The Good Musician

You are truly great.
We all are, but you’re special. You’ve got talent. You’ve got passion. You even have the necessary business-savvy to impress the manager of your local club. Getting a small gig is no big deal.
Ah, us musicians. We love to make music, and yet we want to be noticed and appreciated in every way possible.
Do you know what you’re missing that would actually make you a star?
Let me tell you something: You can’t practice for it, you can’t buy it, and it’s not some “power-word mantra” like “passion”, “enthusiasm” or “show business marketing skills”.
It’s luck. Luck. Chance. Glück.
And …read more

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This is a guest post by Bruce Houghton of HypeBot – a blog about music, technology and the new music business.
Music Marketing 2.0 has not quite arrived, but it’s clearly just around the corner.  Traditional media are being replaced as music promotion and discovery engines by a multitude of online media and person to person viral marketing. Nowhere are the changes happening faster for music marketers then in social networking. Here’s an overview to help you keep up:

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Today, many of my fellow b5media music bloggers are sharing their “Guilty Pleasures” – songs they usually won’t tell you about, but love to hear!
This is a unique occasion for all of you to take a look into what some of your favourite bloggers actually listen to, when no-one’s watching. Of course, I have some guilty pleasures too, so here’s a list of 10, with links to YouTube.
10. Ronan Keating – Life is a Rollercoaster
9. Bomfunk MCs – Freestyler
8. Take That – Back For Good
7. Right Said Fred – I’m Too Sexy [2007 Remake]
6. Scooter – How Much Is The …read more

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No, not the John Williams you think I’m referring to, but John Williams the guitarist. Today I want to share a video with you concerning a performance of his I found over at YouTube, and I’d like you to tell me anything that strikes your mind – anything really, a critique, a love-letter to Williams, praise, interesting points about his whole performance or a remark about the look on the oboists face in the background.

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This short essay was handed to me by Billy Atwell.
This is a notion that can and should be argued for ages. I have always said that I’ll take a pound of passion over an ounce of
technique.
But in reality it’s that tension of the two extremes that make for the most explosive music and art.

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This is a post by associate editor Geoff Young.
Hi, my name is Geoff and I usually blog knucklecurve.com blog about baseball because it is one of the great passions in my life. Music is another. I mainly consume these days, but through most of the ’90s and up until mid-2005, I played in working or semi-working pop and rock bands in the San Diego area.
My primary instrument is guitar, and I also sing — though some would debate the latter point. I’m honored that Arjun has asked me to share some gig stories from days gone by. Not all …read more

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Here’s a quick tip for musicians using iTunes.
Often, especially among guitarists, play-along CDs are included with many of the books you can buy nowadays. Organize these using iTunes, following a few simple tips to keep them from mingling too much with the rest of your music.

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This is Part 4 in the Competencies Series. See also Part 1 (Personal Comeptence), Part 2 (Social Comeptence) and Part 3 (Scientific Competence).
Finally, you’ve mastered the skills covered in this series so far, but now comes the critical point: Putting it all to practice. Practical Competence defines your ability to take your personality, your relationships and your knowledge to the stage and perform.
The subtle step we’re taking is from Know-What to Know-How.

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“I’ll take a pound of passion over an ounce of
technique.”

Billy Atwell is a musician – which makes him a good fit for being interviewed on this blog, because he’s really good. I had the honor of asking him a few questions and in the next few posts I’ll try to profile him as a musician. Today, we’ll just look at his story and how he got to where he is today.

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I’m sure most of you have exploding, huge iTunes libraries or CD-catalogues. You probably brag about it now and then.
You’d expect “someone like me” to have something close to 100GB of music, or thousands of songs. Well, wrong, and most of my friends are startled, because I should be swimming in music all the time.

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