When Christmas Comes To Town...

by Teetee Jay

I'm not actually a person who celebrates Christmas. Despite that, I bought Christmas trees, decorations, boxes, wrapping paper and all that glittery stuff to see smiles from others. But after my last relationship ended, it seems that I stopped participating in the traditions entirely.

This year, to save me from tears, I was asked to cover something special by a close friend/enjoyer of my music. He goes by many names, G-Tier, Brandon or sometimes I just call him B. I was introduced to this song about 3-4 months ago when he asked me to cover it impromptu on my livestream (not that I have a problem with spontaneity!). The moment I played the melody, I knew I liked this song. But it was not until I completed this proper cover that I learned the true meaning of Christmas. (No, I didn't become a Christian.)

The melody of Christmas...

Like I said, I was drawn to the melody of the song. Not the words nor the chords. So the first step I did was to write it out, figure out the original sequence (a.k.a. the 'form') of the song, and arrange it from there. On a whim, I decided that I would reharmonize the whole thing and use my own chords. In order to do that, I purposely did not look at the original chords. I was working around just the melody for 2 months. (The project started in October.)

Some of the nights arranging it went by easily. That is, the chords just flowed like the northern lights. But some nights, the inspiration just wasn't to be found. It was just like the northern lights. In the end, I only started actually recording the cover 1 week before Christmas. Let me tell you what helped me find the light again, and what I learned from the whole experience.

Breaking the ice

Basically, I could see two obvious options to proceed with the arrangement:

A) I should follow the original sequence and stay true to the composer's intentions

B) I can do the jazz thing, which is play to the 'head' (original melody) twice, sandwiched by an improvisation over those chords.

The problem I faced was that 1) If this was going to be a recorded cover, it's gonna be a lot of commitment. So I didn't feel like doing something if I wasn't leaving my mark on it... If I didn't have anything meaningful to say, I'd rather not say anything.

2) As I was writing the arrangement, I got a unique rhythm idea for the bridge ("Present for the children wrapped in red and green...."). The problem is that this idea doesn't go back to the melody in the original style, nor does it fit the "La-la-la" interlude.

3) The chords I played on the melody (Eb for 4 bars) is hard to improvise over because it stays the same for too long. But, it served it's purpose in the arrangement, so I wanted to keep it.

So, after about 2 weeks of being stuck at the same place, I decided to do neither A nor B. I went into improv, but I changed the chords. I played the bridge, but with a totally different emotion or intention from the original. I didn't feel any guilt. It almost feels like this is what you're supposed to do with covers.

All I Want for Christmas is

Some time closer to the deadline, I told my violin teacher Mei Yoke that I could use her guidance in how to interpret this song on the violin and viola.

She said "Are you sure you want to play that many notes?" That was funny.

To be honest, I can't even play the string of notes which I wrote for the intro. I had to record it at 75% speed and use the program RX-8 to speed it back up.

But more importantly, she said two things:

1) I have to upgrade my viola. She said that my violin is decent, but my viola isn't going to give me the sound that I want from it. So she suggested I borrow one from a friend for this cover. That was one of the best decisions... It was after hearing the sound of Isaac's viola, that I decided to do half the improv on a viola instead of the whole thing on the violin.

2) She told me to sing the song. To my surprise, I couldn't...

"If you know which words are sung to which note, you'll know how to phrase the melody."

She was right. During the recording process, I found that if I sing the words in my head while playing, I'll more often than not get the phrasing that I had in my mind.

So from now on, I'll try to learn the words to songs that I play. Well, I'm not sure about livestream requests, though... And bossa tunes aren't in English...

So, all I want for Christmas... is a new viola.

What I love about doing this cover

I often arrange music for string quartets, but arranging for yourself in this way is so much more fulfilling. Firstly, I don't have to worry about writing too difficult parts. If it's too difficult, I can just try recording again and again. After that filter, all minor inaccuracies are fixed with pitch correction software like Auto-Tune or Melodyne. (I'm not condoning out-of-pitch playing at a live music performance! That's a totally different context.)

The pitch chart of the violin solo after editing (at 3:00 of the video)

The pitching of the same violin solo before editing

I once had a conversation with a friend. He said "I like JJ-Lin more than Jay Chou because of his flawless pitching. When I listen to his recordings, I can't find any fault with it! But when I listen to Jay Chou, I can't stand that slight off key singing."

I told him, JJ-Lin is great, but you do know pitch is a commodity in 2021, right? Everyone can sound in pitch now with the software available, but good phrasing and creative interpretation is priceless. I believe that Jay Chou purposely tells his sound engineer to keep it slightly imperfect. I too, believe that perfect pitching is not always necessary-- or even desired. However, that doesn't mean that there's no "goal" when recording.

Each 5-10 second melody in this cover was recorded 10 to 100 times to get the right sound. The viola improvisation section was recorded 400 times (according to the program) until I got one with my favorite phrasing and emotion... Whatever that may have been, I didn't know it until I heard it from the instrument. At the end of the day, none of my recorded clips were even pitch perfect, but they were exactly how I wanted them to feel. It was liberating to be able to play freely knowing that pitch would be taken care of.

Everyone can sound in pitch now with the software available, but good phrasing and creative interpretation is priceless.

Another thing that I was able to do (solely because this is a recording) is to create digital pitch bends. These sound different from a manual pitch bend. You can hear the most obvious one at 3:03 (bar 57 in the photo above) and a less obvious one applied to the orchestral tremolo at 4:04. Maybe one day, I'll get an expression pedal to do the effect live.

So what is the meaning of Christmas?

That particular 'Christmas feeling' that we all get when we hear a carol is nostalgia. But for this song, and the movie it's from, the exact kind of nostalgic Christmas feeling is 'hope'. We hope for a better next year. We look forward to a break from our hectic lives, It seems like adults, more than children, need more of this Christmas hope. Maybe we need to remember how to believe in things again.

As I think about it more, I start to realize why this song was important for my friend Brandon. Believing in Santa is like believing in humanity. Most people quit believing in anything when they reach a certain age. That is, they become jaded and never trust anybody, or in any ideology. However, Brandon is not like that. Brandon is an idealist. Where a normal person would forgo morals in favor of ethics, Brandon would take the leap to trust in people and creeds.

At the start of this year, I made my violin Youtube channel, Teetee Jay. It was a rough start as I didn't have any content on my computer. One day before my first livestream on Youtube, Brandon happened to text me for the first time in 5 years (No, he wasn't promoting a pyramid scheme or anything). And so he was one of the first persons who I personally invited to watch my stream. Ever since then, Brandon has been believing in not just my career path, but our friendship. It's not unlike believing in dreams, which the song talks about.

So Brandon, thank you for getting me off my butt and recording my first solo cover for this YouTube channel, because I learned more than just about music.

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