By Claude Johnson “Sweep picking” is a technique where the guitarist plays single notes on consecutive strings with a “sweeping motion” of the pick. While simultaneously using the fret hand to produce a specific series of notes, usually an “arpeggio.” Both hands are essentially performing these motions in unison, to achieve the particular desired effect of…
In anticipation of Carnegie Hall’s upcoming production of West Side Story at the Knockdown Center in Queens, New York this weekend, we’ve been binge-watching anything and everything we can find about the well-loved musical and its creators on YouTube. Of course, it helps that we recently made a series of videos about the show for the aptly named course, The West…
+ Learn to create and arrange original, instrumental hip-hop music from sampling pioneer RJD2 himself in his new course on Soundfly, RJD2: From Samples to Songs. When we turn on the radio to any pop station, we hear sampling. When we utilize any MIDI instrument technology within our DAWs and hardware, we hear sampling. It’s everywhere, and it’s due…
Entrepreneurship in Music Series: 010 TOM TOM MAGAZINE Founder and Publisher Mindy Seegal Abovitz Tom Tom is, to the best of my knowledge, the only print magazine in the world focusing solely on women drummers and female drumming culture. It was founded in Brooklyn in 2009, and somehow in this age of dying…
Now that we’ve covered dynamic– and distortion-based effects, it’s time to start playing with the actual shape of your sound. From subtle EQ tweaks to dramatic filters, this is where we start really delving into reshaping and altering your tone. These effects can be used to add expression and character to your playing, as well…
+ Welcome to Soundfly! We help curious musicians meet their goals with creative online courses. Whatever you want to learn, whenever you need to learn it. Subscribe now to start learning on the ’Fly. Top 40 charts typically aren’t where I go to find new music. When I was a younger musician, I’ll admit I saw that as a sort of…
+ Welcome to Soundfly! We help curious musicians meet their goals with creative online courses. Whatever you want to learn, whenever you need to learn it. Subscribe now to start learning on the ’Fly. Everyone has lived through a terrible performance of a piece of music. Some songs are beyond help, but far too often a bad performance is a result…
“A composer is somebody who changes the sonic situation… I see composition as basically just a change, because we have to admit that sound is going on all the time.” —Michael Pisaro One of the musical pieces that has undisputedly come to define the last year or so of my life is Michael Pisaro’s 3-disc…
Covers are wonderful in so many ways. If you are a new artist, learning to take on a cover song challenges you to learn new material, and offers exposure for your originals. If you are a seasoned artist, adding covers to your routine can help you grow and define yourself as a musician, and give…
Most of us have a few horror stories involving raised voices, fallen tears, or temper tantrums. There was a time when I thought bad rehearsals were just one of the growing pains every band has to go through — as though a group wasn’t legit until someone kicked over a music stand. Thankfully, I have since…
