
I am back home again. Did Dianne say what her problem with the forum was? I looked at her profile and it looks ok to me. If she forgot her password, it looks like it can be reset.
— End quote
I’m not certain what the problem was… just that she couldn’t get past the login screen.
— Begin quote from ____
I will not have a guitar with me so I am “out” for 2 weeks and will not be doing any playing.
— End quote
You’re killing me! I’m going to forget how to play it by the time you are back.
I sent Dianne an email to see what she is seeing with the login. Hopefully I can help her out.
Larry, it sounds like you are ready to lay down some tracks. What instruments have you been working on? Since I was out I hadn’t been working on anything, but I was thinking about it a bit. I like the little kickoff for the verse that is in the non-Lynch video. If we get too many people (or instruments) for parts, we could have variations of the kickoff done for each verse.
— Begin quote from ____
Larry, it sounds like you are ready to lay down some tracks. What instruments have you been working on?
— End quote
I really haven’t worked on the song that much. I was just enjoying busting on Jesse. I am ready to get this thing off the ground, though.
I’ve mainly been playing the song on guitar (because it’s easier for me to learn that way). I can get through it pretty much the way it is done on the second video. On the mandolin, I’ve worked out the chords and figured out the little 1/3 break from the Claire Lynch video. I’ve done nothing with the dobro.
I was holding off on learning anything more detailed until we figure out exactly what we need.
Poor Jesse, you are picking on him just because you can.
I listened to the track Jesse recorded before. If that’s good for tempo (I am guessing he used a MetroGnome) and key, I guess we could use that as a scratch track. If not we could throw one down. I am in no rush, so I am happy to wait as well. I have been keeping busy with my group lessons.
Her indoors may be moving out for a few weeks soon (next week?) so I can get a bunch of work done on the house - plaster dust, paint smell, oil smell etc - so I hope to have some time then to catch up with a few collab tracks 
… when I’m not working on the house of course …
Just had a call from Geoff and he said you were all waiting on me. Well I have fooled wround and finally logged on and I still am not sure how so here I am.
Hard Times - my views.
I like to sing all 4 verses. When my husband and I sing it we do the turnaround lick because there is usually only 2 of us so not enough intruments to fill out the breaks. If someone does a break between verse 1&2 2&3 3&4 there is no need for the turnaround lick. The breaks sound good if it is just the chorus - half the chorus on one instrument and half on another if needed. The tempo can be faster if it will work better. The ending can be just the last line sung again.
I like to chorus to be lots of voices to get that chorus effect of a choir with the acccidental notes created by the human voices involved and the harmonies can be as people feel them in their own heart. I go for a sweeter vocal sound rather than a loud dominant one in this song.
I hope this is enough info so you can make a start. I felt there was agreement the song would be in the key of C and I am cool with however you want the music side to be. I will sing to what ever works out for everyone on this one. Dianne
— Begin quote from "Oldhat"
Here is a Mp3 file with me playing the rhythm over and over a few times out of C for those interested in using it as a backing track to work on a break or for vocals. I put in vocal cues so one would realize where they are at in the progression.
Is just something for folks in or out of the project to practice with.
Once Dianne gets on here she can suggest a different key and what tempo she wants and I will do a scratch track of that.
Oldhat
— End quote
THIS TEMPO IS FINE
— Begin quote from "ldpayton"
The Claire Lynch version splits the break into 3 parts (kind of like we did with I Know You Rider). That might work well for us. I like the G postion guitar work, too.
— End quote
When I play this I put my capo on the 5th fret and play g chord shapes so its in the key of C but I can use the guitar patterns I use on G.