"Wedding Song - Dream Has Come True"

https://soundcloud.com/gatzka-music/dream-has-come-true-wedding-song

The Couple

I have mentioned this song in my last post, the Wedding Song "Dream Has Come True," for our Son and new Daughter in law. It was played and presented at their wedding reception. My wife and I were surprised by the enthusiastic applause we received from all there.

It is short, 2:25 Minutes, have a listen!

Congratulations to our Son and his new wife!

Kirk Mathew Gatzka | Open Secret | CD Baby Music Store

Kirk Mathew Gatzka | Open Secret | CD Baby Music Store

"Now On Sale At CDBaby = Open Secret" - CDBaby

See shopping cart to your right ->

I've finally done it I have placed one of my Original Songs up for sale on CDBaby.com! Please see the shopping cart on the right hand side of this post.

I am quite excited to offer this song for sale. It is an intimate tune for those that are in a relationship without any secrets. It was once said that this song "has a honest quality to it." It isn't easy to be this open in any relationship, but communication is one of the most important parts of one.

Please consider buying this song. I am very proud to offer it as my First Single on CDBaby!

I thought that you might want to read the lyrics:

Open Secret ©2014 Kirk Mathew Gatzka

It's an open secret

It's a big idea

Nobody knows it better

Than you

It's an open secret

That I'm trying to endure

Nobody knows it better

Than you

Time to see clearly

When I'm being obscure

That you can freely

Read me

Something's are well known

Everything is not

But what's to disown

When nothin' is what you got

I've got to grow up

Time to take on what's tough

Even though I know it's rough

I think I've had enough

    

It's an open secret

It's a big idea

Nobody knows it better

Than you

It's an open secret

That I'm trying to endure

Nobody knows it better

Than you

  

It's an open secret

It's an open secret

It's an open secret

It's an open secret

It's an open secret

Thank you to all who have listened to it on SoundCloud, Now you can own your own copy! Click on the Cart to purchase at $0.99! Visit my CDBaby page Here

"New Song on SoundCloud 'Come Along II' in Open G Tuning"

Seagull !2-String Guitar Open G Tuning

 Come Along II - I recommend headphones or a good set of speakers to listen to this song.

https://soundcloud.com/gatzka-music/come-along-ii

"Does Anybody Know?" ©2013 by Kirk Mathew Gatzka

My new song, I've been practicing it for a long time now. I wanted to present it to you today! Comments are welcome! I have a different version on SoundCloud with additional vocals and reverb. But this is a Bright and Clean recording. Hope you enjoy it!

"Guitar Harp Player"

"Self Portrait Recording" Logitech C260 - Corel PhotoPaint - Corel PSP Pro X3

Recording

I've spent the last couple of days working on recording video and audio. I have a Logitech C260 Webcam that takes fairly good video, though it is not HD (high definition.) I also wanted to record music so I selected for the microphone my Line 6 Toneport UX1 with Gearbox software. I used a "Detroit RnB Vocal," setting for the audio. The microphone is a Shure PG58.

I experimented with a number of programs like Windows Movie Maker, Logitech's own simple interfaced recorder and Pinnacle Studio 12, and got various results.

Both Movie Maker and Pinnacle resulted in syncing problems with the video and audio being out of sync with each other. I have an older PC with Win XP SP3 and the best combination was Logitech's software with the Toneport set as microphone. Probably worked best with my limited 2.5gig RAM.

The "Self-Portrait," you see is a still from my recording sessions. As I was playing back my video I took the still in Logitech's program. I opened with Corel PhotoPaint and used the Local Equalization and a slight bit of Tone Curve for a High Contrast look. Using Filter Forge's Photo Effect Vibrance enhanced the colors, and Frames for a film frame. I saved the 640x480 image and opened with Corel PSP Pro X3.

There I Softened the image, and resized it to 180dpi 1220 wide. Saving that for display here.

For the video I improvised a Blues tune on my 12-String Seagull Guitar and sang some nonsense lyrics that came out: "My Baby Don't Love Me." I placed it on my YouTube Channel also entitled "gatzkART!"

I have a look on my face of concentration, working out the kinks of recording a live video for the first time. So I won't win any contest for most jovial performer with this one!


Listening --- Kirk Mathew Gatzka --- Collision Warning

"Custom Truck Mashup" Corel PSP Pro X3

Custom Truck Mashup

This little experiment shows the value of having a tripod for differing exposures of the same subject to use for HDR images. I ended up with an Abstract image playing around with Corel PSP Pro X3's HDR feature.

I took three exposures of this same custom truck, owned by a friend of mine, and united them in the HDR feature. I used the Align Image tool and it did its best to give me an HDR photograph. I did not use a tripod, only stood there with my shadow on the bumper of the truck. So my photographs did not align properly, as is evident in the image.

Nonetheless, I found the end result rather interesting as an abstract image. I used the Vibrancy tool for the color and a couple of other photograph smart fixes on it. I added the blue and black borders as a finish to block in the abstract image. I also added the visible watermark, my signature prior to adding the borders.

Musically I worked on the song "Playing In A Vacuum," last night with my 12-string searching for a chord progression and melody. I went back through some chord progression notes I have and found a group of chords that fit the subject well. Using them with the lyrics, already written, I created the song. I found a drum beat that was a blues Shuffle and adjusted the speed in Audacity to the pace I had for the tune. I recorded it today and did some over voicing as well for added balance to the piece.

Listening --- Kirk Mathew Gatzka --- Playing In A Vacuum

"Acoustic Magazine" Fake Cover - Corel PhotoPaint

Acoustic Magazine Fake Cover

I chose a magazine motif for a creative activity this evening. I created a digital collage in Corel PhotoPaint. I found some images in old magazines and, after cutting them out,  scanned them in using my Canon MP495 All in one.

On the main face I added the eyes of a female singer and her lips on the Blues player wearing the hat, which were both cutouts as well. I applied the Image, Threshold bi-level, on the entire collage prior to adding any text.

I used the names of myself and two Guitar singer songwriters I met on the Acoustic Guitar Community. I also used the band name of the first band I was in in our senior year at high school for the exclusive interview. I added a blurb about using the free recording program Audacity. And using a bit of humor added the six-fingered Blues lesson.

The Fonts I used for the various text phrases were, Arial Narrow, Bleeding Cowboys, Abadi MT Condensed  Extra Bold and Berlin Sans FB. for a realistic touch I added the UPC code from a magazine blotting out the numbers on the code.

I saved the large file with my signature and resampled for display here.

Listening --- Cowboy Junkies --- Blue Guitar

Guitars - Digital Watercolors - Painter 11 - PhotoPaint

I recently had the privilege of having one of my songs arranged and played and sung by another musician. The song is "Open Secret," and I had just put it on my Acoustic Guitar Community - My Page listed below. ( I have since then added some older songs from 2004 to my listing so the song is listed as #4 on my playlist, my version.)

His name is Kenneth Brodie and he hails from Australia. He requested my permission to play it for his gigs and I asked him for a recording of what he came up with. He did a marvelous job with the song, keeping it simple and delightful, his recording is very good.

My wife said that she really liked his arrangement as well, he did stick very close to my version but simplified it and played a quiet instrumental version with his vocals. Needless to say I am happy that another musician found my song to be one he was attracted to and wanted to add to his repertoire.

Currently my songs and my recordings are not for sale, so you can only listen to them at My Page on Acoustic Guitar Community or some that are on SoundCloud. I have badges for both on the right hand column of this blog down the pages.

Today's image falls right in line with the topic above. It is a photograph of Guitars that I painted in Painter 11. I first used the quick clone with a light ocher background, selecting Real bristle brushes I did some of the background.

For more muck up I selected Skip's Digital Watercolors and creating a small brush I did an auto clone. I then varied the digital watercolor brushes and painted the guitars in roughly. Using the cloner soft clone I added back in some details, like the strings and soundholes and bridges.

I then Applied Surface texture twice first using Image Luminance and then selecting the French watercolor swatch I added more Paper detail, adjusted slightly so as not to overwhelm the painting.

I saved the large file and opened it in PhotoPaint to resample it for display and I added a Filter Forge film frame to the piece.

----------------
Now playing: Ken Brodie perform written by Kirk Matthew Gatzka - Open Secret
via FoxyTunes

SoundCloud - Sharing Music - Song = Collision Warning

CollisionWarning1 by Gatzka Music

Jazz Poster - Dover Publications - PhotoPaint - MixCraft 5

Digital Collage is very interesting to me as a creative outlet. I received some Dover Publications clip art that included a poster for the Fillmore Jazz Festival which intrigued me.

I opened the poster in PhotoPaint and then in Picasa 3 I located one of Mayang's Textures. I copied this to the clipboard and pasted it as a new image in PhotoPaint. Here I used the rectangular tool to cut out a portion of the texture that was a bit larger than the poster. I copied it to the clipboard and pasted the cut piece as a new image.

Switching to the poster I copied that and pasted it into the texture as an object. I used the property Multiply on the poster to make it semi-transparent to allow the texture to show through. I placed the poster in the texture and merged it with the background.

I added some more Dover Clip Art pieces to the poster, a Victorian corner, and an Art Deco piece. Placing them in the corners of the image I created additional balance for the image. I used Filter Forge's Frames to add a film frame.

In music I have decided that using MixCraft 5, though a good program overall, isn't really for me. It made my tunes sound generic and like a lot of songs that are already commonplace.

I've enjoyed my trial period using the program but I prefer to continue to use Audacity for recording my own work, which sounds more original and different than mainstream music.

However I do recommend that you try out MixCraft 5's trial copy for yourself as it may suit you and your approach to recording, the mixing ability is it's strongest feature. It is a fine product for making and recording music.

----------------
Now playing: Kirk Mathew Gatzka - Spaced Out
via FoxyTunes

Feel like a Number - PhotoPaint - Experiments with MixCraft 5

Just the other day I was listening to some Bob Seger songs and "I Feel Like a Number," came on. So I did a search in Picasa 3 for pictures with numbers in them and found this photograph.

I took this photograph with my older 5.2 megapixel camera and the dpi was 72. So I upped the dpi to 128 in increments to save some detail in PhotoPaint.

I also boosted the depth with the Tone Curve darkening it a touch. Then I upped the saturation by 15. I used the Effects> Artistic Strokes> Watercolor> filter on it. And I added a halftone frame in Filter Forges Frames in blue. I added a border of Navy blue and then the green halftone frame with another border of Navy blue.

I have only a few days left for my trial of MixCraft 5 and I have been having a blast trying to use it to the fullest I can before it expires. I've experimented with 8 tunes so far, ranging from Techno to Country Rock. The biggest problem I have had is during the mixing in of the vocals. I have been getting them too driven and it distorts them. I have tried adjusting the input levels so that doesn't happen, but, I still have some distortion.

I am confident it is my own inexperience with this fine program. I have learned to adapt to making the tunes more my own with help from their library of drums, bass, guitar, organ, piano and other synth sounds and effects.

I also found out at their site that they have a Pro Studio version for $149.00. I very much doubt I'll be able to budget in either of these programs. But if I could I would buy MixCraft 5.

The last two songs I worked on are, "Use it or Lose it," and "Don't Leave Me Alone." Both are Rocking tunes. But the vocals are distorted so I am not real happy with them. I need more mixing experience. It's coming along.

----------------
Now playing: Kirk Mathew Gatzka - Don't Leave Me Alone
via FoxyTunes

Irises - Lily pads - Rocks - Pond

Rushing to get a post in today. Here is a photograph I took that I applied a creative touch to. Using a similar workflow of my previous posts, I choose a different film frame for this image.

In Paint.NET I applied Curves and also upped the saturation for color and depth and a painterly filter, then using the Effects> Artistic> Ink Sketch> I turned up the color and lightened the ink lines.

I brought that file into Painter 8 to use the Apply Surface Texture> Image Luminance> for a bit of texture.

Using PhotoPaint I applied the black Film frame for a finished touch. Here I resampled the file for the web.

I have been working on a rewrite of my tune "She Let Me In," and a second song for this week "Smile Again." Both are a challenge to be sure. But I thoroughly enjoy the making of music. Both these songs are Country tunes, a little departure for me as I write mostly Folk/Rock songs. So it is a bigger challenge to make them not sound too much the same. Different lyrics, but similar chord progressions. I am using C F G in the one song and G D C in the other with some departure in the bridges.

All in all an enjoyable pastime.

Listening --- Smile Again --- Kirk Mathew Gatzka

White Lilies - Watercolor - Painter 8

We went on an outing to the local greenhouse here called, "WoJo's." I though I'd take my camera along and get some new photographs of flowers, though we went mostly for our vegetable garden. I found plenty of color and variety there.

These white lilies were among the photographs I really liked for doing a watercolor painting.

I first prepared the photograph by adjusting the Tone Curve in PhotoPaint. The shadows needed to be lightened. I saved that file.

Opening it in Paint.NET I applied one of the paint filter plugins which simplified the details somewhat and gave it a painterly appearance. I then saved again and opened it in Painter 8.

Once there I cloned the image and cleared it and turned on the Tracing Paper. From there I selected the Watercolor brushes and adjusted my opacity, diffusion, and varied the size of the Camel brush. I painted each petal individually and the white watercolor grayed somewhat, which was fine with me as I liked the result. I also painted the pistils and the one bud waiting to bloom.

I created a New Watercolor Layer and proceeded to paint the background keeping it light as much as I could for transparency and grain. I then went back to the original layer and selected the Digital Watercolors and added the yellow to the petals. I applied the soft cloner to the pistils for more detail, and blended with it as well. I saved that file.

Back in PhotoPaint I added the Filter Forge's Freepack 3 - Frames watercolor frame and also added some additional framing using Papersize with varying pixel width.

Last night I was working on a new song. Another broken relationship tune. I am not certain I like it as yet but am still working on it. I am using the chord progression of Em A for the verses, D G D A for the chorus, with a bridge of Dm7 Fmaj7 G7 Dm7 Fmaj7 G and turnaround back to Em A for the last verse. I recorded my first version in Audacity and saved it for my mp3 player.

----------------
Listening to: Eric Clapton - After Midnight
null

John R and Woodward Ave - Pencil - Watercolor - Painter 8

Downtown Detroit, Michigan at the corner of John R and Woodward Ave in the evening. This photograph was taken by my son Keir M. Gatzka.

I opened the black and white photograph in Paint.NET to apply the Effects> Artistic> Pencil Sketch> filter for a pencil based image.

I then opened the file in Painter 8 and used the same Watercolor runny bleach brush as previous posts, in varying sizes. I selected the colors to show the bright lights in the windows and the darkened buildings.

I saved the large file and reopened in PhotoPaint to resize and adjust the Tone Curves to darken and deepen the shadows. These buildings are not decaying but are used everyday Downtown.

Last night I played the 12-string plugged into my Toneport and using the Gearbox software applied a Clean Guitar tone called "Like Heaven" to the following chord progression:

E F#m A C#m repeat 4

C#m F#m repeat 3

A7 on 5th and 6th frets
D E hold

E F#m A C#m repeat 4

C#m F#m repeat 3

A7 on 5th and 6th frets
D E hold

I recorded it in Audacity and added a bass like lead to the tune, making an instrumental. I added a third track using the Gearbox setting for Arch-top Guitar with the bass turned up as a second rhythm.

Listening --- Triad Emaj --- Kirk Mathew Gatzka

Two Young Ladies - Painter 8 Wow! Book Brushes

This painting is done in Painter 8 based on a work I did some time ago reworked in Painter. I titled it "Pucker" because the lips are slightly puckered.

I used Painter 8 Wow Book's acrylic brushes and grainy brushes for this piece. I took the eyes, eyebrows and lips from the original image using the soft cloner brush for details. As I also highlighted the buttons that frame the image with the soft cloner.

I wanted to do some more painting with Painter 8 so I approached this image from that perspective. I did used PhotoPaint to increase the dpi to 96 and sharpen the original. Then used the stamp tool with the selected brushes described above. It is more painterly than some of my other pieces of work, but that was the goal.

The second image is from a photograph taken by my son Keir M. Gatzka. I opened the image in Paint.NET to apply the oil painting filter for my underpainting. I saved it as a tif file format. And I applied the Curves to it to deepen the color and shadows.

I reopened it in Painter 8, using the Wow! Book brushes I painted the piece with another broad based underpainting and then added details with finer oil brushes. I love the realism in this image as I usually go for a looser feel. I really like the smile of this young lady.

I saved the tif file and opened it in PhotoPaint. I only added the grunge frame using Filter Forge's Freepack - Frames again along with my signature. Converting it to jpg for display here.

I worked on a song titled, "Pages Without Numbers" yesterday. I recorded a simple vocal and 12-string guitar with a background vocal as well in Audacity. I used two vocal settings for my PG58 Shure microphone in the Gearbox software from Line 6. One was a Detroit R&B vocal for the guitar and background, and the other one for the main vocal - Bright and Clean. I'm not truly satisfied with the recording as I listen to it today. It is kind of muddy sounding on the background vocal. I need to re-record it for clarity.

Listening --- Pages Without Numbers --- Kirk Mathew Gatzka

Grunge Guitar Collage - Songwriting Musings

Today I am sharing two new guitar based images complete with chord progres-
sions and lyric snippets and drippings. I created them using PhotoPaint and the available features that allow me to add each piece into the digital guitar collages.

I have been working on two new songs and I added some of the lyric snippets and chords from them cutting and pasting from MS Word documents. I place the Text tool into the image and paste the snippets and selecting them all I add font, color, angles and drippings.

I do most of my songwriting on the computer now, I don't keep a journal, I write lyrics in Notepad or MS Word. Sometimes the chord progressions comes first then a melody then lyrics, other times I write lyrics and the chords and melody come afterward.

I structure the song as I go, rhyming, verses, hopefully a bridge, and a good melody. I use various chord progression tools I have found online and printed out to help come up with a progression that works well together.

The two songs, "I'm Counting On You," and "I Need You My Friend," were written differently. I started with "I'm banking on you," first of all with the first song, changing it to "Counting" later as I worked on it.

The second song began as a poem written at my daughter's house, then I altered it as I added a chord progression from my tools I have adjusting the chords, lyrics, melody after the lyric was in written form.

Songwriting is a work of flow and concentration, coming as it does intuitively. It is funny how many revisions can take place during the process. For "Counting," I wrote and recorded about 5 different versions before I was satisfied with the song. "My Friend," took less time and was recorded only twice before I had what I think is a pretty good tune. And with that one I cut a chunk of lyric out to the beginning poem to make a manageable song.

Lately I have been encouraged to write and record using a simple, clean approach to my presentation of the song. Vocal and Guitar only, recorded without any leads or background vocals or drum beats. I think this simplification has helped as I had been too concerned about production technique that it was hurting the songwriting.

Musically I have been enjoying the process immensely as I work on new songs and chord progressions and look for the elusive "bridge."

Listening to ---- "I Need You My Friend" ---- Kirk Mathew Gatzka

Dual Colors - Grunge Guitars

Another digital collage of grungy guitars on rusty painted metal. I used PhotoPaint to combine two colored rusty painted metal textures to create the background. I got the textures from CGTextures.com.

I applied the Little Ink Pot's Thredgeholder to the guitar photograph for the grungy lines. Then I added a bit of lyrics and chord progression plus the paint splatters with dripping using the Effects> Distort> Wet Paint> filter.

I was working on a new song titled, "I'm Banking on You." It's a slow rock piece. with a chord progression of C/G D/F# E and Cmaj7 E. I used a heavy guitar setting in Gearbox for the lead which has a bit of feedback with it. It's only a 3 minute song shorter than my usual fare. I don't have a drum back beat for it, just 4 tracks of rhythm, lead, background vocals, lead vocal. Done in Audacity I saved it as an MP3.

Listening to - I'm Banking on You - Kirk Mathew Gatzka

Blue Corvette - The Last Good Cowboy

Time well spent is time that you don't regret. I have been busy with a family emergency recently and have neglected my posting here on gatzkART.

Here is another image in my Frankenmuth, Michigan Auto Festival of 2009 series. It is an early 1960-61 Corvette, one of the best sports cars made in the United States.

The photograph was taken by Kent M Gatzka and I modified it by cropping it in PhotoPaint then in Paint.NET I applied the Effects> Artistic> Ink Sketch> filter. As the exposure had the sun flare already in it I highlighted it using KPT's Collection LensFlare filter and positioned the flare.

I also have finished the song "The Last Good Cowboy" with some help for both my brother Kent and my wife giving me input about part of the lyrics. I am indebted to them for their contribution to the song.

Using my Toneport UX1 and Audacity I recorded it with a Rocking Country back beat. Upon listening to the result I muted the drum beat and decided I liked the song better with just my vocal and 12-string guitar playing. So I deleted the drum track completely and exported the song as an MP3 track.

I had both my brother Kent and my wife review the song and they both like it, so I am happy with it as well. It tells a story and has a bridge that I incorporate in the song and ending.

Writing and recording are great fun and I had a good time working on this current song. The inspiration for it came from the family emergency I mentioned at the beginning of this post. It will carry memories with it, each time I listen to it.

----------------
Now playing on Windows Media Player: Kirk Mathew Gatzka - The Last Good Cowboy
null