Keyboards

When people think about instruments that have had huge effects on music, the guitar usually gets most of the glory. In all reality, I believe the keyboard has had more of an effect on music than any other instrument. Think of any band in almost any genre of music and I'll bet they use a keyboard. After thinking about this I went through my Itunes and literally almost every song I put on had a keyboard in it. Even Heavy metal songs had a large keyboard parts they were noticeable.
Along with being a large instruments for bands, keyboards compliment the voice very well, therefor they are great instrument for vocalists such as Elton John. Keyboards also have such a broad range of sounds they can create that they can be used with out even being noticed. They can be played as drums, keyboards, clarinets, and almost any other instrument you can think of. With these kind of capabilities its no wonder the keyboard is such a widely used instrument.

In the radio

I chose to listen to four very different radio stations for a total of an hour. I chose to listen to stations from my home town online because I'm not familiar with any local radio stations, and plus I found out that I don't actually own a radio in my apartment. The stations I chose to listen to were, 107.9(Hip-Hop), 99.5(Country), 92.3(Rock/Alternative), and 98.5(Classic rock). Each of these stations are very different from each other, So therefore the guitar plays a different role in each one.
I would say the guitar stood out the most in 98.5. This is because there were many guitar solos, and the guitar was the instrument that led the songs and stood out above all other instruments. Most the classic rock songs used power cords and the guitar sets the melody for the rest of the band.
The next two stations had a good amount of guitar in them also. 92.3 and 99.5 both had a large quantity of songs where the guitar was the stand out instrument. 99.5 used the acoustic guitar most of the time, just because that is the style of country music. 92.3 consisted, for the most part, of just the electric guitar. This station was full of repetitive power cords. There wasn't much as far as guitar solos go, and I would say the drums equaled the guitar as far as the most outstanding instrument within the song.
lastly 107.9 was the only station that lacked guitar. I don't recall hearing one song in the entire time of listening to it, that contained a guitar, or any other instrument other than a synthesiser. There was a complete lacking of instruments and each of the songs were just artists. There was not one song that was performed by a band of group of artists.

88.1 Daytons Classical station

Listening to 88.1 The DPR, I heard a few different pieces. I believe it was 3 whole pieces and 2 partial pieces at the beginning and end. The pieces all had similar set ups. Each piece started in a slow melody with mostly chordophones, which then slowly crescendo into a fast melody composed of a combination of all the instrument families. The chordophones I heard consisted of, but weren't limited to, violin, cello, maybe a harp, and definitely the piano. One thing I did notice tho, is there is a lack of membrano phones. Throughout the entire hour, I heard maybe two minutes worth of membrano phones.

Membranophone

Building my membranophone, I found it to be much easier than building the idiophone. There was no tuning involved and I didn't have to go through the difficulty of trying to find a base that wouldn't hinder the sound produced. I took a piece of plast bag and I stretched it across the top of a semi large glass. This actually produced a decent sound and if you have the talent, you could play a nice little solo on it.

My Idiophone

As I started to brainstorm about the construction and materials required for my idiophone, I immediately hit a wall. It was difficult to figure out what type of idiophone i should create and what it should be made out of. Eventually i came across the idea to use pop cans that i could roll into skinny aluminum rods and set them across a series of angled pieces of paper. This might sound easy but it is very difficult to roll aluminum.
Along with rolling the aluminum, I had to cut the rods to different length so I could get a different tone from each one. After placing these rods across the rolled paper, I realized they were not in the proper place for each of their specif harmonic frequencies. It took many different tries to get the rods at just the right place in order to get the best sound from them. Once finished though, I was surprised at the sound that came from this simple set up. This was by no means comparable to an actual xylophone, but it didn't sound nearly as bad as I thought it was going to.

Personal Song Description

After learning and discussing the different aspects that go into categorizing music, I decided that the song Come Gansta by Tech Nine would be a good song to describe. I want to look at what this song is composed off and why I like it so much.
To start with, like most popular music, this song is homophonic. It consists of a melody along with lyrics. The melody is pretty consistent through the entire song and the lyrics are actually well evolved and meaningful, unlike many of the urban rap artists that are popular.
I'm not exactly sure whether its played in minor or major because the melody is done electronically and not with any instruments and the song doesn't have a sad or happy tone. As far as form goes the song is full of repetition. The lyrics don't repeat but the melody in the back is the same thing over and over with very few changes.
I like this song because, while it might have a simple repeating beat, it is accompanied by meaningful lyrics that are catchy and appealing to me.

Music in Everyday Life

I was asked to note all the music that I heard within a twenty four hour period. This is not an easy task because I was constantly hearing music, whether it be in my room or in class.
To start my day off I woke up to the alarm on my phone, which just happened to be a song by Tech Nine. Soon after waking up I noticed music from a few different rooms down the hall and my roommates room next door. On my way to class I listened to my Ipod and heard multiple types of music coming from dorm room windows.
While in class I heard music coming from rooms down the hall, and multiple phones rang during my classes that coincidentally had songs for their ring tones. It seems that even in places where you would least expect music, it still seems to find its way into the room.
Later that night I couldn't go more than a few mins without music. I didn't matter if I didn't have music on, cause almost every one else within the building seemed to have music on. Even if I went outside I could vaguely hear the sound of music coming from houses that were having parties. It seems that music is a part of everything, even where you least expect it. In twenty four hours I heard music almost the whole time, except when I was sleeping.