Benefits of Online Guitar Lessons

Since some form of guitar-like instruments have been around for well over 4,000 years, it's a pretty safe bet that's how long people have been taking guitar lessons. After all, for the instrument to have survived that long, someone had to teach someone else how to play it. Of course the guitar itself has changed over those years, sometimes slowly as an evolution of design and sometimes radically as technology altered virtually everything in the modern music world.

Imagine if you will, the first beginner guitar lesson. Strictly a one-on-one enterprise, the teacher and student meet. The master strums the lute-like instrument to demonstrate. The student, in turn, mimics the teacher's actions. Over and over again, the two alternately play. Until finally the boy must run home to do his chores, or the master tires. The lesson will only continue when the time is right for both the teacher and the student.

Now fast forward to the early twentieth century. The guitar has evolved into an acoustic instrument very much like the ones today. And guitar lessons? Well, the lessons have not evolved at all. Both the teacher and the student must be present at the same time and same place. Most often the lesson takes place at a prearranged time and place. If one or the other of the two people cannot be there, guitar lessons are suspended for the day - or the week, or longer.

But now we arrive at the modern days. Oh, the acoustic guitar still exists, but it has been joined by its sleeker, louder, more energetic cousin, the electric guitar. And that first beginner guitar lesson, and all the ones that come after it? They have changed radically. Now they're available online, on the internet. Now the student can learn when he wants, because the teacher is always available. With an internet connection guitar lessons can happen day or night, almost anywhere. The student sets the pace, the program provides the expertise. Guitar lessons are now available on DVD or in downloadable formats, and the student can practice with them virtually anywhere.

As we know, inspiration strikes at odd times. The sudden and sustained desire to play the guitar is a form of inspiration. Having the freedom to learn to play when the motivation magically appears is a gift of the internet and online guitar lessons. Through the magic of online video demonstrations, guitar students can not only soon be up and playing, but literally mastering every nuance of the instrument. Beginners learn the techniques of the masters because they learn from the masters.

From the beginner guitar lesson right through mastery of the instrument, crash course beginner guitar courses let you take advantage of the inspiration to learn to play. Go online any time to see video tutorials; download them if you wish. Print out lessons when you want. If you have access to these websites, you can go as fast as you want, or go back and review. Usually the courses come with everything you need (most of the time it does mean everything) to master techniques you've admired in other guitarists.

Crash Course Beginners is the in-home, at-your-convenience course that takes you from beginner to guitar master in no time. Complete this easy-to-follow course and in no time you'll be calling yourself a "guitarist" - and so will everyone else!

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How to Choose Light Vs Dark Violin Rosin - What Is Best for Beginner Violinists?

First of all, what is violin rosin?

Violin rosin is made from hardened tree sap, and is rubbed on the violin bow to give it the friction you need against the violin strings to make a good tone. Without it, no matter how hard you press down with your violin bow you will get almost no sound.

Light vs. Dark

Violin rosins come in many shades between light and dark.

Light Rosin produces a "smoother" sound. Dark Rosin produces a "bigger" sound.

Dark rosins are stickier (have more friction), so while they give you a really good grip, this can contribute to that scratchy sound beginner violinists are so famous for. Light rosins give you a lesser grip, meaning you can't dig in quite as well, which gives you the smoother sound.

I will tell you up front that most violinists use lighter colored rosins, but it is by no means set in stone which type you should use. Ultimately it's all about your personal playing style and preferences.

That is why I recommend trying out a lot of different rosins until you find your favorite (many are relatively cheap, under $10). Here are some of the top factors to consider when making that determination:

3 Factors to Consider When Choosing a Violin Rosin

Humidity - Humidity makes rosin stickier than usual. This means that violinists living in more humid climates (or during more humid parts of the year) may want to consider choosing a lighter rosin to offset the extra stickiness. Conversely, those living in drier climates may want to consider darker rosin.Dust Tolerance - Playing the violin with the bow causes rosin dust to collect on the body of the instrument. Lighter rosin usually produces more dust, while darker, stickier rosin can be more difficult to wipe away. If you have a dust sensitivity you may want to choose a darker rosin. There are also hypoallergenic rosins available to violinists with allergic reactions to rosin.Packaging - This may seem nit-picky, but packaging can play a part in the long term usability of your rosin. Some beginner violin rosin comes in a rectangular wooden block. This makes it easier for beginners to apply it to the bow. However, many players get irritated by this packaging because as it is used over time, the rosin breaks apart sooner than with other packaging, rendering it useless much more quickly. So: get rosin that comes in hard packaging (to protect it from bumps during travel), preferably in a round or square shape.

These guidelines have probably given you a pretty good idea of what type of rosin may work well for you. It is a good idea to use one type for a month or more, and then switch to see if you like a second type. Keep switching like this, comparing your current favorite to a new type, and eventually you can be pretty confident you've found your favorite violin rosin.

For more tips about how to choose the right beginner violin equipment and training, please visit http://www.beginnerviolintips.com/. Beginner Violin Tips is a site dedicated to helping anyone become a beginner violinist and advance as fast as possible.

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How to Become Popular As a Guitar Player

If you are looking for some magic way to become very popular as a guitar player, you will probably be disappointed. There is no such way. It is only hard work that can give you what you desire. Your popularity definitely depends on you.

However, this article will give you a few tips on how to become a popular guitar player.

1. First of all, you must know how to play guitar. Learn some basics and then improve your playing skills constantly.

2. You should be knowledgeable enough to manage the sound of your guitar. There are plenty of devices that you have to try to get your own original sound. It certainly needs time, but you should work on your sound!

3. You need a lot of practice. In fact, you should play guitar every day for at least several hours. That will help you to develop good playing skills. You will also feel yourself more confident when you play on a stage.

4. As soon as you can play well you need to record your songs. It is important to choose a studio and work with a professional sound technician. Making a good recording is not as easy as it seems to be. That is why you should be patient.

5. The next step is promoting your recordings. The simplest way is to promote your music via the Internet. However, it is better when radio stations broadcast your songs.

6. It is very important to play guitar in public regularly. People should notice you. If you play really great they will reward you for your talent. So, try to play as many concerts as you can. Do it on a regular basis!

7. Never stop in your progress as a guitar player. Always learn from you colleges. Try to be the best guitarist in the world. Thus, you need a strong motivation to develop your playing skills every day.

8. Try to be creative. Someone will say that you can't learn creativeness, because it is a talent. However, you can develop your creativity with practice. Try to improvise and compose music regularly. Don't be afraid to be original! Dare to be different!

9. This skill is especially important if you want to make money playing the guitar. You should be patient. Do not expect too much from the very beginning. Just go on working and you will have anything you want.

I wish I could tell you exactly how long it will take you to become as popular as Michael Jackson, but I can't. Everything depends on your talent and hard work. However, I strongly believe that you will become very popular if you put all your efforts in that direction.

I wish you good luck!

Gleb Borchenko is writing articles about music for 2 years. He also likes to write about guitars and equipment. So, you are welcome to visit his latest website about fender cd 60 and fender cd 100 guitars.

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Making Dubstep Tracks - Organizing Your Loops

Making Dub step tracks is fun and allows you to really run wild with your creativity. However, it's hard to take the hundreds or even thousands of different loops, beats, and sounds you acquire making your songs and properly organize them. You need to separate your stuff into different libraries that will make them easier to find. A good organization of your sounds will allow your creativity and track creation to reach new heights. Lets check out some techniques that will help you use more sounds.

The best way to do this is choose your loops that are higher register, lower register, and your funny (different) ones. If you have a lot of funny loops. (voices, birds etc) maybe put all the bird ones in one file, and all the voice ones in another file. Keep doing this until you have separated everything into opposite files and they are easy to find. The next thing to do with the files is take them and organize them into most used to least used. This is important for a few reasons. first, this allows you to grab your most commonly used loops: hi hats, drum kicks etc quickly. This will also let you know where to go if you want to get creative: just scroll down! there will be all the stuff you rarely or never use. Imagine the possibilities of creating library like this: you can now open up your file browser, have your most commonly used loops in the top of each folder, and the least commonly used ones in the abyss, where you can dig from for inspiration. the speed of your track creation and the fluidity of adding and creating loops will skyrocket. Imagine how bad ass loops could be if everyone did this!

Sometimes, its good to just create things form scratch as well. Create a folder with funny sounds that yourself have recorded. record a toilet flushing, dings on pots and pans, a car starting, you burning out in your civic, whatever. These are the sounds that will sound original in your loops, and not only that, but a little modulation can take just about any sound and make it into a complete whirlwind of crazy noise, which will make you create something that nobody else could possibly have, because its your loop!

Use old CDs in your house, if your mother listens to a lot of Bach, or classical, check the copyright dates, and create a new folder that has just CD libraries of stuff that's in the public domain. These can create a whole other venue of things you can draw from. Use these things to create a whole list of new ideas and songs and loops. for instance, pull apart on Bach song, and you have different notes, keys and intonation from 4- 100 different instruments. These instruments can be modulated, slowed down, sped up, pitch modulated etc to create yet MORE unique sounds.

Do the same thing with the more stuff that's just... cool... like your moms car versus your dads car revving in the drive way, or your dog barking. These are all sounds that can be bass dropped, heightened in pitch, slowed down, anything! There are so many possibilities that you could continue to do this forever.

The most important part is organizing, when you organize these things properly, you will create a system that will let you delve into not only your music library properly, but delve into your own creative mind to create completely new musical ideas that nobody else has ever thought of. Imagine being able to throw down your favorite bass and hi hat loop instantly, then just messing around with adding new crazy sounds you found around the house. You would be able to create music that nobody has ever heard before. The music would be intense, crazy, and something that would surprise even you. Creation of music in this nature is what will take a genre like dub step and push it for the stars!

Charles Manuel is a dubstep curator for up and coming Dj's and clubs around the world. Check out the tracks, DJ's and forums at:

http://www.dubstep-tracks.webs.com/

http://dubstep-tracks.webs.com/apps/blog/

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Can You Learn Perfect Pitch?

Is Perfect Pitch Necessary?

Frankly speaking: No! Most of the many musicians I have met during my time in the music game, have survived very successfully without it. They are all respected professionals in many styles of music.

But if you're aspiring to become a member of the Chicago Symphony orchestra, well you either already have it or you should definitively start looking for lessons to perfect your pitch.

What is Perfect (Absolute) Pitch (pp)?

It is the ability to identify or re-create a note or sound, musical or otherwise, without any external reference (according to Wikipedia). This can be done verbally (singing) or with an instrument.

People with this wonderful ability can do any of the following in varying degrees without any given pitch reference:

Name individual pitches (e.g. Bb, F#/Gb) when played on instrumentsHear the key of a musical piece just by listeningDistinguish all the notes of a given chord and name themSing a given pitch with accuracyName the pitch of any everyday noise (ie the whistle of a boiling kettle)

Can You Learn Perfect Pitch?

This is the big question. Some experts say yes and others are not so sure.

How much time have you got to spend? How musically gifted are you? How do you like to learn?

These are questions you need to ask yourself if you want to have attain absolute pitch. There are no guarantees you'll be successful.

If you're an auditory learner you probably have a better chance than if you absorb information visually or kinesthetically (feeling or touch).

The Pros & Cons Of Perfect Pitch

Pros:

Apart from being able to pull some neat party tricks like naming the pitch of a squeaking door, it is of course a tremendous assistant into the inner sanctum of music. By that I mean truly understanding how music works and hearing it on quite a different level.

Cons:

How could there be negatives about something so special? Well, there are. Some of the very few musicians I know who have pp, tell me that it is frequently a pain in the ear.

Think about it: Every time you are teaching or playing with somebody who is out of tune, you'll be tempted to want to leave the room. My solution: Develop relative pitch instead.

Conclusion

Perfect Pitch is not a myth but it is also not necessary to flourish as a musician. It depends largely on your musical aspirations whether you should start taking lessons to learn it.

Unless you're striving extremely high where you'll be sharing the clouds with other so-gifted individuals, I recommend that you invest your time in relative pitch training. A much more attainable goal for us mere mortals.

Look for perfect pitch ear training software, listen to ear training tips and look at musical examples of how to become a better musician, all handy and free on one website: http://www.eartraining-online.com/.

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Relative Pitch Training

What Is Relative Pitch?

It is the ability to name musical notes, chords or keys AFTER having been given a note and it's name as a reference.

Example: Name the pitch "G" correctly after having been given the note "C" and its name first.

Players who develop this ability well should be able to name the chords of a song after having been told that the key is "F."

With time it can go as far as being able to guess the name of notes or keys by relating them to the sound register of individual instruments or vocalists.

Relative Pitch vs Perfect Pitch

The score of this game is about 1000:1, meaning that out of every 1000 musicians with relative pitch there will be 1 with perfect pitch.

As I explain in my article "Can Perfect Pitch Be Learned", it is very easy to survive in the music world, even the top shelf, after learning relative pitch. Both have their disadvantages (yes, even perfect pitch) and advantages.

You need to decide how far you want to take your musicianship. Please go ahead and practice perfect pitch if you have the talent, patience and time but also know that for most musicians being able to relate pitch is the way to go and perfectly adequate. You never know where it may lead you.

Learning How To Relate Pitch

There are no magic formulas for developing this knowledge. The best results come from taking these 10 small but regular and focused steps.

Take a pitch test with the help of a person who knows music and pitch well. You must know your musical status quo.Have the circle of fifths explained. This may seem odd but it provides a solid foundation.Know what guide tones are.Learn to sing (yes, sing) a given note in tune.Develop the ability to play/sing all major scales. (one at a time)From this base knowledge it will be much easier to play ear training games with music intervals. Start relating pitches from note to note inside major scales and gradually expand to chromatic intervals.Start listening to your favorite music differently by working out the key/tonality (find it with the help of an instrument) and then relating other chords to it.Transcribe short sections (even 1 bar) of the melody, chords, bass line etc of a song.Listen to and start to memorize the sound instruments make in certain registers. Gradually getting better at this is a fun way to progress from solid relative pitch to perfect pitch.Know your vocal range (lowest and highest note) and use it in your practice by singing along with music and guessing keys and pitches.

Summary:

Relative pitch training is not difficult if you break it down into regular small chunks. The regularity is the secret to improving ear training pitch.

If you are a big picture person (lot's of grand ideas, like me) you might find it difficult to find the patience to work in small segments. Unfortunately it's the only way and the results will astound you.

Find details how to perform a relative pitch test, lots of free info, tips and audios about the circle of 5ths diagram, guide tones, scales, intervals and chords at: http://www.eartraining-online.com/

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How To Become A Better Musician

Posture & Body Awareness

You may be surprised that this subject is first on my list. As a musician and teacher of the Alexander Technique I see the positive results of body awareness on my students all the time.

Does your teacher question how you use yourself while playing your instrument? Would you like to improve your sound? Can you hold or touch your instrument with less tension?

It is quite possible to learn music and be aware of HOW you do it at the same time. The results on every aspect of your playing will astound you.

The Alexander Technique is an important part of many music schools and conservatoriums around the world.

Arrogance vs Confidence

Learning music is a life-long pursuit, a never-ending search for that next level of refinement and wisdom.

In my teaching career there have been many (too many) students who think that, after having learned 10 notes and a couple of tunes, they know it all. Uncool!

Arrogance in the music world comes in many forms and those who think it's the way to go usually end up on the losing side.

The way to become a better musician is to be quietly confident of your ability and treat "learning-how-to-play" as an open-ended exciting journey.

Reliability

You may get away with being unreliable if you're a hermit marooned on an island or a super-rich and famous star. But if you're trying to make a living from music, reliability is a key component to keeping that phone ringing.

Be on time, always be able to deliver the "goods" musically, pay attention to directions and remember instructions. And please don't be a chatter-box during rehearsals.

Pitch And Time

It does not matter in which musical direction you are heading, being in tune and being able to listen to and fit in with what your fellow musicians are playing, should be your most important aim.

If you can back that up with the ability to create reliable good strong time (and not just float along), you're well on the way to becoming a respected player.

There are many great tools to strengthen your sense of pitch and time, use the link below to access them.

Reading Music And Interpretation

The best way to improve your music reading skills is to just keep doing it. I managed to find a job where I got thrown in the deep end. I soon learned.

The easier reading music becomes, the more presence you'll gain to interpret (not just play) what's on the page.

It is difficult to be accepted as a professional player unless you can read a piece of music near faultlessly the first time and interpret the style at the same time.

Style

Last, but not least, you must understand the style or styles of music that you are going to play. This applies especially to rhythm section players. In todays multi-faceted music world, styles have become so varied and intricate that you really have to know what you're doing and on top of that, own the appropriate instrument(s) and accessories.

For horn and string players the task is a bit easier but it still pays huge dividends to become familiar with you're style(s) of music.

Keep listening and keep learning.

Read more on how to become a better musician, understand the circle of 5ths, guide tones, scales, intervals & chords at: http://www.eartraining-online.com/

For more detail on posture & body awareness, please visit:
http://alexandertechnique-music.blogspot.com/2010/12/understanding-basic-mechanics-of-body.html

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