A few weeks ago, the topic of love came to my attention. What exactly is it? What do you feel when you experience love? When I started thinking about this, my first thoughts went to one thing in particular: the Bible. Now those of you that know me probably know I'm not the most religious person, but I'd just like to say yes I do believe. I could go into way more depth on this situation, but I feel like it would be drifting off tangent to my original subject. A specific passage came to mind when I started thinking about this. It comes from 1Corinthians 13:4-7 and it goes something like this: "love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things." This is how I define love and this is the true definition of love and is quite self-explanatory. This is the basis on almost every single healthy relationship. This is the reason why so many people in relationships make it all the way. This is why I've ended relationships in the past; they told me they loved me when I knew from that very moment it wasn't love. It was almost the exact opposite of everything these verses tell you about love. If you take away anything from this, please let it be that you should use this as a guide to your relationship. This is my favorite Bible verse and I hope it becomes one of your favorites as well.
WC: 230
Sunday, September 23, 2012
Don't Stop Man!
Everyone has their own personal choice of how they express themselves musically. Some choose to play drums, some choose to flaunt their vocal talent, some just like to listen to it and leave it to other people to make it up for them. Personally, one of my favorite ways to express myself musically is by playing piano. Even if I haven't taken a piano lesson since I was in the fourth grade, playing the piano is so much fun. There's something about being able to play, at the very least, semi-difficult melodies and harmonies up and down the eighty-eights, combining an amalgamation of chords, singular notes and octaves that touches the heart and calms the mind.
I think most musicians would agree with me when I say it gives you a sense of pride to be able to play any instrument regardless of what it is and having an extra skill that you can call your own. I mean how many people can brag about being able to play "Devil Went Down to Georgia" on violin or "Classical Gas" on guitar? While I can't do either of these (although I'm working on the latter of the two), I can play some fairly interesting songs on the piano despite having a lack of training in the instrument.
The two most recent songs that I've been working on a lot are both songs I think a vast majority of people have heard and are quite familiar with whether they know it or not. The first one is called "Don't Stop Believin'" by Journey. Yes, that's right I can play perhaps one of the most famous songs from the golden age of music on piano. The only really tricky part of this song is keeping different rhythms all at the same time. For instance, higher part of it, the chords, are essentially just straight eighth notes with a two-note chord/single note alternation. The underlying part is the moving bassline in the lower ranges of the keyboard, quite simple to play once the former becomes muscle memory. To add even further difficulty, if you're singing along with it, the entire piano part pretty much has to be entirely muscle memory, or at the very least mostly muscle memory.
The second song I've been working on is called "Piano Man" by Billy Joel. This one may not be as well known, but it's definitely one of those "I'd know it if I heard it" songs if you don't remember song titles that well. The only thing that really makes this song hard is that it has a lot of chord changes. Not terribly hard chord changes, but quite a few. The other thing that can make this song a little challenging is certain phrases that can easily be thrown out of time if done incorrectly. A lot of it is actually basic music fundamentals as easy as just feeling the beat, but this becomes almost critical when playing piano as you really have to feel where the beat is to play certain songs such as this one.
WC: 512
I think most musicians would agree with me when I say it gives you a sense of pride to be able to play any instrument regardless of what it is and having an extra skill that you can call your own. I mean how many people can brag about being able to play "Devil Went Down to Georgia" on violin or "Classical Gas" on guitar? While I can't do either of these (although I'm working on the latter of the two), I can play some fairly interesting songs on the piano despite having a lack of training in the instrument.
The two most recent songs that I've been working on a lot are both songs I think a vast majority of people have heard and are quite familiar with whether they know it or not. The first one is called "Don't Stop Believin'" by Journey. Yes, that's right I can play perhaps one of the most famous songs from the golden age of music on piano. The only really tricky part of this song is keeping different rhythms all at the same time. For instance, higher part of it, the chords, are essentially just straight eighth notes with a two-note chord/single note alternation. The underlying part is the moving bassline in the lower ranges of the keyboard, quite simple to play once the former becomes muscle memory. To add even further difficulty, if you're singing along with it, the entire piano part pretty much has to be entirely muscle memory, or at the very least mostly muscle memory.
The second song I've been working on is called "Piano Man" by Billy Joel. This one may not be as well known, but it's definitely one of those "I'd know it if I heard it" songs if you don't remember song titles that well. The only thing that really makes this song hard is that it has a lot of chord changes. Not terribly hard chord changes, but quite a few. The other thing that can make this song a little challenging is certain phrases that can easily be thrown out of time if done incorrectly. A lot of it is actually basic music fundamentals as easy as just feeling the beat, but this becomes almost critical when playing piano as you really have to feel where the beat is to play certain songs such as this one.
WC: 512
Response to MM
In light of recent events, I'd like to touch on something that my good blogger friend Music Man talked about in one of his blogs. He was explaining what makes a good song by comparing Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love" to, as MM put it, "(insert horrible Nickelback song title here)" and, in another post, how lyrics are better if they have something to be interpreted. I completely agree with him on this in a lot of ways. But I'd like to focus on the latter of these issues for this post.
Everyone has their own personal tastes in music, but there are some types of music that I will refute completely (such as Nickelback). Just going off the topic of lyrics, a lot of bands word things much better in a more figurative way that makes the overall song better. Even when a song is talking about something like sex, "like a ukulele mama made a baby, really don't mind to practice cause you're my little lady" ("Banana Pancakes" by Jack Johnson) sounds so much better than "you look so much cuter with something in your mouth" ("Something in Your Mouth" by Nickelback). Seriously what happened to good music with lyrics that actually meant something? Or maybe had a rhythm comprised of more than just straight eighth and quarter notes? Why do people just decide to follow the flock of sheep into mainstream music when you can barely call it music anymore?
Today I'd like to share with you one of my favorite songs that actually has good song elements in it. If you refer back to my first post, I talked about a band called Rise Against and how, in light of a better word, obsessed I am with them. The song I'm currently referring to is off their fourth album, The Sufferer and the Witness (my favorite album), titled "The Good Left Undone." The whole song, as I understand it, is about what's called unrequited love, or one-sided love. It starts by talking about a flower in "fields where nothing grew but weeds," most likely referring to a girl that seems to stand out among all the other average girls. Continuing the analogy, he uproots the flower and "finds what he's been missing" by taking this girl out hanging out with her, finding a kind of new meaning in his life. But as the second verse implies, things are not as they may seem. It goes on to say that the dried up petals of this flower fall to the ground. I take this to mean that while the guy may really like this girl, the girl may not be happy being with him. Because he likes her so much, he decides to let her go and "return this flower to the dirt." The chorus explains just how haunted he is by the memory of this girl and how he only dreams of "drowning in the ocean." I love this song because of the analogous comparison of the flower to the relationship of these two people and how it ACTUALLY MEANS SOMETHING!!!!! If you have heard this song before and have another interpretation of it or any further comments, please let me know. If you haven't heard this song, I highly recommend that you check out the video for it.
WC: 499
Everyone has their own personal tastes in music, but there are some types of music that I will refute completely (such as Nickelback). Just going off the topic of lyrics, a lot of bands word things much better in a more figurative way that makes the overall song better. Even when a song is talking about something like sex, "like a ukulele mama made a baby, really don't mind to practice cause you're my little lady" ("Banana Pancakes" by Jack Johnson) sounds so much better than "you look so much cuter with something in your mouth" ("Something in Your Mouth" by Nickelback). Seriously what happened to good music with lyrics that actually meant something? Or maybe had a rhythm comprised of more than just straight eighth and quarter notes? Why do people just decide to follow the flock of sheep into mainstream music when you can barely call it music anymore?
Today I'd like to share with you one of my favorite songs that actually has good song elements in it. If you refer back to my first post, I talked about a band called Rise Against and how, in light of a better word, obsessed I am with them. The song I'm currently referring to is off their fourth album, The Sufferer and the Witness (my favorite album), titled "The Good Left Undone." The whole song, as I understand it, is about what's called unrequited love, or one-sided love. It starts by talking about a flower in "fields where nothing grew but weeds," most likely referring to a girl that seems to stand out among all the other average girls. Continuing the analogy, he uproots the flower and "finds what he's been missing" by taking this girl out hanging out with her, finding a kind of new meaning in his life. But as the second verse implies, things are not as they may seem. It goes on to say that the dried up petals of this flower fall to the ground. I take this to mean that while the guy may really like this girl, the girl may not be happy being with him. Because he likes her so much, he decides to let her go and "return this flower to the dirt." The chorus explains just how haunted he is by the memory of this girl and how he only dreams of "drowning in the ocean." I love this song because of the analogous comparison of the flower to the relationship of these two people and how it ACTUALLY MEANS SOMETHING!!!!! If you have heard this song before and have another interpretation of it or any further comments, please let me know. If you haven't heard this song, I highly recommend that you check out the video for it.
WC: 499
Sunday, September 16, 2012
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