Hal Leonard Taylor Swift – Fearless Piano, Vocal, and Guitar Songbook Standard - $16.99

Hal Leonard Hal Leonard Guitar Method Acoustic Guitar (Book) Standard - $14.95

For more books, see the Guitar Lessons for Beginners Amazon Song Books Store!

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We have a review of Learn and Master Guitar and that reviews these guitar lessons for beginners and compares the DVD lessons to the online video courses.

If you want to buy lessons on DVDs, look at the part about Learn and Master Guitar.

If you prefer to download videos from the Internet, check out the review of Jamorama Guitar lessons.

This is for a very limited time, so act quickly. Have a very, very happy Father’s Day!

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The idea of popular music artists starting fashion trends is not an alien one; indeed, it is a phenomenon that has gripped our society for decades. During the 1960s in the heyday of The Beatles, many men would wear their hair long, inspired by the style of the Liverpudlian songsters. Similarly, in the 1980s, Michael Jackson’s legendary red zipper jacket – made famous in music videos for Beat It and Thriller – was all the rage, with both men and women donning the fashion item. These clothes helped spark the fashion sense of many generations, as people took inspiration from their favourite musicians in order to create their own look and define the fashion atmosphere of an era.

Today, a variety of modern musicians have helped engender new trends in men’s fashion. Modern rockers Kasabian for example, are featured in the 150th anniversary ad campaign for British fashion label, Burberry. Moreover, Pete Doherty’s relationship with British supermodel Kate Moss has made him a staple figure not just in the mainstream press but in the fashion world as well. Indie rave and electro acts, such as The Klaxons and Brazilian scenesters CSS, have also had a significant impact on musical fashion, with The Klaxon’s bright neon t-shirts and jeans engendering a new generation of cool.

Music and fashion have become so intertwined that the NME’s annual music awards have even incorporated the category of ‘Best Dressed Artist’ in their annual NME Awards Show, this year held on March 1st at Hammersmith Palais. The category is sponsored by Topman, a popular fashion retailer who continue to lead the way in men’s clothes and men’s fashion. Last year’s nominees included Pete Doherty, Alex Kapranos, The Killers’ Brandon Flowers, Liam Gallagher and the eventual winner, Ricky Wilson from the Kaiser Chiefs. The proliferation of indie-rock figures here clearly indicates the influence of such artists in the men’s fashion industry today – a trend which is sure to continue into the future.

Martin Mcallister

http://www.articlesbase.com/music-articles/do-you-look-good-on-the-dance-floor-indierock-musicians-initiate-a-revolution-in-mens-fashion-91409.html

We also know that music and exercise has been going hand in hand since long before Jane Fonda’s aerobic videos hit the scene. The right music can help produce energy in the body and in the mind simultaneously. Through actual scientific studies researchers have discovered that the frequencies in some music can actually optimize the flow of energy in the body and brain.

Through their studies researchers have been able to demonstrate how most people live their daily lives in a weakened state and not able reach their full potential as a result of several external reasons. They believed that over 60,000 man-made chemicals in our air, food and water supply actually interrupt the flow of energy in our bodies. In addition, they have also demonstrated how things such as cell phones and mp3 players actually contribute to that weakened state. As a way of counteracting these negative environmental effects some researchers have looked to the possibility of music.

Using the harmonic recording of a monk chanting they discovered that there were actual physiological changes in the body and positive changes in brain wave activity. This inspired a search for other types of music that would reproduce the same effect.

Researchers invited musician Mark Romero to a lecture where they were testing people with a number of different strength, range of motion, flexibility, and applied kinesiology tests. “I actually witnessed how people went physically weak when exposed to some of the negative interrupters such as cell phones and containers that once held chemicals in them. They then had me come up and play some of my music on the guitar and I saw people instantly shift physically in front of my eyes. Where they were weak they instantly became stronger.”

What the researchers discovered was that when the right music plays in the athletic environment there is an instant increase in five physical areas strength, flexibility, endurance, coordination, and balance. All of these five areas were measured in the same environment with the music playing and without the music.

Through brain mapping they were able to determine that the music created a response in brain waves much like that of athletes in the “zone”. The benefits include improved focus, reduced stress, heightened creativity, improved intuition and improved memory. They also noted that the body’s ability to heal and recover was greatly enhanced when in this same zone-like state.

Romero was informed by the researchers that his music had tapped into specific frequencies that are able to harmonize the two hemisphere of the brain and align that energy with the body and that his music could be a great tool to assist people in reaching their full potential.

Out of this emerged an amazing musical technology that can instantly put people into this harmonized state enabling them to operate at a higher level of mental and physical performance. Romero now has a wide range of people using the music as a tool to empower them in their life experience and athletic performance.

“I have people who use the music to help reduce stress in the office, and while commuting and dealing with other stressful situations. I also have people that listen to the music while doing yoga and other physical routines and they notice the benefits.” says Romero.

Romero also says he has people that swear it helps in sexual performance. I have to admit a CD certainly sounds better than a little blue pill! And if my memory serves me the sound track from “Last Tango in Paris” never hurt any.

Tom Terwilliger

http://www.articlesbase.com/wellness-articles/your-music-may-be-destroying-your-performance-441787.html

Formed in the United States, the group assembled in New Jersey shortly after the September 11th terrorist attacks of 2001. Inspired to write by the events of 9/11, Gerard Way put his feelings to paper and enlisted the help of drummer, Matt Pelissier in organizing a fledgling band. Recruited into the band shortly thereafter was lead guitar player, Ray Toro and bass player, Mikey Way – younger brother of Gerard. It was Mikey who named the band My Chemical Romance – derived from the title of a book that caught his attention.

After being signed by Eyeball Records, the band brought on its newest member – rhythm guitar player, Frank Lero in time to record their first album. The album, I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love was released in 2002 to a moderate reception. The next two years brought a series of changes for the band as they dropped their label to sign with Reprise Records.

They began a whirlwind tour following the release of their second album, Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge in 2004 – an album that quickly went platinum and prompted the release of popular singles, Helena and The Ghost of You – rocketing the band to popularity through the airwaves. Around this time, the original drummer, Matt Pelissier, was replaced by Bob Bryar, who continues to hold the position to this day.

The year 2005 was a year of touring as the band headed out on a Taste of Chaos tour – a compilation of alternative bands – and as the opening act for Green Day’s American Idiot tour. But by the end of the year, the group had toured throughout the United States in support of their own album. They kicked off 2006 by beginning to record their third album – Welcome to the Black Parade which was first aired on the radio on September 11th of that year and released in stores by the end of 2006.

My Chemical Romance fans are a dedicated group who carried the band to stardom amidst a grassroots movement, and remain dedicated to the band’s laidback alternative style and horror genre inspired music videos. Also adding to its popularity among fans, the band was also heralded for being among the first to offer free downloads of their songs through MySpace and other online resources.

My Chemical Romance continues to tour this year in support of their album with a legion of loyal fans behind them and packed arenas around the country. Since the band’s beginning they have stayed true to the music and their own personal style – and in so doing have attracted another generation of music lovers coming up in the world.

Samantha Kay

http://www.articlesbase.com/art-and-entertainment-articles/songs-of-a-different-nature-my-chemical-romance-127365.html

Early Beginnings

The band was formed in the affluent Chicago suburb of Wilmette in 2001, and the members, Patrick Stump (lead vocals, guitar), Pete Wentz (bass, backup vocalist, and primary lyricist), Joe Trohman (lead guitar), and Andy Hurley (drums) were friends who knew each other based on their common musical interests.

Fall Out Boy got their start like most bands – they began to jam together in their respective garages, and as soon as they had refined their sound, they began to play at local clubs. Their venue of choice in their early days was the local Knights of Columbus Hall, and they’ve since shot videos there to pay tribute to their roots.

The band quickly garnered a loyal local following, and it wasn’t long before Fall Out Boy tickets were in demand in Chicago. As a result of their growing influence, they got together to release their debut album on a small label, Uprising Records, entitled Fall Out Boy’s Evening Out With Your Girlfriend, which was released in 2002. The release was an EP, and it sold relatively well.

Commercial Appeal

The band released their first full-length album in 2003, after they put out a full-length version of their first EP, and it garnered even more notice, to the point that they signed a recording contract with Island Records. They achieved immediate commercial success with Island, as their first album under the label, From Under the Cork Tree, released in 2005, went double platinum.

Their most recent release, Infinity on High, released in February of 2007, immediately shot up to the top of the US charts. The band’s fast but precision-laden pop punk sound is already influencing other bands, and Fall Out Boy tickets will allow you to see an act that’s only going to continue to rise among the list of stars in the music world as they continue to hone their skills.

Jay Nault

http://www.articlesbase.com/art-and-entertainment-articles/fall-out-boy-tickets-see-a-rising-band-live-114641.html

The Collective Sound Music Academy, a non-profit, has been filling a gap in youth music education for over a decade, with programming that focuses on collaboration and creativity in current music genre. Working with music industry leaders such as Capitol Records, Volcom Entertainment, Sabian, the D’Addario Foundation, Gallien-Krueger, Gretsch Drums, Gibraltar, Dunlop, Roland, Digidesign, Yamaha, and Genz-Benz as well as music teachers, students will not only experience the creative process and hone their instrumental and technical skills, but will get a good look at the music industry.

 

“Much of what’s taught in school music programs today is repetition of selected traditional music…with little emphasis on the collaborative process that is inherent in writing and performing music” says TCS Founder, Zac Smith. “In today’s scene, creativity is key and the use of a sampler or software application is as relevant as, say, the use of a trumpet. Our goal is to present youth from varying socio-economic backgrounds with an outlet for creative expression through the vehicle of current music trends.”

According to Smith, kids not only compose their music for live performance, they also produce additional creative media content in the form of band photos, recordings, midi compositions, music videos, electronic press kits, and online profiles, giving them the tools needed by today’s do-it-yourself musicians.

“TCS showed me that playing the drums is not just a hobby, but something that I can actually do for the rest of my life,” says student Lane Beckstrom. “There are a variety of youth based programs out there that involve sports and other activities, yet it is peculiar that creative expression through music has few guided and funded options. It is a valid plight to offer youth a platform to conceptualize and bring to fruition their musical ideas, while teaching them the value working and communicating with others in developing an idea. Our foundation is promoting and empowering young musicians and developing their confidence in their creative and musical potential.”

Highlights from last year’s summer music camp, including watching the kids work on a music video for award-winning Australian artist, Ben Lee, can be seen in the Web Series “Let it Be Heard…” – The Story of the Collective Sound at: www.thecollectivesound.com.

“As soon as camp was over, I couldn’t wait for it to start up again,” says last year student, Andrew Rywak.

For more information, visit www.thecollectivesound.com, email info @ thecollectivesound.com, or call 530-354-4045.

Adv. Vikram Swaran Singh Chadha

http://www.articlesbase.com/branding-articles/first-ever-touring-youth-rock-roll-music-camp-now-offering-two-popular-rock-electronic-summer-programs-for-2008-429588.html

I cannot stress enough the importance of being able to play by ear. Everything that you’ve ever heard anyone play on your instrument is at your disposal – you just have to figure it out. Learning how to play tunes or instrument parts using your ear is just like anything else you practice: the more you do it, the easier it gets. If you do it often enough, you won’t even need your instrument to figure it out. The concept of teaching your ear to decipher musical structures as they’re being played is called ear training and it’s been practiced and honed for centuries.

Whether you are interested in learning to play the guitar by ear, or virtually any other instrument for that matter, there are a number of excellent learning aids available to assist you! The current state of learning aids for ear training is quite well these days (thank you for asking). With a variety of books, CDs, DVDs, and even software, there’s plenty from which to choose when you decide to add this important skill to your arsenal:

Ear Training Books -

In the musician world, there are two reknowned learning institutions, the Berklee College of Music in Boston, and Musicians Institute (MI) in LA. Both have their own take on ear training. For Berklee, it’s Essential Ear Training for the Contemporary Musician and for MI, it’s Ear Training – The Complete Guide for All Musicians. Homespun, which makes a large variety of books, CDs, and DVDs for all musicians and styles, has their take, which is Ear Training for Instrumentalists featuring a whopping 6 CDs full of exercises and drills. If you’re a guitar or bass player, you’ll definitely want to check out Ultimate Eartraining for Guitar and Bass by Tribal Tech’s Gary Willis. My friend Chris, who’s a working electric jazz bassist in NYC, absolutely loves this book.

Ear Training Videos -

Playing the guitar by ear, or nearly any other instrument for that matter, is not as hard as you may think! For videos, Berklee has produced Harmonic Ear Training (DVD). This 73-minute DVD will help you recognize chord progressions quickly and listen to music more analytically. Bass players get a real treat, as jazz bass great John Patitucci has released John Patitucci – Electric Bass 2: Soloing Ear-Training And Six-String Technique Video, which teaches soloing by stressing the importance of ear training.

Ear Training Software -

As you might expect, software is a natural choice for teaching ear training because it’s interactive. The cream of this crop is Ars Nova Practica Musica which is both Windows and Macintosh compatible, covers just about every aspect of ear training, and features customizable exercises. Ear Training Coach is a more affordable option and offers a 10-grade curriculum in ear training and sight-reading. However, the piece de resistance and the one tool that should be in everyone’s ear training bag is the SlowGold CD-ROM. This nifty piece of software lets you slow down any piece of music on CD or MP3s without changing the pitch. So if you’re learning to play a passage from a recording, and it’s too fast, just run it through SlowGold to hear every single note at the exact pitch it’s played.

Ear Training Hardware -

Not surprisingly, music equipment makers have gotten into the ear training game, and not surprisingly, the offerings are particularly good for electric guitar and bass guitar. The Tascam CD-GT1 MKII Guitar Trainer and the Tascam CD-BT1 mkII Bass Guitar Trainer features the same slowdown technology of the SlowGold software, but have housed it in a standalone unit with a built-in CD player, effects, and a headphone jack for silent practicing. Tascam has even made one the vocalists, the Tascam CD-VT1 Portable CD Vocal & Performance Trainer, which has a Vocal Cancel feature that removes the vocal from the CD during playback. Karaoke will never be the same …

Learning aids aside, one really useful exercise is to pick out a recording of a simple tune that you like. Listen to it very carefully. See if you can determine when the band is changing chords. If you can pick out where these chord changes occur, then you’ll know the points in time when you need to determine what the next chord is.

Tune your instrument to the recording. Take the first chord in the tune. As it plays, try to pick out a low note on your instrument that best matches that chord. There should one note that resonates with the recording. Did you find it? This is the root note of that chord. If this note is a C, you know that the first chord is a C (something). It could be a major chord, a minor chord, a 7th chord, but whatever it is, it’s a C version of that chord. If you’re listening to “Hey Jude”, the root note for the first chord is an F. If you’re listening to “Wonderwall”, it’s an F#. If it’s “Layla”, it’s a D …

Now that you have your root note, the next step is determine what the quality of the chord is. Is it a major or minor chord? Is it a power chord? One surefire way to determine this is trial and error. Assume it’s a major chord. Test out this possibility by playing the major chord for your root note along with the recording. Does it sound good? Does it resonate? If so, you’ve just figured out what the first chord is. If not, try a minor chord. Play the minor chord for your root note along with the recording. Does this sound good? Does this resonate? Try a few different choices. If you get stumped, look at the sheet music or transcription of this recording. This is your answer key, so to speak. If you’re just starting out and need a lot of easy tunes for practice, there are some great 3-chord songbooks such as The Guitar 3 Chord Songbook and Favorite Songs With 3 Chords.

After you’re figured out the first chord, go to the next point in time where this changes, and figure out what the second chord is. Repeat this process until you’ve covered the entire tune. A lot of popular music is cyclical in that the same 3-4 chord pattern will often repeat throughout the tune, so you may not have to figure out more than 3-4 chords for the entire song. Yes, when bands write great songs using just “three chords and an attitude”, it makes your job a lot easier.

So why would you want to do this? Well, first of all, you’re improving your ear. Secondly, you’re improving your knowledge of chords because you’re forcing yourself to play a variety of chords. If you know your root note for a particular chord is an F#, but you don’t know what the quality is, you may have to test out an F# major chord, an F# minor chord, an F#7 chord, and so on. This solidifies your knowledge of chords throughout the parameters of your instrument. The more tunes you figure out, the easier it is to find and play these chords. The other benefit of going through this process is that you’re playing along with recordings, which is going to make you’re playing better, because you’re subconsciously absorbing all the nuances of the recording into your playing.

The main thing is to not get discouraged and to do it on a regular basis. Turn on the radio and try your hand at whatever’s playing. If you don’t like the tune, change the station. Put it on the classical station – yes, you can play along with classical ones too. Don’t be afraid. It’s all just music, and in the end, armed with just an ear and the knowledge of some basic chords for the trial-and-error process, you can figure out how to play it.

Christopher Sung

http://www.articlesbase.com/music-articles/learning-to-play-by-ear-88454.html