'Ukulele
Why do you play video games? Why do you play music? Why make art?
Why do you play video games? Make music? Draw pictures?
Is it Skill and Achievement? Social? Money? Role playing?
Reflecting on a recent episode of Imaginary Worlds.
Why do you play video games? Make music? Draw pictures?
Is it Skill and Achievement? Social? Money? Role playing?
Reflecting on a recent episode of Imaginary Worlds.
It’s Saturday and for many people that means pizza! Here’s a fun song to go along with your pizza party. Some second graders from Hibbard Elementary and I wrote this song in 2018. Here is a lyric and chord sheet that you can download to learn to play the song yourself!
For someone who is relatively new at playing music, learning a new tune, or a bunch of new tunes can be overwhelming. Because of this, I thought I would share my process for learning tunes. Maybe you’ll find it helpful to see how I do it. In this video I learn the tune Nancy on my harmonica. I learn an arrangement from my good friend, Jonas Friddle. I highly recommend checking out more of his music at jonasfriddle.com Enter your email address here to receive a free .pdf that accompanies this video essay.
Here is a quick guitar lesson for total beginners. This is my usual first lesson for both youth and adult musicians. If you can do this, you can do anything on the guitar! This will get you started. If you do get started with this lesson and are looking for some more in depth study, let me know! I’ve moved all of my teaching online for the time being and would love to meet with you. We’ll have you playing in no time! Here’s the Rain, Rain Go Away video lesson and here is a free download of the lyric and melody sheet.
During this challenging time of life I’ve been inspired by the Marquette Makers’ Project to keep busy with some creative work. I’ve made a lot of lessons like this, but this is the first one where I used a virtual whiteboard and recorded my voice along with the drawings I made on the whiteboard. It turned out pretty well and I learned a lot! In the video I mention two songs that use the minor 2 chord. Here are lyric and chord sheet for those to songs Old Devil Time by Pete Seeger Hungry Heart by Bruce Springsteen [vimeo http://vimeo.com/400364601] Here is the weekly schedule for Marquette Makers’ Projects during the physical separation from our communities. Cool stuff. I’m excited to see what people are working on.
Wow! What great musicianship at the packed house for Family Harmonica Workshop at Saturday’s 2020 Winter Roots Folk Festival! Most of the attendees had never played the harmonica before and they plowed through ALL of my teaching material for the day. Three of the songs were the classics – Hot Cross Buns, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and Boil ’em Cabbage Down. The last was an original song by me called Juice Box (which you can learn to play here.) We even had some juice boxes at the end to celebrate our music. Looking forward to another opportunity to play together! Photos and video by Susan Rutter Divine, Katy Divine and Sue Demel. [vimeo 392247139 w=640 h=1138]
Hi everyone, Today I’m teaching my first workshop as part of Winter Roots Festival in Marquette, MI. In honor of this big day I wrote a new song for you to learn on your harmonica! It’s called Juice Box and it’s all about everyone’s favorite drink . . . a juice box! Here is some recordings of me singing and playing the song. The first recording is just the harmonica part. The second is my harmonica, my guitar and my voice. You can download a FREE .pdf of the notation of this song. Print it double-sided an cut the paper along the dotted line to make your own zine! The zine also has the notation to another favorite song, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
Recently, it was a very snowy morning here in Marquette, MI. I was waiting for some of my students to have their lesson and I wrote this song. I made a video of me playing the song, and there is a .pdf of a zine that you can print out to help you learn it. Print it double-sided and then follow the instructions to make the zine! The zine contains the lyrics, standard music notation, and specialized notation for harmonica, guitar and ‘ukulele. I was wondering, what would happen if we changed the lyrics from “snowy day” to “cloudy day” or “sunny day”. What changes would you make in the rest of the lyrics so that the song is about your day? Download the Snowy Day Zine here. Be sure to print it double sided and then watch the short video below to learn how to fold your zine. Thanks to Ore Dock Brewing Company for letting me use their beautiful community space to make some music.
Last Friday, the 3rd graders at Jane Ball Elementary in Cedar Lake, IN and I had a great time starting up our Harmonica Orchestra . We got right down to business, learning how to hold it and learning how to play only one note. Then we dove into some Hot Cross Buns and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. Reports are that it went over very big with the students. One grandmother wrote to me and said, “He’s played it every day since. Thank you for inspiring him to enjoy music in a different way ” That is awesome to hear.
[vimeo 387363157 w=640 h=360] Fargo Skateboarding January 2020 from Jason McInnes on Vimeo. It was a packed session tonight at Fargo Skateboarding. These photos are from later in the evening when it was starting to slow down. Something interesting happened that I wasn’t anticipating. Because I was so full I had to make the most of my opportunities. When I went to drop in for the first time (my first drop in since spring 2019), I just had to do it. I didn’t have time to talk myself out of it. I found that I could just GO and I didn’t need to psych myself up nearly as much. Cool! This was my first long session since I broke my elbow. It felt a little strange to be the only one in full protective gear, but I’ve decided that I’d rather look a little out of character and be safe, than look cool and either break something, or be too nervous to really skate. Last year I dropped in 100 times, which was a big accomplishment because I was so scared. Today, I dropped in countless times, and I think I can kind of do it now, at least on the medium size half pipe. Still trying to get my kick turns to be more compact. I don’t have video of it, but I can feel that I kind of bail out of a full 180 turn when I’m going fast, and end up doing two 90 degree turns. Just got to keep working. Check out this video. I feel very accomplished! (It’s hilarious to watch the video because it seems so slow, but when it is happening, it is terrifyingly fast!) #workinprogress #workandprogress
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