I heard a curious thing a while back. I heard a young person play two pieces of music. The first one was an extremely technical classical piece. It is the kind of piece that only the top classical music students would tackle. I know it well but I would not touch it with a ten […]
Category Archives: Free Lessons
Want an easy way to get a thicker, more complex sound in your music? One of the easiest tips I can give you is to start using major 7ths. In this short post, I am going to tell you what major 7th chords are, when to use them, and how to use them. Sometimes, music […]
One of the great tragedies in the way music has been taught over the past century has been the irrational focus on rote replication of classical music. Over the years, I have heard from hundreds of pianists who tell me the same sad tale. Many of them have advanced degrees in music but once they leave the glass tower of […]
According to one of my online critics, I am not an arranger; I am apparently a deranger. I have been around the absurdities of the bickering that goes on in church music for a long time and thought I had heard it all but I have to say I have never heard that one. It […]
My daughter Kelsey informed me on Friday that she had to play in church on Sunday so I had to arrange something for her. Due to the time, it had to be simple but I still wanted to do something off the beaten path. The video below demonstrates what we came up with. In the […]
It is that time of the year where we church musicians get have to play Christmas carols. Yeah! Sigh…. I know it is not politically correct to admit it but I am not the biggest fan in the world of Christmas music. Don’t get me wrong—some traditional carols are great (“O Come All Ye Faithful,” […]
After publishing my latest free arrangement of “Christ Arose” last week, several of you asked for me to discuss it in a video so here it is. I wrote the arrangement in just a few minutes and I don’t consider it to be the best thing I have ever done. The one thing I consciously did while […]
Maybe eight years ago, my wife and I went to a concert that changed the way I viewed music forever. It was in a tiny venue in downtown Atlanta. My piano teacher at the time was on the piano and he had a drummer and a bass player with him. At one point in the […]
After last week’s post about transitioning between songs, several asked me to demonstrate. Yesterday, I recorded this 15-minute video demonstrating the six tips in that article. * Planning ahead * Making modulations easy * Starting all transitions early * Playing fill music while waiting for the leader to start * Giving cue signals to the […]
One of the current trends in church involves how congregational music is selected and executed. In the past, a congregation might just sing a diverse group of stand alone hymns. Today, churches choose songs to support an overall theme and package the songs together into melodies. I like the trend, but it does put a […]
In a recent sermon, our pastor was discussing what Christians should do when they are in those periods where they are not sure what God’s master plan is for their lives. That is a good perspective. Doing God’s will is not about mystical feelings and fleeces. More often, it is just about doing the things […]