Salt and Demetri 10/20

Ok so sometimes I forget to post updates at a prompt time due to it just slipping my mind. By the time I get home from teaching I just want to chill. Thanks to iPhone tethering I can now use internet on my laptop at work and post updates immediately...sorta. Woo!!!

-Daniel

So today's lesson started off with a fantastic lunch from TJ's of Angier. Fantastic burgers, awesome fries, awesome everything. I think we all deserve some free food for that little spot there. Maybe? Possibly? Enough about lunch and delicious burgers though. The band is currently working on Smoke On The Water by Deep Purple. Salt and D have been working hard on getting the various parts to this song down. I am proud to say that today we made it through our arrangement of it from start to finish! We are seeing a lot of improvement week to week from these guys. We will get some new video up soon so you can go back and watch them at the beginning and then watch them at their current point. Tomorrow Alli and Adam come in for their lessons so there will be an update on them soon afterwards.

Foster's First Visit

Here is a video from Foster's first visit to the studio.

The First In House Band Jam Session

Alli wasn't able to make it so we had a couple of our students fill in on bass. So here they are, videos from the first 96rock In-House Band jam session.


First up is a video of Can't You See. We have Salt and D on guitar, Adam-12 on drums, Foster on vocals, and Camden Irvine on bass.





Next up is Sweet Home Alabama. Same line up except we have Elizabeth Ellington on bass.

A little solo from Adam-12

Adam just messing around a little bit.

Alli's Second Lesson

So basically we changed the arrangement of Can't You See by the Marshall Tucker Band and showed it to Alli and Adam, after showing them a DIFFERENT arrangement the previous week. They had no problem with it.

Salt, D, and Adam-12 Together

A discussion was stirred up about barre chords. Apparently someone had suggested that Demetri use those instead. Here's part of the discussion.





Here is a video of the three of them jamming.

Alli's First Lesson, Adam's Second Lesson

When Alli Morgan arrived we were pleasantly surprised to find out that she had previous musical experience, which will make her progress much faster. Here is video of her and Adam-12 jamming and a video of her playing with some of our younger students.

Potential Prodigy?

According to colleagues, Adam-12 has been drumming for a while now...air drumming that is. Here is a clip of his (allegedly) first time behind an actual drum kit. Is he the next Moon, Bonham, Peart, or maybe even Elvin Jones*?






*Elvin Jones was jazz great John Coltrane's drummer.

Back To The Beginning

The first of the 96rock DJs to come to Ellington Studios for their lessons were Demetri and Salt.  It was Demetri's original intent to play keyboard.  The general consensus ended up being that keyboard wasn't "rock" enough for this particular project so the switch to guitar was made.  The two picked up fairly quickly.  Here is a video of them jamming (yes jamming...it's what we do) during their very first lesson.







When their lesson was over a group of students who have formed a band (The Stool Pigeons) stopped by for a quick jam. Demetri and Salt then took over vocal duties on "Call Me The Breeze". Was a very unique rendition. The vocal phrasing was very William Shatner-esque.

New Blog To Follow The Progress Of Our DJs!

This blog was created to give updates on the progress of Salt, Demetri The Greek, Adam-12, Alli, and Foster on their quest to become the 96rock "in-house" band with the help of Ellington Studios!  We'll be posting video and other assorted things here.