Kelly Madsen - Guitar Lessons

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays everyone!

Dream of Summer Day 2023 (a little late). ☀️🏖

Sharing Serenade To Summertime by the amazing Tommy Emmanuel and Richard Smith. Arrangement from the Jerry Reed and Chet Atkins album, "Me & Chet."

Another winter storm approaching this week. Have you been dreaming of summer too? 🌴

Serenade to Summertime l Collaborations l Tommy Emmanuel & Richard Smith The arrangement for “Serenade to Summertime” that Tommy Emmanuel and Richard Smith play comes from the Jerry Reed & Chet Atkins album - Me & Chet. This song ...

I am always surprised that many of my students have never heard the iconic song, "Somewhere Over The Rainbow." Last week, on February 15, was the birthday of composer, Harold Arlen, who composed the classic (lyrics by E.Y. Harburg), along with many other well-known pieces for film and Broadway. Judy Garland sang the song as "Dorothy Gale" in the 1939 film, The Wizard Of Oz, for which it was written. It won the Academy Award for Best Original Song and was voted the number one song of the 20th century by the Recording Industry Association of America and the National Endowment For The Arts. Judy Garland's performance of the song was entered in the Library Of Congress National Recording Registry for its significance.

Another famous version was recorded in 1993 by Hawaiian musician, Israel Kaʻanoʻi Kamakawiwoʻole (IZ). You can listen to this version, which features IZ's vocals and ukulele accompaniment, below. 🌈

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Arlen

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=V1bFr2SWP1I

Happy St. Cecilia’s Day to all musicians and music lovers! Here is “St. Cecilia’s Reel” written by Rounder Records mandolinist Lou Martin.

Sharing a performance and some information about influential guitarist, singer, and songwriter, Elizabeth (“Libba”) Cotton in celebration of Black History Month. The North Carolina-born blues and folk musician amazingly taught herself to play a guitar strung for a right-handed player upside-down, since she was left-handed, creating her own unique style of fingerpicking in which she would play bass lines with her fingers and melody notes with her thumb. She began writing songs in her pre-teen years, including “Freight Train”, now a traditional music standard, in 1904 at age 11. Many years later, while working for musicologist Charles Seeger’s family after having mostly retired from playing guitar, she began making recordings and performing after the Seegers discovered her talent. Mike Seeger, a very important folk revival musician who documented many older influential traditional musicians, made reel-to-reel recordings of Elizabeth’s songs in the late 1950s, which were later released as the album, Elizabeth Cotton: Folksongs and Instrumentals with Guitar on Folkways Records. She also played concerts with Seeger and other artists associated with the folk revival of the 1960s. She wrote new songs, released more records, and performed for many years. In 1984, she received a National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as a Grammy for Best Ethnic or Traditional Folk Recording in 1985. She passed away in June of 1987 while living in Syracuse, NY, at the age of 94. Below, Elizabeth Cotten performs “Freight Train”, demonstrating her own “Cotten Picking” style. 😊
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Cotten

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2DCWfBkMSI

Elizabeth Cotten - Freight Train (Rare Live Performance) Elizabeth Cotten performing her Freight Train classic in this historic footage from the University of Washington, courtesy of the Seattle Folklore Society.A ...