This Blog is moving- please update your feed

This is my last post for this blog here at mystro2b.wordpress. I’ve settled on

http://mystro2b.edublogs.org as my new home (still powered by WordPress…just a new domain)

If you are following this in an RSS reader, please update your feed/subscription to

http://feeds.feedburner.com/MusicIsNotForInsects

Thanks for keeping up with my posts.

Photo: kenliu

Frets on Fire: we are shredding on our Mac

UPDATE: this is a follow-up to my last post about Frets on Fire. After poking around the FOF website, we were able to find a simple hack to get the program to work on my Intel based iMac. Here is what you do:

1) Download 2 separate versions of Frets on Fire: Version 1.1.324 and Version 1.2.438

2) Follow the directions from the screencast here to make a simple change to the program.

3) Start shredding!

You will definitely want to Google your way to adding more songs to the library. There is a great post here from the FOF Fan Forum on how to use Audacity to convert mp3 files to Ogg Vorbis files so you can create your own songs.

I see a lot of potential for a fun program you could use with your students…especially the creation of new songs. Let me know if you have tried this with your students.

The Vegetable Orchestra

Check out this unbelievable video from The Vegetable Orchestra:

Rock Band: video game music teacher?

Last night my son showed me the video review (see below) of a hot new video game called Rock Band by MTV Games. I am familiar with the video game Guitar Hero and have played it at the local electronics store (with out much success) and thought it was nothing more than a fun game and an exercise in coordination set to music.

But after watching the video of Rock Band, I was wondering if this kind of technology could really be used to teach music. There can be as many as 4 players in your band- Each player uses a controller in the shape of a guitar, microphone or drum set and has to “pluck”, “sing”, and “hit” in time with the music and lights that appear on the screen.

Check it out and tell me if you think this kind of technology could be used to teach an aspect of music…rhythmic accuracy perhaps? I do think the multi-player approach to “making music” is what sets this game apart.

Rock Band Video Game Review at GameSpot

This is a Blog post…

This is a Blog post sent from my cellphone using Jott.com. Happy Thanksgiving. listen

Powered by Jott

Happy Thanksgiving

“…but we missed the point the whole way along…it was a musical thing and you were supposed to sing or dance while music was being played.”
-Alan Watts

Band nerds and video game geeks: UNITE!

Garageband Tip: Musical Typing

Thanks to Hans Feldmeier and his post at etwinning e-digiskills blog for turning me onto Screencast-O-Matic so I could show you this cool tip in Garageband. The audio makes me sound like I have a lisp, and the video is a little wonky, but it’s a decent on-line screencast tool in a pinch.

Insect Band

Insect Band, originally uploaded by Baggage Reclaim.

How can we keep from singing?

Soundjunction: awesome Web 2.0 music site

Thanks to Larry Ferlazzo and this link from his “Teacher’s Page”.

Soundjunction is a great interactive music site-

“SoundJunction is the award-winning site for listening to, exploring, discovering and creating music.

Listen and explore: rock, classical, jazz, African, drum ‘n’ bass, pop, fusion and much more…”