Category Archives: musics

Electrify Your Senses With Belly Dance Music

Belly dancing has been popularized over the years as a joyful womans art, and why not, after all it has all the essential ingredients that make it worthy to be cherished at moments of joy or woe. Now days belly dancing is not only practiced by female dancers, even male dancers all over have taken a deep interest in this form of art. This dance form was made popular by the Arabs, who called it raqs sharqi (oriental dance). With the passage of time, Belly dance has witnessed several alterations in its form, style, and costume and the same goes for its music.

When it comes to Belly dance music, its those grooving beats with their upbeat motions that imparts this dance form its true beauty. The graceful movement of each part of the body with a flickering pulsation of the hips and the hypnotic music forms the awe-inspiring sight to behold.

Belly dance music is always associated with Middle Eastern Music. Improvisation of this genre has taken place with the introduction of various instruments, each of which has their own specialty. Nonetheless, Belly dance music has to be such that it creates an electrifying and stimulating atmosphere and helps to ignite the fire both within the dancers and the audiences. The traditional Middle Eastern music instruments like tabl beledi, nakara, and a wide assortment of Eastern frame drums multiplies the real flavor of Belly dance.

Along with different fusions of belly dance, the music has also fused with different forms and styles of music. The contemporary form of belly dancing has been popularized by Shakira, the Latin America rock star. She brings forth a beautiful blend of Belly dancing along with Latino as well as other modern dance forms. Suhaila Salimpour, (world renowned dancer, performer, and choreographer) has also stepped up in revolutionizing belly dance music with her online belly dance mp3 store that features very modern and very classic styles of bellydance music.

How Does Music Influence Our Daily Life

We cant deny that music can affect our state of mind, influencing our daily life, and the reason for this is mysterious. We always look for a music that is something livelier while doing some physical work or exercises or out socializing on a larger group and keep listening to relaxing music for a nice and quiet romantic dinner. An increased rate of car accidents ican be caused by listening to fast music while driving and based on recent studies the Mozart effects claim to increase intelligence. We might have heard of farmers who increase their production by playing music to their animals. Below are the main aspects of music and their facets in turn that influence our daily life.

Tempo & Rhythm

Pitch Melody and Harmony

Music suggests movement as it moves in time. Tempo and Rhythm is combined to have an immediate physical impact on our perceptions. The rhythm of an object suggest more or less frequent movement to qualify the repetitive nature of the underlying beat, even though the tempo of a piece of music might be slow and relaxed. The tempo of a piece of music roughly equates with the heartbeat associated with corresponding state or emotions that the music suggest. A high frequent of notes can suggest a degree of contained excitement within that relaxed state. Music tends to have a steady tempo to it, often measured in beats per minute “. Most of the music based on simple observation is in the range of 50-200 beats per minute, the same as the extreme range of our heartbeats.

Anything in the range 60-80 beats per minute is calm and relaxed, less than 60 often very relaxed, introspective or even depressed. 80-100 is moderately alert and interested. 100 upwards is increasingly lively, excited or agitated and, since we crave some degree of excitement from our entertainment, 80-120 is quite a common tempo, and even 120-160 is common in some energetic situations, since there is a strong degree of suggestion between the heartbeat and music tempo. Music moves in time and suggests movement, and we tend to associate music unconsciously with movements made by our bodies while talking, walking, running, dancing, riding, etc.

Pitch, Melody & Harmony

Pitch on its own affects our perception. It depends on how we perceived sounds and music providing a basic scale from high= light, happy, carefree” to low = dark, sad, ominous.” We must find a large thing more threatening than a smaller one as part of our evolutionary heritage. In general bigger objects make deeper noises whether long column of air or long strings in a musical instrument, big chest, large animal footsteps, or large objects banging together. Conversely smaller instruments, short columns of air, short strings, small animals or objects make higher pitch noises. A Melody can be preferred if sounds are reasonably close together with a variety of nice harmonious intervals between them and a rhythm is similar to that of speech. A good melody (even if it doesn’t have words) is often one that we could hum, sing or whistle. Generally melody consists of a linear sequence of tones. The notes should have durations which are not too short and not too long, and should not be in an extreme range or shouldn’t have large awkward jumps between them. Although instrumental musical can stretch those boundaries a little, melodies in its way are very similar to sentences that our brains are designed to speak and listen to.

Harmony is the combination of tones with different pitches, Even though some are seem to be close to the combination of notes is completely the natural set of different notes produced by something vibrating and easily demonstrated musically of brass instruments. Those natural (without keys) instruments such as bugle, octaves, fifths and thirds produced are a series of notes. That is so well together to make harmonious ” sounds like major chords. String instruments can be demonstrate the lowest notes of the harmonic series by playing the strongest ” harmonics” of the strings which divide the length into fractions like halves, thirds, quarters, fifths, etc. All that varies in degrees within all notes, and their proportions help to make sounds their unique color or tones, is always presented by harmonic.

Repetition is the simplest form of PATTERN. If we see something familiar, then it triggers memories and related thoughts are sometimes consciously and unconsciously. The repetition need not to be exact but “similar” enough to trigger familiarity. The aspects of our intelligence allowed us to adopt in so many different climates and conditions that make the best use of available shelter and resources, to build language and culture to communicate to each other in succeeding generations. It also allow us to appreciate and to create pattern for its own sake in the form of visual and aural arts which human brains particularly seem to have a highly developed and flexible pattern recognition capability.

Salsa Timing – 5 Tips To Finding The First Beat Of The Music

One of the most challenging humps to get over for many beginning salsa dancers is to learn to recognize the first beat of the music and actually count the music properly to keep on the correct salsa timing . Yet, rhythms are often innate in us. Just like we can become aware of our heart beat, we can become to be able to recognize the salsa rhythm.

However, just like it is actually much harder to count your pulse, learning to count and understand the direction of the salsa music is much harder. But with proper guidance counting salsa timing will become easy as well. Here is how to do it.

Tip # 1 Listen To The Cow Bell To Find The Salsa Rhythm

The salsa rhythm goes quick, quick, slow, quick, quick, slow. The first step to learning timing is to make sure that you can recognize the rhythm. After you recognize the rhythm, half of your job is already done. One of the easiest ways to recognize the salsa rhythm is to try to find the cow bell in the music. The cow bell plays on the core beats of 1,3,5,7, loops over and repeats 1,3,5… and so on. Not all songs have the cow bell included, but many traditional salsa songs does and this can help you find the rhythm.

Tip # 2 Listen To The Montuno Rhythm To Find The First Beat Of The Music

In salsa there is a rhythm called Montuno that is often played with piano. If a particular salsa song is playing the montuno rhythm, recognizing it is one of the easiest ways to finding the first beat of the music. The reason for this is that unlike the cow bell, for example, the piano montuno rhythm is played over eight beats rather than just four. In other words, when you listen to the cow bell, you can find the rhythm, but you might easily mistaken the first beat of the music to be the fifth and vice versa. Piano montuno rhythm however can go something like this, 1, and, 2,3, and, 4, 6,7,8, and, 1 and so on. Obviously, this is harder to understand conceptually and it would be much better if I could actually play this salsa timing for you so that you could hear the difference. But nevertheless, this is one of the easiest ways to find the first beat to the music.

Tip # 3 Listen To The Vocals

In salsa music, like in many other types of music as well, it is often customary for the vocals to start on the first beat of the music as well. This is another concept that can help you learn to recognize the first beat of the music. So the next time you are listening to salsa songs, rather than pay attention to the instruments, if the song has a vocalist(s), pay attention when they begin and try to see how that correlates with the rhythm of the music. Chances are they start on the first beat and if so, you have found the one.

Tip # 4 If All Else Fails, Buy A Salsa Timing CD

Salsa timing CD is a great way to help you find the first beat of the music. What makes salsa timing so challenging is that there are many inter laying rhythms and not one easy beat to follow. What can be extremely helpful is to listen to a song with a voice over of someone who keeps you on count. This way, you can constantly monitor how you understand the timing and compare your counting to someone who is keeping you on track. By listening on a salsa timing cd at home you can take your time to develop your understanding and reflect how the counting reflects the rhythms.

Tip # 5 Keep At It

It is very easy to get frustrated if you don’t quite get a grasp of the rhythms and salsa timing right away. But don’t get discouraged. When I started, it took me months just to be able to hear the rhythm. I am probably one of the most ungifted children musically, yet, it has been my determination and perseverance that has made me one of the experts in salsa musicality. So keep at it and your ear will soon be able to detect even the subtlest of salsa rhythms and you will be able to recognize the first beat of them music with ease.

House Music – The Origins

Establishing “House”

The birth of the words “house music” is a hotly argued question amidst artists and DJ’s. Some people assert it originated from a night club called “The Warehouse” where longtime resident Producer/DJ Frankie Knuckles played a distinctive brand of dance music until 1982 when the establishment closed down. Knuckles himself suggested he initially witnessed the term when driving by a bar on the south side of Chicago that hung a sign in its window reading “We play house music”. DJ Leonard “Remix” Rroy suggests the sign was likely a reference to the style of soulful songs one would listen to at your own house.

A second sentiment is that the phrase referenced the production of music in the residences of groundbreaking DJ’s and dance producers. These early creations would be recorded with synthesizers, drum machines and sequencers. Many others assert that “house” references the relationship of particular tracks with their respective DJ’s, as in the house DJ’s played their very own house records.

The Fathers of House Music

The Chicago night club scene of the early 80’s was spurred by DJ’s spinning a number of styles of music like disco, hip hop, funk, pop, and R&B. The beginning of somewhat economical electronic instruments led to some DJ’s crafting their own combination of existing tunes by mixing in drum machines and effects.

Seen by many to be the very first original house music record, “On & On” by Jesse Saunders was published in 1984. The album’s prosperity ignited a wave of tracks from the earlier DJ’s attempting their hand at putting out house music. The music soon branched off into subgenres of house such as deep house and acid house.

Through the support of club DJ’s such as Lil Louis, Frankie Knuckles, Ron Hardy, and radio stations like WBMX, house music quickly gained popularity in Chicago. Concurrently, house began to spread to nearby DJ’s and producers of Detroit, Michigan. Artists like Marshall Jefferson helped push house outside of Chicago with his hugely well known track “Move Your Body”. From the middle to late 1980’s artists such as Larry Heard, Derrick May, Kevin Saunderson, Farley Keith, and Steve Hurley, persisted to popularize the style.

Now, house music is more prevalent than ever and can be heard in a variety of forms in night clubs spanning the earth. The genre has continued to fork off into subgenres including progressive house, electro house, techno house, breakbeat, and the list goes on. House isn’t just a style of music, but is a religion protected by loyal followers the world over.

How To Produce Music Like Dr Dre

Dr. Dre started his career with the World Class Wrecking Crew in the late 80s. Soon this Compton breed producer became the poster boy for gangster rap music. Dre would receive heavy criticism for the misogyny and violence surrounding his music, but there was one thing his critics could not deny, his music production. The success of NWA, Ice Cube, Eminem, The Chronic and 50 Cent all became proof positive of Dr Dres sonic touch. This is why he is considered one of the most influential music producers.

Many new producers are trying to emulate his sound. Here a couple of key points to produce music like Dr . Dre.

Dr . Dres production never veers away from the traditional four on the floor time signature. This Time signature is used in most dance records. Take For instance 5o cents get rich or die trying album, each song starts with a thick bass drum and the same time signature.

Whats also unique about Dr Dres production is the timing of the snare. Unlike most producers, his snares are played slightly offset. This is critical in creating the California laid-back Hip hop that has made him one of the most sought after producers.

When producing Music like Dr.Dre start with the right instruments. The legendary producer uses standard instruments found in old funk records. Rhythm and Strat guitars are woven to create the bounce of the track. Horns are also a favorite of the producers. Staccato horns, in particular, are used to create suspense and build the music. Another favored instrument is the Chorus Piano. Dr. Dre uses this in his production to complement the bassline.

Creating Music like Dr. Dre take time and skill to master. Be patience and persistent and soon you will also produce a stable of work to influence the next generation