Asheville Music Lessons

Our brain is the most complex part of our bodies, the mysteries of how it works and stores information are still being researched and unraveled. I’ve spent some time in recent months thinking about ways to approach memorizing information. Most of the better approaches are along the lines of “Spaced Repetition” which essentially means you see the information at regular intervals until it’s well known and then you see it less frequently.

Let’s say I asked you to memorize two phone numbers. One you would not use for 10 years, the other you would use daily as part of your work. After five months which one do you think you will know better?

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Popularity: 17% [?]

Not too long ago I had someone mention the Christopher Norton Connections series. It’s more Jazz and popular oriented than some methods and is not aimed at the absolute beginner (Very Advanced Grade One is what the description over at Sheet Music Plus reads. It looks like an interesting series and I’m placing it here as a reminder to myself to look into it a bit further.

Popularity: 17% [?]

I’ve recently been looking at CD duplication possibilities and found a pretty good deal (and well reviewed service) over at cdpostershop.com. It looks like just under $2 a cd (in jewel case/ with inserts) for a minimum of 50 discs. There are a lot of sites out there offering similar offers, this is one of the shortest runs I’ve seen advertised though.

Popularity: 15% [?]

Just wanted to post a quick mention of a relative newcomer to the Asheville music supply scene… Soli Classica. Karen Sams runs the store and will help you find just what it is you’re looking for. She is a piano instructor and has a good knowledge of the repertoire as well as familiarity with many of the method series. Whether you’re looking for classical piano or voice, strings, woodwind or brass music I think she will have most anything you can think to look for. They’re located on Hendersonville Road in the Fugazy center (just south of where the Blue Ridge Parkway crosses over Hendersonville Rd.

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Popularity: 17% [?]

You may see some fluctuations in the posting schedule for this site. One of the things I’m considering is moving to every other week posts to allow more time for work on the pages for this site. So, if you see an “empty” week here, it’s not necessarily the start of a long absence, but just an every other week routine starting.

Popularity: 7% [?]

There is really a very short list of golden rules when it comes to audio recording. Following those rules though can help you make the best out of your recording opportunities. Todays recording tip is related to minimizing background noise in your recordings. The world is a noisy place and not all of us are fortunate enough to have sound proofed isolation booths. So how can you get a good recording with the least possible noise?

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Popularity: 7% [?]

UPDATE – Price drop to $8500 to sell this before year end!

I received a note this evening from Quincy Foil with a Piano for Sale. I offered to post it here to help out. Here are the details. (Pictures follow)

I’m selling this piano below to benefit The Arts Experience -
www.ArtsExperience.org a nonprofit arts organization that I founded. Let me
know if you or anyone you know may be interested. Asking price $9500 now $8500

Thanks – Quincy 704.305.3535.

Weber WG-51 5′1″ c1998

Like New – Beautiful condition, great action, no repairs needed, comes with
original bench.

Made by Young Chang (Korea), the Weber is among the highest quality pianos
today. With Renner (German) actions, tapered soundboards, and channeled
bridges, Weber can surpass the Japanese manufacturers in quality of
construction and response. Weber is a very high quality, new Asian piano.

Serious inquiries only. Buyer responsible for delivery.

Soundboard and Strings

Full View of Piano for Sale

Close up of Piano Keyboard

Beatiful Instrument! (Obviously I haven’t heard it, but it looks fantastic!)

Popularity: 16% [?]

Music Education, is it equivalent to Language Education? I’ve spent the last several years improving my Spanish and studying languages is somewhat of a hobby of mine (yes… yet another…) I’ve studied Spanish, French and German now although currently my Spanish is by far the best. But what similarities are there between learning music and learning a language? Both are used for communication, with both spoken words and musical notes the WAY something is presented can change it’s meaning. One of the things I see people work with is trying to memorize and become fluent in the note names. Identifying notes on the staff with keys on the piano is essential, much like knowing the meaning of words is essential to verbal language.

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Popularity: 7% [?]

Just had to put this up for any guitar player that’s struggled to get “just” the right sound out of the first chord of the Beatles Hard Day’s Night… A Math professor has cracked the puzzle and found out that it wasn’t JUST the 12 string guitar from George Harrison… Read a bit about it here.

Popularity: 7% [?]

I recently had a student ask for a suggestion for software to take a piece of music and transpose it. The suggestion that I’ve run across is Finale’s Printmusic. It’s $99 and has a demo version. It allows the scanning of music and then you can transpose to other keys. It’s available for Mac or Windows. (I’m able to run Finale Allegro under Linux using wine so it may even be worth a try for linux users to get the demo and see if it can run under wine.)

If anyone else has other suggestions than the Finale line of software go ahead and chime in… this one’s open for comments.

Popularity: 6% [?]