Ketong71 - thank you very much for watching this and your kind words. We played this by ear - many hours starting and stopping a cassette tape to listen to the parts... I would spend several hours a day practicing along with the music on various instruments. One of my favorite performances, which I don't have a recording of unfortunately, was "Joy Ride" - where I played the saxophone for the whole song, but switched over to the guitar for the solo in the middle, then back to the sax again.
@m1ke3d -- I applaud you and your band mates for the time and talent you guys have to painfully go through each note and nailing the song like that. I remember when I did the same thing for Grover Washington, Jr.'s Winelight. But, I never sounded half as good as you guys did. Any chance of doing a reunion gig?
Wow! You guys did this when you just 17? Great work! Where did you get the sheet music for this? I've always loved Old San Juan? Or did you guys just jot the notes by ear?
And I would definitely agree with your recommendations of taking it nice and slow and using a digital camera nowadays...for any potential 17 year olds who can pull off a Spyro Gyra song :)
And finally, after sitting in a box for a long time, I found a way to transfer it to MPG to my computer, and then had to edit just the one song out, and save to another format and lessen the quality so the video wouldn't be hundreds of megs in size to post to YouTube, the purpose of which, was to share with my band mates, and family and friends, not to showcase my band to the world. So it is a pleasure to know someone else watched it.
Old San Juan, while a very beautiful song, is also a long song - and so, combined with nerves, we played it faster in order to get the whole song in. As for the quality of the video, it was taken with a home video camera (which was not very good back in 1988) and recorded in a dark auditorium onto VHS. That tape was then dubbed to one that my family got a copy of, and watched hundreds of times since then.
This was 1988 - 22 years ago, at a high school talent show. My band members and I were 17, playing to a bunch of 15-18 year olds who never heard of Spyro Gyra, and thought we made up the song. We were given only a certain amount of time to perform, and we did two sons at each performance to showcase different styles.
Pena3d - Thank you for taking the time to watch and comment on this video. I suppose I should have put more in the description that would have perhaps made it a little more clear as to the reason for the rushing and the video quality...
This would of been great if you'll didn't fricken rush it and had more feel. Anybody can just play the notes. Slow it down and it will sound great. What you think if you played it slower the audience would leave???? They don't leave at spry gyra gigs
Excellent!! I loved this song.
lookingforronfalter 11 months ago
Ketong71 - thank you very much for watching this and your kind words. We played this by ear - many hours starting and stopping a cassette tape to listen to the parts... I would spend several hours a day practicing along with the music on various instruments. One of my favorite performances, which I don't have a recording of unfortunately, was "Joy Ride" - where I played the saxophone for the whole song, but switched over to the guitar for the solo in the middle, then back to the sax again.
m1ke3d 1 year ago
@m1ke3d -- I applaud you and your band mates for the time and talent you guys have to painfully go through each note and nailing the song like that. I remember when I did the same thing for Grover Washington, Jr.'s Winelight. But, I never sounded half as good as you guys did. Any chance of doing a reunion gig?
ketong71 10 months ago
Wow! You guys did this when you just 17? Great work! Where did you get the sheet music for this? I've always loved Old San Juan? Or did you guys just jot the notes by ear?
ketong71 1 year ago
And I would definitely agree with your recommendations of taking it nice and slow and using a digital camera nowadays...for any potential 17 year olds who can pull off a Spyro Gyra song :)
m1ke3d 1 year ago
And finally, after sitting in a box for a long time, I found a way to transfer it to MPG to my computer, and then had to edit just the one song out, and save to another format and lessen the quality so the video wouldn't be hundreds of megs in size to post to YouTube, the purpose of which, was to share with my band mates, and family and friends, not to showcase my band to the world. So it is a pleasure to know someone else watched it.
m1ke3d 1 year ago
Old San Juan, while a very beautiful song, is also a long song - and so, combined with nerves, we played it faster in order to get the whole song in. As for the quality of the video, it was taken with a home video camera (which was not very good back in 1988) and recorded in a dark auditorium onto VHS. That tape was then dubbed to one that my family got a copy of, and watched hundreds of times since then.
m1ke3d 1 year ago
This was 1988 - 22 years ago, at a high school talent show. My band members and I were 17, playing to a bunch of 15-18 year olds who never heard of Spyro Gyra, and thought we made up the song. We were given only a certain amount of time to perform, and we did two sons at each performance to showcase different styles.
m1ke3d 1 year ago
Pena3d - Thank you for taking the time to watch and comment on this video. I suppose I should have put more in the description that would have perhaps made it a little more clear as to the reason for the rushing and the video quality...
m1ke3d 1 year ago
And the video quality sucks
pena3d 1 year ago
This would of been great if you'll didn't fricken rush it and had more feel. Anybody can just play the notes. Slow it down and it will sound great. What you think if you played it slower the audience would leave???? They don't leave at spry gyra gigs
pena3d 1 year ago