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The Glee cast are in the United Kingdom, well many of them anyhow, and they are doing everything they can to be sure that those few remaining Brits who are not already gleeks are exposed to their all singing all dancing gifts. Glee’s Matthew Morrison (Will Schuester), Amber Riley (Mercedes Jones) and Chris Colfer (Kurt Hummel) were on Fri. Night with Jonathan Ross yesterday evening, and one or two of the cast have been seen outside at London nightspots this week as their dastardly plan to convert the entire world into musical theatre fans continues to happen. Nevertheless Mr Morrison (he’s the teacher after all) went one better than his associates the other night when he was able to score a gig with Leona Lewis at her sell out 02 Arena show.

Ukulele and all, Mr Schuester knocked out an enthralling version of Somewhere Over The Rainbow with the X Factor winner turned international mega star, who’s rumored to be teeing up an appearance on happiness (who isn’t at the moment?). Now, Matt’s a person who knows ways to please a group, schmoozing Leona and the group by asserting, You look extraordinarily lovely. I must say, London girls in general look beautiful. I cannot dent Leona’s a looker, but he glaringly has not been around my way on a Fri. night! Bon Jovi continue their twelve show residency at the 02 this week, I’m wondering if they are going to be inviting any guest stars to play Living on a Prayer with them what about somebody from Hollyoaks?

Glee music videos

You’ve written a few good songs, made a dollar or two jamming with a few bands or busking on the corner. Now, you’re no longer satisfied: dreaming of stardom, you’re hungry for the big time. The worst thing to do is to hold out for the big break that never happens: Better to play for the love of music. With no false hopes and no illusions, start from zero. Somewhere, there’s an audience for you. Let someone hear you - mother, daughter, friend, lover - and listen to what they have to say. Drink in the encouragement and consider their criticism. It’s all good. Just get someone, anyone, anywhere, anytime to listen to you. Sing in the dark, sing in the park. Play for friends, for strangers, for young and for old.

All you need is a song and a crowd; the rest comes easy, one step at a time. The day will come when you’ll earn a place of respect. People will notice when you walk into a room. You won’t hear a pin drop when you begin to play at a local coffee house. The whole room will “rock” when you plug in and play at your neighborhood blues cafe.

But, if that’s not enough and you still want to get signed to a major record. Pet your dog. Kiss your wife or girlfriend goodbye. You’ll be away for a long, long time playing for people you don’t know in places you’ve never been before. Your chances of becoming a rock star are about as good as winning a lottery. Call it a glass ceiling. Call it a brick wall, mainstream success is rare.

They say the Beatles started their career playing in strip joints in Hamburg, Germany. Forty years ago, Hamburg’s infamous red-light district was where some of the world’s most popular rock musicians paid their dues. One day Brian Epstein discovered the Beatles when they packed the Star Club with whores, pimps, transvestites, sailors and fans of “beat music” swilling alcohol and dancing until dawn. Epstein saw something in them that no one else could see. Somehow he knew one day their raw sound would thrill audiences with a magic that will never return again.

Maybe someone will notice you one day. All you’ve got to is get the right people interested in what you’re doing and hold that interest long enough for them to “buy” what you’re doing. The more interested they are, the longer they stick around, the more ideas they’ll get for selling what you have to offer.

‘The cream always rises to the top’ doesn’t mean the best rise to the top. Without at least some marketing savvy, the average musician won’t make it very far alone no matter how good he is. Which brings me to my next thought. A performing career isn’t for most people. Most so-called pro musicians live below the poverty line spending their daylight hours watching TV in a dingey downtown apartment waiting for the phone to ring with a booking for your next paying gig. When you’re a seventeen year-old drop out, playing bar songs for a crowd of rowdy drunks might be someone’s idea of a good time but there are better ways to make a living.

If you want a life, think again. With a strong regional presence, it’s possible to make a name for yourself as an artist. If you travel a circuit, and stay around long enough your audience will grow and your CD sales will climb. If you’re good, you might become a cult hero or even a regional icon.

Dennis Walsh progressofmusic@hotmail.com

Online video search engine blinkx launched a new tool Tuesday to find and watch music videos on the Internet.

Freshly launched blinkx Music has indexed more than 33,000 hours of music videos from over 10,000 artists.

“There are hundreds of thousands of music videos available on the Web today, which makes it nearly impossible to navigate and find what you are looking for,” said blinkx founder and chief executive Suranga Chandratillake.

“We built blinkx Music to help our users find their favorite music videos quickly, easily and in one place.”

Blinkx allows searches by artist, album, genre or song. Search results include information about artists and their careers.

The online tool founded in 2004 boasts more than 35 million hours of video and audio content in its index. The company is based in San Francisco.

Radio is apparently rallying against falling listeners (damn you Spotify and internet radio) by circling the wagons on a catch-all website for UK stations. So it probably doesn’t want to hear about another online music venture that will see blinkx launch a new universal jukebox that gives users access to over 33,000 hours of music videos from over 10,000 artists.

“While MySpace and GoogleBox have launched services in the US and Australia, blinkx is the first to bring a music jukebox to UK audiences,” the spokeswoman tells AG.

blinkx Music allows users to find and watch music videos online, “putting the biggest collection of online music videos in the hands of consumers.”

Adolphe Adam (1803-1856), composer of “O Holy Night,” once observed, “In Paris, at the hub of the arts, one cannot enter a church without being followed by one or sometimes two serpents.” Most believe the bewitching instrument he was referring to was invented around 1590 by French priest Edmé Guillaume of St. Steven Auxerre Cathedral to add a fuller baritone/bass voice to his choir. The serpent consists of a wooden tube carved as two half-rounds, glued together and then firmly wrapped with a coil of veal skin or other leather to make it airtight. The most common version needs to be about six feet long, so in order to make it compact enough to hold they give it several crooks. Classically there are six holes for the fingering and an angled metal tube ending in a wooden or ivory cup-shaped mouthpiece similar to that used for a trombone. Indeed, people taking up the serpent nowadays are more often than not trombonists or other low-register brass players. It emits a rounder, more organic tone than a metal instrument, somewhat bassoon-like yet also rather human. It’s fiendishly difficult to play in tune, plus you need exceptional dexterity to negotiate its holes swiftly and unerringly.

As musical instruments go, the serpent enjoyed a distinguished career about 300 years until it was phased out first by the ophicleide (a less zigzaggy version made of metal and employing keys rather than simple holes) and then finally the euphonium and tuba by the late nineteenth century. George Frederick Handel employed the serpent in his Royal Fireworks Music (1749), Beethoven in at least one of his marches, Berlioz in Messe Solennelle (1824 but lost until 1991), and Wagner in his opera Rienzi (1842). Christopher Monk, Alan Lumsden, and Andrew van der Beek founded the London Serpent Trio in 1976, which continues to perform in a wide range of musical genres to this day with a newer generation of players.

Aside from the Trio, two of the serpent’s strongest exponents are currently Douglas Yeo and Michel Godard. Yeo has been a bass trombonist with the Boston Symphony since 1985 and a hands-down authority on the subject, but when it comes to virtuoso serpentry he’s clearly a Man on a Mission. Check out his newest CD Le Monde du Serpent (with free MP3 excerpts). Says Fanfare Magazine, “It’s obvious Yeo meant to entertain as well as to educate, and this lively CD succeeds at doing both brilliantly. The performances are expert and loving, and the production values demonstrate the utmost in care and discernment.” Michel Godard’s CD, Sous Les Votes le Serpent, is a different reptile entirely but intriguing in its own way, featuring selections such as “Tuba Chant” and “A Black Dust Cloud and Stars Embedded in Gaseous Nebulosities (For Carl Sagan).” I’m afraid Garrison Keillor won’t be standing in line for either of these, though, having said of the serpent, “The urge to perform is not a sign of talent.” To each his own, I guess.

This article comes from the Curious Thing of the Week section of my site Sui Generis at http://www.CuriousNotions.com where you’ll find only the world’s rarest, best, oddest and most legendary. If you crave the exotic and march to your own drummer, or serpentist as the case may be, please stop on by!

I’ll never forget the time I took my first piano class. It was at the Community College of Philadelphia 1984. It was a group class with 20 or so electronic keyboards arranged around the room. We each received a class text book titled “Class Piano.” No shocker there.

I opened up the book and saw that I would be learning how to read music and play triads. I also saw that I would be playing very simple classical pieces. Now, while I enjoyed this and learned how to play these easy pieces, it just didn’t do it for me. It was because as I soon as I put the book down, I was dumbfounded! I didn’t know what to do on the piano without the book!

I soon realized that I didn’t want to become a professional note reader. No. I wanted to be able to sit down at the piano, place my fingers on a chord that called to me, and just play. I wanted to express myself at the piano in the same way visual artists are able to take pen and paper and artfully color their inner worlds. Why was this so difficult to do?

It was at this time that I started to look for new ways to play. I came upon a book that taught a modern chord position which could be used right away to make music with. Amazing! No note reading. Just chords. And once I learned a few chords, I was able to create my own music. This open position chord structure allowed me to improvise music quite easily.

Another book influenced me as well. This one showed how to play chord progressions using 4, 8 and 16 bar phrases. With this chord charting technique, I could see that I could create my own pieces. It taught me the principles of repetition and contrast - the cornerstones to musical composition.

A few chords arranged for 8-bars is repeated 2 or more times giving you what is called an “A” section of music. Another few bars of different chord changes and the “B” section is produced. And all of this was taught within a very slim volume. Maybe 46 pages or so.

After a few years of working with this material, I synthesized both methods so beginning piano players can take a modern sounding chord and work with it within a set framework. The result is a method where students are able to improvise their own music right away!

Edward Weiss is a pianist/composer and webmaster of Quiescence Music’s online piano lessons. He has been helping students learn how to play piano in the New Age style for over 14 years and works with students in private, in groups, and now over the internet. Stop by now at http://www.quiescencemusic.com/piano_lessons.html for a FREE piano lesson!

There are several websites that provide guitar lessons, some even for free. The modules are usually designed by guitarists that have already found success in music and are now trying to provide some useful tips to beginner guitar players. There are both advantages and disadvantages if you want to learn guitar fast online.

The Good

Many of us don’t necessarily want to learn to play the guitar like pros. They just want to learn a few chords to play at campfires and impress their friends or family with their music playing skills. These people are not interested in investing time and money into a more complete learning program, such as private guitar lessons. For them, being able to learn guitar fast online is a great thing.

Even if you would like to learn how to play the guitar well, you might not have the time and resources to do it. If you have a job, a family and various errands to run every day, traveling back and forth to guitar classes might not be for you. Being able to learn guitar fast by practicing whenever you find some free time without having to leave the house is a good thing.

Online lessons are often more dynamic and successful in keeping you focused than a theory book. They usually include graphics, animated images and demo sounds to make it easier for you to learn. If you get stuck, you usually can ask the guitarist providing those lessons for help.

And last, but not least, online guitar lessons are very inexpensive, sometimes even free. In contrast, private lessons are often expensive and you have to pay per hour. Not everyone wants to invest so much money into learning to play the guitar.

The Bad

As tempted as you might be to learn guitar fast online, you have to consider the drawbacks as well. If you are serious about playing the guitar, nothing compares to a good teacher. Online lessons can only provide a standard teaching program, while a teacher can tailor his/her method on your learning style.
Online lessons can not actually focus on your particular learning needs. You might want to focus more on certain aspects, but a teaching program is standard and tries to respond to the needs of average guitar players. In contrast, a private teacher will give you personal attention and respond to your specific needs.

With online lessons, no one will applaud you when you’re progressing and get you motivated. A private teacher can provide you with positive feedback and knows how to increase your motivation when necessary.

Finally, you might be making some mistakes you won’t even notice and end up playing badly. With online lessons, no one will be there to correct them. A private teacher will spot your mistakes fast and correct them in time before they turn into long-term habits.

If you want to truly learn to play the guitar well, it might be better to dedicate a little more time and work to the learning process. However, for many people who don’t want to become superstars or don’t have the time to do it, the opportunity to learn guitar fast online is actually great.

Fame Ahmed is a well known author worldwide. He has written numerous works on various topics. He is an expert in research and writing reviews and articles based on his findings.
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The Beatles may well be arguably the worlds biggest ever band. Musically from the early 1960’s to the end of their career they covered an array of different music styles from the jangly pop of their early days to the psychedelia of their latter albums. To cover all these different sounds they needed a broad range of instruments.

Throughout their career they used a variety of guitars and you can see many photographs of the Beatles with Rickenbacker’s (325’s in particular) various Gretch, Fender and Hofner. However they are also linked with Epiphone Guitars and often choose Epiphone guitars over all other guitars for recordings and live performances.

The first Beatle to own an Epiphone guitar was Paul McCartney who bought his first, an Epiphone Casino,during 1964. Influenced by the sound of this guitar John and George bought theirs soon after. The Epiphone Casino is a hollow-body double cutaway electric guitar. Although available in a variety of colors, George Harrison stripped his down to bare wood saying that he liked the sound of the guitar being able to breathe.

John Lennon favored the Epiphone E230TD Casino and used a variety of these guitars from 1966 onwards. Lennon painted this guitar and it appeared during the White Album sessions and in the Film “Let it Be”. During that film Lennon can be seen playing his Casino while rehearsing new material. Lennon’s Casino also features during the celebrated performance on the London roof top of their office building. Lennon is synonymous with the Casino, so much so that Epiphone recently re-released a John Lennon signature Casino. This faithful reproduction is of the guitar as John originally purchased it with the vintage sunburst finish and stock hardware.

The Beatles also used Epiphone’s acoustic guitars. Paul McCartney favored the Epiphone Texan acoustic guitar and it was used to record the epic track Yesterday. McCartney still uses Texan’s to this day.

Clearly the Beatles have been one of the (if not the) biggest influences in popular music over the last 50 years. Their sound was distinct and this was bought about both by their playing and their selection of instruments. Thier Epiphone guitars contributed to their sound and a number of guitars have become iconic in their association with arguably the worlds biggest band.

ShanzuGuitars.com is a reference site for guitarists everywhere. The site features guitar news, resources, guitar gear reviews, online lessons and free tools.

What exactly is a Gong?

The gong is a musical instrument in the percussion family.
A gong can have either a definite or an indefinite musical pitch. Usually gongs that produce a definite, specific tone are played with other specific-tone gongs in a setting like traditional Gamelan, or an innovative rock concert like the Grateful Dead.

Are there different types of gongs?

Gongs come in a variety of sizes, styles, and shapes. Like dialects of language or sects of religion, the instrument evolved differently in each location and culture it was used.
Many gongs are flat, but some have a central dome, also called a nipple. The outside rim of the gong is usually turned down; it is not sharp-edged like a cymbal.

Generally, you can think of gongs as having two basic styles: Suspended and Bowl.

Suspended gongs, which are more flat, are called such because they are literally suspended. They are hung vertically using a chord that is passed through holes close to the rim. Suspended gongs are played with a mallet or bamboo stick.

Bowl gongs are called such because they are literally bowl-shaped. They can rest on the ground or special cushions. Bowl gongs can be played in several different manners. A musician can bang a bowl gong with a mallet, but might also rub the rim with his or her finger to elicit a whole other sound.

How are they made?

Gongs are constructed of hammered metal. Most are made out of bronze or brass, but with an amalgam of other metals.

Although a lot of gongs are made in China, they are not mass produced like televisions or plastic toys. Each one is handmade.

If you hear a particular gong, like it and order that style, you must expect that the one you get may not sound exactly like the first one you heard. Minor differences are to be expected, and should be embraced. Don’t worry though! Most gong styles, thanks to design specifics, maintain a similarity of tone to the untrained ear.

Andrew Borakove is a media writer and gong aficionado. He also is the proprietor of the internet store, Gongs Unlimited. http://www.gongs-unlimited.com

You can find more info on Gongs there, and all kinds of gongs and related instruments for sale.