Imagine you’re in Jamaica, circa sometime in the ‘60s and ‘70s. You want to make some cash, maybe selling wares and food, get a little bit of a party going. You need to attract customers to your spot, so how are you going to do it? Well, one way you might is by getting a sound system going - some speakers on a flatbed truck, for example. You need to play some music, so you [...]
Those of you who haven’t been living under a metaphorical musical rock recently have probably noticed the substantial uptick in a little genre called “trap”. The genre originated in the 1990s in Atlanta; at its origin, the term “trap rap” referred to the lyrics of trap music. Rappers would tell tales of the hardships of drug dealing and poverty, the word trap a reflection of how difficult it was to leave that lifestyle. The word [...]
Humans crave simplicity. We crave complexity too, but under very different circumstances. The beauty of simplicity is that it’s easy to understand, and understanding things easily is important to our survival. Simplicity is especially useful in language, because tight definitions allow us to convey information in fewer words. I once had a friend ask me what the “shape that was like a square but two sides were longer and the other two were shorter” was; [...]
Manitoba is a province dedicated to culture and music; Winnipeg is known as a city of festivals. Here at Academy Music, we don’t just strive to be a Winnipeg music school; we strive to support music in our province in as many ways as possible. We know that musicians are music lovers, first, and that inspiration will often strike when listening to gorgeous music played by someone else. Put all of this together, and we’d [...]
Winnipeg has had an outsized effect on the music world considering our population. From classic rock to hardcore underground metal, Winnipeg musicians have had substantial influence across genres and eras. We want to help you carry the torch of these greats; after all, a Winnipeg music school should pay tribute to the amazing people from the city we live in. We’ll go through some well known classic, some more obscure, experimental influencers and some exciting [...]
Winnipeg Canada - Academy Music, a home tuition service that inspires and educates children about the joys of playing a musical instrument is pleased to announce that they are receiving a lot of praise from parents who are thrilled with their children’s musical progress. But perhaps just as importantly, the highly talented and passionate team of teachers are not only teaching the children how to play an instrument, they are also helping them to develop [...]
You know that we offer trumpet lessons in Winnipeg here at Academy Music - but did you know we offer history lessons as well? Okay, we don’t really offer history lessons, but this post will serve as a history lesson and a music lesson rolled into one. You’re going to learn about theory, about jazz, and about new modes of thinking - you’re going to learn how Miles Davis changed music. Bopped Out For those [...]
Today, we’re going to explore some of the fundamentals of Western music. What we’re learning about is one of the most integral building blocks of most of the music you’ve ever heard in your life - we’re learning about tones and semitones. In order to explore these concepts further, it’s helpful to understand the 12-note, or chromatic, scale. The Chromatic Scale You probably already know the chromatic scale without even realizing it: A A# B [...]
Our Winnipeg in home music lessons will teach you about rhythm - but what is rhythm? One definition I particularly like is “timed movement through space”, a quote from Charlotte Jirousek. We seem to be able to feel rhythm from very young, and some speculate that the ability to feel rhythm has existed in humans since our prehistoric days. That means rhythm has been around since before we could write; the systems that we have [...]
One of the nicest things about the guitar is how easy it is to tune. While our standard tuning is E-A-D-G-B-E, we can use those six tuning pegs to create an astonishing variety of different tunings. These tunings can have a variety of different uses; they might be used to create sounds and chords otherwise practically unavailable, or to help guitarists with weak fretting hands to make beautiful music that might otherwise be impossible for [...]