This post is longer and more formal than usual because it was my term paper for a class in the NYU Music Technology Program. Questions of authorship, ownership and originality surround all forms of music (and, indeed, all creative undertakings.) Nowhere are these questions more acute or more challenging than in digital music, where it [...]
Filed in Composition, Copyright and Authorship, Key Musicians, Music, Music Business, Politics, Recording, Sampling
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Also tagged ableton, afrika bambaataa, amazing grace, amen break, authenticity, bach, beyonce, biz markie, brian eno, classical, compulsory licensing, copyright, danger mouse, david shields, dj, dj earworm, dj premier, double dee and steinski, entropy, Evolution, fairlight cmi, fugees, girl talk, grandmaster flash, harold bloom, hip-hop, informationtheory, jay-z, jesse walker, john coltrane, jonathan lethem, linkedin, looping, marcus boon, mashups, memes, midi, missy elliot, mohawks, nas, nyu, originality, plato, plunderphonics, questlove, reason, Recording, remixes, richard dawkins, Sampling, sasha frere-jones, stravinsky, susan blackmore, theodor adorno, walter benjamin, william gibson
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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.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
I know this melody as the cartoon snakecharmer song. Here’s a kid playing it on bass clarinet: I’ve always wondered where the Egyptian melody came from. It turns out to be hundreds of years of old, and goes by many different names. You can find an excellent capsule history of it in William Benzon’s book [...]
Filed in Copyright and Authorship, Evolution, Music
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Also tagged cartoons, cliches, das racist, folk, jazz, linkedin, louis armstrong, memes, middle eastern music, pop, quora, stereotyping, steve martin, they might be giants
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Thursday, October 20, 2011
The bassline is neglected by most non-musicians. But if you want to write or produce music, you quickly find out how important it is. The bassline is the foundation of the whole musical structure, both rhythmically and harmonically. The best basslines interlock with the drums and other rhythm instruments to propel the groove, without you [...]
Filed in Composition, Dance, Improvisation, Key Musicians, Music, Sampling
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Also tagged 808, art blakey, bass, black sheep, bootsy collins, charles mingus, daft punk, dance, digable planets, duke ellington, electronica, funk, groove, herbie hancock, hip-hop, james brown, janet jackson, jazz, john coltrane, kanye west, ladysmith black mambazo, looping, michael jackson, miles davis, morphine, paul simon, pop, rock, sequencing, talking heads, teddy riley
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DJ BC is my favorite mashup artist right now. He deserves the nod just for Snoop’s Nu Shooz:
Filed in Autobio, Composition, Copyright and Authorship, Key Musicians, Music, Sampling
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Also tagged bangles, brian eno, danger mouse, dj bc, dj earworm, hip-hop, jay-z, linkedin, mashups, mia, nu shooz, pop, Sampling, snoop dogg, soundcloud, wu-tang
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Tuesday, September 27, 2011
The internet has spoken! These are the tracks of mine that you like the best, in order of listens. It comes as no surprise to me that three of them involve Michael Jackson, and two involve the Beatles. Wanna Be Startin’ Something megamix by ethanhein Bitter Sweet Symphony Megamix by ethanhein Human Nature Megamix by [...]
The defining musical experience of my lifetime is hearing familiar samples in unfamiliar contexts. For me, the experience is usually a thrill. For a lot of people, the experience makes them angry. Using recognizable samples necessarily means having an emotional conversation with everyone who already has an attachment to the original recording. Music is about [...]
Filed in Emotion, Evolution, Music, Sampling
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Also tagged beyonce, chi-lites, elvin jones, Evolution, grateful dead, jay-z, john coltrane, manu dibango, mashups, memes, michael jackson, monkeysphere, pop, radiohead, remixes, sample maps, Sampling, sarah mclachlan, soul makossa, susan blackmore, tribe, zap mama
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If you’ve been following my internet presence, you know how much I love flowcharts. So naturally, I was amused by this Randall Munroe cartoon: I was reminded of it walking down the street the other day, because someone in our neighborhood in Brooklyn was blasting a dancehall track from their car that sampled the “na, [...]
Filed in Music, Sampling
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Also tagged ableton, bananarama, flowcharts, katamari, mashups, memes, pop, rock, singing, songwriting, soul, Video Games, wilson pickett, xkcd
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Saturday, January 22, 2011
When you first set out to learn your scales, it can be discouraging. There are so many of them, and their names are so bewildering. The good news is that when you learn one scale, you get a bunch of other scales that you get “for free.” This is because many scales share the same [...]
Filed in Music, Music Teaching, Music Theory
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Also tagged benny golson, bjork, blues, classical, dizzy gillespie, jazz, lynyrd skynyrd, miles davis, modes, Music Theory, rock, samuel barber, scales
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Thursday, December 23, 2010
John Lennon supposedly thought “Dear Prudence” was one of his best songs. Who can argue with him? I could make a case for it as the best song by the Beatles generally, which puts it in the running for the best song by anyone ever. The song was written about Mia Farrow’s sister Prudence, who [...]