I have written here and there about the Kickstarter phenomenon before but never in length. I have to admit that the underlying philosophy bothers me a bit and I actually think it may do musicians far more harm than good. So I want to take a post and explain why. Here is a quick background […]
I have to be honest about something. What I am sharing today is not that difficult but nevertheless took me a long time to learn. It is a tip for learning to write more efficiently. In the six CDs I have previously recorded, I have written or arranged all the music. My process has always […]
I live in the Atlanta, a very urban and ultra-competitive place. Atlanta has grown up a lot over the past ten years. When I first got here, it was incredibly shallow because of all the money. Somewhere along the way, the money dried up and now people have become a bit more grounded. I like […]
Some people are really hung up on gender roles. I am not referring to women’s rights so much though that is part of it. What I am more referring to is their obsession with men learning to “act like men.” As a quick aside, when I was growing up, that is how fighting was justified. […]
Someone recently posted this on Facebook:
I have a music studio and I want people to find out about it on the internet. How can I ensure that people typing “<city name> piano lessons” into Google will find me?
I was in a group discussion the other day discussing how men can be better leaders at home. Eventually, the conversation came around to the balance between work and the other responsibilities of life (especially family). One person brought up the fact that men tend to be too obsessed with work. They work too much […]
I am playing a lot these days and one of the things I am working on is voicing. I spend a lot of time playing charts of voicings, drilling them until they become instinctive. It is not fun work; in fact, it is one of the most mundane things I know to do on the piano. But it is also very necessary.
I was talking to someone the other day and she mentioned that the modulation formula she always used was simply to play ii – V – I into the new key. In other words, if moving from F to G, she would finish the song in F and then play Am – D7 – G to get into the new key.
Over the weekend, I went to the Whispering Solo Piano concert near San Diego. The primary reason I went was to meet the musicians that are associated with that genre (New Age). I am in a very similar genre and they play my music on Whisperings and similar radio stations.
Yes, professional musicians are not always treated well. But their response matters too.
Someone asked me recently to write a post about how a young music student could cross over to the professional world of performance, recording, etc. I have written about that in the past but really need to revisit that subject every year because things change very quickly. So here is my current take on it.