Mia Cafe: Another New Demo!

This track is a commissioned work to accompany visuals from an art gallery showing in Perth, Australia. Entitled "Mia Cafe", it's a blend of Egyptian pop-rock rhythms, mountain dulcimer, Native American flute, synthesizer washes and a sort of Flamenco approach to the solos. There are some didgeridoos in the mix as well.

I was asked to create something sort of 'aboriginal' and could've gone what I suppose would be straight tribal, but was sort of at a loss as to how that might be brought about with an uptempo and modern sort of feel. My aborigine playbook isn't exactly spilling over with tunes. However, I love great Australian pop-rock, and one thing that stands out in this music are dry, dusty solos that aren't fancy - yet carry the weight of red rocks and sand with burning heat.

To create the haunting foundation for the track, I chose a minor key, in this case B minor. The progression is very sympathetic with open D tuning on a dulcimer:

Bm - E - G - A

You can play E on the dulcimer in dd-A-D tuning (5-6+-8) but to keep things in the same range as the rest of the chords (played within the first four frets), I barred at the first fret, effectively an E5 chord - so named because it has no defining third (and with no major or minor third, it can substitute for either.)

The chorus goes:

A - G - D - G

A - G - Bm

Which brings us back into the verses.

This is a rough mix with plenty of E.Q. left to do - but I like to post these tracks as they are, to show the progress of "opening up the soundstage."