Let there be music-NOT

[Shadoewolf]

Umm the one song I remember is "Breakfast"? So guess its very old Newsboys!

[WhatWouldJohnCrichtonDo?]

38 minutes ago, Shadoewolf said:

Umm the one song I remember is "Breakfast"? So guess its very old Newsboys!

Michael Tait is a great singer, but I like the old Peter Furler albums best. "Breakfast" is a good song. 

[freshlemonade]

Um...don't forget about Flame

 

[HarryPotterFan]

On 10/17/2017 at 4:24 PM, Bad Wolf said:

No idea. I do not understand the thinking of the Vatican. Now, the violin I understand. A screechy  violin played by an untalented child is surely the devil 's music.

Me neither. But you could make anything inappropriate/sexual, just ask Freud.

On 10/17/2017 at 4:58 PM, SnazzyNazzy said:

Maybe it's HOW you play the sax. You put your lips around the tip, and blow....

I've seen A LOT of movies where people do that, just not with a saxophone.....

Well, thanks for bringing back memories of when I was 11 and my family went to France and my brothers and I were flipping through TV channels...

[Jenn The Heathen]

My 9 year old just started playing the saxophone in school, so this has been a disturbing conversation....

[Four is Enough]

Is it me, or is so much Christian contemporary music mind numbingly REPETITIVE~ 

God is awesome, we love God, repeat repeat repeat

[SapphireSlytherin]

9 minutes ago, Four is Enough said:

Is it me, or is so much Christian contemporary music mind numbingly REPETITIVE~ 

God is awesome, we love God, repeat repeat repeat

Wouldn't know - I never listen to it. lol

[elliha]

24 minutes ago, Four is Enough said:

Is it me, or is so much Christian contemporary music mind numbingly REPETITIVE~ 

God is awesome, we love God, repeat repeat repeat

I more or less hate all music labelled Christian unless it is hymns or sacral music. I know a lot of people like more modern stuff and Christian music not meant for worship but it makes my skin crawl. I still have flashbacks from the horrible evening a friend of mine dragged me to a musical evening at a church in our town. I thought it would be a half-lame singalong of different Christian songs and wasn't really that pumped up by it but to my horror I discovered it was Christian hardrock by one of the silliest bands that ever roamed this earth. My friend "Isn't this great?" *Me smiling a huge fake smile and nodding and feeling bad for lying that hard in church*. At least they offered free tea and sandwiches afterwards, I felt like they owned me that.

[Bad Wolf]

Some of the praise songs go like this

Chorus

Verse

Chorus x2

Repeat verse

Repeat chorus x2

Repeat all

One more time with the chorus.

 

I got bored quickly. Changed  churches. We sing stuff like Satchmo's Wonderful World. No repeats.

[Rachel333]

Obligatory... 

[Naga Viper]

All of the above. One time years ago I went with some extended family to their church and got subjected to a barrage of ultra-vanilla praise songs complete with people doing their sky pilot salutes or whatever. I was...uncompelled. And to make matters worse, we were in the second row, so it wasn't like I could be a smartass, throw up some devil horns, and headbang to the band. Maybe I could've just held up a lighter, but I doubt that this crowd was big on irony.

I think an agnostic British acquaintance summed it up best: "Christian rock doesn't really do subtext, does it?"

[NakedKnees]

I hate "contemporary Christian" music with a fiery passion. It's embarassing to listen to for me. Definitely reminds me of when friends tried to recruit me to their evangelical churches and nights with lots of lighting and powerpoints and music like that was their idea of a good time for the youth. Gag. After that, I was super easy to recruit to the United Methodist church, with it's all handbell choirs and pipe organ and what not. Unfortunately, Christian worship music infiltrated that church in the year or two before I left. So sad.

I hate to be so cruel but it's the one genre of music that I don't like, and I don't have an "exception" band or song or album for. Every time I think I remember a Christian song I like, it turns out to technically be a hymn. I'll take recommendations, though!

[Seahorse Wrangler]

On 10/22/2017 at 11:21 AM, Four is Enough said:

Is it me, or is so much Christian contemporary music mind numbingly REPETITIVE~ 

God is awesome, we love God, repeat repeat repeat

There was a poster on a now defunct forum I was on who had a formula for how much she liked the music vs the number of times God or Jesus were mentioned.  Anything with a less than 3 count was automatically bad.

[Bethella]

On 10/22/2017 at 11:21 AM, Four is Enough said:

Is it me, or is so much Christian contemporary music mind numbingly REPETITIVE~ 

God is awesome, we love God, repeat repeat repeat

We call it 7-11 music, 7 words repeated 11 times  

[ATimetoDance]

On ‎10‎/‎12‎/‎2017 at 7:57 PM, Cleopatra7 said:

The Duggars may have the resources to get a good music teacher, but I doubt they are willing to go outside of their fundie bubble to find one. My guess is that they have used random women in their social circle who may have a little music knowledge but not enough to be an effective teacher. As others have mentioned, the Duggars were always terrible at their instruments and they seemed oblivious as to how bad their playing was. It also seems like the Duggars are very lazy people and don’t want to work at anything to be good at it, whether it’s music or “ministry” or even just getting to places on time.They seem to think that their shining Gothard counternances will do all the work for them.

Jana and Jinger are both really good on the piano. They both seamed to put in time and effort to that. Of course they weren't aloud to do anything else as hobbies. 

The group violin performances they were awful.  I never saw any of them perform alone. So maybe some of them where OK but they have to all play at the level of the worst member. 

I know Jill played the harp. I think Jinger and Jana might have also played. The gold one they bought was a peddled harp. You have to be pretty good at regular harp before you even try adding peddles. I don't remember ever hearing anyone play on camera though. 

Meechelle claimed that Jana was a concert pianist in a birthday message to the twin a few years ago. 

[VVV]

15 minutes ago, ATimetoDance said:

Meechelle claimed that Jana was a concert pianist in a birthday message to the twin a few years ago. 

Oh this drives me crazy, referring to anyone with any presumed competence on an instrument at all as a "concert" (whatever). A concert pianist is a soloist who plays concerts, for money, to large audiences, and most likely makes recordings also. A concert violinist is a soloist who plays concertos with orchestras. I am a professional violinist; I am not a concert violinist, because I play IN the orchestra, not IN FRONT OF the orchestra.

The correct modifier for "pianist" in Jana's case is "amateur."

[mango_fandango]

It's much easier to produce a good sound on the piano than on the violin. 

I used to have flute lessons but never practised. Of course now I regret it somewhat and wish I could take it up again. 

Question: how do Americans progress in music? Do you do things like grades? We have the ABRSM which administers exams in musical instruments, you can do Grades 1-8. There's also Trinity College London but ABRSM are the best known I believe.

[meowfundiecatz]

The reason the group violin sessions were so horrid was because of the method the Duggars use to teach. (Or really, the Query women use to teach.) IIRC, it's basically a "by ear" method for the younger ones, which is why Jana would be the "leader." So yeah, if you have a seasoned musician playing with a 5 year old, it's going to sound sad. I do think all of the children *are* trained musically. There are some videos of Jinger playing piano beautifully.

[SapphireSlytherin]

6 hours ago, mango_fandango said:

Question: how do Americans progress in music? Do you do things like grades? We have the ABRSM which administers exams in musical instruments, you can do Grades 1-8. There's also Trinity College London but ABRSM are the best known I believe.

Is this in school? All of my lessons were private, starting at age 4 on the piano. I had one teacher who insisted on my playing for the "Guild" (I can't remember the full name) every year, which included tests of theory and technique, as well as musicality. I was pretty far along when I finally burned out (after drawing a blank on a stage in front of about 300 people). I always had severe stage fright when playing in front of people.

[VVV]

6 hours ago, mango_fandango said:

It's much easier to produce a good sound on the piano than on the violin. 

I used to have flute lessons but never practised. Of course now I regret it somewhat and wish I could take it up again. 

Question: how do Americans progress in music? Do you do things like grades? We have the ABRSM which administers exams in musical instruments, you can do Grades 1-8. There's also Trinity College London but ABRSM are the best known I believe.

I don't know of anyone who does the grades where I am but I'm sure some teachers somewhere do use the ABRSM grades--probably piano teachers more than anyone else. ASTA (American String Teachers Association) has their own set of grades (ASTA CAP) but I don't think they've caught on very widely either.

Commonly, American students playing orchestral or band instruments are in their public school ensembles. Every year there is a "solo and ensemble" contest at which students play a solo and receive a grade and comments from a judge, though unlike ABRSM there isn't much of a required progression and there aren't co-examinations on piano or theory. Some private school students have something similar. The better and/or more ambitious students often join a youth orchestra, which is available to public, private, and home-schooled alike. But honestly it is the constant competition for "chairs" in bands or orchestras (school or youth) along with All-Region and All-State competitive auditions in high school that serve as the biggest motivators in my opinion.

There is nothing wrong with the Suzuki method (beginners learning by playing by ear); that's how I got my own start. But there are good and bad teachers in every style, and there are more or less motivated students of every teacher. I'd hate to be judged by my weakest students.

[mango_fandango]

Music lessons are often done through school and exams are part of that (think you have to pay) but you can also do lessons outside of school, either through a private teacher or through a centre. 

Which instruments you can learn depends on age, but piano and violin are usually from a younger age than most. 

[CreationMuseumSeasonPass]

Speaking of praise music in churches, I grew up in a mainstream Presbyterian church in Iowa. We had the traditional morning service of classic hymns, organ music and handbell choirs. The music was a bit boring as a child, but I have fond memories of growing up in that church.

However, about 10 years ago, my congregation realized our numbers were significantly declining and changes needed to be made for the church to simply survive. The solution was implementing an early morning praise service with a praise band whose members are all aging rockers who have PhDs in music related fields. Even though they play basic contemporary Christian songs, they definitely bring the rock to it.

I think the solution of adding another service definitely worked with 8 a.m. early morning modern service with Christian rock, 9 a.m. Sunday school and 10 a.m. traditional service with organ music and old school hymns.

Has the church lost the close-knit atmosphere that was abundant when there was just one service for the congregation to attend? Perhaps in a way. However, this change was necessary to keep the church in existence. The contemporary praise service has definitely brought in a younger family crowd, and the traditionalists can still have their OG service, too. Change isn't always bad, it's just different.

[NakedKnees]

I played music throughout my time in school in the US. I echo a lot of the above, that a lot of the more "serious" musicians did extracurricular things- whether those were private lessons ($$$, but scholarships existed) or ensembles, church/other reglious groups, or independent groups ranging from rock bands to string quartets. I participated in all of these at varying times.

Different schools had different emphases in music, which often varied by student body size. My enormous high school had 3 orchestras, 1 symphonic band, 1 marching band, and 2 jazz bands during class periods. There was also symphony orchestra, drumline, pep band, percussion ensemble, and AP music theory offered outside regular schedule (and always extra marching band stuff). Most of these groups competed in district competitions and sometimes state/regional competitions (for high-level groups), and there were also small ensembles (string/wind quartets/duets, etc) created and sent to competitions every year.

Agreed that getting Principal Chair was often a competitive goal. All-district, all-Southern (California), all-state, Western Regional, and National groups were audition only. I was proud to make district a few years, and everything "above" that was worthy of major praise and recognition. All of this sort of thing went on to college/job applications, us being young people looking for any type of experience.

Really long, roundabout way of saying that I don't think there's a very universal way music is learned in the US, not to say that it's not effective. I honestly love the memories and the things I learned going through that culture.

ETA: summer/winter "camps" focused on music were big too.

[WhoompThereItIs]

2 hours ago, NakedKnees said:

I honestly love the memories and the things I learned going through that culture.

Same, and I miss how much time I was able to devote to it. I joined a community band last winter, but work keeps getting in the way sometimes  

[Four is Enough]

16 hours ago, ATimetoDance said:

Jana and Jinger are both really good on the piano. They both seamed to put in time and effort to that. Of course they weren't aloud to do anything else as hobbies. 

The group violin performances they were awful.  I never saw any of them perform alone. So maybe some of them where OK but they have to all play at the level of the worst member. 

 

 

I can't say whether or not Jana and Jinger are "really good" on the piano, as I've only heard Jinger play ONE song. I've heard it more than once, and it sounds identical every time I hear it, as if she learned one song, to be played one way, forever...

And of course "Amazing Grace" from 19 violins is a horrible mess when the Duggars are playing, and that's all I've ever heard them play, I think.

So I believe they have one or two much practiced repertoire pieces, and that is it. Hell, it's been 25 years since I took piano lessons, and I can still crank out "Standin in the Need of Prayer".. but not in front of anyone. You wouldn't like it...