Archive for: August, 2011

The Problem With Music Advocacy

Aug 07 2011 Published by under Uncategorized

Have we, as an interested group in music education, damaged our own efforts simply by labeling it as “music advocacy?” I, along with many music educators, am very thankful for “VH1 Save the Music,” and other music advocacy efforts. But only those who are already passionate about the value of music education truly champion those efforts. Although the term, “music advocacy,” has its place within the circle of music supporters, it is a misrepresentation in general society.
The word, “advocacy,” indicates helping an underdog. It places it in a category of sympathetic efforts toward something worthwhile in need of saving. Contemplate the term, “child advocate.” What pictures come to mind? Visual images of children in need pulling on your heart-strings of giving, right? We love them and want to do more for them, but invoking emotions of sympathy only reaches a few. Think of all the phrases that include the word, “advocate,” or “advocacy.” What is your instant emotion? pity? charity? sympathy? empathy? left-wing? righteous? desire to fight for the cause?

Why do we feel that way? It indicates a need to fight for the defenseless, vulnerable, needy. Who puts on the gloves and does the defending? The one’s closest to the underdog. Those with a deep compassion and emotion connected to the victim.
How do they fight for the victim? They work to bring the world’s attention to the problem. They paint graphic pictures through word and images that guilt people into giving. Those most passionate for the defenseless work tirelessly, attempting multiple methods to reach the masses, but only winning a few.

Music is not the underdog in reality, just in the education system, and in lack of funding. In our efforts to improve the perception and financial support, we sabotage the greater mission to revere and admire. Music is not something to sympathize, but to admire and seek to aspire to greatness. What if we turned sympathy into admiration?

People love winners. People love champions. People want to be part of the winning team. It inspires them to go after their dream and admire those who did and succeeded. For example, I’m not much of a sports fan, but when the local high school team begins advancing to the state playoffs, I’m there with the rest of the town. Everyone loves a winner. Sound familiar?

Now contemplate a contrasting picture-Shawn Johnson. Have you heard of her? A young girl from Iowa had a dream. With only the support of her family and coach, Shawn focused on the gold and passionately dedicated her time, energy and talent toward achieving excellence, and she did. Shawn obtained a gold and silver in the 2008 Olympics held in China-and hasn’t stopped yet.

Before the Olympic season, only those within the gymnastics’ circle knew of Shawn Johnson. Similar to only those within the music circle are aware of the benefits of music instruction in a person’s life. Shawn Johnson is not a sympathetic picture. No one is a martyr for Shawn Johnson. No one needs to be or even wants to be. Shawn Johnson is one girl who had a dream with an action plan. She had a small support team of her family and a coach. Shawn did not recruit “advocacy” groups to help pull her along and represent her case. She did not see herself as an underdog. She was going for the gold-the Olympic gold.

Did she dedicate a percentage of her time reaching for sympathy votes and support groups? No. As she poured her heart into her work, she began to excel and as she began to win, the world clamored to see her, learn about this incredible success story, take pride in her as one of our own in the U.S. Everyone admired Shawn’s dedication and proudly claimed her as a representative of what is possible when you aspire for excellence in your craft. For Shawn Johnson that is gymnastics. For us, it is music.Millions of kids take gymnastics, but it’s only the excellent ones that the world wants to watch. Many people are involved in music, but it’s only incredible musicians that draws the world’s attention.

The large majority of U.S. citizens never attend, or watch, or participate in gymnastic events, but in the summer of 2008, all U.S. eyes were watching Shawn, willing her to win and celebrating her victories. Google Shawn Johnson and you will find articles and video clips from around the globe. Fan clubs and web pages came into being. All of this from one girl with a dream that took the necessary action to make it happen.

People love a winner. People want to be apart of the winning team. People gravitate and seek out winners. They want to be part of that dream.

Music is a winner. We, musicians and music educators, know that. Anyone who sits in an audience and is moved to tears from the sheer beauty of the perfectly sung notes in a musical or opera, or the exquisite sounds of the instruments in an orchestra or band that cause people to rise to their feet in impulsive applause, understands. Music experienced at that level does not evoke sympathy, but awe. Everyone that experienced the incredible music shares it with enthusiasm to anyone who will listen. Like a virus, everyone clamors to experience the magical moment created through music. All eyes turn toward the source of the inspiration and want to experience it again.

We know that, but does society? We need to stop portraying music education as an underdog needing rescued and start exclaiming the opportunities for incredible experiences unlike any other. If our music programs inspire and excel as winners, all eyes will turn to us and want to be part of what we are doing. They’ll experience what we already know and music will be viewed as the hero it already is.

“Music advocacy?” I don’t think so. Within our music circle? Maybe, but only within our circle. We need to view it as something with wondrous awe that we are excited to share, not defend. Does music education need more support and help to keep it in existence? Absolutely. No question. But we are going about it the wrong way. Outside of the music world, the phrase, “music advocacy,” hurts the mission before it even starts. The term indicates a solicitation for sympathy votes before you even understand what they are about. They only really effect those who are already passionate about music and already see the problem. Music education will NEVER be elevated and perceived with respect with labels that indicate defenseless losers and illicit pity.

Pursue excellence in music with a single-focused passion and people will follow. Pursue excellence in music education with passion and people will rally and clamor to be part of the success of their kids-your students.

We treat music education like a needy child trying to compete in an olympic games out of sympathy votes. Only eyes of pity on that child-and then they are fleeting. Music education needs to be Shawn Johnson, and in many schools it is perceived with admiration and respect. Music performed with excellence already is admired and respected with wonder and awe by those who have the privilege to witness it. There are many examples from Paul Potts and Susan Boyle to Kristen Chenoweth, Bobby McFerrin, Yoyo Ma, etc. Pursue excellence in music education and the world will notice and be inspired.

How do we achieve this? Teach kids with passion. Practice with passion. Conduct with passion. Educate parents with the beneficial facts of music education and instruction, but not as a plea, but as an exciting opportunity to involve their kids in the best. We have something that is in desperate need-smarter, brighter and more creative citizens. Music education instills, develops and exercises those qualities. We have wonderful tools available for today’s children.

Teach with passion and the term, “music advocacy,” will become obsolete.

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Exactly Why You Tube Is So Widely Used For Advertisers Who Work With The Article Converter

Aug 05 2011 Published by under Uncategorized

Year after year, it seems to be as if something new takes place on the Internet. The dilemma is that fads, also identified as trends, come and go. Unfortunately it is tough for a specialized Internet project to stay trendy for a prolonged period, there is one that goes on and on to increase and it is not going to show any symptoms of declining. That is the use of on line videos, and the most widely used of these is You Tube.

Online video websites are explained as on line websites that post videos and the most effective way to set up a video to post is to make usage of an article converter. If you just do not at present know the way to convert articles to video the best way is to use an article video robot. As soon as a video has been uploaded onto the website, it will swiftly be seen and looked upon by thousands, if not millions, of Internet persons. In combination with enabling Internet site visitors to discover on line videos, lots of video websites also allow Internet users the possibility to develop, upload, and show their own videos.

As earlier stated, You Tube is one of the most distinguished on line video websites. The truth is, it is so widely used it ranks only behind Goggle as a search engine. Regardless of whether you have made use of the services supplied by You Tube or not, you may be itching to know what is so great about the site. Precisely what is it that makes millions of excited users view it, lots of people on a daily basis. The answer is not as uncomplicated as you may think. This is due to the fact there are a number of distinctive reasons why You Tube has gotten so recognized.

One of those good reasons was discussed above, on line video websites provide Internet users the capacity to produce, load, and share their own videos with the rest of the world. This technique is a method that is literally awesome and can provide fantastic coverage to your website or product. Millions of men and women have a good idea or notion that they would like to document or divulge, but many are helpless to do so without the benefit of You Tube. After you have made your own video, you can very easily have it uploaded, in most cases in as little as a couple of minutes.

On You Tube, you can check out videos specializing on business, training, marketing, recreation, sports, cars, comedy as well as ‘how to’ videos. Considered to be one of the few constraints that You Tube has is that videos should be no longer than ten minutes which is very good for those of us working with article to video software as the common article will produce a video lasting 3 to 7 minutes. Additionally it is nice that you are not obliged to listen to lame advertisements, as a number of other on line video websites might need you to do.

Possibly, the greatest rationale why You Tube is so prevalent is simply because it is free. Yes, free. It implies that you can not only keep an eye on as many videos as you choose, without having to pay a thing, but you also have the option to generate and share your own so if you make use of article marketing as part of your marketing campaign you can convert to video virtually every article you write delivering you unlimited free advertising.

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Sharing Your Ideas in You Tube

Aug 05 2011 Published by under Uncategorized

In searching the internet, there has yet to be a site that is more visited other than youtube. In doing my research I have discovered so many topic and people share their information in you tube and unless I really need something that is in print, id rather listen and watch a video on telling me how to jailbreak my iPhone rather than just reading about it.

And with the release of the new iPhone 4, I just cant wait to watch some lucky guy upload his video of unboxing his first iPhone 4, sometimes Im thinking why do other people get so lucky. As I watch these amateur videos of people sharing their reviews online, I just realized that as leave my comments, many would then react in my comments some in a positive, some to a degree of sarcasm, some are just plain brutal. What I do like about this is I was able to meet some friends who share the same interest that I have of owning a iPhone 4. I got some wonderful ideas and one thing that I didn’t bother to think about before is actually getting iPhone insurance. Now that sounded totally alien to me, because when I got my first iPhone, I didn’t quite give attention to it. But now as I plan to change my iPhone, many videos comments did give me the impression of how important iPhone 4 insurance is.

It’s an insurance cover that is specifically designed to the iPhone 4, hence the name iPhone 4 insurance. Its unique design has state of the art energy conserving system where it intelligently adjusts the brightness of the screen in special situations like when you will lift your iPhone to your ear to answer or to make a call, a proximity sensor will detect you are doing that and it will turn off the display to save power and prevent accidental dialing when the surface touches you cheeks. So ask if they will also cover that in the case of damage.

Having your iPhone especially out in the streets can be rather risky and not getting an iPhone insurance policy can be a very big risk on the owners part. So I learned this valuable information, thanks to friends I started to know while watching some videos.

I do realize there is lot of crack heads out there, but genuine and real people still exits in the web, its just a matter of being a real person as well to attract those who you can get to know and share valuable information with a click of your mouse.

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Royalty Free Music Library – How to Recognize Quality

Aug 04 2011 Published by under Uncategorized

Due to copyright law, it is illegal to use a piece of music in a commercial production without securing the rights from the creator. Fortunately for media producers and musicians/composers alike, most people are aware of these legal limitations. Also fortunately, many websites offer royalty free music to download with the rights to use this music commercially, resulting in compensated creators, and producers who can breathe easily when releasing their product.

Recognizing that one needs royalty free music, however, is only the first step. The next step is figuring out where to find great tracks. Hundreds of companies and websites offer royalty free music. Being able to recognize the following qualities in a royalty free music library will make your decision of where to license music much more efficient and less confusing. The four main attributes of a quality royalty free music library are category structure, musical quality, pricing, and edits.

Category Structure:

Finding the “right” music for a media production is not an easy task, especially because often a user does not know exactly what they need. So, a music library must have not only strict categories for royalty free Instrumental music, World, Rock, Electronica, Orchestral, and Soundtrack etc. plus all the subcategories for each of these genres, but also categories based on descriptive words. In addition to music genres, a quality music library will organize tracks based on mood (energetic, mellow, etc.) and instrument (guitar, piano, etc). Do not go with a library that only lists genre or you will be wasting tons of time. You might need a “mellow” but “uplifting” pop rock track and do not need to ruin the afternoon clicking through hundreds of heavy metal tracks irrelevant to your needs.

Musical Quality:

Royalty free music libraries are notorious for having “muzak” type tracks in their offerings. These are tracks that are cheesy, too digital sounding, lack original and fresh melodies, and are just plain boring pieces of music. Many composers only write music for royalty free libraries, which is an admirable undertaking, but in the effort they lose all inspiration and churn out bad music. Seek libraries that host inspired tracks, fresh emotive music, music made by musicians with passion. As a human being, you will know this superior type of music when you hear it. If 1 out of every 5 tracks on a site is bad and full of elevator quality royalty free Christmas music, then go somewhere else. Related to this, make sure the library you choose does not accept uploads from all users, for such sites have loads of amateur poorly recorded, uninspired, and badly produced music

Pricing:

In the world of royalty free music, cheap is not necessarily good. Like computers, cars, power tools, etc. quality of production music is often more important than price. Music is an incredibly important part of media productions and the right track can make a production sing, while a poor track can destroy it. Some sites offer tracks with “micro” payments such as $3-$5 per track. These sites tend to host musical garbage and many professional musicians and composers will not sell through them because they realize their music is of a higher value. Today, somewhere between $29 and $79 is a fair price for a professionally produced, inspired piece of excellent royalty free classical music. If you are paying anything less, then either you have found a fantastic deal, or you may be purchasing the license to use something that 1,000 other people have already used.

Edits:

A well planned library not only offers royalty free music tracks, but also offers 1 minute, 30 second, 15 second, and 5 second edits of that track called an “edit set.” By offering different length versions of a track, a library gives their uses the most flexibility in dropping the music into their project. Often, too, each of these edits will be royalty free music loops, which are seamlessly loopable audio clips that can be stretched out in time to fit a particular scene. If a library only offers full-length tracks, then they and their contributors and not taking the time to optimally prepare the music for your use. Find instead,a site that offers full tracks, edits of varying lengths, and music loops.

By recognizing a quality royalty free music library through its organization, musicality, pricing, and edit offerings you will save both time and money. You deserve this, your productions deserve this, and your audience deserves this.

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Royalty Free Music Loops – Characteristics And Benefits

Aug 03 2011 Published by under Uncategorized

Music and video producers frequently throw around the words”music loop.” But, if one is not familiar with this term the exact nature of music loops can be a mystery. Simply put, a music loop is a short piece of music that can be repeated infinitely in a media project. It can be “looped” over and over seamlessly so that it sounds like a continuous piece of audio. Music loops can either be a single instrument, such as a drumbeat, which are often used in music production, or they can be a part of a full music track. Many royalty free music companies offer such loops. The specific characteristics of music loops and their benefits are explained more fully below.

Characteristics:

Music loops, first of all, are prepared by a music producer or sound designer with expertise so that they loop seamlessly when repeated without any clicks or pops in the audio. They are always offered as .wav files because .mp3s do not loop as they have a tiny break at the beginning of an .mp3 file. Music loops such as bass loops for music production are categorized in two main ways. They are organized according to instrument and according to beats per minute, or bpm. Different instruments in the same key can be combined to create fresh musical tracks. For example a hip hop bass line in the key of C major at 95 bpm could be combined with a blues piano loop in C major to create a perfectly in sync new measure of music. As long as the drum loops and piano loops are in the same key and bpm, you are set. Loops come in all instrument types and all genres such as synth loops, strings loops, woodwind loops etc. .

Music loops for video are similar, however they are generally not broken down into different instruments, but rather consist of parts of a full-length song that a video editor can use to loop according to the length of a particular scene. Does an editor need 3 minutes of music when a track is only 2 1/2 minutes? No problem, they can simply import a loop of a part of the track into their project and repeat it to the exact duration that they need it. Since music loops are useful for video editors, quality royalty free music sites will offer loops in addition to music tracks for video editing.

Benefits:

For music producers, the benefits of music loops are many. First, drum loops allow producers to include drums in their tracks without having to play drums, have a room that can accommodate a drum set’s size and volume, or hire a drummer. And actually, all loops of all instruments allow music producers to include all sorts of sounds in their music not possible before the invention of loops. Furthermore, MIDI loops are particularly valuable because once they are inserted into a project, the actual notes of the loop can be changed to alter the loop and create a new melody. In other words, a copywritten loop can be swiftly rearranged into a new fresh and original loop for commercial use.

For video editors, as mentioned above, loops give flexibility of music and editors do not need to be dependent on the duration of a music track. If it’s too short or too long, loops solve the problem. Also, loops are cheap at $1-$3 per loop and even cheaper when bought as collections.

Music loops are rampant in all types of media production. If abused, they can sound sterile and musicians and composers run the risk of sounding like everyone else. However, if used creatively, they can provide great inspiration for new loops, instrumentation that would not otherwise be possible, and new musical ideas by combining them in new and unique ways. They are not something to be looked down upon, but rather a new means of musical expression, a powerful way to create and deliver new original music.

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How to Extract Audio From Youtube Flv Videos to Mp3

Aug 03 2011 Published by under Uncategorized

Sometimes, what we need all from the video is only the sound and can enjoy them on our music portables during our trip or in our leisure time. But on Youtube, we are limited to listen or watch online only. Have you ever tried to convert You tube videos to MP3 format?

Total Music Downloader is also a Youtube MP3 Converter software , which provides you with turnkey service to download and convert Youtube videos to MP3, WMA, AAC, M4A etc formats.

Use Leemsoft Youtube MP3 Converter software, you can extract MP3 audio from Youtube flash videos witth lossless quality. Now, listenning Youtube on your local PC without network connetcted or even putting youtube musics on your iPod, iPhone, PSP, Zune, Creative Zen, iTunes is no longer a trouble for you with Leemsoft Youtube MP3 Converter

What’s more, this practical Youtube MP3 Converter also allows you to download musics from other popular sites, like Google, Yahoo, BBC, ineem, iLike, Myspace, Facebook and so on. And convert all downloaded musics to WMA, MP3, AAC, M4A, AC3 etc. It’s a multi functional music downloder and converter software compatible for all sites and almost all popular audio formats.

Steps on how to convert Youtube to MP3 format

Step 1. Download Total Music Downloader, install and launch it on your PC at first

Download Total Music Downloader at first, install it following the installation wizard. After installing software, you can launch it by double click the MP3 Downloader icon.

Step 2. Go to Youtube site, and find the video you want to download as mp3 music, play the video online

Just play the Youtube video online, Total Music Downloader will detect the video URL and download the mp3 music from Youtube video automatically

Step 3. Convert downloaded musics to other formats you want

After all musics downloaded completely, click “Converter” icon on the toolbar, you will get the converter window poped up, the downloaded files will be listed automatically in the converter window. You can choose any one to convert by checking the checkbox ahead of the file name. Total Music Downloader supports batch conversion well.

Step 4. Customize output settings for target musics

Click “Format” dropdown list, you can get various audio formats to choose as output. Click Settings button, you can customize the output parameters for output musics, like bitrate, sample rate, Channels, codecs.

Step 5. Start Conversion By click Start button.

After all essensial settings, you can click Start button to start conversion.

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