3 Minutes of Awesome! Best rock song ever...

For a rock song to be considered the best rock song ever, at least in my book, it requires the following items:

• It must be guitar-driven. Synth rock and EDM need not apply.
• It has to have a memorable hook, something catchy and engaging without being trite.
• It must have a sense of chaos and danger. Rock was never about safe music.
• There must be a bit of snarl to it, in both attitude and voice.
• It cannot be pretentious (and there's a whole lot of pretentious rock out there).

Now there are plenty of great songs that don't satisfy these requirements. That doesn't mean they aren't exemplary in their own rights; they just can't qualify for my list of "Greatest Rock Songs of All Time." And that's okay--Steely Dan will never make the list, but I still love their music. Ditto Paul Simon.

So what's on my list? Well, for years it was just one song. I've since added a couple of runners-up, but I should probably lengthen that list. These include "Smells Like Teen Spirit" by Nirvana, and "Twist and Shout" by The Beatles. But the song I believe to be the Greatest Rock Song of All Time is "My Generation" by the Who. Here's why:

• Guitar-driven? Check! Pete Townshend's windmilling guitar propels the track.
• Memorable hook? Check! The background vocals "talkin' 'bout my generation" and Roger Daltrey's stuttered leads.
• Chaos and danger? Check! Keith Moon's on-the-verge-of-falling-apart drumming that sounds sloppy as all get out but never loses a beat.
• Snarl? Check! It's the classic "us vs. them" mentality, with Roger singing Pete's famous and now ironic line "hope I die before I get old."
• Pretentious? Not in the least!

Add to that a wicked bass solo by John Entwistle, a surprising modulation, and a live show that typically wound up with total destruction. Greatest. Rock. Song. Ever.

3 Minutes of Awesome! Morning run playist...

Today, instead of one track, I'm sharing 16! This was the random playlist my iPod generated for me on my morning run. I've excerpted it to be under three minutes, so you can enjoy it without spending the hour plus that I was out on this beautiful day. Here are the artists:

• The Beatles
• War
• Prince
• The Sugarcubes
• Dave Matthews Band
• R.E.M.
• The Rolling Stones
• Esperanza Spalding
• Paul Simon
• Steely Dan
• R.E.M. (again)
• Los Lobos
• Led Zeppelin
• Yes
• Parliament
• Sting

Check it out:

Link

3 Minutes of Awesome! Gustav Holst and one of the greatest works ever written for band...

In the early years of 20th century, very few important composers wrote music for bands. Fortunately for us, Gustav Holst was one of them. His two landmark works, First Suite in E-flat and Second Suite in F, have become cornerstones of wind repertoire. This coming year, we will be studying his life and music, and I'm sure that both Wind Ensemble and Symphonic Band will spend some time with these wonderful pieces. There may even be time to dip into his orchestral suite The Planets, which explores the mythological beings of Mars, Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.

As an ironic aside, noted Holst scholar Colin Matthews composed an eighth movement, Pluto, in 2000. As Holst wrote his original work over a decade before Pluto was discovered, it always felt "incomplete" to later audiences. I wonder how Dr. Matthews felt when, six years later, Pluto was demoted!

In any event, here is the Intermezzo movement from the First Suite in E-flat, as performed by the United States Marine Band.

3 Minutes of Awesome! Louis Armstrong and Earl Hines...

Welcome back to "3 Minutes of Awesome," my summer series on incredible music that you can enjoy in only three minutes or so, bite-sized bits of wonderful sounds from classical, jazz, pop, and world music.

Today, I'm highlighting the first true giant of jazz, Louis Armstrong. Before he became a movie star and a retro-performer, he was on the cutting edge. Here some of the reasons he is considered a groundbreaking musician:

• He was one of the first soloists to improvise in a manner that went beyond mere embellishment of a pre-existing melody.
• He popularized the trumpet when his peers were all playing the mellower and quieter cornet.
• He may have invented (but definitely popularized) scat singing.
• His sense of the swing rhythmic style was much freer and smoother than the "ricky-tick" beat of other musicians.
• He played with a bigger sound and a higher range than other trumpeters.

If you want to hear the true Louis Armstrong, check out his Hot Fives and Hot Sevens, which were recorded in the late 1920s. These are much more interesting, in my opinion, than his later work. One of my favorite recordings, however, is this duet with pianist Earl "Fatha" Hines, on "Weather Bird." Check out this insightful commentary while you listen.

Why marching band has meant a lot to me over the years...

Last weekend, my family and I went to a reunion with some of our closest friends from the Northwestern University Marching Band. It's been almost 30 years since any of us marched in "NUMB," but our friendships, which were forged on the practice field and in the rehearsal hall, have lasted over the years. Among us, we had four piccolo players, three sax players, and a euphonium player. Two were drum majors, and a bunch of us were on the band staff. All told, with our kids and non-marching spouses, we had 17 people in a rented log-cabin house near Smoky Mountain National Park in Tennessee.

Today, we work in law, pharmaceuticals, music education, and parenting, with kids from 12 to 23. Most of our children have continued the musical tradition by playing in bands and orchestras from middle school into college. They enjoyed (I think), listening to us rehash old tales and swapping "what's he doing now?" stories.

There's something about the time spent together in marching band that truly binds people together socially. It's a lot like being on a team, except it's coed. Right now, I'm making plans for the 2013 season of the Warrior Marching Band, and it's possible we are going to break last year's record numbers. I'm starting to get excited about watching another wonderful group of students come together to form a family of musicians--one that just might create friendships that last for decades.

3 Minutes of Awesome! Little Richard is the man...

This may be one of my all-time favorite recordings ever. I'm not sure when it was done, but it's not the original single released by Little Richard. It sounds like something from the 60s, but I'm not an expert on his discography. I love the drummer and the horns on this one.

In any event, Little Richard rocks the piano as well as anybody, and he outdoes the Beatles on his "woo" effects. His outrageous stage persona and unbridled raw energy make him one of my five "Founding Fathers of Rock" (along with Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, and Jerry Lee Lewis).

Ask one of my music theory students about my patented Little Richard impersonation...

I'll be on hiatus for the holiday week ahead. See you with more "3 Minutes of Awesome" on July 8. Happy Birthday, USA!

3 Minutes of Awesome! Back to Brazil...

Every year in Concert Band, we study the music of Latin America. We begin with mariachi and norteno from Mexico, move on to son and samba from Cuba/Puerto Rico, and finish with samba music from Brazil. This year, the band was particularly taken with the Brazilian band Timbalada, and many of the students were downloading their music to listen to on their own. I was very excited to see that I had turned them on to one of my favorite musical cultures, right up there with Mali and India.

I went looking for some similar bands and found Monobloco. This is how they describe themselves:

Monobloco's eclectic repertoire goes from traditional carnival marchinhas by João Roberto Kelly to sambas by Cartola and Clara Nunes; from xotes by Alceu Valença to forrós by Luiz Gonzaga; from the Brazilian funk of MC Leonardo to pop songs by Paralamas do Sucesso, Raul Seixas and Tim Maia. Among the hits performed during the shows are Taj Mahal, Fio Maravilha, País Tropical and Santa Clara Clareou (all by Jorge Benjor), Rap do Real (by Pedro Luís and Rodrigo Maranhão) and São Gonça (by Farofa Carioca). This unexpected mixture is also seen in the array of instruments - electric and bass guitars are added to traditional samba school instruments such as cavaco, repique, tamborim, shaker, surdo and agogô.

When you check out the video, watch for some of these instruments, like the tiny tamborim (frame drum), the caixa (snare drum), the large surdo (bass drum), and various agogo bells. You'll even hear the apinto, which is the whistle used to signal a new section of the tune for a large percussion bateria marching in a samba parade.

Enjoy!

Here's the whole album on Spotify: