I do private instruction on Piano, Guitar, Drums. If your family lives around Highland Park, Lake Forest, Lake Bluff, Libertyville, Buffalo Grove, you're in my area.

Erik Alfred Satie born in 1866. He of the lovely, light, minimalistic pieces. Every time I play his Gymnopedie #1 in public, every time, someone comes up and says, "Will you please turn your sound down?" Er, no, wait, that's not the phrase to which I was refering. ALMOST every time I play Satie, in public, someone ELSE comes up and says, "Hey, isn't that music from [such-and-such a tv show/movie] or something?" And tv, not to mention movies, hadn't even been invented yet when Satie was writing. Isn't that c'est incrediable?

The first-ever merry-go-round was seen today in 1620. Obviously it was at a fair, but not so obviously the fair was in Philippapolis, Turkey. Oh, you already knew that? Hmmm. Riders on the merry-go-round reported that the sound system playing AC-DC's You shook me all night long sounded terribly distorted. So much for carnival technology in the 17th century.

The Beach Boys' eleventh album, Pet Sounds, is released on this day in 1966. This is such an easy target for silly comments that I'm not even going to bother.

Johannes Kepler announced his harmonics law today in 1618. It immediately went planetum. He later released it in his greatest hits album, Harmonice Mundi (latin for I hate Mondays). 

Last summer, I was a featured performer at the first-ever Third Ward Art Festival in Milwaukee. It was great and I hope to be back there next year (in the same lovely, shady spot).

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel (online edition) ran a photo essay of the event with a picture of, blush, me, jamming away! (Click the pic to go to the article.)

Read more: Music Practice and Brain Development