Sales Crowd

By Duane Shinn

 New pianists learn notes first. An understanding of musical notes and their values is the foundation for learning any instrument. That includes the piano. The values of the notes are easy to remember because their names denote their values.

* Whole note: A whole note looks a bit like an egg on its side. It is round or oval-shaped and not shaded/solid. A whole note is held for four beats in 4/4 time.

* Half note: A half note is so called because it is held for half as long as a whole note. In other words, it is held for two beats. It resembles a smaller version of whole note, but with a line attached to its side.

* Quarter note: A quarter note is held for a quarter of the time a whole note is held: one beat. A quarter note looks like a half note, with one minor difference. While the half note is not shaded, the quarter note is.

* Eighth note: The eighth note is, of course, an eighth of the value of a whole note. In other words, it is held for half a beat. It looks like a quarter note with a curly “tail” at the end of its line. Eighth notes can also be joined together in groups of two, three, or four. If they are joined, they are connected by a bar across the top, rather than having a “tail.”

* Sixteenth note: The sixteenth note is one-sixteenth the length of a whole note when held. It is held for a mere quarter of a beat. A sixteenth note looks similar to an eighth note, but has a double “tail.” When two, three or four are joined, they are connected by a double bar.

There are seven different names for the keys on a piano. If you look at the keyboard on a piano, you’ll see that the keys repeat their order every eighth white key. The names of the keys are denoted by letters of the alphabet. The middle white key on the piano is called “middle C.” Going up the scale from C, the rest are D, E, F, G, A, B, and they start again with C. The notes from any C on the keyboard to the next C make up an “octave.” It is so called because it contains eight keys, or eight notes.

The notes in a song or scale are written on a “staff.” These are the series of lines and spaces that you’ve probably seen on a piece of music. The staff consists of a treble clef and a bass clef. Each line and each space on the clef denote a particular key/note. The notes on the treble clef begin on the bottom line of the staff with E above middle C. The notes on the bass clef begin on the bottom line of the staff with the G below middle C.

Which type of note appears on which line or space on the clef determines which key is played and for how long that key is held. In other words, if a whole note appears written on the bottom line of the treble clef, then the instrumentalist would play an E above middle C. It would be held for four beats. Once the note types and names are learned, the beginner is ready to start playing!

A free email newsletter on exciting piano chords and chord progressions from Duane Shinn is available free at “Exciting Piano Chords & Chord Progressions!”

Indie Band Lists - Does it Start With MySpace?
By Ian Dougherty

 The Internet has clearly made it easier for bands to promote themselves and make themselves better known but people still have to find them. Social networking sites like MySpace or Facebook are supposed to be the answer to this problem so let’s see how good at finding indie bands MySpace really is.

MySpace offers top ten artists of today for a number of genres and for today (August 27th 2008), the top the indie bands were: Bloc Party, Bring Me The Horizon, Adele, Oasis, The Wombats, The Streets, Kano, Chemical Brothers, Paul Oakenfold, Biffy Clyro.

That’s quite an eclectic mix and to be honest, theres a lot in that which would not pass for indie. It may give you a good starting point and with the rush release of Bloc Party’s new album you can tell why they rank highly but some of the choices are baffling to say the least.

The selection between 11 and 20 is probably more stereotypical for indie featuring The Kills, Last Shadow Puppets and The Automatic amongst others. This means you can find indie bands on myspace but you may need to do a bit more digging around for them.

How does MySpace defines Indie?

What makes it more frustrating is that in the column beside the indie acts is a mainstream column and not far away from The Last Shadow Puppets are the Arctic Monkeys. Yes, Sheffield’s current finest may have sold enough records to make them mainstream, but they remain an indie band. They are certainly more indie than Paul Oakenfold or Kano who made it into the top ten of the indie chart. Similarly, The Verve rank highly in the mainstream chart but nowhere on the indie column.

That said it’s not as if it’s telling you about any new or up and coming acts is it? All of these acts, indie or not, are major commercial artists when MySpace should really be about launching new bands. There is an unsigned column but when you see that contains acts like The Darkness and Fatboy Slim, you start to lose faith in it.

It is still possible to find new indie bands but MySpace doesn’t really help until you search through the musical sections and come to the indie section and here is where you can start to find some news about new acts. Some of the new acts featuring on this section include:

Flamboyant Bella:

If you could imagine Kate Nash joining up with an indie band you would be close to the sound of Flamboyant Bella. They carry the excitement of youth and may well be a tip for mainstream crossover although musical greatness is probably beyond them.

I Haunt Wizards:

With a name like that you just know they are going to have a slightly electro edge and yes, I Haunt Wizards are influenced by the electro 80s sound that appears to be fashionable at the moment. Another bunch of three crazy kids who may be worth checking out soon before the musical fashion changes to something else.

The Filthy Youth:

With a few more choruses these lads could be the new Fratellis as the guitar riffs and swagger are all in place. Theres a cheeky 60s vibe running through their songs and of the new bands listed so far, they appear to be the most equipped to become an indie favorite.

Obviously, the beauty of MySpace is that once you find a band there will be songs available for you to check out right away. This is where these sites really excel and help listeners get involved with new bands right from the off.

Ian Dougherty is a freelance music writer and lover from the United Kingdom. Dougherty has written for well known music magazines, Ezines, and websites for over fifteen years. For the latest in indie artists and get the latest news through an up-to-date indie blog, visit MadeLoud.com, where bands keep more from each digital music download.

Your Online Source To Beating The Crowds While Shopping

60 Years Of Music Trends
By Aydan Corkern

 In the early 50’s music called rock and roll took our world by fire. The younger generation of those days loved this music, and their parents hated it. Our parents said that this music would never last, but they were wrong. Our rock and roll music lasted through the 60’s and 70’s, and then it became Hard Rock. This music made our music look and sound mild.

By the time I started listening to music, it was in the middle 60’s. We had groups like Kansas, Boston, and Three Dog Night. We had Bread. There were a lot of different types of music for all types of people. There were always concerts in the parks at least one weekend a month, or you could go to concerts indoors. If you went to the state fair or even the county fairs, they would have concerts at least three nights of these fairs, and the music was always picked for several types of music being played.

Music in those days was fun to listen to and you could learn to sing most of these songs because they were easy to understand the words. The music of today sounds like a bunch of cats tied together by their tails. The songs are nothing but a bunch of guys screaming into a microphone. The songs of today have no meaning and no soul.

That’s what was so great about our music. It was mostly about life and a lot of soul. Some of these songs were also easy to dance to. The music that is being played today isn’t easy to dance to because to me it looks like the kids are trying to hurt each other. They had one kind of music, if you could call it that, that when the kids would get on the dance floor, they would bump into each other. The more kids that went on this dance floor the worse the bumping would become.

There are a lot of different kinds of music today for all types of people. We have rock, rap, country, easy listening, pop, and soul. There is gospel also. I still like to listen to our older groups but sometimes I like some of the new groups of today, but don’t ask me their names. I love to sing with a lot of them, but I’m not a very loud singer because my voice isn’t what it used to be. Sometimes I still like to try.

Aydan Corkern is a writer of many topics, visit some of her sites, like

Water Damage Restoration and Chicago Water Damage Restoration.

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