Still Alive (from Portal) - piano

A thousand years ago, my first regular professional gig was accompanying a cabaret singer who had made her name as an Edith Piaf impersonator. Her many accomplishments included producing Real Tears (TM) on cue and finding the time to try and run my personal life in fine-grained detail. My flatmate MoShang and I have many fond memories of her daily 10-minute-long answering machine messages revealing things like her knowledge that I was spotted going to the mall barefoot and finally, when I gave my notice, exhortations to "surrender the suit" that she had tailored for me. Funny, I haven't really worked in that town again, but I am still alive.

Anyhoo. On to GLADoS.

When I realised that I will not have lived until I have played Jonathan Coulton's "Still Alive", I eventually settled into a cabaret rendition. You know, girl-on-a-barstool-in-a-single-spotlight kind of stuff. A song starting with a little story leading the audience up to the moment of realising what's coming, and you all let out a collective "ahhh" (it's 2050, you have disposable income, and you're very prone to nostalgia attacks. Probably you're on a cruise ship).

So without further ado, here is the solo piano reduction of the cabaret version of the Barry Manilow Broadway take on "Still Alive". Oh, I see you're already finished listening.

P.S. MoShang also survived and is making fantastic music. Check out Comfort Zone at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9CvHyLtD2s and chill out.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Borba
• Spinotti
• Jonathan
• Coulton
• JoCo
• Still
• Alive
• piano

[MasterSquishy1]

This is fantastic! Did you transcribe the sheet music? Or is it all in the brain?

[BorbaSpinotti]

@MasterSquishy1 I haven't notated it yet, but perhaps I should...

[On3Sound]

Pretty amazing, i don't know if i was the only one getting a "christmas jazz" type feeling but i was.

[BorbaSpinotti]

@On3Sound Good observation, and thanks for the phrase "Christmas jazz". There are a few "wrenching" harmonic alterations that only seem to be allowed at Christmas. (FWIW, a fantastic proponent of Christmas Jazz is Lisa Ono's mostly-bossa Christmas album ;-)

[meroxyersox]

Amazing, but i think it would have been better if you hadn't changed the tempo so often. Get a metronome!

[BorbaSpinotti]

@meroxyersox and @lieutenantflufy: Thanks for sharing - I sometimes wonder if people aren't being too polite! Certainly food for thought, because although I made a conscious decision for lots of rubato, that may not have been the right decision or implemented as well as it could have been. Maybe my excuse should be that this is the timing an over-dramatic cabaret singer would have used.

[MoShang]

An actual quote from the very same cabaret singer's show:

"A thousand years ago Leonard Cohen wrote a song called Bird On A Wire... [pause for effect and knowing giggle] I think he was the wire."

WTF!

[SavageInsight]

@meroxyersox Normally I'd disagree, changing tempo is a big part of being expressive ( Fur Elise ) but the way Borba is playing this piece, you're right. A lot of the tone changes are very abrupt and jarring!

[thundercat287]

it's a good improve with some different feeling to it.

[E2controlledPlayer]

One person is a lie

[MasterSquishy1]

@BorbaSpinotti If you ever do i'd LOVE a copy, the chords sounds so unnexpected and jazzy!

[Matt561]

Amazing you made it sound just beautiful, I wonder how people will interpret it if they don't know the song its based off of.

[Saachasm]

Awesome, so want to play this song when I'm good enough on the keyboard P: