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Popularize Your Music On Youtube

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While there is actually no problem with making your own videos and releasing them on YouTube – in truth I completely advocate that you do – there’s a very powerful way to get thousands of visitors, either to your own videos, your band’s web site, or even better a promotional offer like “sign on to our mailing list to get our new single for free”, or some other such thing, by simply paying other YouTube users to incorporate a link to your site within their description box.

If you don’t quite know what I’m talking about go to Youtube and search the most viewed videos. You need to find a few examples of videos with the link in the description box.

To the right of the video you should see a link. This is an example of what I’m talking about.

To do this you simply take these steps.

Search YouTube with keywords that relate in some way to your song or your band. For instance, if you had done a cover of smells similar to teenager Spirit you may search words like Nirvana, smells like teenager Spirit, Grunge, etc .

Next, sort the results by “view count”. You’re looking for videos with many thousands, or perhaps millions of perspectives. Disregard any videos that are posted by the artist themselves or any videos that already have a link in the outline box.

Then all you have to do is send the users of applicable videos a message explaining that you would like to pay them on a once per month bases to place your link in there outline box.

You may possibly only find that one in every ten or twenty people are interested in your offer, but if even one link on a highly viewed video can imply thousands of new visitors, and potential new fans every month.

This is just the tip of the iceberg.

*Note* I would suggest that you use this method with 2nd tier record companys initially and then try your hand with he bigger boys once you have a few singles and a good sales previous record under your belt. Perhaps even try to get a music publishing contract first.

Most major labels want to see that you’ve had some success on your own before taking the chance and offering you a massive advance.

But to be completely truthful with you for an instant, the idea of getting a record deal for me is a real turn off today. I have discovered a simple system to build a list of fans and sell my music that’s completely new to the music industry.

This stuff is actually cool and you must definitely examine it below.

With that said I am doing hope you enjoyed learning how to get a recording contract and if you have got any feedback or questions please tell me. You’ll be getting lots more free music marketing guides form me over the coming months.

Tip : Scroll down to the page and there’s a link for a free report that is totally full of some pretty great strategies.

Which Casio Digital Keyboard is the Best Choice For Beginners

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Black Friday Grab.com found a good article for guideline who would like to purchase the best Casio Keyboard for Beginners. This article wrote by Mr. Alex Buck as a Director of Internet Marketing & Music Schools at Umbrella Music and article source from EzineAticles. Black Friday Grab.com would like to share this tip “Which Casio Digital Keyboard is the Best Choice For Beginners?” for guide our shoppers.

He advised that Casio have been making keyboards for quite a while now and their name is synonymous with electronic keyboards, so you’d expect them to do what they do well, which they do. Casio are particularly good at making entry-level digital keyboards and they have a wide variety to choose from. This article will help you to choose the right one for you.

There are basically two ranges with different models within those ranges – the LK digital keyboard range, and the CTK range of keyboards. To look at the two ranges there isn’t a huge amount of difference to the untrained eye. But once you delve further into the functions and features there is a marked difference.

The main difference between the Casio LK and CTK digital keyboards is that the LK range, have what they call a back light keyboard. The back light keyboard is a tried and trusted feature designed to help absolute beginners to start learning and playing quickly.

He and the school use Casio LK digital keyboards in our own music school and he has seen countless kids and adults find this to be one of the most useful training tools, but especially for younger learners as they can become frustrated and unfocused if they can’t learn quickly. He is not saying you’ll become a piano maestro immediately upon using the tool – it just provides a very practical learning guide.

There are 5 models in the Casio LK range of keyboard: LK-120, LK-220, LK-230, LK-270 & LK-300TV. All of these models have 61 keys which all light up. 61 keys are plenty to be getting on with for absolute beginners. The Casio LK-120 is the entry level and goes up to the LK-300TV at the top end. Each model has slightly more features as you go up the range. For instance the LK-120 has 100 onboard sounds whereas the LK-300TV has 514.

Similarly the LK-120 has less rhythm choices than the LK-300 TV digital keyboard. As you go up the range you’ll find more features such as effects e.g. delay, reverb. The ability to connect outboard gear becomes possible as you go up the range e.g. adding a microphone and playing along to someone singing. One thing that is common throughout the models is the capability to connect to a computer easily either through Midi or USB. They also feature the Casio Step up learning system.

The Casio CTK-range is also suitable for absolute beginners but do not feature the back light keys. They do however all feature the Step-Up learning system as well more recording, sampling and effects features. There are 6 models in the CTK range; CTK-230, CTK-2000, CTK-2100, CTK-3000, CTK-4000 and the CTK-5000. As with the LK range of digital keyboards, the CTK range increases the number of on-board sounds, digital effects as you go up the range. The CTK-230 is the entry level, and it should be pointed out that it only has 49 keys, where as the others all have 61 keys.

Another feature of the CTK range worth mentioning is the appearance of the keys. On a lot of keyboards at this price range, you can find that they keys are a different size to those of an acoustic piano. Casio have made the keys to be the same size and to look the same as an acoustic. All of which helps with playing technique.

So the question is which is the best Casio keyboard for beginners? There is no right or wrong, but as a guideline, I would chose the LK-230 absolute beginners who are younger i.e. 4-7 years old. For older players I would choose the CTK range.

The Midnight Funk Association, The Last Great Radio Show

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The Midnight Funk Association was the 12 a.m. segment of the legendary late night Detroit radio DJ Electrifying Mojo, a.k.a Charles Johnson.
An entire generation of faithful fans and listeners from the late 70’s through the early 90’s recognize the radio show for shaping the musical tastes of listeners in the Metropolitan Detroit Area, Northern Ohio, and Eastern Ontario Canada.

Mojo broke many artists in the Detroit market including Prince, The J. Giles Band, The B-52’s and turned audiences on to classic legends like Pink Floyd and Peter Frampton, artist previously unheard on radio stations that were labelled as “black”, or “R and B” .

Nightly at 12 a.m., Mojo called to order The Midnight Funk Association, an homage to some of the great funk bands of the day and of all time. He frequently played original long versions, and entire sides of albums by George Clinton and Parliament / Funkadelic, Prince, Rick James and many other all time great bands and artists, as well as local groups like Ready For the World.

At the top of the show, Mojo opened membership to the MFA, and members new and old were asked to stand up to show solidarity.

* If you were driving you were to flash your headlights.
* If you were at home, you turned on your porch light.
* If you were in bed listening to the show, you were required to dance on your back.

And every night for years, people did it !

To become a card carrying member of the MFA, listeners wrote in the radio station and would receive their official MFA I.D. card.

Electrifying Mojo, and the Midnight Funk Association was one of the last great radio music shows of our time. Many fans of the radio show credit Mojo for being fans of music that they would have otherwise never heard of. He was a huge influence in turning millions of listeners into Prince fans, and many say was responsible for a six show sell out at Cobo Hall in Detroit in the late 80’s.

It is common to speak to fans of the show that will credit him for turning them on to Peter Frampton, The B-52’s, Pink Floyd, and many other artists that were never heard on Detroit’s “R and B” stations, yet he also supported emerging rap artists like Eric B and Rakim, Run DMC, Whoodini, L.L. Cool J, and the many styles of music heard of the show fit together semmlessly as if they were mean to be enjoyed together.

The Godfathers and Originators of Detroit House and Techno Music, Juan Atkins, Derrick May, Kevin Saunderson, now known and respected around the world as groundbreaking, credit Mojo and the Midnight Funk Association as an early influence in their musical development and he frequently supported and played thier early and history making tracks that launched Detroit techno to the entire world including Inner City’s “Good Life”, Derrick May’s “Strings of Life”, Cybotron’s “Cosmic Cars”, Model 500 “No UFO’s”, “Technicolor”, “R9” and so many others.

Mojo was known to support and embrace electronic music in it’s early stages and frequently played artists like Africa Bambaataa, Kraftwerk, and New Order as part of his nightly radio show.

Common segments of the legendary radio show included:

* 10:00pm – The Landing of the Mothership. This was the intro to each show with spaceship sound effects and related dialog. Sometimes the music heard during the first hour was indicative of what you’d hear that night; sometimes it would be completely random.
* 11:00pm – Awesome ’84, ’85. In the mid eighties, Mojo played an hour of brand new music (hence the year in the title) and a lot of new songs were introduced.
* 11:30pm – Lover’s Lane. A half an hour of “slow jams” for lovers.
* 12:00am – The Midnight Funk Association. Consisted regularly of Parliament-Funkadelic, The Gap Band, Zapp and other funk bands of the era.

From 1:00am to 3:00am (2:00 am on Saturday nights), Mojo’s show was different every night. Sometimes, the MFA would stretch well beyond 1:00am, other times Mojo would introduce segments such as:

* Star Wars – A classic “artist vs. artist” set, where Mojo would alternate selections from two different groups or artists, and the listeners would call in to vote for their favorite.
* Journey – Sometimes a multi-night segment, where Mojo played songs by a single artist or group, spanning their entire career. This usually included a mix of hits and obscure songs by that artist.
* Shout-out – Everyone that called into the station during his show was the recipient of a “shout-out”. He would go on for as long as it took rattling off the first names of every single person who had called in to the show.
* 35-35-35 – Mojo would take suggestions from listeners about their favorite artists and bands. He then would choose the three most popular groups that night and play thirty-five minutes, commercial-free, of each group. This segment often gave airtime to groups that no other radio station in Detroit played.

At other times, Mojo would spend the last 2 hours of his show showcasing live mixes on two turntables, by bringing in local DJs to do the same. One such DJ, Jeff Mills, began his career with Mojo as “The Wizard.” Mojo also would air music by local groups at this time.

In the Metro Detroit Area, The Midnight Funk Association was more than a nightly radio show, it was an event that listeners looked forward to every night for years.
It was common to see cars flashing thier lights at midnight and horns honking on the streets all over town at Midnight.

Mojo crossed color lines and did not adhere to a play list like today’s prepackaged radio stations and while broadcast on stations marketed toward the African-American market, his programming was an inspired blend of the best soul, funk, New Wave, and rock that defied standard radio industry formats and genres.

He believed that good music had no color, and should not be packaged into “Black” stations, and “White” stations, a concept still lost on today’s radio station owners, and program managers.

Electrifying Mojo and his Midnight Funk Association was the last of the great radio shows, and the last show that had any originality, and independent thought outside of a prestructured play list or carefully crafted demographic studies.

By following his love of music and adhering to a standard of just playing what was good, Mojo accomplished something that radio has been unable to do since. Capture a cross section of music lovers that encompassed every age, race, and finacial demographic, and create listeners andloyal fans that tuned in simply because they loved the DJ and the music.

Most recently, Mojo is serving as Program Director for a handful of Detroit radio stations – he does not publicize which ones – and he was in negotiations to bring his show to XM satellite radio in 2006, but so far nothing has been heard about it.

Fans from all over still speak of the legendary radio show, as well as, others who have heard about it and what it meant to so many, for so long.

For those of us that were there, The Midnight Funk Association will live in our hearts forever, and we will always be card carrying members.

It was truly one of the last great radio shows of our time.

How To Improve Your Sight-reading (organ, Piano And Keyboard)

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As an organist, I have been working in club land in the North of England for the past 30 years or so and one of the crucial qualifications in this environment is the ability to sight read music on demand.
When I say music this can be anything from a beer matt to a ripped piece of paper repaired with selotape and stained with beer.

To be fair most of the music is written by professionals and is nice to read but not always easy.
As a club organist, you do not get a band call. In fact, you are lucky to get five minutes to scan through between 10 and 15 pieces of music. Some written in different keys, and every organist will tell you they hate it when they get the dreaded 6 sharps or 6 flats or even 7 sharp keys in a piece of music that just happens to contain a solo especially written for you.

So how do you improve your sight-reading? Well I asked my music teacher this very question as I embarked on my club land career. His answer was to practice sight-reading. He went on to tell me that session musicians practice by picking up any music book start playing on page one and continue until they have finished the book.

Does it work? Yes it does. Try it for yourself, pick up any piece of music you can find, preferably one that you are not that familiar with, then start to play, but do not stop. If you make a mistake it does not matter, you are not practising how to play this piece of music you are practising sight-reading this piece of music.

If you really want to test yourself. Get yourself an audience. I practice my sight-reading every week in front of a 200 plus audience. Its surprising how your concentration improves.

Music to enhance your child’s learning skills

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A child’s development depends on all-round care and nurture. Education is one facet of their lives but so too are others. Music is one such factor. Helping to provide self-discipline, organizational skills and building teamwork, this much-dismissed program is an essential part of a child’s learning structure.

If you’re still skeptical of its ability to nourish your child, check this – according to a M.I.N.D. Institute research, music improves spatial-temporal reasoning. Scientists have found that children who take up music are better at problem-solving, evaluation and analysis and have higher thinking skills. It has also been found that children who spend time learning music are less likely to get involved in drinking or drugs.

For elementary school music lessons, planning has to be more detailed as children become more able to grasp details and harder topics or subjects. A planbook’s components should typically consist of single lessons, assessments, repertoire, resources and standards. Here, repertoire means performances; and resources mean the materials, available space and time.

Other elementary school music lessons can include integrating music with other subjects kopiervorlagen like maths and drama. At times, students can zone out if the music in the curriculum is not to their taste. Don’t hesitate to incorporate more modern music. By combining classical and modern, you’ll be able to pique their interest while also teaching them music worth learning. Remember, innovation is the key to being able to teach well.

Like any other subject, you cannot make your child -feel’ music. What you can do, however, is fill your home with music, humming and singing while they are still very young so that the trend is not lost. In fact, some mothers while still pregnant, make their babies listen to classical music to get the most out of the experience. Aside from its ability to promote developmental skills, music education is an integral part of human culture and behavior like gottesdienst. It also helps promote peace and civility in schools as the mind and body is made to integrate to create something that is beyond a person’s subconscious. Parents and others alike should band together to make music education compulsory in all schools, be it in the West, Middle East or East, if they want their children to grow up to be wholesome individuals.