After reading a short piece about Russian soldiers riding motorcycles toward the Ukrainian forces, running over mines, getting shot by drones, and Ukrainian soldiers, I wrote a song and made the above music video about it.
Spunk is shocked
After I finished intensive chemo in 2010, I complained to my oncologist about not having feeling in my fingertips or toes. I asked when the feeling would return. She said probably never. I gave her a disappointed look and grumbled about it. She said, “It’s better than the alternative. Stop complaining, you’re still standing above the ground!” She was right. I had no right to complain. She had saved my life, and following her instructions, I never got sick or had any complications that I’d heard so many people had with chemo. After my second bout with cancer, and even more intense chemo than I had with the first bout, there was no chance of regaining much feeling in my fingertips.
As one might imagine, playing the guitar with numb fingertips is challenging. I started relearning to play the guitar in 2018. I wrote the lyrics to Standing in 2019, but never got a tune or music worked out that I liked. I gave AI Music the lyrics and the parameters for the music, and I finally got a song I liked.
Søren knows what it’s like to be standing!
Standing
By Timothy Price
Verse 1
Numb and swollen fingers
Fumble on the strings
I can’t feel the music
I’m Lost in sonic spaces
Verse 2
My guitar rings in my ears
I struggle with the sound
I’m trying to make some music
A joyful noise is what comes out
Chorus
But I won’t complain
And I won’t shed tears
It’s a miracle
That I’m still here
I won’t go down
Or get torn usunder
Becase I’m still standing
Above the ground
Bridge
Errant notes dangle
Then they Fall
Slipped off strings
And fingerboard
They lie scattered
Across the floor
They’re silenced
Under foot
Otro
Numb and swollen fingers
Still fumble on the strings
I still can’t feel the music
I’m still lost in sonic spaces
It’s like eeEEeeek!
The storm is one of my recent songs. It has some really high notes that are held out. It took many takes to get them right, but I managed.
The Storm
by Timothy Price
[Verse 1]
Riding on the edge of night
Rainbow storms play on left
Sun shines on the right
[Chorus]
Light bounces off gray clouds
Shadows cling to the ground
Dead trees stare at useless rain
Much too late to ease the pain
[Verse 2]
Standing against the wind
Vultures circle overhead
Wishing my demise
[Bridge]
Angels ride
On lightning bolts
The gods argue
Their thunder rolls
Primary colors
Come undone
Trying to calm
The violence
Of the sun
[Outro]
Light bounces off gray clouds
Shadows cling to the ground
Dead trees stare at useless rain
Much too late to ease the pain
May’s Flower Moon
Dusk
Please take a moment to checkout the same Moments featering Teagan Geneviene on vocals that I posted last Mondy, but with a different video animated with a Shadow Dancer derived from Michele at My Inspired Life. Michele is into dancing, and working on a few different styles of dance, so when I was creating dancers to animate for the video, I made one with Michele in mind. While the AI created the dancer as a silhouette, the silhouette could be Michele. I described the choreography for the animation and it came out reasonably close to what I wanted.
Jake: “Whoa! Michele is a great dancer. How do I get attention for her?”
First Iris
TnT’s latest musical collaberation is a version of Moments I made for Teagan. While I was trying different animations for the video, Teagan created a happy image of a singer and musicians for me to animate. Of the many problems I encountered creating animations for the a video to go with the song, the main two issues were 1) getting a consistent singer and musicians through the entire video, 2) syncing the singer’s mouth to the lyrics.
Using Teagan’s image, I was able to keep the singer and musicians the same all the way through the video. I gave AI the lyrics and incuded timing and prompts in attempts to sync the singers mouth with the lyrics. I do not have an AI subscription that allows me to upload the music in an attempt to sync the music with the animation, so I have to do a lot of trial and error to get things synced up the best I can. I got the mouth syncing moderately close to the words in the video, but they are still off.
I know a lot of people don’t like AI imagery and animation and are put off by it. However, it’s getting better all the time. It also gives artists like me and Teagan a way to create images and animation that we could not afford to do in the traditional ways of creating images for animation and video, or paying someone else to do it for us. Teagan has really polished her use of AI to create images, and I am getting better at the animation for video. We are really psyched about the possibilities that lie before us.
Dawn
My first fully animated music video. I used AI for the images and animation. I wrote the lyrics and used AI to assist me in arranging the music.
Pre-Dawn
Winter’s Moon: Lirycs by Timothy Price. Music and Vocals by Teagan Ríordáin Geneviene.
The song for this year’s Winter Wolf Moon is very special because Teagan came up with the melody and music using my lyrics. In the past, I wrote the lyrics and music for the songs that Teagan sang for me. Teagan had to learn the melody before she would record her vocals for me to mix into the song.
I wrote the lyrics for Winter’s Moon in early November 2024 and sent them to Teagan to review. She was inspired and came up with the melody and played the piano as she sang. I added acoustic guitar to the song, and we used NightCafe to produce images based on the lyrics and music.
Then I made two more versions of the song by adding electric guitar, bass, and percussion for a Metal version of the song, and then I made a version with only acoustic and bass guitar. I will post those videos later.
This has been a really great collaboration, and I am so impressed by the melody and music that Teagan produced for the song. I am also grateful that Teagan is willing to work with me on music.
Happy Winter Wolf Moon!
You can see Teagan’s companion post at https://teagansbooks.com/2025/01/13/music-collaboration-tim-price-the-rise-of-mnemosyne-part-1/
Off Center & Not Even 