The Mellotron Group

You probably had a cold.
 
 
 
In a message dated 2/2/2012 2:59:55 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,  
mike.dickson@gmail.com writes:

 
 
 
..and this was most definitely one of those days.    


I got home quickly enough because I had the germ of a musical good idea  
going on in my head and needed to get it down quickly so I wouldn't lose it.  
All it would need is piano and Mellotron and that's it.  After that I  could 
take it easy.


However.


First the Mellotron was flat on all counts.  Tuning it up made no  
difference.  So tune it way up and then back it down.  Now  it's sharp all round, 
even when it was wound down beneath where the pitch  control was before.  Then 
I get it to approximate with the piano...just  about.  Then I start.  Then 
I stop.  It's flat again.  Repeat as above.  Great  Start again.  Now it's 
about a  quarter-tone sharp, despite being where it was on the dial when it 
was flat  before.  Then it went flat as I played.  Then it was tuned up.  
Then it went sharp.  Notice that at no time did the  bastard thing ever pass 
through correct tuning; it went from Sharpville to  Flatborough without even 
passing anywhere close to what I was after.  


Okay..screw this.  Try the flutes.  Never has there been a  worse idea, not 
even when Archduke Franz Ferdinand said 'to hell with the  expense...let's 
go on holiday to Sarajevo...'. If the strings are bad  then the flutes are 
going to be worse.  I mean way worse.  I mean it  didn't even sound like C#1 
was playing the same note any more than once every  five minutes.


Walked away.  Let it run.  Must be a temperature thing.  Yes...that's it.


The fuck it was.  I came back to find the strings were flat  and they were 
staying that way, always suggesting that they were in  tune when in fact 
they were about as out of tune as those wailing high notes  on 'I Will Always 
Love You' just before the vibrato mercifully kicks  in.  Repeat as above.  
Sharp.  Then flat.  Then sharp  and flat.  The probably neither.  Then musical 
limbo.


I suspect the M400 was trying to tell me that my germ of a  musical good 
idea was actually garbage.  


You'll just never know.  Sat down.  Played Angry Birds.  Forgot.


-- 
Mike Dickson, Edinburgh