Tag: music history

  • Who’s Never Heard of Hal Willner?

    Who’s Never Heard of Hal Willner?

    Exploring the wacky career and curatorial escapades of one of New York’s most important musical directors, despite Willner never becoming a household name.

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  • Fanny Mendelssohn and Clara Schumann: The Inspiring Composers Music History Missed

    Fanny Mendelssohn and Clara Schumann: The Inspiring Composers Music History Missed

    Editor’s Note: The conspicuous absence of women from the historical canon of great classical composers is worth noting. There are myriad reasons behind that lack — women have historically been denied the ability to hold a job, access higher education, receive professional mentorship… The list is endless. Women composers were not given the opportunities to even…

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  • Klaus Nomi: The German Countertenor Who Shook Up the New York Art World

    Klaus Nomi: The German Countertenor Who Shook Up the New York Art World

    + 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. Klaus Sperber (January 24, 1944 – August 6, 1983), known by his stage name, Klaus Nomi, was many of our favorite weirdos’ weirdo. He was one of…

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  • On Sofia Gubaidulina, the Once-Blacklisted 86-Year-Old Composer Who’s Still Working

    On Sofia Gubaidulina, the Once-Blacklisted 86-Year-Old Composer Who’s Still Working

    + 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. If you wander up an unremarkable remote backroad outside a certain quiet village in Germany, you might stumble across the home of one of the world’s most…

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  • What Is ‘Subconscious Plagiarism?’ Just Ask George Harrison

    What Is ‘Subconscious Plagiarism?’ Just Ask George Harrison

    + Improve your songwriting with Soundfly! Explore our range of courses on emotional chord progressions, basic songwriting technique, songwriting for producers, and many more. Subscribe for unlimited access here. Late in the summer of 1976, as a matter of fact it was 42 years ago today, the man known as the “quiet Beatle” made quite a stir when he was…

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  • Remembering Jerry Garcia’s Musical Impact on the Anniversary of His Passing

    Remembering Jerry Garcia’s Musical Impact on the Anniversary of His Passing

    + 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. Jerry Garcia was the lead guitarist of the Grateful Dead, a rock band formed in 1965 in San Francisco that forever changed how music is written,…

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  • How Adam Yauch Became Rap’s Fun-Loving Social Change Advocate

    Anyway you slice it, Adam “MCA” Yauch of the Beastie Boys was as “cool as a cucumber in a bowl of hot sauce,” even when his conversation changed from silly lyrics and dropping beats to deep social commentary and dropping thought bombs. The hip-hop pioneer, who would’ve turned 54 yesterday had life not been cut short…

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  • On July 25, 1965, Dylan Went Electric at Newport – Here’s Why It Mattered

    On July 25, 1965, Dylan Went Electric at Newport – Here’s Why It Mattered

    + 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. It’s 1965. After almost a century’s worth of benefits and remarkable improvements to our daily lives, electricity is here to stay. Light bulbs, television, computers…

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  • The Fall of Milli Vanilli and 5 More Lip Sync Disasters

    The Fall of Milli Vanilli and 5 More Lip Sync Disasters

    + 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. Lip-syncing has been a time-honored… well not honored… tradition in the music industry for decades. If you don’t believe me, watch any Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade or episode…

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  • How Rap Ushered the Piano Into Its Next Developmental Phase

    How Rap Ushered the Piano Into Its Next Developmental Phase

    Hip-hop is officially pop music. With Bruno Mars and Kendrick Lamar’s sweep of the Grammy Awards earlier this year, it’s evident that hip-hop has officially shed its status as “that controversial music genre” that prompted the Grammys’ organizers to refuse to air any rap categories back in 1989, which subsequently prompted some to boycott the event.…

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