Greetings from The Music Bowl! I'm The Wonderfish. If you are anything like me, you have a hard time keeping up with all the new stuff . You know, new movies, television shows, comics, memes, music, remixes, deluxe editions, and John Mayer music videos (featuring premium content!) all over the place. Then there are the video games, the newsletters, the causes, and books, national anthem performances, photos, hashtags, Pinterest boards, podcasts, product endorsements, Gordon Ramsay ventures, and I could go on and on and on. Face it. There is new content everywhere all the time. We cannot possibly keep up with everything. But, we can stay connected. And we tend to our own little corners of the universe as best we can. In terms of music, we've had a slew of new releases thus far in 2018. It is now the middle of June, which means it's time for the Half of the Year Hear . That's right, we've narrowed the never ending list of new albums down to a select f...

Greetings from The Music Bowl! I'm The Wonderfish. Summer is upon us! We here at The Music Bowl want to let you know what's bubbling to the surface in the next couple of months so you don't miss any of the music goodness. What's coming up? 1) NEW POSTS Next week, we'll introduce our "Half of the Year Hear" where you can check out some of the year's new albums with us. Fin Favorites start this month! The Wonderfish will introduce you to films about music that you won't want to miss, such as 20 Feet From Stardom , It Might Get Loud , Whiplash , and Sound City .   What is summer without summer concerts? We'll be discussing summer tours and festivals - the pros and the cons, yes, but also the sheer joy that is meant to take place. 2) NEW SHOWS Heard has some gigs!  I have some gigs!  Yes, there are even a few Heard and The Wonderfish gigs this summer! You can keep up with our show schedule on our website . 3) NEW SONGS &...

Greetings from The Music Bowl! I'm The Wonderfish. In case you missed last week's post, we talked a little bit about how music can change someone's mood. I used Kendrick Lamar's performance on Saturday Night Live of the song I as an example of a performance that pushes me to work harder as a musician and songwriter. This was the first time I saw Kendrick perform live and I will never forget it. I was mesmerized. I had heard of Kendrick Lamar and listened to a few of his songs off of Good Kid, M. A. A. D. City prior to the show, but I hadn't listened to any of his albums in full. This song changed that. And, honestly, I haven't tried to learn the lyrics of a hip hop song word for word since my college days. This song changed that, too. This is the power of music. So, after seeing this, I promptly purchased his To Pimp A Butterfly album and gave it a couple of listens. I thought it was incredible. In 2016, he released u ntitled unmastered and Damn in 2...

Greetings from The Music Bowl! I'm The Wonderfish. Let's talk about mood this week, shall we? They say that most musicians, particularly ones that perform live, are especially good at reading a room. This is probably a skill that one can improve on the more gigs, or performances, one plays. Now, some musicians read the room and adjust what they are doing accordingly. Others ignore the mood of the room, or don't even attempt to read it in the first place. I am the type that constantly tries to get a sense of how the audience is responding to the music I'm playing. I want to create an experience for the listener, and if I notice there is not much of a response in the audience, it pushes me to put even more energy into my performance. Music is a powerful mood setter all on its own. As we previously discussed, music is incredibly personal, too. There are certain songs and certain artists that can always make me smile, make me think, and me me want to play my guitar. It ...

Ahoy! I’ve been performing as a bassist for more than a decade. I’ve performed with groups of all sizes and even done several solo gigs. I could rattle off a list of many favorites and the ones that have meant the most to me. Instead, for your benefit, I’m going to tell you about one of the worst. Aside from being a bass player, I have a substantial background in guitar, even studying classical guitar as my major instrument as an undergrad. There was a time I could literally play any Dave Matthews song you named on guitar. An off shoot of playing so much guitar was that I started writing lots of songs. They were simple, but they were my creative outlet none-the-less. I did some really low budget recordings in Audacity and played for family and friends occasionally. Eventually the idea came up of putting on a solo show. I booked a venue, borrowed the pieces of gear I didn’t own, rehearsed like crazy and awaited the day to arrive for the gig. And then no one showed up. I ...

Ahoy! You may have noticed a sharp decline in my posts so far in 2018. In fact, I have yet to post. Thankfully the Wonderfish has kept things rolling for me as I have been in the last semester of graduate school. The work load was intense and I unfortunately could not keep up with school work and the usual blog schedule. However, with my comprehensive exams and masters recital now finished you can expect your usual Monday post from Yours Truly. Here’s a sneak peak at what I’ll be discussing over the next few months: 1) I had the chance to work with artists Miguel Zenon and Maria Schneider and I’ll detail those experiences to give you an inside look into playing with them and preparing their music. 2)    I wrote and arranged all the music for my recital and will talk about the compositional process, the coordination of musicians, and the scheduling of rehearsals. 3)    Despite my recital being part of my degree requirement, I didn’t treat this ...

Greetings from The Music Bowl! I'm The Wonderfish. Do certain songs give you goosebumps? Or might they give you the sensation of having goosebumps without the goosebumps actually forming on your skin? Or perhaps a song causes a chill to run up your spine? Did you know there is a French word for this sensation? Could I start a post with more questions? The term is frisson, which means "aesthetic chills". We pronounce it as "free-sawn" and when a song gives you goosebumps, this is what you are experiencing. Why shouldn't music be powerful enough to give us goosebumps, or something of the like? Music is a universal force! We connect to it, study it, and consume it generation after generation. There was a drum circle session at an education conference I recently attended and I jumped at the chance to learn more about drumming. One of my fellow participants discussed how drumbeats hold significance for us because they remind us of hearing our mother...