8 May 2013 (Thursday)

Another beautiful sunny day in Seattle. Six students came to talk music.

As I was setting up the class I explained the word "supposedly" (definition) and then asked each student to use it in a sentence.

When it came time to ask for song suggestions I realized I had not suggested a topic/theme for songs for the day. Everyone was scanning their minds to think of a song when one students suggested "Beautiful Girls" (video, lyrics, song info) by Sean Kingston (info). 

Do you hear the sample of the song "Stand By Me" (video, lyrics, song info) by Ben E. King (info) in that song? I love that original song!

Following the theme of beautiful girls I played a bit of a song by INXS (info) that I like a lot: "Beautiful Girl" (video, lyrics, song info). I like the melody as he sings "Beautiful girl, stay with me".

The next song chosen was "Goodbye Hook(?)" (video with lyrics). The student who chose it likes it because it is a cheerful song, though cheesy ;-) .

The next song chosen was "Nothings Gonna Change My Love For You" (video with lyrics, song info) by Khalil Fong (info). This is a cover of a song originally by George Benson (original version) but made famous by Glenn Mederios (video).

I can't remember now why I decided I wanted to tell the class about the Blind Boys From Alabama (info), but I wanted to show how they harmonize. I played a little bit of "Amazing Grace" (video, lyrics, song info). However I wanted to show how these old guys can make modern music sound really cool so I played "Well, Well, Well" (video, lyrics, song info), a song they did together with Ben Harper (info).

We talked a little about how blues music led to rock n roll music. Someone asked what the first rock n roll song was. It is debatable which song was the first rock song, but it is generally considered that "Rock Around The Clock" (video, lyrics, song info) by Bill Haley & His Comets (info) brought rock n roll music to the mainstream in 1954. It is funny now to think that at that time the music and the look of the musicians was outrageous. 

Speaking of outrageous at the time, I played a clip of Elvis Presley (info) doing "Hound Dog" (video, lyrics, song info). This video shows Elvis doing all his moves, but on a later TV show they only filmed him from the waist up because they way he danced was considered indecent.

One student asked if a person's spoken accent in English can be heard when he or she sings. This was an excellent question! Basically, the answer is that all English-speaking people sing with the same accent; it is pretty much an American accent. Here's an article which supposedly explains the phenomenon. 

As an example of the accent question I played a bit of "Can't Stand Losing You" (video, lyrics, song info) by The Police (info). Notice how he sings "I can't" like an American, not "I cahn't" like a Brit. (This song was banned by the BBC because it talks about committing suicide.)

One of the students mentioned that his favorite song is "Every Breath You Take" (video, lyrics, song info). I asked him why he likes this song so much and he said it's because the lyrics are easy to understand. 
  
At this point I went into my usual explanation about the song meaning, that it is *not* a love song, rather it is a song about possession and obsession(!) and that Sting later wrote the song "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free (video, lyrics, song info) as an antidote to "Every Breath You Take".

The last song we heard for the day was "I'll Be Missing You" (video, lyrics, song info) by Puff Daddy (info), which uses a sample of "Every Breath You Take".


With that our time for the week was over. It was a fun conversation!