Whether accompanied by organ, handbells or electric guitar, or not accompanied by an instrument at all, Christians have used songs and music to worship God throughout history. Let’s take a look at musical instruments in the Bible, the history of music and worship and how different denominations of Christianity use music today.
Source: ChristianUniversitiesOnline.org/
Cracks is one of the strangest clips Sesame Street has ever produced. It features a young girl riding a camel made up of wall cracks that takes her meet other crack animals and finally “The Crack Master.” If that doesn’t scare you from watching it the first time, go ahead. If you vaguely remember this, here’s another thought – it was from 1975, and yes, you’re old, and this clip is going to come back to you.
Greater participation inmusic classes may benefit children’s language development, a new study finds.
Researchers followed kids in the nonprofit Harmony Project, which provides music education and instruments to poor children in Los Angeles.
Over two years, children who actively participated in the classes showed larger improvements in how the brain processes speech and reading, compared to those with lower levels of participation.
Also, the benefits of active participation in music classes occurred in the same areas of the brain that are traditionally weak in children from poor families, according to the study published online Dec. 16 in the journalFrontiers in Psychology.
“Even in a group of highly motivated students, small variations in music engagement — attendance and class participation — predicted the strength of neural processing after music training,” lead author Nina Kraus, professor of communication sciences and of neurobiology and physiology at Northwestern University, said in a university news release.
“Our results support the importance of active experience and meaningful engagement with sound to stimulate changes in the brain,” she added.
Participating in music classes can actually “remodel” a child’s brain in a way that improves the ability to process speech, an ability that’s closely linked to reading, according to researchers. The study finding is important for children from poor families, who process sound less efficiently. This increases the risk that they’ll do poorly in school, Kraus said.
“What we do and how we engage with sound has an effect on our nervous system,” she said. “Spending time learning to play a musical instrument can have a profound effect on how your nervous system works.”
Slowed and stretched over and over… a few thousand times. This is Wham! or a vast glimmering drone of digital data. Either way, I know it’s a bit early (or late) for Christmas music, but believe me, keep this handy in 10 months to be life of the party. You’ll get tangled up in this, and there’s no way out.
Forgt playing the usual dive bars and lush concert venues for a moment, and think about, if you’re an artist, where you can play your next batch of shows. Somewhere different. Somewhere exciting. Like a forest.
Tom Odell is hitting the road, announcing a slew of special gigs in UK forests next summer. That’s right. Parks and forests.
The chart-topping Long Way Down star, who took home the 2014 Ivor Novello award for Songwriter Of The Year, will be returning in 2015 to play some unique shows as part of Forest Live – an independent program in the UK organised by the Forestry Commission to bring forests to new audiences.
Money raised from the shows will go towards protecting, improving and expanding England’s forests and woodlands.
“This will be a whole new experience for me,” said Odell. “I can’t wait to bring my live show to the woods and I hope to see you there.”
Friday 19 June: Bedgebury Pinetum, near Tunbridge Wells, Kent.
Saturday 20 June: Westonbirt Arboretum, near Tetbury, Glos.
Thursday 25 June: Dalby Forest, near Pickering, N Yorks.
Friday 26 June: Sherwood Pines Forest, Edwinstowe, near Mansfield, Notts.
Saturday 4 July: Delamere Forest, Delamere, Cheshire.
Sunday 5 July: Thetford Forest, near Brandon, Suffolk.
Sunday 12 July: Cannock Chase Forest, near Rugeley, Staffs.
That’s thinking outside the box.
For your Oscar consideration: A veteran puppeteer, who plays an avian icon, battles his ego and attempts to find his way back to a certain furry and friendly street. This is ‘Big Birdman.’ It features original cast member Caroll Spinney as himself and Big Bird, who he played, and also Matt Vogel as Big Bird, too. You’ll figure it out….
Dan Reynolds on his strained relationship with his parents and his mother’s hesitancy about him becoming a musician:
“You know, I’ve always kind of had strained relations with my parents, just because I was kind of left-of-center compared to what my family comes from, which is a very conservative family of doctors and lawyers. I told my mom I wanted to be a musician when I was little, you know. It was scary for her, and she was—she didn’t forbid me, but she didn’t quite… you know, she didn’t…. How can I put it… She didn’t fully embrace it… Especially when I talked about dropping out of college to pursue it. She was scared about it, but my dad was always actually secretly into it. He’s a lawyer, and he’s the one who kind of instilled the love of music into me in the first place. He’s always been into Paul Simon and the Beatles, the Beach Boys—all those artists with the great melodies. That’s where that came from.”
Via Vegas Magazine
“LL Cool J is hard as HELL/Battle anybody I don’t care who you TELL!” Those words were recited by a then 17-year-old LL Cool J on a song called “Rock The Bells” in 1985. The lyrics would go down as some of the greatest opening lines in rap history. By the time Rick Rubin’s unforgettably rough and raw beat kicks in on the song, LL Cool J takes you on a furious lyrical tirade in a way the world had never really heard before. Although LL had already put out a handful of records prior to “Rock The Bells,” this is the song that really proved the self-proclaimed GOAT rapper was a phenomenon. “Rock The Bells” isn’t just one of LL’s best songs, it’s one of the best rap songs ever.
What’s important to understand about “Rock The Bells” is that there’s was really no precedent for it. The early days of hip-hop, from the late ’70s to the mid-80s, were great but rap was still an emerging genre, so kids like LL didn’t really have a proper template for their careers. While he was still a teenager, LL not only embarked on what would become one of hip-hop’s most illustrious careers but he also helped define what we expect from every rapper that came after him. When rap fans think of the golden age of the ’80s hip-hop, they often cite GOATs like Rakim, Big Daddy Kane, and KRS-One—and yet in most cases, LL precedes all of them. Sadly, many younger rap fans might know LL more for things like acting and hosting the Grammys these days, but none of that should take away from his status as a legendary rapper.
To document this classic record, Complex Magazine talked to everyone from LL Cool J to Rick Rubin but also Russell Simmons, LL’s DJ Cut Creator, DMC of Run-D.M.C., former Def Jam Publicist Bill Adler, as well as journalists like Bonz Malone and Karen Hunter. Together, they all provide a look into how this song was made, the impact it had on the streets, and why LL Cool J is who he is.
Oliver Sacks has cancer. Damn. I hope you live out the remaining days with the greatest happiness anyone has ever had on this planet. You, of all people, deserve it.
From The New York Times:
Over the last few days, I have been able to see my life as from a great altitude, as a sort of landscape, and with a deepening sense of the connection of all its parts. This does not mean I am finished with life.
On the contrary, I feel intensely alive, and I want and hope in the time that remains to deepen my friendships, to say farewell to those I love, to write more, to travel if I have the strength, to achieve new levels of understanding and insight.
This will involve audacity, clarity and plain speaking; trying to straighten my accounts with the world. But there will be time, too, for some fun (and even some silliness, as well).
I feel a sudden clear focus and perspective. There is no time for anything inessential. I must focus on myself, my work and my friends. I shall no longer look at “NewsHour” every night. I shall no longer pay any attention to politics or arguments about global warming.
This is not indifference but detachment — I still care deeply about the Middle East, about global warming, about growing inequality, but these are no longer my business; they belong to the future. I rejoice when I meet gifted young people — even the one who biopsied and diagnosed my metastases. I feel the future is in good hands.
Former Factory Records graphic designer Peter Saville discusses the design + effect of Joy Division’s iconic “Unknown Pleasures” album cover.
