Christopher Sutton's SonicTruths Stream

Music is a universal language and every pupil should have the opportunity to become fluent. A high-quality music education should provide all pupils with the opportunity to sing and to learn a musical instrument. Pupils should leave school with an appreciation of how music is composed and performed, allowing them to listen with discrimination and judgement to the best in the musical canon.

via jsavage.org.uk

The day that I went to my first rehearsal was the day that my life changed. I’m not exaggerating. I discovered that every single note you sing is not only the foundation of the song, but also crucial towards the success of its sound. An A Cappella group is completely reliant on you, and you on it. Tonality-wise and emotionally, if one person falls down, everyone is going to fall down. You simply have to be strong enough – and in both respects - to pull yourselves back up.

So what can you do to get a taste of what I am attempting to portray? I would absolutely advise anyone who has a love of music and the voice to try forming an A Cappella group and reap in the rewards. Find an arranger, ask them to write you something, just see what happens. The sound of six voices (in Vive’s case) that blend together to reach a place that is only attainable if you are all completely in the zone is unlike any other. It gives me a high, an adrenaline rush, an extreme sensation of pleasure which no other form of music has managed to deliver.

via londonjazz.blogspot.co.uk

The commitment of time [for tweeting etc.] is to the bigger picture of being determined to communicate with people, not just relying on an existing format and tradition and the institutions to do that for you, it's to take it into your own hands and be determined to break those barriers a little bit. It's something that the public want and re looking for now, a closer and more personal connection with the people they are watching play.

And I'm more than happy to do that, because I feel what we do doesn't exist without those people.

Listen to the rest of the interview here

via classicfm.com

Like James Rhodes, Nicola Benedetti does a great job of connecting the traditional world of classical music with the modern, fan-engaging world of music creation.

Loud noises attract our attention and these days adverts and brands are screaming at us from every angle to take notice. Consumers are overloaded, so it’s time to look at some slightly more cunning ways to get the attention of the public and get your message out there using the power of audio.

via ithacaaudio.com

Why can’t we have nice things — by which I mean why can’t we just, like, pay for music somehow and have it forever, rather than forever fretting about what we put in each walled garden? Really, what we need is “one big database,” or some other solution for tying music to people regardless of service or device.

If this gets figured out, here’s what it might look like for music fans:

1. Buy a song, like it, or collect it in a subscription-type environment.

2. Access the file, preference, or stream anywhere, forever, manually or through APIs.

3. That’s it.

Would you buy, like, and collect more music in a world like that? I know I would.

via evolver.fm

Eliot continues to push "one big database" of music ownership - and I think I agree. That was always the one silver lining of DRM, that it suggested you as a person owned some rights to the media, and the bits were just a representation of that. Now we're in a weird limbo where sometimes music is treated as files you own, and sometimes the right to stream it, and never actually in a flexible or enabling way.

This week, the usually excellent Hypebot published a post by Kyle Bylin called  Music Discovery: The Path to Digital Failure. In this post, Kyle takes issue with a recent Billboard article about how music discovery is one of the key areas in the new music business.  Kyle pulls no punches. He says “Music Discovery is a lie that is never going to come true”.  His argument is threefold:

via musicmachinery.com

The Joe Smith Collection at the Library of Congress

More than 25 years ago, retired music executive Joe Smith accomplished a Herculean feat—he got more than 200 celebrated singers, musicians and industry icons to talk about their lives, music, experiences and contemporaries. In 2012 Smith donated this treasure trove of unedited sound recordings to the nation’s library.

The Joe Smith Collection contains over 225 recordings of noted artists and executives and is a veritable who’s who in the music industry. They include Artie Shaw, Woody Herman, Ray Charles, Barbra Streisand, Little Richard, Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Elton John, Paul Simon, David Bowie, Billy Joel, Sting, Tony Bennett, Joan Baez, James Taylor, Dick Clark, Tina Turner, Tom Jones, B.B. King, Quincy Jones, David Geffen, Mickey Hart, Harry Belafonte...more

(via Pitchfork and weallwantsomeone.org)

I am late to the party, but this Atoms For Peace project seems pretty exciting. Listen to the first single, "Default", above. Heard about this on The Current yesterday.

Another wonderful app from this weekend's Music Hack Day, lalalalalala auto-creates singing artist images in sync with lyrics:

Johnny Cash Has Been Everywhere (Man)!

  by Iain Mullan at Music Hack Day London 2012

Easily one of my favourite hacks from the hack day, this demo put a massive grin on my face and had me cracking up.

For Hallowe’en, bum-loving popstrel Kate Nash, Emmy the Great and some of their friends took over a screen in the Hackney Picture House for a top-to-bottom performance of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer musical episode, Once More with Feeling.

And you missed it.

Thankfully, quite a lot of the show was filmed and put online.

via bleedingcool.com

One of my favourite artists (Emmy the Great). Performing my favourite TV show's best ever episode (BtVS Once More With Feeling). In my city. Last night.

I cannot tell you how upset I am that I missed this.

Clearly I am signed up to all the wrong mailing lists and have all the wrong friends.