It was a no-brainer in selecting the “Old-Fashioned” as the first featured cocktail. It’s a classic cocktail that many people order as their default choice. What defines an old-fashioned? A cocktail primarily focused on the base spirit with a few modifiers such as a sweetening element and a flavoring element. In this first video, we will use the traditional method of making this popular drink, muddling sugar into bitters. I used Bogarts Bitters for this drink, though Angostura Bitters would be the most common choice for most. As for the garnish, both lemon and orange peels will be expressed over the drink, called “bunny ears”.
It was originally just called a whiskey cocktail during the early/mid 1800s. Over time, imported European liqueurs and fortified drinks hit the American market. Bartenders started playing with the construction of the whiskey cocktail, adding these new modifiers to their drink in hopes of creating their own signature concoction. Eventually, patrons moved away from these mixological experiments and craved the unadulterated original version of spirit, sugar, and bitters. They would ask for a whiskey cocktail, “the old-fashioned way.” Thus coined the term, the old-fashioned.
We will be exploring different versions of this popular drink over the next 4 weeks.
My video on the Improved Whiskey Cocktail, the “adulterated” version of this drink before it became an old-fashioned: https://youtu.be/1bg2ZFRr0Fo
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Thank you everyone for tuning in on my weekly videos! And a special thank you to those who helped me along the way! I can’t believe I was able to put together 18 episodes so far for this video series. If you missed a video, scroll back and see the evolution of my videos over time. Feel free to ask me any questions or contribute any ideas for future videos if you wish. I’m always looking for new inspirations and jam sessions.
I will be taking a month or two off to brainstorm different ideas for the next season of “Cocktail Notes”. Coming up will be exciting new collaborations, new themes, and of course new cocktails!
[March 04, 2021]
Season finale! The last original song I am featuring for this collection is “Beyond the Vast Blue”. I wrote this blues with a few challenges in mind: I wanted to utilize a 6/8 time signature, have a major sounding melody, and include a borrowed submediant chord. These compositional elements result in a song that evokes a nautical journey, wondering and wandering somewhere beyond the sea. It is my favorite composition in my blues collection. Accompanying me is my talented friend, Justin Schrum. Besides being an amazing pianist, he is also quite versed in wine knowledge. We have shared plenty of drinks, food, and discussions about drinks and food over the past years. After sharing this song with him, we found that this song resonates strongly with us. I have associated this composition with him ever since!
The cocktail I created to pair with this week’s original piece is called the “Pianoman and the C”. The inspiration behind this cocktail is a martini variation in which I incorporate elements of a caesar cocktail (a Canadian bloody mary variant). The one ingredient that distinguishes a Caesar from a bloody mary is the addition of clam juice---sounds strange, I know, but it gives the drink lightness and a sweet brininess that makes it addictive. I created this drink for Justin because of his love for martinis and happy hour shellfish. It was a perfect amalgamation of his two favorite treats.
The name itself has a playful meaning behind it too: it is a spin on the classic Ernest Hemingway novel, “The Old Man and the Sea”. The “Pianoman” refers to Justin, while the “C” could mean “Caesar” or maybe the C on the piano/key of the song. I enjoyed this cocktail quite a bit, but would probably swap in blanc vermouth for the dry vermouth. That would bring a sweetness to balance the savory and tart elements of the drink and highlight the fruitiness of the tomato juice. Cheers!
[February 25, 2021]
This week’s installment features the first original song that kicked off my blues composition project a few years back. “Twelve for Jo'' was a musical idea that I was dabbling with at work one day. During that time, I felt motivated to study other guitarists for new ideas. I started with an analysis of Joe Pass’ guitar playing and seeing if I could incorporate some of his tendencies into my own playing. Although I did not pick up any of his musical habits in the end, the process did affect the way I improvised and approached arrangements. This song was inspired by the lessons I learned in analyzing his virtuosic fingerstyle jazz playing.
The cocktail I created to pair with this week’s original piece is called a “Marzipan-hattan”. My sister actually was the inspiration for this recipe (the connection to the song being that she also goes by the name Jo). Her favorite drink has recently been a spirit-forward Manhattan. Last Christmas, she was really craving marzipan candy for some reason. I thought it would be a fun idea to combine the two ideas and create a Manhattan with the subtle hint of almond, honey, and rosewater. By adding the almond flavored liqueur, amaretto, along with honey syrup and rosewater, I think I was able to create something that hinted to the holiday treat. Cheers!
[February 18, 2021]
Valentine’s Day is quickly approaching, so I wanted to keep with the theme and feature an original that is a little bit more sultry and provocative. I wrote this song a few years back as the R&B installment to my blues composition project. The form is AABA, with the first and last sections having a 12-bar blues structure. The B section is an 8 measure melody, outlining a more “Major” sound to contrast the “Minor” sound of the A sections. In recording this video, I needed more takes than I planned for. My improvisation during the video was not as rhythmically clean as I would have liked, but I chose this take for my overall performance on the melody portion of the song. It was a compromise in quality that is sometimes to be expected for songs with improvisational elements.
The original cocktail I created for this video is called “Les Framboise Apres”, or the “raspberries after”. The idea behind making this drink was creating an after-dinner type of cocktail that is sweeter, but also leaned towards the spirit-forward side. The inspiration was something along the lines of chocolate and raspberries. I challenged myself to use ingredients that were associated with dinner-dates/romance. This drink includes cognac (french, classic), chambord (are raspberries sexy?), vermouth (wine is certainly romantic), elderflower liqueur (in place of giving flowers), and chocolate bitters (obligatory chocolate). It was honestly a bit of a mess, maybe too much on the sweet-syrupy side. I will have to take a look at this recipe and revise it a little. Not bad for its first iteration though! Cheers!
[February 11, 2021]
For the month of February, I will be featuring all original pieces and cocktails. The first piece that I will be playing is one that I wrote in my final year of college. “Aperture Blue” is a standard 12-measure blues piece that I used as a basis for some harmonic experimentation. In this piece, I played around with some chord alterations along with some chord substitutions. Revisiting this piece after nearly a decade has been enlightening. I find humor in how I forced such a dissonant, chord-extension-filled melody over the chord progression just for “academic” purposes. On the other hand, it was eye-opening to see what compositional habits I still maintain today.
The original cocktail I created for this week is the “Rhuma-zzotti Highball”. It’s my take on an elevated rum and coke. Back when I was in college, around the time I wrote this piece, Captain Morgan was my social drink of choice. I created this cocktail as a tribute to that time, using different ingredients to evoke a similar flavor. I used Rhum Agricole, a sugarcane rum, instead of the usual CapMo. It differs from Brazilian Cachaca in that Cachaca is distilled from fermented sugarcane juice, while Rhum Agricole is distilled from fresh sugarcane juice. Regardless, the process gives the spirit a dry, grassy, and funky taste. It’s paired with Ramazzotti, an italian amaro that has the sweetness of a cola or root beer. Together, topped with soda water and a lime wheel, they mix harmoniously. Cheers!
[February 4, 2021]
The final song in this tribute to Herbie Hancock is “Maiden Voyage”. This is another song from his collection that I had not played up until this point. I have heard it many times, but never had the opportunity to try it with any ensemble. “Maiden Voyage” has a modal, harmonically-sparse chord progression that is written with the intent to allow the improviser to stretch out and be creative. The hardest part for me was maintaining the accompaniment pattern while playing the melody. In that regard, it was similar to “Cantaloupe Island”. I felt like that was the theme for the songs I played in the past month. It really tested my control of multiple voices, my precision in maintaining strict accompaniment rhythms, and my overall hand endurance.
The cocktail I chose to feature this week is the “Airmail”. It is a rum daiquiri topped with champagne. The “Airmail” was a refreshing cocktail that tasted exactly like it sounds: balanced sweetness from the rum, and a hint of lime tartness. The dry champagne brings welcome effervescence that makes it too easy to drink. Not much can be said about this drink. It was straightforward and delicious. Honestly, it tasted nostalgic. The cocktail tasted like the Vietnamese drink “Soda Chanh”, which is just a sparkling limeade that I frequently ordered when I went out to eat as a kid. From the looks of these cocktail specs, that’s pretty much what this cocktail is! Cheers!
[January 28, 2021]
The third song in my tribute to Herbie Hancock is “Cantaloupe Island”. This was one of my go-to jams in high school jazz band. I liked the slow harmonic progression and the straight 8ths beat. It gave me room to try out different improvisational ideas when I was a younger player. This song was also a good choice to play in a contemporary funk style. I didn’t take that route in this interpretation. Instead, I tried my best to imitate the piano part as I played the melody---more of an acoustic feel. It was very challenging to maintain the groove and accuracy throughout the melody. I was lucky my hand endurance held out. Maybe playing this on an acoustic guitar was not a great idea? For a future performance, I would definitely try to explore more exotic and dissonant scales in my improvisation. This song is a prime candidate to expand out and try different tonalities and colors.
The cocktail I chose to pair with this song is the “Midori Sour”. Midori is a famous melon liqueur from Japan that is almost candy-like in sweetness and aroma. The addition of lime juice balances out the drink by bringing a bitter, citric flavor. Typically, “sours” will have egg white in them. The egg white adds protein which froths up the drink when shaken, making the drink a little silkier in texture and mellows the tartness of a sour drink. I’m not a fan of wasting food (in this case, the egg yolks), nor did I want to go through the hassle of separating eggs. Instead, aquafaba makes for a good substitute for egg white. The cocktail itself was a little to 2-dimensional for me: it was just sweet and tart. I ended up tweaking the recipe lanter on by adding pineapple juice and a half ounce of vodka. In doing so, the cocktail tasted much deeper. Either way, it’s pretty rare to see a green drink! Cheers!
[January 21, 2021]
![[14] Airmail.png](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5507a594e4b0098066880c30/1611854834584-6ETBUOIRI7BTDA804NFV/%5B14%5D+Airmail.png)
![[13] Midori Sour.png](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5507a594e4b0098066880c30/1611274705240-U3QQ9UB4S0QEEXANZDYP/%5B13%5D+Midori+Sour.png)