Posts Tagged Music

Buttwinick Musical Services Update ~ Nov 2011

Mar 12

Posted by Marty Buttwinick in Music and Life | No Comments


Greetings!

As 2011 comes to an end, activity is activated and production is purposeful!

I hope all is well with you, and here is an update from my zones of creation:

Composing

 

I’ve finished mixing some live music with Richard Robinson and have released four tunes! I should have the next project completed in a month or so. We completed a funk ballad, swing tune, rock fusion piece, Latin piece and a few others. I’m very excited about this! The music is posted at my music, and there is more of my music here as well. :-)

 

 

Teaching

My student’s are winning like crazy. (Sometimes ya have to brag…) My personalized curriculum continues to expand, and every lesson is really fun. One student is recording some guitar & vocal tracks, another is learning classical bass, a piano student went from focusing on reading to grooving and playing blues while an alto sax is being assaulted by another! You can see a list of current students here, success stories here, and more about what I do here.

Also, anyone you know who is bogged with their current musical studies or wants to start some enhancement yet doesn’t know what, should click here. I’m a good trouble shooter/consultant and this page will tell you more about it.

And now is a good time to check out my Holiday Gift Packages! Music lessons make great gifts! You can get them for someone else, or have someone else get them for you!

 

Musicians’ How-To Series

Book publishing continues to expand. We recently developed a new customer who purchased all 15 titles and is getting ready for his band consultations.

And what is this about? Read on…

“There is more to being a musician than fingering notes on an instrument. There are the subtleties of group interaction, musicianship, repertoire, the business side (if you are a professional), and many additional subjects.

The Musicians’ How-To Series consists of short- to medium-length e-books about a variety of music-related topics. This series provides musicians and singers with supplemental information that for the most part isn’t taught in schools and might or might not be learned on one’s own or from a private instructor. Much of this information has never before been in print.They are designed to throw in your bag or instrument case, take to your gig, rehearsal or jam, and PUT TO USE!”

 

That’s all folks!

Well, there’s always more: gigging, new books, blogs, a regular rock-band-teaching gig I have, copywork, etc. But the above are the main points I wanted to tell you about.

So I did.

And thank you for reading this!

Let me know if there is anything I can help you with. OK?

Marty B.

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Marty Buttwinick
(818) 242-7551
http://buttwinickmusic.com
http://musicianshowtoseries.com

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Great Jazz Quotes

May 7

Posted by Marty Buttwinick in Music Quotes | 1 Comment

 

 

“Some days you get up and put the horn to your chops and it sounds pretty good and you win. Some days you try and nothing works and the horn wins. This goes on and on and then you die and the horn wins.”
Dizzy Gillespie

 

“Music is my mistress, and she plays second fiddle to no one.”
Duke Ellington

 

“Jazz is the only music in which the same note can be played night after night but differently each time.”
Ornette Coleman

 

“A great teacher is one who realizes that he himself is also a student and whose goal is not dictate the answers, but to stimulate his students creativity enough so that they go out and find the answers themselves.”
Herbie Hancock

 

“The bottom line of any country is, what did we contribute to the world? We contributed Louis Armstrong.”
Tony Bennett

 

 

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Different Awarenesses While Playing Music

Apr 10

Posted by Marty Buttwinick in Playing Music | No Comments

 

In addition to learning the mechanics of playing an instrument, here are some various points of awareness one develops, or not, as musical skill and playing experience evolves. This is not in an exact order, as people develop however they do, nor is it every possible awareness: it’s just a bit of an overview. A person could stop at any point, have strengths and weakness along the way or continue to the highest level.

  • Learning the mechanics of the instrument. (Technique)
  • Learning the most basic theory of the music involved, e.g., what the note names on the instrument are called, what a chord is.
  • Establishing ear training, recognizing sounds, of what one is playing and hearing. (This can occur at any time.) This brings about duplication and understand.
  • Stabilizing a balance between technique, theory and ear recognition.
  • Creating music: strumming a chord, improvising, jamming, playing along with the instructor and other musicians.
  • Playing songs and/or pieces, which can begin at any point.
  • Discovering what is fun or not.
  • A further balance and enhancement of technique, theory and ear recognition.
  • Songwriting, if that is a direction.
  • Basic composition, if that is a direction.
  • Self discovery of style, creativeness or lack of, and interests.
  • Development of personal taste and musical preferences.
  • More writing and creation if those are a direction.
  • Learning more songs and/or pieces.
  • Playing with others.
  • Getting used to playing with others and getting over any introversion and embarrassment. (Not everyone has these, though most do to a certain extant. Some people are just plain bold from the start! I could tell you some amazing stories from workshops I’ve run throughout the years about this topic!)

If one continues, various levels applying to solo playing or playing with groups are:

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Glossary of Musical Terms

Mar 26

Posted by Marty Buttwinick in Learning Music | No Comments

Check out my new Glossary of Musical Terms!

It is an expanding list of musical and music-business related terms. It has brief, yet concise definitions of important words. Not everything will be here as we already have dictionaries for those terms.

There are often many definitions for a word and I will mainly list a musically-oriented, simple definition or two for each one. Sometimes simple is good! (As time goes on I will be adding more involved and more in-depth definitions that you can access by clicking on words that are hyper-linked.)

The main focus is musical terms that are commonly mis-understood, or should be known by anyone playing or studying music.

I just started this project in March or 2010 and it will be expanding over the next few months. If there is anything you need a definition for let me know.

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Prodigy Boy Playing Spain in a Jazz Club

Jan 27

Posted by Marty Buttwinick in Playing Music | No Comments

His name is Gadi Lehavi and he is amazing!! He plays “Spain,” and plays so well it’s almost unreal. But here he is, so watch and listen and be blown away! (Who was this guy? )

 

 

 

 

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Control versus Force While Practicing Music

Jan 23

Posted by Marty Buttwinick in Practicing an Instrument | 3 Comments

 

More often than not, my students practice too fast. I have an article about finding the “correct” speed in which to practice something, but here is an often missed point of view.

When you play too fast, you’ll end up using force instead of control. This defeats the whole purpose of practicing. Using force creates tension. Repeating something while using force creates tight muscles, which creates more tight muscles and then even more tight muscles. There are various “tension techniques,” but even then you need control and not force. You can learn certain things by using force, but that tends to take a long time and become a robotic-like motion rather than something totally under your control.

Check it out when you next practice something. Are you using control or force?

 

Marty B.
http://buttwinickmusic.com

 

 

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Favorite Music Quote #9

Dec 30

Posted by Marty Buttwinick in Music Quotes | No Comments

Plato

 

“Music and rhythm find their way into the secret places of the soul.”

Plato

 

 

Quote provided by the awesome singer, Tricia Kelly, with the Jeannie Deva Voice Studios in Hollywood. I played a gig with her a little while ago and she rocked!

 

 

 

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Pro Musicians’ Tips #2 of 4: Cords, Earplugs & Gloves!

Oct 12

Posted by Marty Buttwinick in Playing Music | 1 Comment

 

As a supplement to the large bodies of valuable information available, these lists of “Pro Musicians’ Tip” has been compiled from years of personal experience, observing others and by personal survey of about a dozen working professionals spanning all echelons of the business from local clubs to major-venue players and stage hands. In my book, How To Make A Living as a Musician, these were listed as appendix material, called “Miscellaneous Tips & Advices.” These tips represent dues well paid over many, many, years. Though this is a hefty list, there are hundreds of other tips around to be discovered. Use them to enhance your prosperity as a musician!
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