Piano lessons for beginners used to require a teacher to come to your home, or you to theirs. But technology is changing all of that and the internet has made it possible to learn from home almost completely on your own. This article will look at the top 3 reasons to give piano lessons online a try.

1. Less Expensive: Taking piano lessons the traditional way can cost a lot. And although there are many benefits to studying the piano this way, it isn’t the only way available to do so anymore. You could easily spend $15 or more for a half hour lesson every week. This can add up to over $700 per year, and if you take lessons outside of the home you also have to factor in gas mileage. Using the internet to learn is a much less expensive way to learn.

2. Study at Your Own Pace: Choosing to learn online piano lessons via software allows you to study at your own pace. You can skip ahead to future lessons or slow everything down if you wish. A piano teacher won’t be able to control you and decide whether or not you are ready for a certain piece of music.

3. Choose Your Particular Interests: Unlike traditional piano lessons, where you have to play the pieces that are given to you by your instructor, you have much greater freedom to choose your particular interests with online piano lessons. While classical music plays an important role in learning technical skills and mastering theory, it can sometimes be pretty boring and will motivate you less to practice than if you get to play something you really want to play.

This article discussed 3 reasons to try piano lessons online. Choosing this way to study the piano is less expensive, allows you to study at your own pace and pick the kinds of pieces you really want to play.

Although it is a new way of learning a treasured instrument; the same principles exist for online instruction as they do for the traditional way of taking piano lessons. Don’t be afraid to give this method a try and decide if it will work for you.

Whether the lessons are for yourself or your child, online piano lessons for beginners is a fairly new way of learning…

Want to learn more?

Lily Adams, a mother of two and web entrepreneur has created a helpful meeting place for parents. Her website, ParentMeltingPot.com, has more information regarding free piano lessons for beginners as well as many other parent problems.

Acoustic music is one of the most well-received kinds of contemporary music these days. After all, how can you ever ignore a person who seems to be baring his/her soul with an almost-a-capella rendition of a particular song? There’s no other instrument than can go with his/her voice than an acoustic guitar.

There are a lot of people who believe that blues acoustic playing is really easy. Usually, the songs played are slow, which can give them ample time to position their fingers at the right keys. They also don’t have to think about complementing other sounds that may com from the drums or the keyboards. But then again, there’s also plenty of room of mistake, and one wrong move can eventually destroy the entire presentation.

Here are 4 basic tips when it comes to playing acoustic guitar:

1. Match your height with your guitar. One of the most important things in acoustic blues guitar playing is that you have to be extremely comfortable with it. If you have a constant gig, then you’re going to be utilizing the instrument the whole time. You should have no reason to feel sore for carrying it all over your shoulder. Hence, make sure that you pick a guitar that’s the right size for you. This will also help you reach out to the keys more easily.

2. Adjust the strings to the proper pitch of the song. It’s highly essential that you truly have an ear for music. This will help you determine if the music requires a low or high pitch. Depending on the real pitch of the song, you need to adjust the tuning pegs of your acoustic guitar accordingly. When you tighten the strings, you are in for a high pitch. Conversely, a low pitch is produced if you’re going to loosen the guitar strings.

3. Start with standard tuning first. This is considered the default mode in acoustic guitar and thus real easy. If you’re a beginner, you better start with standard tuning before you decide to play on some more complicated notes. You simply need to match the tune of your guitar to the pitch of the song. All six strings should be compatible with the sound produced by the singer.

4. Use a pick. You can always make use of your fingers, but if they get burned out for long playing moments, you will surely get distracted, and you won’t be able to play as better as before. Moreover, fingers don’t really create a much louder sound, which you may need when you’re playing in a large crowd. The best solution to this is to use a pick.

Are you harnessing your blues guitar to its fullest potential? Jam with a professional live band with blues backing tracks at 50 Blues and start improvising. The #1 Resource for Professional Blues Guitar Backing Tracks

categories: blues guitar,guitar,blues musician,blues guitarist,blues music,guitar,music,arts

First the bad news: Chinese Democracy is not the heavy metal sonic assault suggested by the early release of the title track. On the other hand, it very well may be the best album of the year.

After a rock band becomes a major success, they’re really in a ‘no win’ position. If they try to break new artistic ground, exploring different sounds or influences, they’ll invariably hear complaints that they were better the way they ‘used to be’. If they keep doing things the same way, a band risks losing any sort of artistic relevance and becoming a ‘nostalgia act’. KISS is a good example–a lot of purists hated it when they took off their makeup and became another 80’s ‘hair metal’ band, but they deserved respect for doing something different and trying to forge a new artistic path. On the other hand, there’s KISS now: Gene Simmons eventually made the calculated, slightly cynical decision that commerce trumped art. Hes now giving fans the best representation of KISS that their nostalgic desires long for”to the extent of dressing a new guitarist and drummer up like Ace Frehley and Peter Criss. Not exactly a high water mark in artistic creativity, but a highly lucrative enterprise that reportedly nets Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley a cool half million bucks per concert.

Axl Rose could have taken the same route with Guns n Roses. All he needed to do was patch things up with former lead guitarist Slash and the two of them and whatever supporting players they recruited could have toured forever playing the old songs in the old way and make a ton of money along the way. To some extent, Slash has chosen this route with his band Velvet Revolver. They play similar blues based hard rock to vintage GnR, and brought in former Stone Temple Pilots vocalist Scott Weiland on vocals (who sounded almost just like Axl on a number of the early STP songs) Never mind the fact that everything Velvet Revolver has ever recorded sounds the same, or that the band members are all well in their 40s and a little old to be doing the rock n roll gypsy routine.

Axl refused to play the nostalgia game. Hes a very talented guy, but he doesn’t have much of a knack for self promotion or media spin. While he worked on putting together a new version of the band and recording Chinese Democracy he let a variety of interests”not the least of which were his old bandmates”control the media spin. For that reason, there are plenty of people including media and critics that have predisposed to hating this album before it was released or even having heard any of it.

In many ways, its reminiscent of the Use Your Illusion releases in its depth and complexity. Many albums are fairly straightforward and are easy to figure out with a couple of listens”this song rocks, this is the power ballad, this song is filler and so forth. Others evolve and change with repeated listening”different songs become your favorites, you notice new things about ones you thought you knew well and most significantly songs that you glossed over the first time around start to grow on you.

On Chinese Democracy that’s definitely the case”the best example being the song Better. It doesn’t really impress on first listen, but quickly becomes a favorite. Axl claims that he doesn’t try to write hit singles and that’s probably the case, but in addition to being an impressive tour de force for Robin Finck on guitar it may be the catchiest pop song since The Killers first album.

One of the real triumphs of Chinese Democracy is the difficulty that a listener has in pigeonholing the songs. There’s definitely a lot of the piano based material first heard on the ‘Use Your Illusion’ releases but overall its evident that the band is breaking entirely new musical ground and even they don’t really know where they’ll end up. It’s very unpredictable and can be hard for a long time fan to wrap their head around, but once that happens its a very exciting sound.

The only real liability of ‘Chinese Democracy’ is that a few songs have been watered down by overproduction”biggest case in point Madagascar which the band has been playing live for the better part of this decade. The album version doesn’t quite have the edge or raw emotion that was on display when played live.

That’s a minor beef, however, about what is overall an amazing album. If you’re one of those who’ve bought into all of the anti-Axl media hype the best suggestion I can make is to try and put aside all of your prejudices, preconceptions, and misgivings and just listen to Chinese Democracy. There’s nothing nostalgic about it, just the sound of a great band breaking new ground.

David Glisan is heavy metal editor for The Savage Science, a website covering both MMA fights and heavy metal music. He’s an avid MMA and boxing enthusiast as well, and reportsUFC news for several mainstream sports broadcasts and websites. He’s studied judo since childhood and has earned the rank of black belt.