About Steel Fiddlin'

Composed April 2011. Performed a few weeks later in a rehearsal by some
members of Cardinal Calypso: Alexis Arnold, Will Tucker, Emma Sagan, Ben
Roth, and myself on drums. There's a video on the video page.

I had played drum set in Cardinal Calypso for almost three years,
yet I had almost never played pan or written music for it. I was about
to graduate so it was my last chance.

I decided to write something that would suggest a different way of
performing for the group. This performance isn't exactly as I imagined
in that there is only one person per part. Each player was given
a set of riffs to choose from inside each part of the song. A sort
of "structured improvisation." There are cues between the sections.
Originally, I was hoping that each section in the band that had multiple
players would then devise visual cues to switch between riffs, since
they would have to be doing the improvisation in unison. Unfortunately,
we were pressed for time and space, so it was turned into a small-group
jam song. Honestly, it probably sounds better that way since it is not
very interesting musically, and works better as a short, light-hearted
little exercise.

It's best to imagine the title in a southern accent saying, 
"still fiddlin."