Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Thelonious Monk’s beautiful ballad “Round Midnight” is said to be the most widely recorded and performed jazz tune — that is, a tune that was written specifically for jazz, not an adaptation of a showtune or pop song. It’s a testament to its popularity that it’s one of exactly two songs that Dave Chappelle knows [...]
Also filed in Composition, Improvisation
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Tagged ballads, bebop, bud powell, carmen mcrae, Composition, cootie williams, dave chappelle, dizzy gillespie, ella fitzgerald, hip-hop, jazz, john coltrane, krs-one, linkedin, miles davis, oscar peterson, Sampling, singing, thelonious monk
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Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Rather than attempting the impossible task of explaining how everything in jazz works, I’m going to pick a specific, fairly mainstream tune and talk you through it: “Someday My Prince Will Come” by Miles Davis, off the 1961 album by the same name. First of all, here’s the original version from Snow White. Once you’ve [...]
Also filed in Improvisation, Key Musicians
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Tagged disney, hank mobley, Improvisation, jazz, jimmy cobb, john coltrane, linkedin, miles davis, movies, Music, paul chambers, quora, wynton kelly
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Tuesday, January 10, 2012
The mind constantly works to find tonal centers in any music. The best atonal music is really just very complex tonal music, challenging our ability to get our harmonic bearings without totally overwhelming us. Music that strikes the right balance between predictable, functional harmony and randomness is the stuff that people find exciting; the unexpected [...]
Here are some recommended people to follow on Twitter. Most of them have blogs of various kinds which you can access via their Twitter profiles. For hip-hop, sampling and everything related: Questlove Kevin Nottingham Whosampled Grown Folks Music Wayne Marshall Hank Shocklee Jeff Chang For technology: Deb Chachra Tara Busch Paul Lamere For the highbrow [...]
Auto-tune was already a well-established studio tool by the time “Believe” came out, though it was unknown outside the music industry.
Also filed in Recording, Software
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Tagged autotune, cher, dance, electronica, Music, pop, posthuman, quora, Recording, Software
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Friday, December 16, 2011
A musical pitch is a blend of many different frequencies beside the fundamental. Here’s a visualization of the different vibrational modes of an ideal string. The string’s movements are the sum of all these different modes simultaneously.
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
John: “Instant Karma” I’d put “Oh Yoko” up there too. “Imagine” has a gorgeous melody, but the lyrics are like something an eighth grader would write.
Several US presidents and other prominent politicians have also been musicians. Here are some highlights. Harry Truman played classical piano.
Also filed in Politics
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Tagged alan greenspan, america, bill clinton, classical, condoleeza rice, harry truman, jazz, john ashcroft, mike huckabee, Music, Politics, presidents, richard nixon, rock
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Saturday, December 3, 2011
Improvisation Charlie Christian – “Waiting For Benny”
Also filed in Composition, Improvisation
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Tagged art blakey, blues, charlie christian, clifford brown, Composition, count basie, duke ellington, herbie hancock, Improvisation, jazz, john coltrane, max roach, miles davis, quora, soul
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I have a bunch of teenaged cousins, and they do the majority of their music listening on YouTube. They even DJ parties with it using playlists. Anytime they have a choice, they’ll always prefer music with some kind of video accompanying it, even if it’s just a still of the album cover.