Dave's Lament
Created by Hag
In AG magazine in 2009 Chris Dickie, formerly editor of The British Journal of Photography, wrote:
Before the world of photography had Photoshop it had Hag, but there the connection ends. While the former works its magic by computer reprocessing of picture elements, the latter works with his hands and a bank of enlargers, printing selected areas of multiple negatives onto a single sheet of black and white photographic paper, while displaying an apparently infinite imagination combined with a degree of skill that has been the envy of anyone who has ever stepped into the dim light of the darkroom.
A selection of Hag’s combination prints can be found in his book How Things Are (K.Ostra Productions, 2008) or on the website: https://hagsphotography.com/
But this article is not about Hag’s photography. Like the great French neo-classical painter Ingres, Hag is immensely talented in another art form: in Ingres’s case it was , famously, playing the violin to a professional standard; for Hag it is playing the guitar to a professional standard and composing.
On Hag’s latest album, In Your Head (available to buy or stream from Apple Music, Spotify and Amazon Music), is a composition for jazz quartet called ‘Dave’s Lament’. The following is Hag’s fascinating acount of the piece’s creation and remote recording with his collaborators: Nick Biggins (bass); Pete Lemer (piano); and Paul Robinson (drums).
Dave’s Lament
When my partner Julia and I got together, she had a Jack Russell cross rescue dog called Dave. Dave was a singularly unusual dog not being the least bit interested in other dogs but was very affectionate if he thought you were worth it. He loved a tipple (including spirits) and hiding fallen apples in the bushes to eat when they were fully fermented. Dave would not play ‘fetch’ and would look at you as if to say, ‘Why? You threw it.’ He did like a pulling match and going down holes, being very interested in small furry creatures. Primarily he loved water and anything which floated, sunny reflections moved by the wind on water mesmerised him and his peak obsession was riding the waves ‘surfing’.
Eight years later we sadly called the Vet to send Dave peacefully on his way. This was carried out in his favourite place in the boot of the car where he’d spent many a happy hour snoozing and watching the comings and goings in the garden. He was of a grand age, deaf, blind and could not easily stand. Dave had come to the point where he didn’t know what he was doing anymore. This was exceedingly sad especially for Julia who was heartbroken. It was a hard decision to make however inevitable.
Dave’s last day was the16th of May 2019.
Four days later
Feeling disturbed & sorrowful, I needed to get it all out softly & loudly. I pressed record and quickly made a loop. The chords were influenced by John McLaughlin’s Lotus Feat, a piece I had played for around 30 years with my musical partner and close friend Pat Dean, also sadly departed. I changed the start and the time signature from 3/4 to 4/4 and used different chord inversions throughout.
The loop became the piano solo introduction. I then played all the lead electric guitar parts in one take over the chords on the same stereo track. I felt better.
I edited my selecting of the guitar patches leaving all the lead parts (both good and bad) intact.
There were parts which were difficult to the ear.
Some time later, speaking to Julia about Dave, I mentioned this recording. Julia leans towards folk & classical, mostly peaceful music and not music with stretched harmonic & rhythmical landscapes, however she was moved. This encouraged me to progress further.
I cut 58 seconds from the lead part keeping musical coherence, but also creating a problem: I was cutting the loop to bits and thus also the regular time. It didn’t matter with my guitar lead parts, but it did if I wanted more instruments. There would be no click track for them to play to.
21st June[1]
I sent bass player Nick Biggins the edited track first for a bass track. He had no problem playing to my loop & lead track; we had played together over many years with free form pianist Steve Miller, culminating in the group K.Ostra and the CD Its Out There, recorded shortly before Steve’s death. It was his last released recording.
Nick’s bass became the lead bass.
21st August
I asked Pete Lemer if he could play a piano introduction and keyboard bass. I thought it was perfect.
With these in place I began adding sympathetic acoustic guitar parts, mostly under Pete’s piano.There are five acoustic guitar tracks which do different things throughout. I made a new electric rhythm guitar part just for the piano intro - which fades in under the piano as I did not like the sound of the loop. You can still hear it with the lead guitar on the slides up from Dm7 to Em7 at the start of the loop.
25th March 2020
It was all sounding very pleasing but what would drums and percussion do?
I ran it passed Pete and he agreed: “See if Paul Robinson would like to play”. We were now into Covid; very bad for touring musicians but very good for me. There was also the no regular rhythm problem.
Paul is an exceedingly skilled, amicable, fellow Yorkshireman whom I have known since the early 80’s. My brief was clear, just go for it, play to the music, and so he did.
On completion he texted me saying, “it’s a bit extreme, I hope you like it”. In his email, delivering his tracks, he wrote: “I like its mood. I added some percussion first, following the dynamics of the track. Then I added the kit, bouncing off my own percussion & your guitar and grabbing tempo from wherever I could feel it.
I think it has a nice mood. I hope Dave would agree?”
Peter’s comment on hearing the completed track with the drums was,”That’s rather lovely - I think Paul’s added a great deal and the whole feels at one with itself.”
I loved the drums so much I added the whole drum track again from the end doubling the 6.34 length.
Fine by me though I knew it needed something else, yes then it dawned: the dawn chorus I’d recorded in the garden last June on my then new Zoom Stereo/Surround-Sound Portable Recorder. A bird watcher friend identified eleven birds: Goldfinch, Jackdaw, Collared dove, Blackcap, Carrion crow, House sparrow, Wren, Wood pigeon, Dunnock, Robin and Blackbird.
I loved the transition from the full band to drums, percussion and birds, so I double tracked them, with the different versions requiring some editing to remove birdsong clashes. At the beginning of the piece I added a short burst to resonate with what was to come.
15th May
I realised the extended version was only good for what I now call ‘specialist listeners’ who enjoy long drum solos.
With the pastoral birdsong arriving after the electronics I recalled I had some DADGAD open tuning acoustic guitar recorded back in 2017[2]. This was an improvisation which with some editing had potential. It was played on my Italian Echo jumbo, bought from my college grant in my first year at Regent St Polytechnic in 1968 for £25.
I edited it down from 5’.19” to 2’.27” removing inappropriate Rock & Roll sections. The change from E minor to the relative G major performed its magic, but it wasn’t long enough for those birds and drums. I found a second piece of acoustic guitar I had recorded on my Martin on 1/11/2020. It was an improvised introduction to an old tune of mine called ‘Messages to Frida Kahlo’ in A minor.
It worked well, moving from the E minor via the pastoral-sounding A minor, to G major - although it required something else to connect them. I found another acoustic guitar part from the 2017 recordings which worked fine.
There was some moving about and fading with the three guitar tracks, and of course the birds singing, to make it work together but I didn’t touch the drums. Four instruments, recorded independently, were now playing together. It was now 10’.11”, a further 3’.32” of Pauls wonderful drums completing Dave’s Lament.”
[1] The dates given are the dates of the various recordings having been made.
[2] Whilst searching for these recordings I found another Garage Band 9 track version 4’.53” long created on 22/02/2019 and last modified 0I/05/2023 of which I had no recollection.
They are backing tracks of three acoustic guitars and midi instruments of grand piano, string ensemble, upright bass, snare & bass drum. All the bars & chords are notated in a arrangement track.
There are no lead instruments yet.