The origin of hip-hop can be traced back as far as the ancient tribes in Africa. Rap has been compared with the chants, drumbeats and foot-stomping African tribes performed before wars, the births of babies, and the deaths of kings and elders. Historians have reached further back than the accepted origins of hip-hop. It was born as we know it today in the Bronx, cradled and nurtured by the youth in the low-income areas of New York City.

Fast-forward from the tribes of Africa to the ghettos of Kingston, Jamaica in the late sixties. The impoverished of Kingston gathered together in groups to form DJ conglomerates. They spun roots and culture records and communicated with the audience over the music. At the time, the DJs comments werent as important as the quality of the sound system and its ability to get the crowd moving. Kool Herc grew up in this community before he moved to the Bronx.

During the late sixties, reggae wasnt popular with New Yorkers. As a DJ, Kool Herc spun rhythm and blues records to please his party crowd. But, he had to add his personal touch. During the breaks, Herc began to speak to his audience as he had learned to do in Jamaica. He called out, the audience responded, and then he pumped the volume back up on the record. This call and response technique was nothing new to this community whod been reared in Baptist and Methodist churches where call and response was a technique used by the speakers to get the congregation involved. Historians compare it to the call and response performed by Jazz musicians and was very much a part of the culture of Jazz music during the renaissance in Harlem.

Hercs DJ style caught on. His partys grew in popularity. He began to buy multiple copies of the same albums. When he performed his duties as a DJ, he extended the breaks by using multiple copies of the same records. He chatted, as it is called in dance hall, with his audience for longer and longer periods.

Others copied Hercs style. Soon a friendly battle ensued between New York DJs. They all learned the technique of using break beats. Herc stepped up the game by giving shout-outs to people who were in attendance at the parties and coming up with his signature call and response. Other DJs responded by rhyming with their words when they spoke to the audience. More and more DJs used two and four line rhymes and anecdotes to get their audiences involved and hyped at these parties.

One day, Herc passed the microphone over to two of his friends. He took care of the turn table and allowed his buddies to keep the crowd hyped with chants, rhymes and anecdotes while he extended the breaks of different songs indefinitely. This was the birth of rap as we know it.

Hip-hop has evolved from the days of the basement showdowns to big business in the music industry. In the seventies and eighties, the pioneers and innovators of the rap record was the DJ. He was the guy who used his turntable to create fresh sounds with old records. Then, he became the guy who mixed these familiar breaks with synthesizers to produce completely new beats. Not much has changed in that aspect of hip-hop. The guy who creates the beat is still the heart of the track. Now, we call him the producer. Even though some DJs work as producers as well as DJs (quite a few start out as DJs before they become producers), todays title DJ doesnt carry the same connotative meaning it did in the eighties. Todays hip-hop producer performs the same tasks as the eightys DJ.

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On January 27, 2006, it is the 250th anniversary of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, born in Salzburg, Austria. Mozart is widely regarded as one of history’s greatest classical composers.

Mozart was born on January 27, 2006. His parents, Leopold and Anna Maria Pertl Mozartis, gave him the name Johann Chrysostom Wolfgang Theophilus. The first two were saint’s names and not commonly used at the time in daily life. Theophilus translates as Amadeus (Latin) and Gottlieb (German). Mozart preferred to use both Wolfgang and Amadeus and is generally known by these two names.

Mozart is probably the most significant and enduring of classical composers. His remarkable musical gift became apparent when he was about three years old. At the age of four he could play the keyboard with total confidence and composed his first pieces at five.

His father, Leopold, a composer and violinist, was one of Europe’s leading musical pedagogues. In those formative years, Mozart received intense musical training from him, including instruction in both the clavier and violin.

Leopold soon realised that he could earn a substantial income by showcasing his son and the young Mozart soon gained a reputation as a musical prodigy. During these formative years, he made several journeys around Europe, including the Imperial Court in Vienna.

It was at this time that Mozart met a great number of influential musicians and acquainted himself with the works of the great composers of the time. Of particularly importance was Johann Christian Bach. They became friends in London, where Bach’s influence on the young Mozart became a significant and constant inspiration.

In 1767, the family returned to Vienna for five months where he wrote a comical play for the Emperor and a spoken-dialogue opera in German. But Mozart had problems with the other musicians, particularly the composer Antonio Salieri, who made it very difficult for him to produce his operas.

Mozart then left Vienna and returned to Salzburg where he was appointed honorary Konzertmeister to Archbishop Sigismund von Schrattenbach.

Mozart’s tremendous creative output includes works that are pinnacles of symphonic, chamber, piano, operatic and choral music. Many of these are now part of the standard concert repertory and widely recognised as masterpieces of the classical style.

On August 4, 1782, Mozart married Constanze Weber against his father’s wishes. Although they had six children, only two survived. But this was to be an auspicious year for Mozart’s career: his opera, The Abduction from the Seraglio, was a great success and he began a series of concerts where he premiered his own piano concertos as conductor and soloist.

Having become closely acquainted with the works of Bach and Handel led to a number of works imitating their Baroque style, which later had a powerful influence on the fugal passages in The Magic Flute and the 41st Symphony.

In 1783, Wolfgang and Constanze visited Leopold in Salzburg, which saw the composition of one of Mozart’s great liturgical pieces: Mass in C Minor. It was premiered in Salzburg in the same year and is one of his best known pieces.

Mozart spent 1786 in an apartment in Vienna which may be visited today at Domgasse 5, behind St Stephen’s Cathedral. It was here that Mozart composed The Marriage of Figaro, followed in 1787 by one of his greatest works, Don Giovanni.

Mozart’s life was fraught with financial difficulty and illness. Often, he received no payment for his work, and the small amounts he did receive were quickly consumed by an extravagant lifestyle.

The actual cause of Mozart’s death is a matter of conjecture. Dozens of theories have been proposed, including trichinosis, mercury poisoning and rheumatic fever.

Mozart died on December 5, 1791 while he was working on his final composition, the Requiem. Franz Xaver S?ssmayr was engaged by Constanze to complete it. He was not the only composer involved but he is associated with it over others due to his significant contribution.

The major productions for Mozart Year 2006 are being held at the Theatre of Vienna ? which is now, after extensive renovation, considered the new opera house in Vienna ? together with various other concert halls and St. Stephan’s Cathedral.

Tickets for Mozart Year 2006 concerts may be viewed at the Vienna Ticket website.

Peter Handel-Mazzetti is the owner of ATT Travel Agents, one of the leading ticket agents in Vienna offering a complete range of tickets for concerts, opera, theatre, musicals as well as sightseeing tours.

Flaunting any excessive or anti-social behavior is considered brazen. When it is no longer considered brazen it is proof that it has become embedded as part of our culture. Not to say this is a good thing, after all headhunting was considered a cultural norm in some societies. The question to ask here may be, was rap ever truly a part of our culture? Will it eventually run out of steam and go the way of things like doing the twist, afro haircuts or break dancing? I for one would argue that it is not truly a part of the American cultural scene, but is a forced, twisted and contrived money machine that appeals to only the basest passions of the youth in our country.

Long before the gangsta element slid over to hip hop the reasoning for the whole genre and style was generally purported to be, to show what life in the hood was like. That worked for a while and it even drew more sympathy from the otherwise estranged. But as lower passions would have it, the style and language of rap began more and more to take on a life and purpose of its own, namelysex. If by some magic stroke sex were temporarily extricated from every rappers thoughts and vocabulary, the entire industry would collapse quicker than the stock market in 1929. Now thats brazen!

Referring to rappers as artist and giving them full press doesnt guarantee that it is really an art form, all it says is that its here. But was it here before? Does it really have anything to do with the African American background, culture or heritage? I propose that it does not. Very few whites have succeeded in rap but even that does not prove that it is necessarily a black cultural thing. Growing up as a boy there were only two black families in our town. One of the boys from those families was my best friend. But to say that gave me even a basic knowledge of the African American culture would be an exaggeration. Later I arrived in the city of New Orleans just after the civil rights laws were passed. My exposure to the black culture increased exponentially. Finally I attended two seminaries the last of which was part of the National Baptist Convention a purely African American denomination. What I discovered about the African American culture will always be one of the greatest excursions of my entire life.

Our entire class would sit before some of the most dignified black gentlemen, professors and wait for the streams of their thoughts, opinion and knowledge to flow down to us. Most exciting was when they shifted their emphasis away from the curriculum and began to divulge elements of their private lives and their past. Life in New Orleans as a black man or women was no easy thing. Stories of their upbringing and their struggles would leave anyone with their heart in their throat. These old gentlemen for me were living examples of courage dignity and the best human qualities. What I learned about black culture in short is this. African Americans have a deep and ancient past; they are people with a lasting heritage.

I am sure that the blatant indulgence of sexual descriptive and four letter words that is raps most prevalent aspect, is not part of their ancient culture and history. It does not accurately depict their culture, their history or any other part of their experience. I dont think my protesting is such a big deal. But Id guess that if my old seminary professors could see and hear todays rap, you would hear the roar raising up from their graves and billowing down many an American avenue.

Rev Bresciani has written many articles over the past thirty years in such periodicals as Guideposts and Catholic Digest. He is the author of two books available on Amazon.com, Alibris, Barnes and Noble and many other places. Rev Bresciani wrote, Hook Line and Sinker or What has Your Church Been Teaching You, published by PublishAmerica of Baltimore MD. He also wrote a book recently released by Xulon Press entitled An American Prophet and His Message, Questions and Answers on the Second Coming of Christ. Rev Bresciani has his own website at http://americanprophet.org

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?Listen, you spoiled little cretins, the world does not revolve around you,? I patiently explained.

?You?re kidding right?? hooted my students derisively.

?Pick up your instruments, start together on the downbeat and count carefully.?

How many music teachers have had the first part of that conversation? Almost none, at least not out loud. The second installment is an every day plea for many.

Our youth-obsessed culture seems to make a liar out of me, but lest you think your work is in vain, let me present you with a few ideas.

One of the things adults commonly complain about in their later years looking back on school, aside from a lousy prom, was that they felt ?alone? and like an ?outsider?. The band and orchestra students that I have canvassed don?t often feel that way. Isn?t that interesting? I?m lobbying to have my son do a graduate research project on this issue. I?d love to see the results, wouldn?t you?

Common sense, that harbinger of things ?everybody knows? insists that if you learn to be part of a group that needs you in order to get something done, you will feel valuable and worthwhile. Anecdotal evidence supports this concept.

Our sports-mad country feeds us with stories of the scrawny child who becomes Mr. Olympia seven times, makes multimillions in movies and then governs California. What is often overlooked is that music serves many valuable parts of the maturation process that sports do not.

Let me elaborate briefly. Most people involved with music know the statistics. Music makes you brighter, helps you focus in all areas of study, gives you greater mastery over fractions than heretofore thought humanly possible, etc.

But here?s a thought for all those guitar players strumming alone in their garrets. When you have to listen and fit in, when there is the tyranny of a written part to play you are going to find yourself learning new musical concepts at light speed. Why? For the same reason that learning say, mathematics, is easier with some formal guidelines. Reinventing multiplication or discovering every formula newly takes a few lifetimes of inquiry, just check your history texts. Solitary inquiry is necessary and good and I hope it has a place of honor in everyone?s intellectual pantheon, but it cannot be the only method of realization.

One thing ensemble music instruction teaches you is that you must ?make nice? with others in order to get the job done. ?So what?? you say. It gets back to the heart of both of our issues.

One of the signs of maturity, which my adorable dumplings in the lower grades find difficult to exhibit, is one?s place and involvement in an activity. In spite of what our youth worshipping culture and media would have you believe individuals are generally not the most important things on the program. In music you learn that you can have a part that is vital to the results, but so are the other parts. Together you all help to create a whole that is satisfying to everyone.

This is something that musicians learn and team players discover, but many other people miss completely. Unlike sports where there can be a competitive factor to be the ?best?, music requires everyone be good to make the whole creative performance satisfying. This is an even higher level of sophistication than sports because creating your part well and thoroughly gives you no personal glory but makes the whole experience better for all the other players and the audience. And all without someone else having to ?lose?.

A good musician must practice alone but still be able to play with a group to create something larger than themselves. The product of this collaboration? All of us have favored pieces of music associated with the times of our lives, and a majority of those pieces were created within a group, rather than by a solo artist.

Both musician and listener profit from this synergy. With recordings you can hear your favorites repeatedly extending the memories for a lifetime. So, although the world doesn?t revolve around any one of us, the extended fruits of our conspiracies are definitely worth striving for. Go forth and make music for yourself and for all of us.

Suzie Hammond is a teacher turned writer and factotum for: http://www.musicalcompositions.net

There you may purchase and download sheet music for concert bands, choirs, chamber ensembles, jazz groups. See it, hear it,download it, rehearse it. FREE Newsletter and FREE Special Report written by Carl Hammond Phd. a 35 year international music veteran.

Well written interesting music for your groups to play right now via download. Score pages, MP3s to help you decide suitability.

Purchasing a classical guitar can be a difficult task particularly if you are not yet an accomplished player. Here are some tips and hints on finding a good quality classical guitar whether it is in the hundred dollar range or the thousand dollar range.

If you are have ever gone into a well stocked guitar shop you have no doubt been confused by the selection of guitars. There are literally hundreds of shapes, sizes brands and types of guitars. And the price can range from a hundred dollars to several thousand. .If you are a beginner, judging the sound quality can be difficult to do because your ear is not yet highly trained. Here are some tips to help you make a good choice.

When in a guitar shop and looking at the guitars you should always ask a sales person to help you. This way you can take guitars down and play them. If you cannot play very well you should ask the sales clerk to play for you so you can get a feel for the sound of the different guitars. If the sales clerk doesnt play you should ask if there is someone working in the shop that does play. As a last resort you should even ask other customers in the store. Not listening to the different guitars is like shopping for a car but never test driving any of them. Guitars have very different feels and tones and you should listen to a lot of them to get a sense of what you like. Dont be bashful in this respect. Guitarists are usually a very gregarious bunch and a guitarist will almost always jump at the chance to play for someone else. If you dont yet play well and you cant find somebody to play for you I recommend you not purchase a guitar. You should come back another time when someone is available to play or you can bring a friend who knows how to play.

Check the size and shape of the guitar

Classical Guitars, of course, come in different sizes and shapes and you should sit with a wide variety of them to get a feeling for what is comfortable to you. Your body shape has an effect on this. If you are over six feet tall the smaller guitars might not be comfortable for you and the fret board may be uncomfortable for your hands. So even if you cant play music you should always hold and sit with the guitars to get a sense of how the different ones feel.

Check the mechanics and playability of the guitar

Here are several things you should do when considering the purchase of a classical guitar.

1. Play every note on every string all the way up and down. Listen for frets that dont play properly. They will give a rattling sound and if this occurs on any fret at all you should put the guitar aside and try another one. This is a sign of inferior quality. Every string should play cleanly on every single fret.

2. Check the action of the strings against the frets in terms of how much pressure is needed to play notes and chords. You should play bar chords all the way down the frets to insure good pressure. If it is too hard to press the strings in order to make a clear chord this could be a sign of an inferior guitar.

3. Play harmonics on the strings. This is an excellent test of the quality of the guitar. Playing harmonics is the technique of plucking the note with your right hand and only lightly touching the string with your left hand. Test the harmonics of all the strings on the 5th, 7th, 12th and 19th frets. If you do not know how to play harmonic notes ask the sales clerk to help you.

4. Examine and test the tuning pegs. Do they look clean and sharp? Wind and unwind them while watching and feeling for smooth turning motion.

5. Visually examine the whole guitar. Look it over very carefully from front to back and top to bottom. Are there any small cracks? Are the frets firmly installed into the fret board? Are there any cracks or glue exposed around the bridge?

6. Tap on the front of the guitar (The sound board) in a variety of different spots. Does it have a rich echoing sound or are there spots where it sounds dead and limp? The internal structure of the classical guitar is very important for the sound and important for the longevity of it. Dull thud sounds could be an indicator of an inferior instrument.

7. Examine the details. Look at the purfling around the edge. This is the decorated pattern that goes around the full body where the soundboard or face meets the sides of the guitar. Is it accurately laid in? If this has variations and inconsistencies it is a good sign that the guitar is of inferior quality.

8. Dont hesitate to take a good look inside the guitar sound hole. You will see wooden braces in there. Do they look straight, accurate and well placed? If you see sloppy globs of dried glue around these braces it could be an indicator of inferior craftsmanship.

9. Remember that there are three distinct areas you must consider when purchasing a classical guitar: The Look, The Feel, and the Sound. If you keep all three of these things in mind and carefully examine the guitar in relation to these you will be able to choose an instrument that will bring you a lifetime of trouble free playing enjoyment.

A Classical Guitar is a purchase that can give you a lifetime of enjoyment and you should consider the purchase carefully. Even if you dont plan on playing every day you should buy an instrument that is of good quality so it will maintain its sound quality for a lifetime. And to do this you dont need to spend thousands of dollars you just need to know how to identify a well made guitar.

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It is no secret that over the past couple decades country music has struggled with it?s identity far more than any other genre in the industry. At this point nobody can really claim to be a country music fan without being questioned what kind of country fan? The answers being seemingly endless, I?ve broken them down into a few main categories (but really, there could be so many more).

Pop Country

This category could really be referred to as ?Nashville Country.? It hosts probably about 90% of the country music out there. I often find people not wanting to admit in conversation that they?re fans of this category. They like to talk about how they love Willie Nelson and mouth the words to Merle Haggard songs even though it?s obvious their faking it. Then they get alone in their cars and unwind by driving down the highway, blasting Shania Twain on the radio, and singing along at the top of their lungs. Let me just say, there?s nothing wrong with that, like what you like. Nashville record labels pick very talented, often attractive singers that perform with some great bands. They also have some of the top songwriters and composers in the industry working for them.

One criticism I would have against this category?In recent years, there has been a rebellion of sorts against Nashville music from musicians in both the Rebel and Texas sub categories (see below) with songs booing Nashville and praising the old timers. Sometimes this gains them popularity and they get so popular that they land a big contract with a Nashville record company and for some reason everybody is perfectly comfortable with this phenomenon. This is what I like to refer to as ?Pat Green Syndrome?.

Rebel/Rock Country

Very liberal people are who you tend to find in this category. These artist just do whatever they feel like doing, and consequently there are not many of them, or at least not many of them that stay popular after their initial shock value wears off. They are usually independent and like letting it all hang out. A good example currently in the limelight is Gretchen Wilson. Others that haven?t quite reached her popularity level, but have been around for a while include Ray Wylie Hubbard and Todd Snider.

Sometimes the guys in this category derive quite a bit of their rebelness from incorporating rock into their music. Good examples of this are Robert Earl Keen and James McMurty (I highly recommend both of them).

Texas Country

This category has developed into somewhat of a music cult, and it stretches all over the United Sates. (Note, this last month there was a huge three day Texas music festival in Colorado). It?s popularity started off with the likes of Willie Nelson, Jerry Jeff Walker, and Gary P. Nunn. What really sent it off in recent years was the popularity of Robert Earl Keen, Cory Morrow, Pat Green, and Jack Ingram. It plays extremely well in frat houses across the Lone Star State. While the guys mentioned earlier have taken off in a different direction, new artists like Max Stalling, Mark David Manders, and Ed Burleson have started to take their place. If you ever watch this development, it?s easy to see that the Texas music industry is growing so fast that it will probably soon be just as big as Nashville?s.

Old Country

If you can sing the words to three or more Willie Nelson, George Jones, and Johnny Cash songs please come in. If you can sing along to Patsy Cline, Charlie Rich, and Hank Williams please take a seat. If you can croon all night with Bob Wills please let me get you a beer, I?m glad we met. Welcome to the old country category, sadly a lot of people find it boring here.

Real Old Country

Most people in this category know how to yodel. They?ve probably witnessed someone play the bones, if they do not already know how to play them themselves. The people in this category refer to each other as ?folks? and recognize that country?s roots derived from folk music. This category requires being able to enjoy sitting on a front porch sipping ice tea in the middle of the summer while some old man plays ?Streets of Laredo? on an old Gibson. Indulging in campfire banjo playing helps as well.

If you?re like me, you probably have your favorite category and then like some things out of each one. There?s not really any one way to define country music, and with it being an ever-changing industry there probably never will be. One thing that doesn?t change though, no matter which category, you can still dust of your boots and take just about any country song to the dancehall with you.

Sarah Francis

This article, written by Sarah Francis, was first published at MusicShopper.info – a great resource for music lovers. Providing information and resources about music shopping, it also has an extensive range of music reviews, music competitions and giveaways, and a popular discussion forum. It is also an important music reference source with a music website directory of more then 1,000 hand-picked sites listed. MusicShopper forum and newsletters subscribers are entered into monthly draws for Amazon voucher.

Hip Hop music is popular with today’s youth. The Hip Hop audience ranges in age from the very young to the seasoned at heart. The messages in the music are clear and often depict life in the real world. Most artist use their own life experiences to tell stories that reflect what their world is like. Hip Hop music is a venue that gives the artist an opportunity to tell it like it is. Many of today’s youth find that through the sounds and messages of Hip Hop they are able to see reflections of themselves and the world around them.

Although some of the messages conveyed by Hip Hop are viewed as negative, it must be understood that the lyrics in these songs are someone’s reality. Hip Hop artist sing about what they have seen and many of their personal experiences. Unfortunately, many of their experiences are not so pretty. Other Hip Hop songs carry a positive message and force the listener to think and dream beyond their current situation. Hip Hop music has taken America by a storm and it will continue to influence our youth. We must all these free expression and the growth of Hip Hop music because what we hear is relative to what’s going on in the world today.

GMP Records, Inc. http://www.godmadeitpossible4me.com also check out http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/deepcover

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I, Us and Them

David Gilmour sings the last line of ?Money? and the energy of the song dissolves to a shuffling swing? ?Away?away??

As the track fades, the question and answer calls between Gilmour?s guitar and vocal are joined by fragments from another conversation? ? I don?t know if I was really drunk at the time??

Meanwhile, on the crossfade, a new dawn of colour slowly materialises. Eventually, as a mass of suspensions and densely clustered notes clear, Rick Wright?s Hammond organ settles on the chord of D. The gentle swirl of the Leslie effect wraps around this new glow of consonance then, having waited patiently for long enough, the rest of the band enter to begin the blissfully slow and relaxed instrumental opening to ?Us and Them?.

—————————

This is a landmark moment on Dark Side Of The Moon. Not only does the beginning of ?Us and Them? provide the listener with some relief and respite after the rip-roaring guitar-and-drums feast of ?Money? but it also gracefully announces the arrival of a long-awaited object? Chord I of D major.

This is a significant structural moment as, from here on, throughout the rest of ?Us and Them?, ?Any Colour You Like?, ?Brain Damage? and ?Eclipse?, the music is all harmonically centred around the keynote of D. It marks the beginning of the end. Like seeing a ?welcome home? banner displayed somewhere before you?ve reached your destination.

But how do we know that chord I of D major is ?home? when we first hear it? Perhaps, to see how this happens, we need to take a look at the whole journey?

II and V

There are many wonderful and startling harmonic twists and turns on Dark Side Of The Moon but a great deal of the album?s convincing cohesive quality could perhaps be put down to the predominance of one chord progression in particular.

E minor to A to D (along with its other eleven transposed forms) happens to be one of the most conventional and popular chord progressions in the history of western tonal music. Often it will be used at the concluding moments of a section due to its stable, resolving quality. No surprise then that this very three-chord sequence, referred to by musical analysts as a II-V-I chord progression, is the one used repeatedly and to the same effect on Dark Side Of The Moon. However one statement of the sequence is particularly interesting.

?Breathe?(E minor) to ?Time? (A) to ?Us and Them? (D)? This long-term realisation of ?E minor to A to D? contributes to the overall sense of overall coherence. Spread out, as it is, to form the backbone of the entire album?s harmonic structure.

But why call it II-V-I? Well, as any musical analyst will tell you, if ?D? is to be our ‘chord I’ then a visit to the chords of ?E minor? and ?A? immediately prior to it can be seen respectively as a statement of ‘chord II’ (a triad based on the second note of the scale) and ‘chord V’ (based on the fifth) in D major. So there we have it in summary?II-V-I of D major. A softly spoken spell under the surface which embraces the whole of Dark Side Of The Moon and another magical way of convincing our ears of its apparent unity.

A full chordal analysis of the album, song by song, should serve as support to the claims made so far. Not only will it help to clarify the points about coherence due to one particular chord progression but it will serve to expose some other interesting points too about Pink Floyd?s economy with material and a fondness for simplicity behind the mystique and the magic.

The Whole Of The Moon

SPEAK TO ME

Heartbeats, ticks and clanks.
Fragments of speech about madness.
Clare Torry?s scream.

Surely we can?t start talking about chord progressions here at this early point, can we? Or CAN we? It so happens (amid all the heartbeats, talking and screaming) there is a note. A held note. The pitch of that encroaching helicopter-like drone is?B!!!

Pink Floyd, as we will see, are fond of preceding the new key of a song or section thereof with its dominant (or chord V). Unlikely as it may seem, this means of gravitiating to a new ?place? is already in evidence as the opening ?B? drone happens to be the dominant of the next keychord we hear?

BREATHE

E minor – A7 C – B minor – F – G – D7#9 – B/D#

Suffice to say, that opening sequence – E minor to A7 – is the true ?daddy? of sequences on Dark Side Of The Moon. It?s the album?s motif, as we?ll see. After being gloriously repeated more times than I?m willing to count, the hypnotic oscillation of E minor to A7 is only relieved by the second sequence ie. C – B minor – F – G – D7#9 – B/D#, which in contrast wanders unpredictably through a series of secondary dominants before resolving back on E minor. There?s another blissful repeat of the whole thing then the arrival of E minor for the last time marks the beginning of the next track?.

ON THE RUN

Pink Floyd?s clear purpose here is to clear the palette, abandon convention and explore another mode of expression using non-pitch oriented sounds. Harmony is not an issue here. Tension and release is brought about by all manner of effects and events which clash and conflict with each other within the sound collage. And to resolve that ?what else? But an explosion. Out of which, as the dust settles, we hear?.

TIME

Introduction:E – F# minor
Gilmour?s verse:F# minor – A – E – F# minor
Wright?s verse:D – A – D – A – D – C# minor – B minor – E7
Wright?s verse (last time):D – A – D -A – D – C# minor – B minor – F/B

Tickety-tock-a, tickety-tock? CLANG, BANG, etc? After the last several minutes of non-pitch oriented music our ears have been well and truly diverted from any sense of keynote left dormant from earlier. What brings us back to the path? A single, bold E? And so, we take up from where we left off at the end of ?Breathe?. Except things are certainly about to take a different turn.

That return of E sounds like an ominous new beginning rather than a reassuring return. It lingers, decays then is followed by an equally bold, single F sharp (a fresh keynote to a chord not yet heard on the album so far) that also lingers and decays. With each return to E then F sharp again, Rick Wright exposes more of the new harmony in his light, improvisatory tinkling on the keyboard and, as he does, the E turns out to be the keynote of E major. So subtle. Just a light sprinkle of E major in Rick Wright?s right hand part and our perception of the path forward has shifted. At last, a gravitation away from the key of E minor (chord II of our overall harmonic structure, remember!) last stated at the end of ?Breathe? which will ultimately take us to the next significant point in our long-term II-V-I realisation?A major?although not until the verse sung by Rick Wright.

So much else happens in this song (as with all the songs on the album!) but for the purpose of this analysis, let?s forward to the end? Only when Wright?s verse returns to end the song do we gravitiate away from A major again with dramatic harmonic effect. In fact, it?s perhaps the most intense moment in the harmony so far. That is, a chord of F with B in the bass during the line ?thought I?d something more to say? which leads us to a monumental sonic precipice. We lean over the edge?.and DOWN we land. Back on the opening chord of ?Breathe? again?.

BREATHE REPRISE

E minor – A7
C – B minor – F – G – D7#9 – B/D#

?Home, home again?.? The relief, after the hiatus of F/B at the end of the last song, is palpable. Here we are?home again on good old ?Eminor to A7? for another visit of the opening song to close the ?first act? of Dark Side Of The Moon. Yet, despite reaching this closing chapter, there is still the promise of a sting in the tail. More on that in a moment but first? Time to take a breather and summarise what has happened harmonically so far.

Mid-Session Summary

The chord progression – II-V-I – which serves as the backbone to Dark Side Of The Moon?s overall harmonic structure is well underway?. II is represented by the song ?Breathe? which is in the key of E minor (chord II of D major). V is represented by the song ?Time? which is in the key of A (chord V of D major). We still await the arrival of D?our chord I.

Even though a chord of D appears gloriously at the beginning of Rick Wright?s verse in ?Time??garnished as it is with flanged female choir, message-laden lyrics and the fresh sound of Rick?s lead vocal?we are yet to reach D (our ultimate chord I) as a keychord. Why not? Well, because this moment only constitutes a ?visit? to D. The chord that follows it, A, is clearly the home chord for the song (so the D before is actually chord IV of A major!). A firmer, resolutory D (as chord I of D major) will appear later, of course!

As well as this long-term album-spanning statement of a II-V-I progression, we have also had the beginnings of the II-V-I progression suggested on a more local level. The chief example being the ?E minor to A7? progression of ?Breathe? which imprints itself on the listener?s brain in readiness for a resolution on D that is yet to come. Another more sneaky suggestion of II-V-I, albeit in a different key, is used as a device in ?Time?? to get from Wright?s verse back to the ?F# minor – A – E – F# minor? sequence for Gilmour?s fantastic guitar solo. Note how B minor (on the line ?no one told you when to run..?) followed by E (on the line ?you missed the starting gun?) could have been followed by A to complete a II-V-I progression but teasingly it resolves on the relative minor, F sharp, instead.

And now, back to that sting in the tail at the end of ?Breathe Reprise??

To close the song, the C – Bminor – F – G – D7#9 – B/D# sequence does not resolve on E minor as it did first time at the end of ?Breathe?. Rather surprisingly (or crudely, some would say), from D7#9 to B/D# (which prepared our ear for the return of E minor both times in the earlier song) we land unpredictably at B minor. The band freeze in their tracks as if startled by the lack of preparation. The new ?surprise? key chord fades?

GREAT GIG IN THE SKY

Wright piano:B minor – F – B flat – F/A ?G minor – C7 – G minor – C7 ?F – B flat – E flat – C minor ?F – B flat – E flat – B flat ?? Torry vocal:G minor – C7 ?G minor/D – C#dim – F#7 – Bminor ?? Wright & Torry:B minor – F – B flat – F/A ?G minor – C7 – G minor C7

Rick Wright confirms the new harmony with his opening piano chord. But there are soon plenty of further surprises in the pipeline as Wright?s introduction creates a sublime diversion from our main harmonic path with a ?round the houses? series of secondary dominants. Carrying the ear to somewhere completely new and alien. And yet, this is not wholly unrelated to the whole design…

Note how there are realisations of new, transposed II-V-I progressions as miniature motifs of the big, main one (yet to be completed, of course!) during Wright?s piano introduction. First of all, G minor -? C7 – F. Secondly, C minor? – F – B flat. Both are good examples of how the II-V-I progression smoothly transports the listener from one musical corner to the next. Also, both exemplify Pink Floyd?s fondness for the progression itself on this album.

Other than that, note that the repeated G minor to C7 sequence which takes up most of ?Great Gig In The Sky? and serves as a platform for the main event – Clare Torry?s truly remarkable vocal solo – is a transposition of another prominent two-chord progression heard before on the album?namely, the repeated E minor to A7 sequence which takes up most of the song, ?Breathe?. Note also that, whereas that two-chord sequence in ?Breathe? isn?t yet followed by its third chord to complete a II-V-I progression (yet!), the transposition of that sequence as used in ?Great Gig In The Sky?, is ie. Gminor – C7 – F. This is a hint of what is to come surely.

Interesting to note further that, despite featuring Gminor? – C7 – F somewhere as a II-V-I progression, ?Great Gig In The Sky? ultimately ends on G minor to bring the song?s recurring two chord oscillation to rest and Side One of the album to a close. This is a transposition of what happens at the end of ?Breathe? where, after so many repeats of E minor to A7, matters comes to rest on E minor.

So much recycling going on here? ?Breathe? and?Great Gig In The Sky? may seem like two very different songs but harmonically there is so much in the latter that is recycled from the former (albeit in transposed form) which again helps to form connections and cross-references between distant points on Dark Side Of The Moon. As well as that, there is no doubt about how effectively this recycling pays off in the hands of Pink Floyd. So much drama comes from the later visits as here in ?Great Gig In The Sky?.

So, Side One ends. Things are about to get a lot simpler.

MONEY

Verse:Bminor Turnaround:F#minor – Eminor – Bminor

If Dark Side Of The Moon had been composed years later when the music would not have to be divided between Side One and Side Two of a vinyl long-player, then the probability is that Pink Floyd may have done something different here harmonically to smooth things over. G minor, the last chord heard at the end of Side One, is a world away from the B minor which opens the first track of Side Two. Nothing inherently wrong with that. Just that it clearly marks a division of sorts due to the limitations of the format for which it was recorded.

Anyway, just as ?Great Gig In The Sky? constitutes a diversion from the main harmonic path, ?Money? delays the return to the main road a little longer with its ?blues in B minor?flavour. With regard to harmonic progression, there really isn?t much else to add to that. It?s a monster of a track. Rip-snorting guitar solos, thundering drums, great bassline? But, for the sake of this analysis, we can ?fast forward? to the end where something very significant happens?.

US AND THEM

Main sequence:D – D6 – Dminor#7 – G/D
Bridge:Bminor – G – C

As described at the beginning of the article, this is a sublime moment on the album where we suddenly get taken ?home? harmonically with the arrival of chord I of D major.

Against the fading, retreating B minor of ?Money?, Rick Wright superimposes the upper end of a suspended dominant seven without its keynote, A. Like a clearing of mist, the ?home? chord of D emerges. A truly magical transition and one which answers all questions asked by the use of harmony so far on the album. Here is the album?s chord I. And, as if to celebrate and make the most of it, the D remains at the foot of the texture throughout most of the song while the upper harmony notes change. The melancholy effect of the Dminor#7 chord enables Rick Wright and Dick Parry to add some delightful turns during their solo. For all its dynamism and power, the bridge sequence – B minor to G to C – is merely a sidestep. D is ?home? from here on and the end is in sight?

ANY COLOUR YOU LIKE

Dminor – G7
Bflat – Aminor – Eflat – F – C7#9 – A/C#

Yet again, this shows Pink Floyd?s fondness for revisiting and recycling earlier material. Yet again, it?s done creatively. This time as an instrumental featuring an enthusiastic exchange of solos between guitar and keyboards over several repeats of D minor to G7 (another transposition of the E minor to A7 sequence from ?Breathe?).

Unlike earlier transpositions, this two-chord oscillation somehow does not suggest the beginnings of another II-V-I progression. The D minor is simply prolonging the keynote of D as our ?home?. We feel at rest harmonically. And yet?the concluding sequence to the song (again a transposition of the second sequence from ?Breathe?) resolves this time surprisingly in the major. ?That is, the opening D major of the next song.

BRAIN DAMAGE

Verse, part one:D – G7
Verse, part two:D – E/D – A7 – D (D7 when going to Chorus)
Chorus:G – A – C – G
Bridge:G – Bminor – Eminor – A

We may have stayed at ?home? with the prolongation of D but here?s another twist. The first part of the verse – D to G7 -? is yet another transposition of ?Breathe? but in the major key!

Note how the second part of the verse confirms our global II-V-I sequence for the album in true form and at a local level with the sequence of E/D (that?s E with D in the bass) to A7 to D. Most significant of all though, to end the song we hear a final, confirmatory statement of the II-V-I progression which (as I?ve said often enough now!) is the backbone to the whole thing. As a fitting conclusion to the album, this track links with the next via E minor to A to?..

ECLIPSE

D – D7/C – Bflat – A7

Celebrating our ?home? chord of D for one final time, this circular sequence draws Dark Side Of The Moon to a close with all the stateliness and pomp that such a huge journey deserves. Finishing on (what else?) a final, resounding D.

Vinyl Thoughts

So there is more contributing to our sense of Dark Side Of The Moon?s coherence than just the recurrence of ideas such as heartbeats, loops, spoken word fragments, lyrics about madness and mortality etc.etc?. And it arguably comes down to one of the most tried and tested sequences in western music. Yet this is done without us taking much notice and across such a long span of time.

Eagle-eyed readers may have noted how the four chord progression which straddles the final moments of ?Brain Damage? and the beginning of ?Eclipse? – namely, B minor to E minor to A to D – matches the progression from ?Speak To Me? to ?Breathe? to ?Time? to ?Us and Them? if we include the B of the opening helicopter drone! So maybe the signature chord progression was VI-V-II-I all along! I?ll let you argue that one out amongst yourselves?.

To finish, I want to draw attention to how the long-term harmonic structure of Dark Side Of The Moon organises the shape of the album into neat symmetrical proportions. ?Breathe? and ?Breathe Reprise? bookend the opening sequence of songs where our chords II and V dominate. In turn, this forms a bookend balanced by another at the other end of the album where the latter four songs of the album are centred round the harmonic keynote of D (chord I). Between these two ?song suites? seemingly bound as they are by harmonic relationships, ?Great Gig In The Sky? and ?Money?? function as a spectacular interlude to the process.

Creating bookends to an album was something that seemed to be a signature trait of the 70s Pink Floyd from here on? Wish You Were Here of course was bookended by ?Shine On You Crazy Diamond Parts 1- 5? and ?Shine On You Crazy Diamond Parts 6-9?. Animals was bookended by ?Pigs On The Wing 1? and ?Pigs On The Wing 2?. Something even more ingenious, of course, was used on The Wall to create that sense of departure and return. That is, by making the beginning of Side One follow on from the end of Side Four so that ?this? would be where ?we came in??.

Beat that for coherence!

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?2006 David Sanderson

Dave Sanderson is a musician/songwriter/teacher with his own website promoting his latest album ‘Songbook’. For more details visit http://www.flowerbedmusic.com.

Hip Hop music is popular with today’s youth. The Hip Hop audience ranges in age from the very young to the seasoned at heart. The messages in the music are clear and often depict life in the real world. Most artist use their own life experiences to tell stories that reflect what their world is like. Hip Hop music is a venue that gives the artist an opportunity to tell it like it is. Many of today’s youth find that through the sounds and messages of Hip Hop they are able to see reflections of themselves and the world around them.

Although some of the messages conveyed by Hip Hop are viewed as negative, it must be understood that the lyrics in these songs are someone’s reality. Hip Hop artist sing about what they have seen and many of their personal experiences. Unfortunately, many of their experiences are not so pretty. Other Hip Hop songs carry a positive message and force the listener to think and dream beyond their current situation. Hip Hop music has taken America by a storm and it will continue to influence our youth. We must all these free expression and the growth of Hip Hop music because what we hear is relative to what’s going on in the world today.

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More articles at database for articles

Some of you may remember a book titled Drawing on the Right-Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards.

In this book, Betty Edwards tried to teach you how to see differently. She reasoned that once you could look at something with the eyes of an artist, you would be able to create like an artist. A simple idea, yet one that has helped many draw.

I wondered how this might also apply to music. Music is, at it’s best, a right-brain activity. That is, the thinking left hemisphere is dormant while the intuitive right side is engaged in creative processes.

So how then can we play piano on the right-side of the brain? The answer has to do with trusting ourselves. Once we sit down to play, we must allow ourselves the freedom to play ANYTHING that comes to the fore. If that anything is doodling and making nonsense noises, then that is what we must do.

Once we allow ourselves the freedom to play anything, we are sending a message to the creative right hemisphere. We are saying, OK, I’m giving in to whatever. I’ll just play what I want. Now, once you can do this, PLAYING AROUND WITH CHORDS BECOMES AN EASY MATTER because you have given yourself permission to mess up.

Edward Weiss is a pianist/composer and webmaster of Quiescence Music’s online piano lessons. He has been helping students learn how to play piano in the New Age style for over 14 years and works with students in private, in groups, and now over the internet. Stop by now at http://www.quiescencemusic.com/pianolessons.html for a FREE piano lesson!