Friends are usually the best people to make great music with. The founders of Techno, Juan Atkins, Kevin Saunderson, and Derrick May started as good friends in school. They were further bonded together as they were the only African-American kids in school during that time.

Their after school hang-outs was an extension of their creative side. During their spare time, they would listen to Bootsy and Yellow Magic Orchestra in the dark. According to Derrick May, they “…never took it as just entertainment, we took it as a serious philosophy.”

These guys went on to create Techno. When they grew up they got together and called themselves the Belleville Three. The rest is history.

What’s a futurist? According to all-mighty Wikipedia, it’s “...the practice and art of postulating possible, probable, and preferable futures.” in short, it’s like predicting the future based on what happened in the past and what’s happening in the present. Mind you this is a complicated subject; but what does this have to do with Techno Music?

One of the founders of Techno, Juan Atkins was inspired by the books of author and futurist, Alvin Toffler. From his book, Future Shock, also came the terms, “cybotron” (Atkins’ first group) and “metroplex” (Atkins’ label).

So you guys out there, read your books: you never know how it’ll inspire you to create music.

So, you want to write your own music huh? Here are some tips to help you turn it on!

First and foremost, think about your audience. Who would they be? Would they be able to relate to your music? You must aim to connect with them emotionally, and you could do this by many ways: powerful lyrics, evocative music, catchy tunes, skilled use of instruments, and many others. In order to do just that, you must practice your technical and artistic skills and keep them at their toes by doing something new every now and then.

Seek inspiration, it’s all around you and deep within you. Listen to others’ songs and learn from them. Stop comparing yourself with other songwriters and create your own style.

to be continued…

Appearing in the western parts of London, the genre is also referred to as West London, mainly because Goya Music’s offices were in London’s Ladbroke Grove, W11, as were most of the participating artists studios.  Broken beat is an electronic music genre first appearing at the end of the 20th century and pioneered by Goya Music Distribution

Have you heard that music is used for therapy? Yup, you heard it right. It is currently an established health service comparable to physical therapy. And not only does it raise IQ of kids and keeps the party spirit going, but it also develops motor, social and cognitive skills, self-awareness, and spirituality as well! And oh…it is also used for pain relief and stress reduction and produces good ‘vibes’ and warm, fuzzy feelings.

Music therapy is a nice thing, it is used in developmental work with individuals with special needs, songwriting and listening in reminiscence/orientation work with the elderly, processing and relaxation work, and rhythmic entrainment for physical rehabilitation in stroke victims. Next time you turn on your mp3s, you can be sure you’re already having a new kind of therapy.

The internet has birthed to great changes in music experience, because of increase choice and access to songs. YouTube has provided an opportunity for amateur and professional musicians to post their music videos for the public to enjoy. MySpace has bridged the gap between musician to fellow musician, facilitating the distribution of songs among many. Also, there are sites that allow download of songs at a fee, or sometimes even for free. Which is good for listeners but very bad for the producers! For me, I think that they would have to revise a lot of things to keep up with the changes, or else, music would be entangled in a net spawned by the internet.

Prime minister Tony Blair has championed e-government and launched several multimillion-pound IT projects.   The ID card bill, whose essential element relies on disparate technologies such as biometrics and databases working perfectly together, has absorbed much of this parliament’s time Understanding technology – information technology at least – would be close to MPs’ hearts

Initially, a contraction of the term discotheque, discos sprung up as a movement in the mid-70’s in response to a number of factors. And as discos grew in popularity, the DJs began to exert more influence in the shaping of popular taste.

Disco was the pop music of the mid-1970s.

Reference:
Keyboard Magazine Vol. 21, No.7 (issue #231, July 1995.)
Gregory, Hugh. A Century of Pop: A hundred years of music that changed the world. London: Octopus Publishing Group Ltd., 2006.

In 2005, the duo teamed up and assembled a group of musicians as diverse as their musical backgrounds — members hail from Turkey, Israel, Spain and Morocco — to form Balkan Beat Box. They are accomplished underground musicians Ori Kaplan and Tamir Muskat They have performed in many innovative bands in the past decade. And recorded a danceable self-titled debut, which was an instant success

With dancing ladies and big trombones, the sound of Balkan Beat Box carries a faint reminder of the day the circus came to town,. But the dancers are belly dancers and the saxophones and brass recalls the Klezmer tradition of going from village to village, in this case, the Booklyn, to weddings and funerals.In this case, the village is Brooklyn.