Syzygy- people coming together for/with a common purpose.
The Internet age has blown open the doors of possibilities for the indie musician. Derek Sivers, founder of cdbaby.com, has made the otherwise unattainable global market for unsigned artists as close as your own computer. Brian Austn Whitney, founder of Just Plain Folks, has created a global forum and ocean of meaningful support for indie musicians to share their own work, links, success stories and critiques with fellow stalwartly independant artists. Both of these resources have become the model for all the others who have come after them; the watermark, the touch stone for what really good ".com" sites should be about. Community.
In June of 2008, I was introduced to another such resource, Ourstage.com. If you haven't heard of it, please go there. If you love music, you owe it to yourself! In a nutshell, indie artists can upload their music and or videos for judging BY THEIR PEERS! You log in, select the channel(s) of music you'd like to hear and you're presented with two songs/ videos to enjoy, then you get to vote for your favourite. How cool is that? Very. There's no elitism, no 'stacking the deck' nothing but a random selection of completely new-to-you material you can sit back and enjoy.
I uploaded two of my own songs "Trial By Style" and "Too Hot To Sleep" to Ourstage and I'm very proud to have Trial By Style currently ranked 3rd in the instrumental category. This is absolutely amazing to me! I live in rural northern Ontario, a village of maybe 300 people. No sidewalks, no streetlights, and only dial-up Internet service. My attic is my 'digital refuge' where my muse and I have our discussions on the course of my music. There's no place to play live here, no talent scouts checking out the buskers... sometimes it feels very much like a cultural 3rd world. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't trade country living for any other kind, but even just looking at the entertainment section of the Toronto Star gets my mind and ears eager to be able to walk down the street and go see Koto drummers, or a ballet, or the Brandenburg Concerti.
So from my attic studio, I have been able to reach out to the world, and they seem to like what I have to say! So go on over to Ourstage, pull up the intrumental channel maybe my song will come up, if it does I hope you'll send me your love, if it doesn't, then please let some other independant musician know that their work is being heard, enjoyed and supported.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
When Inspiration Meets Information
When Inspiration Meets Information.
Tear Down The Wall
I had an interesting conversation with one of my guitar students recently; it was another one of my sort-of-long-winded pep talks on how he might benefit by learning to read music and the importance of understanding the fundamentals of music theory. I felt as though I was looking at myself in the proverbial mirror that history sometimes thrusts into our faces- I remembered being an eager 15 year old guitar player who had managed to fake his way through a few standard classic rock hits with reasonable efficiency; I knew a bunch of chord fingerings and had pieced together a few simple solos by ear. But, I had no idea what I was actually doing! I didn’t have the facility or vocabulary to communicate or fully express my musical ideas, if somebody had told me “…this one’s in G…” I knew that was important, but had no idea what they really meant. I had hit the proverbial brick wall of understanding and I could fake my way no longer- and my student had that same blank, confused/interested look on his face I’m sure wore myself.
Polly Wanna Jam?
In short, I was a musical parrot… you can’t have a conversation with a parrot because it will only say what it has heard or has been told to say, worse still it has no comprehension of what it is saying. Musically speaking, this is the exact situation that I have seen many students at or above that pivotal age of 15 in, they have managed to learn some songs, lots of intros, bits of solos and even a few cool tricks, but their comprehension of what they are playing and what those bits of information mean to each other is zero.
So many times I have encouraged students to try some basic improvising- playing a scale over top of some accompanying chords; most have said after about two seconds “...I’m really not too good at this…” or “…this is going to suck, you’re way better at this than I am…” but after a few minutes of ‘jamming’, they are smiling, nodding their heads to the rhythm, and catching short phrases that they can repeat. They have found that when they have some logical, virtually fool-proof parameters, (scales) the glaring mistakes just don’t seem to happen. There are merely notes that they will like better than others, but none are wrong. And that’s huge; they proved to themselves that they really do have the ability; it just needs to be honed, focused and guided.
Happy Collisions
Every melody, every harmony, every guitar riff, solo or chord pattern, every bass line, keyboard part, every bizarre sounding jazz chord has come from somewhere, the scale. That central piece of information, that golden-glowing series of seven notes has given voice to all that you hear in music…OK, except drums. But that’s pretty amazing to think about for a beginning musician who dreads the very thought of learning scales; to think that they have before them all the same tools as Bach, Mozart, Jimi Hendrix, Miles Davis, Jaco Pastorius and the list goes on. Innate genius aside, they have the potential to reach for those heights.
I have several students who don’t and probably never will read notated music; tablature is perceived as the end-run around learning to read notes. So be it. As long as you learn your notes on your instrument, go ahead and learn all your scales by tablature, but you have to learn how to apply that knowledge and how to connect those dots. There are lots of professional players and successful songwriters who don’t read music- BUT, they really, really know their stuff when it comes to their instrument, they know their notes, chords, scales, how to harmonize, how did they do that? It’s irrelevant really, as long as you get there, you’re still there.
At some point, their inspiration met head on with a healthy dose of information and they discovered they had the tools to more fully express their most excellent musical ideas. They had taken the muzzle off their muse so-to-speak; they fostered, fertilized and fed their desire to become ever better at their craft- with information. Whether they asked a lot of questions, learned to read music, bought those learn-to-play DVD’s, somehow they got the information they needed. They certainly didn’t flounder about in their bedrooms wondering how to make a solo to that chord pattern that starts on fret three.
The Big Bang- Theory
There is always, without fail some kind of product created when musicians who haven’t had that glorious ‘inspiration meets information’ happy collision, actually get down to some sort of study of musical theory. Your inner musician now has a much more potent tool kit to work with in order to become the outer, more expressive musician. Theory by definition means something is unproven, when it’s proven it becomes fact; music theory becomes music fact when you as the musician become the arranger of those facts into something meaningful to the ear. A great quote to consider: “Music is the artful arrangement of sound over time.”
If you haven’t experienced it yet, then do whatever you can to make it happen, if you have experienced it, then you’ll know exactly what I mean; when you are excited and inspired to play, to create music, when you become addicted to your instrument the entire process of making music is invigorated, everything is potential. Your product is more satisfying; you can reach for and achieve better results much quicker and more creatively. Trust me, it’s true! You’ll be like old Ebenezer Scrooge on that fateful Christmas morn, everything is exciting, and you’re practically giddy with anticipation wondering what you’ll create next.
Tear Down The Wall
I had an interesting conversation with one of my guitar students recently; it was another one of my sort-of-long-winded pep talks on how he might benefit by learning to read music and the importance of understanding the fundamentals of music theory. I felt as though I was looking at myself in the proverbial mirror that history sometimes thrusts into our faces- I remembered being an eager 15 year old guitar player who had managed to fake his way through a few standard classic rock hits with reasonable efficiency; I knew a bunch of chord fingerings and had pieced together a few simple solos by ear. But, I had no idea what I was actually doing! I didn’t have the facility or vocabulary to communicate or fully express my musical ideas, if somebody had told me “…this one’s in G…” I knew that was important, but had no idea what they really meant. I had hit the proverbial brick wall of understanding and I could fake my way no longer- and my student had that same blank, confused/interested look on his face I’m sure wore myself.
Polly Wanna Jam?
In short, I was a musical parrot… you can’t have a conversation with a parrot because it will only say what it has heard or has been told to say, worse still it has no comprehension of what it is saying. Musically speaking, this is the exact situation that I have seen many students at or above that pivotal age of 15 in, they have managed to learn some songs, lots of intros, bits of solos and even a few cool tricks, but their comprehension of what they are playing and what those bits of information mean to each other is zero.
So many times I have encouraged students to try some basic improvising- playing a scale over top of some accompanying chords; most have said after about two seconds “...I’m really not too good at this…” or “…this is going to suck, you’re way better at this than I am…” but after a few minutes of ‘jamming’, they are smiling, nodding their heads to the rhythm, and catching short phrases that they can repeat. They have found that when they have some logical, virtually fool-proof parameters, (scales) the glaring mistakes just don’t seem to happen. There are merely notes that they will like better than others, but none are wrong. And that’s huge; they proved to themselves that they really do have the ability; it just needs to be honed, focused and guided.
Happy Collisions
Every melody, every harmony, every guitar riff, solo or chord pattern, every bass line, keyboard part, every bizarre sounding jazz chord has come from somewhere, the scale. That central piece of information, that golden-glowing series of seven notes has given voice to all that you hear in music…OK, except drums. But that’s pretty amazing to think about for a beginning musician who dreads the very thought of learning scales; to think that they have before them all the same tools as Bach, Mozart, Jimi Hendrix, Miles Davis, Jaco Pastorius and the list goes on. Innate genius aside, they have the potential to reach for those heights.
I have several students who don’t and probably never will read notated music; tablature is perceived as the end-run around learning to read notes. So be it. As long as you learn your notes on your instrument, go ahead and learn all your scales by tablature, but you have to learn how to apply that knowledge and how to connect those dots. There are lots of professional players and successful songwriters who don’t read music- BUT, they really, really know their stuff when it comes to their instrument, they know their notes, chords, scales, how to harmonize, how did they do that? It’s irrelevant really, as long as you get there, you’re still there.
At some point, their inspiration met head on with a healthy dose of information and they discovered they had the tools to more fully express their most excellent musical ideas. They had taken the muzzle off their muse so-to-speak; they fostered, fertilized and fed their desire to become ever better at their craft- with information. Whether they asked a lot of questions, learned to read music, bought those learn-to-play DVD’s, somehow they got the information they needed. They certainly didn’t flounder about in their bedrooms wondering how to make a solo to that chord pattern that starts on fret three.
The Big Bang- Theory
There is always, without fail some kind of product created when musicians who haven’t had that glorious ‘inspiration meets information’ happy collision, actually get down to some sort of study of musical theory. Your inner musician now has a much more potent tool kit to work with in order to become the outer, more expressive musician. Theory by definition means something is unproven, when it’s proven it becomes fact; music theory becomes music fact when you as the musician become the arranger of those facts into something meaningful to the ear. A great quote to consider: “Music is the artful arrangement of sound over time.”
If you haven’t experienced it yet, then do whatever you can to make it happen, if you have experienced it, then you’ll know exactly what I mean; when you are excited and inspired to play, to create music, when you become addicted to your instrument the entire process of making music is invigorated, everything is potential. Your product is more satisfying; you can reach for and achieve better results much quicker and more creatively. Trust me, it’s true! You’ll be like old Ebenezer Scrooge on that fateful Christmas morn, everything is exciting, and you’re practically giddy with anticipation wondering what you’ll create next.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Greetings!
This is the first post in what I hope will be an interesting read for all you fans and enthusiasts of music and sound recording.
As a musician, an audio gear-junkie and a professional guitar instructor, one of the biggest pleasures in my musical life is to create and perform my music. I studied audio recording in college, classical guitar too, music theory and recently released my own music on CD to the world on the Internet. My life for the past 20 years has been all about music.
In my years as an instructor though I have been very intrigued by learning methods displayed by my guitar students- which has lead me to do a lot of reading and practical application of what I have learned about the right and left brain interaction and interdependance in learning; not just music, but coordination, procedures and methods. Music exists on many levels, subtle and obvious at the same time; if you can appeal to both sides of the brain with music not only can it be learned more efficiently but your understanding and appreciation of it is vastly improved.
This is something I have deliberately composed into my own music and something I am very upfront with in dealing with over 50 one-on-one studnets each week. What I would like to do is to post my observations with this whole-brain music learning idea, open a discussion on the technical side of music and audio gear for the home enthusiast and practical ideas for the advancing musician and guitarist.
Thanks for taking the time to read my first entry, I'll be back soon with one of my favourite topics: "When Inspiration Meets Information"
As a musician, an audio gear-junkie and a professional guitar instructor, one of the biggest pleasures in my musical life is to create and perform my music. I studied audio recording in college, classical guitar too, music theory and recently released my own music on CD to the world on the Internet. My life for the past 20 years has been all about music.
In my years as an instructor though I have been very intrigued by learning methods displayed by my guitar students- which has lead me to do a lot of reading and practical application of what I have learned about the right and left brain interaction and interdependance in learning; not just music, but coordination, procedures and methods. Music exists on many levels, subtle and obvious at the same time; if you can appeal to both sides of the brain with music not only can it be learned more efficiently but your understanding and appreciation of it is vastly improved.
This is something I have deliberately composed into my own music and something I am very upfront with in dealing with over 50 one-on-one studnets each week. What I would like to do is to post my observations with this whole-brain music learning idea, open a discussion on the technical side of music and audio gear for the home enthusiast and practical ideas for the advancing musician and guitarist.
Thanks for taking the time to read my first entry, I'll be back soon with one of my favourite topics: "When Inspiration Meets Information"
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