When I teach remixes in music tech class, I like to make the analogy to radical jazz arrangements of standards. Technically, John Coltrane’s version of “My Favorite Things” is not a remix of the version from The Sound of Music, but it occupies the same cultural role as a remix. (In fact, I just accidentally …
Tag Archives: funk
Dilla Time in “Chameleon”
After reading and re-reading Dan Charnas’ Dilla Time, now I’m listening to music with new attention to rhythmic subtleties. I have especially been digging into the relationship between J Dilla and Herbie Hancock–Dilla sampled Herbie on “Get Dis Money” and “Zen Guitar.” That digging made me go back to my favorite Herbie tune with fresh …
Watermelon Man
As part of my current J Dilla binge, I was excited to find a track where he flips a Herbie Hancock sample (no, not “Come Running To Me“, though that one is great too.) This sent me down a rabbit hole with “Watermelon Man.” This track has had quite a journey, both in its prehistory and …
Living for the City
This Stevie Wonder classic is an iconic blues-based groove combined with some very non-blues-based harmony. Stevie sang all the parts and played all the instruments, including the sumptuous analog synth sounds designed with Malcolm Cecil and Robert Margouleff. Stevie’s brother Calvin Hardaway is the main character in the spoken interlude. Ira Tucker Jr of the …
Defining key centers with rhythm
Let’s say you have two chords, G7 and C. According to Western classical theory, these two chords establish that you are in the key of C. The G7 is tense and unresolved, and it makes you yearn for the calm stability of C. Music theory resources are full of language about how dominant seventh chords …
The politics is in the drums: Producing and composing in the music classroom
This post was published in the Journal of Popular Music Education! Pierre Schaeffer and DJ Premier Introduction Digital audio workstation software, recording equipment and MIDI controllers have become steadily less expensive and easier to learn over the past two decades. As a result, it has become possible for schools at all levels to offer “an …
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Starfish and Coffee
My kids love “Starfish and Coffee”, and rightly so. The version on Sign o’ the Times is fine and all, but for me, this is the canonical recording, both musically and visually: According to the Genius annotation, Cynthia Rose was a real person who Susannah Melvoin knew growing up. All the details are taken from …
I Want You Back
Why is “I Want You Back” by the Jackson 5 such an uncontainable explosion of joy? It has the happiest chord progression ever, which I wrote about in a previous post. But the harmony is just the icing on the cake. The real heart of this tune is the groove. Let’s have a look! I …
Pieces vs Songs vs Grooves
In preparation for making a bunch of new YouTube videos, I have been thinking about Anne Danielsen’s distinction between songs and grooves. It’s a useful scheme for thinking about pop, but it doesn’t cover everything in Western music. We need a third category for linear through-composed music. So here’s my proposal: all of the music …
Chain of Fools
“Chain of Fools” by Aretha Franklin is a song I loved for many years just for listening and enjoying, but then I started to love it even more as a music theory teaching example. It’s emblematic of blues tonality, one-chord changes, and groove structure. The released version is edited down from its original arrangement, which …