Wednesday, January 31, 2018

"Surfin' Safari"

Earlier this month (the 6th) I figured out the bass part for "Surfin' Safari."  Like the other parts I know from the Surfin' Safari album so far, it's actually pretty simple.  Over the last few weeks, I notated it piecemeal.  Of course, there's the usual disclaimer that I might have something wrong.  I extended the bar lines past the staff in a few places to distinguish some sections (the guitar solo, for example).


As with "County Fair" (the next track on Surfin' Safari), the bass part resembles waves when it's notated.  Because "Surfin' Safari" is about surfing (which involves waves), I'm wondering if this is something of a musical joke.

Sunday, January 14, 2018

"Shut Down"

I was recently thinking about "Shut Down," and I realized something about the melody.  The end of the line "But the 413's really diggin' in" is sung to a descending melody, so there's a musical representation of that "diggin' in."  It's sung to the musical phrase Db C Ab, and since Ab is the lowest note in the lead vocal melody, there's a sense of reaching the lowest depth.  I'm pretty sure the song is in Ab major, so there's even a sense of Ab's being the musical foundation, the lowest one can reach in the metaphorical bedrock.