You don’t need an instrument to play music

One of the Google searches that seems to bring people to this site is “how do I make music without knowing how to play an instrument”.

There are lots of interesting ideas out there on the internet when it comes to topics like this.  Given time, we’ll hopefully explore a lot of them in this blog.

One of them that may seem more obvious is “Body Music”… simply, making sounds with your body.

Here’s a video I found on Youtube that demonstrates several techniques.  This video is done as more of a demonstration.  If you are interested in stuff like this, listen closely to what he talks about, because he mentions several techniques that you can look into.

A friend of mine posted this on facebook, and I immediately had to come here and share it.

This is a prime example of being creative with music.  These people made a song completely out of noises from their Jeep.

That’s cool enough in itself, but I’ve seen similar things done in the past.  What makes this one extremely awesome… they performed it LIVE on video!

Check this out.

Wow.  Who needs to be able to play a musical instrument to write a cool song?

I love YouTube. I can spend a bit too much time on there rather easily.

Tonight I got into watching Hang Drum players. If you haven’t seen, or heard more importantly, people play hang drums, you’re missing out. It has a very cool melodic percussive sound.

Here’s a video of a guy playing one.

Very interesting sound.  If they weren’t well over $2,000, I might think of adding one to my collection! 

I love it when I come across someone who is looking at the world as one big musical inspiration.

The guy that made the video below saw a picture of a bunch of birds sitting on some power lines. He decided to map out where those birds were sitting on a musical staff and turn it into a song.

Birds on the Wires from Jarbas Agnelli on Vimeo.

Is it the most amazing song musically in the world?  No, but I love where the inspiration came from, and to me, that was more of the point anyway.

Erik Mongrain: A Creative Approach to Guitar

Here’s another video example of someone who has taken a traditional instrument (an acoustic guitar), and learned to play it in a totally unconventional way.

This guy’s name is Erik Mongrain. When he plays the guitar, it doesn’t even really sound like a guitar…. but it does sound amazing.

KT Tunstall

Watching KT Tunstall play her song “Black Horse and a Cherry Tree” turned me into a fan of hers instantly. I had heard some songs from her before and liked them, but when I saw how she performed this song live, I was amazed.

This is a great example of creativity in live performance.

Watching this video inspires me every single time I see it.

Technically speaking they’re not writing creative music, but they’re definitely performing and producing it creatively.

This group, called Playing For Change, recorded each track of this version of Stand By Me seperately…. all as street performers in different parts of the world.

If this doesn’t make you want to go out and try something new and different with your music, I’m not sure what will!

Creative Approach To Music: Instruments that aren’t Instruments

A friend of mine sent me this video a while back, and I absolutely LOVE the concept. Here are three guys that want to make music, and they found a creative way to do it. They’re playing very un-traditional instruments. In fact, many would say they’re not even playing “instruments”.

Two of them have iPhones, one of them has a Nintendo DS.

They each have a different program… one of them is some kind of random noise/beat generator, one is a piano, and one is a bass. They play them together to make a pretty cool song.

I love stuff like this. Watching people come up with ideas like this makes my brain work a little harder trying to come up with something original as well.

Here’s the video:

I stumbled across Andy McKee a couple years ago. His technical ability and level of guitar skill is way beyond me, but watching his videos still inspires me to think about music differently.

When Andy plays the guitar, he plays the whole thing… not just the frets and the strings. He uses the body as a percussive instrument while he plays the strings by both strumming them and hitting them. He’s really turned the acoustic guitar into a completely new instrument when he plays it.

Here’s a video of his song called Drifting: