Happy Birthday To Sir Paul McCartney, 82

by Kevin Burton    When Paul McCartney was 14 he wrote a whimsical song called “When I’m Sixty-Four.” As of today he’s 82.    Can you believe that?    On that pivotal night, Feb. 9, 1964, when the Fab Four Beatles first appeared on the Ed Sullivan show, their collective age was 86.    A …

Amazing Facts About Musical Instruments

by interestingfacts.com     Each musical instrument has its own amazing facts and stories. Here are astounding facts from the world of musical devices, both familiar and unusual. 1-The Piano Defies Classification    What type of musical instrument is a piano? When a piano is played, each key controls a hammer that strikes a tuned string …

Retronyms: The New Defining The Old

by Kevin Burton    We all know that time marches on. So does technology and so does the language we use to describe it.    Today from our friends at Merriam-Webster dictionary, we get some phrases made necessary by those inexorable marches. They are called retronyms. Think of them as a blast to the past. …

Skunk Baxter’s Unlikely Second Act

   His parents named him Jeffrey, you know him as Skunk.    How did he get the nickname Skunk? He isn’t saying.     He played guitar for two of the best rock and roll bands ever, Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers.  He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a …

A Scientific Study Of Groove In Music

by Kevin Burton    As a consumer of popular music for more than 50 years I thought I knew exactly what a groove was, until I tried to define it.     I have no trouble feeling the groove in “Ain’t That Peculiar,” by Marvin Gaye for example. But how to define it?     The website …

Quick Music Fans, What Is A Groove?

by Kevin Burton    One of my beep baseball coaches called me “the answer man.” This time, I struck out.   My wife asked me “What is a groove?” I am an amateur musician and somewhat of a historian. You would think that question would be right in my wheelhouse.      I gave perhaps the …