A lot of people have told me that they hate school or they hate their jobs and that they wish they could be a musician or a stand-up comic, because they are extraordinary jobs with extraordinary pay. Of course these are people that at school, do the bare minimum just to get by. Or at work, do mind numbing repetitiveness because it is easy. I tell them that I know how they feel, that being rich and being in the spotlight and being known would be amazing. In my mind however, I think that these people will never get there because by the way they say things they think it is an effortless walk in the park. This always reminds me of my High School history teacher; he would always say that the problem with people today is that they like to complain but never move a finger to change things. …click here to read more

I read about this new technology, as I like to call it, called “open courseware.” It allows anyone and everyone with an internet connection to access course material from over 150 universities around the world. Basically, major colleges and universities post their curricular material on the net and at no cost, anyone who’d like to, can access this information and learn from it. Some courses are in the form of video or audio and some are in transcripts. Originally, this was planned for educators to share material. But it did not take long before this quality material was discovered by far more people than anticipated. The great thing, in my opinion, is that about half of the readers, visit these sites for the sake of learning; which goes to show and proves me wrong in that there still are people out there who appreciate the truly meaningful and important things in this world. The resources are vast and are expanding at a rapid rate. MIT has all of its 1,800 courses available and Yale University has 7 out of a scheduled 30. …click here to read more

Technorati Tags: open courseware, MIT, Yale University

Sony has announced that for the first time, it will release Blu-Ray players that will feature an ethernet port so that through a broadband connection, extras such as movie trailers and bonus features can be downloaded. The players will debut this summer and as you probably guessed, they will be pricey. A specific model will be released with an Ethernet port, but its ability to actually connect to the internet will be implemented later on; it will be in the form of a software upgrade called BD-Live. Another, more expensive model will be released at the same time that will feature both, the online connectivity as well as BD-Live.
…click here to read more

Technorati Tags: Sony, Blu-Ray, BD-Live

How do you expand your opportunities to work in the music business? How do you improve your employment prospects? The key to doing that is developing your versatility. There are many ways of expanding what you already know how to do as a musician. It’s all about using the skills that you already possess and channeling them towards related fields.

Ask yourself what your most basic skill is. Let’s say you play the guitar. You will find that there are several related instruments that you can easily adapt your skill to. Instead of limiting yourself to the guitar or one kind of guitar, why not expand your employment opportunities? Why not learn to play related instruments? …click here to read more

Technorati Tags: work in the music business, play the guitar

This lesson can open for you a secret of high-speed guitar playing. If take the given technique for 2-3 weeks you’ll feel progress in high-speed playing of complex passages.

The given principle of development of techniques “was tested” not by one generation of guitarists and not only guitarists…

In this lesson we shall concern high-speed techniques. Skilled guitarists already know that the basic brake in development of guitar high-speed techniques is the right hand. Therefore when playing the most ultra-high-speed passages for simplification guitarists play legato (i.e. the right hand does not take some notes, it is done with fingers of the left hand by receptions pull-off, hammer-on). …click here to read more

Technorati Tags: high-speed guitar playing, high-speed techniques, legato