Caedmon’s Call has always been an inspirational to band to me. The song Dance on the album Long Line of Leavers really stood out to me among the rest. It’s really hard to describe why. The song production is generally fun and up beat. However, the lyrical content contains a difficult subject matter (that of age, society’s dealing with age, the tragedies of life, and death), but the way the subject matter is approached and addressed is amazing. I just really connect with it.

Oh, and it’s really only about five minutes long, but for some reason the video has about three minutes of silence. Hope you enjoy:

So I’ve recommended Eric Whitacre, but this piece and artistry is well worth another recommendation. That and I can’t this music out of my head at the moment.

So Eric already has these amazing choral pieces and know has put together a “virtual chior” to perform them. (Find out more on his website here.) The idea is such a creative use of technology. I eat stuff up like this. Basically he has singers from around the world submit individual youtube videos of themselves singing individual parts to his piece Sleep. (and previously Lux Aurumque) Then, with the help of others, he combines all the individual tracks/videos to make one “virtual chior.” (Find out more from his TED talk here) The idea is sooooo amazing. So for Sleep he got over two thousand people to sing it and the thickness of the choir sound is quite incredible.

Without further adieu here it is:

I was trying to work the other day and being a curious guitar player decided to look more deeply into a style of playing called “travis picking.” (Nope I wasn’t trying to avoid work at all.) And then stumbled upon the “inventor” of “travis picking,” Merle Travis. And it was a real treat. His style really helped shape and pioneer country, blue grass, and blues. It’s amazing that he could get so much sound out of a guitar with only two fingers. That’s right the other three are just chilling out/getting a tan on the face of the guitar. And not just skill level to be able to play what’s he’s playing, but what he’s playing and distinct/pioneering it was in it’s day. Wow.

Needless to say I’ve been trying my hand at it ever since. Here’s a compilation clip of him on youtube. Enjoy.

My friend and talented musician Kevin Brown recommended an artist/composer named Eric Whitacre to me recently. So I picked up the album light & gold. Just the first track moved me to almost to tears. I actually had to turn the music off to recompose myself. The depth and emotion of the music is beyond this time and place. And really music is just simply audible/physical emotions. That first track is what I’d like to share. I would venture to say this is some of the best music I’ve ever heard. Although I am slightly biased to choral music.

Here is Eric Whitacre’s Lux Aurumque

I can’t get this guitar part out of my head lately. As you may or may not know, I’m a pretty big Dave Matthews Band fan. In the past few months I don’t believe I’ve listening to the Groogrux King album all that much. But then all of sudden a guitar part starts singing in my head and it’s the riff for my baby blue. So here it is. Not only is the song great, but strings arrangement is amazing and fitting.

One quick thought for any guitar players out there: I was thinking how can he be playing this guitar part and singing at the same time? Well the riff actually get’s simplified a bit once the singing comes in. And thank goodness, because that would otherwise be ridiculous.

Been listening to Peter Gabriel’s new album Scratch My Back (on amazon here or on wikipedia here) and it’s great. It’s mainly orchestral arrangements of “modern” songs. Anyways, thought I would recommend a song to check out. It’s called The Book of Love and is actually a cover of The Magnetic Fields. The song is done so well. The orchestration is great and something about Peter Gabriel’s has just gotten so great with age. I mean it was great when he was young also, but has really grown and aged well too.

Oh, and do yourself a favor by not watching that youtube video; just listen. Enjoy.

Here is The Book of Love by Peter Gabriel written by The Magnetic Fields on youtube.

Listening to my music on shuffle the other day and this track came on. It through me for a loop with the Beethoven choir portion in the beginning. But once the piano part came in….. Sooooo good. Everything about the song is great; from the choral intro, to the great beat/bass line, epic keyboard part, the great use of the choir throughout, Michael Jackson’s improve vocals, melody lines, to the dynamics of the song as a whole, this list could keep going. Yeah, I like the king of pop…. I could do without the quote unquote “will you be there conversation” towards the end.

Sidenote: Do you even have to write quote unquote when you’re writing? Kind of defeats the point. Oh well, I’m new to this blogging stuff.

Enjoy.