Piano Songs and Guitar Lessons

My dad is having me learn Bridge Over Troubled Water on my keyboard. It's so hard that I can't even make it past the first measure. That's good, because I need stuff that challenges me such as that song. If any of you people out there have a song you want me to learn, tell me on Facebook and I'll try to learn it.

Starting next Tuesday, I'll be taking guitar lessons from Jonathan Cummings, the man who organizes the Open Mic at the Crafted Keg. I am both excited and prepared for whatever he has for me. I think he is going to challenge me a lot.

On Lego Harry Potter, I am almost done with year 3, and have learned Expelliarmus, the disarming spell. There are also Dementors, kind of ghost looking creatures that suck your soul out and leave you zombie-like. The only way to defeat them is the Patronus Charm. Point your wand at the Dementor, think of the greatest, happiest moment in your life, and say "Expecto Patronum!"

I hope y'all enjoyed this blog. See ya in the next one. B'bye.

Pianos, Guitars, and Trumpets.

Last week was my public piano debut at the Crafted Keg. I played That's Just the Way It Is by Bruce Hornsby. It's a very complicated song and it took me about a year to complete it. I give thanks to Dad, who printed out the lyrics for me, and to Miss Debbie Boykin, for teaching me the basics of the fingering and chords for piano. Last year, my guitar teacher, David, got me a piano for my birthday. When we brought the keyboard in, Dad wanted me to learn That's Just the Way It Is. Now, a year later, I have learned and performed it in public. Thanks Dad for keeping me going with that song.

I am learning a bunch of new songs on guitar such as Cry Love - John Hiatt, Boat on the River - Styx, and my most recent song, Let My Love Open the Door - Pete Townshend. Each week at the Crafted Keg, I learn at least one new song and play it there. I am Currently working on Child of the Wild Blue Yonder - John Hiatt. Thank you Jonathan Cummings for letting me come up and play every Tuesday at the Crafted Keg.

Up until three days ago, my musical inventory was four guitars, a guitarlele, a keyboard, a set of harmonicas, and a saxophone. After I got the sax I wanted a trumpet, but the problem was that musical instruments are expensive. Then a few days ago, Dad was cruising through Craigslist and he found someone selling a trumpet for only $20. The trumpet is an Etude ETR 100 in like new condition, and it has the case and everything. Dad called the guy up and said "I'll come over and get it."

Now I have Sarah the Trumpet in my musical inventory. So far I am learning how to go from C to G with the other notes in between. G is a bit hard to get, because C is open, so you don't press any of the valves down, and G is the same way.  So you have to adjust your lips to get the G sound, and when you do middle C, keep your lips in the same position for D, E, and F. Dad played the Tuba so he teaches me a little bit.

Frank Aird (Trumpet Man): "Take 5", 'Alfred's Ocean Palace', Negril, Jamaica, 2011

That's all for this week's blog post. I'll see you guys next week! B'bye.

By Fletcher Morton.

Happy Birthday Dad!

This Monday was my Dad's 54th birthday. We went out and had a birthday lunch, with Sam T. Dog. My Mom and Dad had Publix sub sandwiches, and I had some chicken strips with Cool Ranch Doritos. We also had some really good barbeque sandwiches for dinner. Then we had some Pecan Pie for the birthday cake, and watched The Hunt For Red October, which is about submarines being very quiet on the sonars when they activate their Caterpillar Drive, a mechanism that is very effective under water.

My Mom and I are going to go see the Hunger Games: Mocking-jay Part 1. I have seen the trailer for it and I think that it is going to be awesome. In Catching Fire, Katniss Everdeen, the main heroine of the story, shot an arrow at the top of the arena that houses the Hunger Games, a fight to the death, just when a stroke of lightning the tree that had a piece of string that was attached to the arrow. The arena blew up, and her friends came down and picked her up, but left Peeta Malark, Katniss's love, behind and now the Capitol, the makers of the Hunger Games, have him as prisoner. Will Peeta still be alive in this movie. Who knows?

I am working on a song called The Mad Man With A Box from Doctor Who on my piano. So far, I have little pieces of it right, but I'm still working on getting the whole thing. It is a great song about a lonely Time Lord, traveling through time and space on his own. The rest of the Time Lords are dead, and he has lost his friends. Then, he finds Amelia Pond, and soon after Clara Oswald, a.k.a The Impossible Girl.

Music, Fishing, and An Awesome Website

Next month mom and I are going down to Key West for my Grandpa's wedding.

I have learned quite a few good wedding songs, like I'll Stop the World and Meld With You ~ by Modern English, Footloose ~ by Kenny Loggins, and Love Will Keep Us Alive ~ by the Eagles. With Love Will Keep Us Alive, I am going to finger-pick the riff that is in the beginning all the way through the song, transitioning from chord to chord as I go.  Here's what I have so far:

I am trying to get Forever Autumn from Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of War Of The Worlds down on piano because it is a really good song for it. Actually, all songs on that album are spectacular for keyboards. Also, it is one of my dad's favorite songs. Just listen to it and you will know why.

I am also getting very interested in fishing. I am using lures and frozen shrimp on an open face spin reel. So far I haven't caught anything yet, but I might just need to switch to live bait, I don't know. One time, I got right smack dab in the middle of a snook feeding frenzy, and I felt my lure touch some of the fish

but none of them went after it.

My dad found me this really cool website for learning called edX. It's a website that has great online courses for stuff like poetry, William Shakespeare, science and cooking, computer programing, and more. All you have to do is sign up for free, find some classes you might enjoy, and enroll. These courses are made by a whole bunch of really awesome schools, such as Berkley, Harvard and others.

History Of The Eagles

 

Last night we watched History of the Eagles on Netflix. The Eagles is one of my favorite bands of all time. They are known for songs like Take It Easy, Desperado, and Take It To The Limit.

The Eagles was originally made up of four guys: Glenn Frey, Don Henley, Bernie Leadon, and Randy Meisner. Glenn Frey lived in Detroit, MI. He started playing piano when he was five years old. At twelve, he quit playing piano, went to a Beatles concert, and said "I need to be a guitar player." Don Henley grew up in Linden, TX, and started playing drums by banging his fingers and pencils on books. Then, his parents got him a red drum set.

Glenn was a lead singer in the Mushrooms, and later he met Bob Seger. He was going to make a band with Seger, but it didn't work out. Don's first band was called Shiloh. He was able to get Kenny Rogers to be their manager. Glenn went to J.D. Souther and played with him a bit. He also met Jackson Browne. They lived in the same apartment building and through that, he learned how to write songs. Jackson Browne was working on Take It Easy, but he was stuck on the second verse with "I'm standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona." Glenn put in "It's a girl, my lord, in a flatbed Ford, slowing down to take a look at me." Glenn and Don were both signed by Amos records with their separate bands. That is how they met each other. They went to see Linda Ronstadt one day, and her manager said "We need some singers and guitar players. Come with us." They auditioned, and they started working with Linda. Glenn and Don wanted their own band, so they found Bernie Leadon and Randy Meisner. That was the creation of the Eagles.

They were first signed by David Geffen's new record label, Asylum records. Then they also found Glyn Johns, a record producer. They found a manager named Irving Azoff, who helped them on several occasions. Soon after that, they didn't want Glyn to be the record producer, so they went for Bill Szymczyk,(pronounced Simsick). The Eagles decided that they needed a third guitar player, so in came Don Felder. Randy made Take It To The Limit, and everyone loved it when he sang those high parts in the end. Unfortunately, a while later Randy decided he didn't want to do that song anymore. So he left, and was replaced by Timothy B. Schmit. They also found Joe Walsh and replaced Bernie with Joe. After the Long Run album, the Eagles did a benefit concert for Senator Allan Cranston. The Senator's wife came around and thanked Don Felder, and he says "Your welcome,... I guess." Glenn got really mad about that and said "I'm going to kill you." Felder replied "I can't wait." The Eagles split up in 1980.

In the fourteen years that followed, the fans still really enjoyed the music. Don, Glenn, Timothy, Joe, and Felder all had solo careers. In 1994, they all got back together and played at a benefit concert in Aspen. Three years after that, they did the Hell Freezes Over tour. The name was inspired by something that Henley said. "The Eagles will get back together when hell freezes over." Then after that tour, there was tension between Felder and the rest of the band again.  So they replaced him one more time with Steuart Smith and they continue to tour and make new music. Hopefully they will keep on going for the rest of their lives.  Here's a video of me playing one of my favorite Eagles tunes.

This Is Your Brain On Music

My guitar teacher, David, gave me a book called This Is Your Brain On Music. It's written by a great musician and producer, Daniel J. Levitin. It's about why people like music so much and why some people have more abilities with music than others. For example, he did some experiments and one of them was to put people in an MRI, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, machine and played them some music. Then, he asked them to imagine hearing music. On the screen, parts of the brain lit up both times. In fact, the parts of the brain that lit up were so similar that they couldn't tell which one was when he played and which one was them imagining.

I'm also learning a song called The Way It Is by Bruce Hornsby. It's going pretty well. I have the first intro, the second intro, and the piano fill.