spotlight on...onesummer oh

Onesummer viene dalla California settentrionale:sin da bambina ha cantato con i suoi genitori in una  country and western band, e si è dedicata alla musica tutta la sua vita.



Onesummer Oh "the Voice" e il suo  mega groovin' "Girl Power" Show deliziano il suo pubblico inworld con un mix di Blues, Rock, Ballads, Country ed anche “Broadway style”....  


Alcuni dicono che ha una voce  sexy !Altri dicono che ha una voce che “ruggisce” o che riesce a 
risvegliare i morti!!!











Coming from northern California, Onesummer was a child performer with her parents
country and western band, and has been around music all her life.
Now singing for her counsins band in real life blues and rock .  


Onesummer Oh "the Voice" with her mega groovin' "Girl Power" Show !!!
Blues, Rock, Ballads, Country and even Broadway style.... she serves it all !!
Come on the journey won't you??

Some say she have a sexy voice! Some say she have a voice that growls !! Some even say she has a voice that can wake up the dead..   Hope you can join us and make
up your own mind!! From nothern California in the valley OneSummer Oh  wants to rock your world . Looking forwards to seing  you all   tonight ..  
"OneSummer is different and refreshing. Staying away from standard covers and mixing up a lot of blues and rock and the fancy stuff ! A change from the folksy guitar you see a lot of here."


Here below our interview...

First of all some words about you:where are you from?   

I was born and raised in Northern California

How long have you been playing music?  

 All my life

What instruments do you play?

 I play the guitar

How would you describe your style?  

Variety Of Styles  Sounds And Eclectic

How prolific are you?

 Musically speaking, I am very prolific!

What do you spend the most time on; music or lyrics?

Both I must feel the music  first then I  have to learn and the lyrics at which time I must make the song my own.

Which acts have most inspired you?

Janis Joplin has been my main  source of inspiration

Where do you get ideas for songs/pieces of music?

Friends and family ask me for songs they would like to hear.

Except for other musicians what else inspires you?  

Art and going to museums

What has influenced you to get your to where you are today musically?

 Friends and family .. All my family plays music and they inspire me.

Which song would you most like to have written?

People Get Ready

Let's start spending some words about SL : how did you discover it?

 A friend of mine told me  about it so  I took a peak in and loved it .

What brought you inworld?

Some  friends wh were alredy in SL.

Did you ever think to use your real name for what you usually do in Second Life?
I
use my name that I use for my graphics and my family calls me for a nick name .

What you like to do here in Second Life when you are not playing?

 I love to meet people from around the world and  learn more about them and their country

Do you like shopping or going to music concerts or art exhibits?  

I am not a good shopper! I do love going to concerts to hear people either sing or play music .

:Do you think SL can be a valid showcase for your RL works?

For me no since I would not use it as a showcase .. but I do feel maybe some could find that it could help them .

In SL you have opened a live music venue:can you explain to us why did you start this virtual adventure and what are your aims, business or just fun?

I do have a club  AWWRadio.. I own a licences radio station and our goal is to bring people together through music for a better understanding of one another .

Do you use other kind of digital promotions?

 I use myspace  

Where do you see yourself a year from now:will Second Life still exist?

 I see myself as a very happy and grateful person having met interesting  people ..  and attending more more more music concerts ..

spotlight on...saintess larnia

Saintess Larnia is new to the live music scene on SL.  She is a British musician who will captivate you by the very first note with her strong, powerful, yet emotional voice. She delivers awesome and moving acoustic covers. She is poised to make a huge splash in SL with her dynamic sound.   She has been singing all her life and is inspired by the likes of Eva Cassidy, Crowded House, Heart, and K T Tunstall.  


Interview:

SANDY:Where are you from?
SAINTESS: I'm from the United Kingdom.



SANDY:How long have you been playing music?
SAINTESS:I have been singing seriously for about 15 yrs. It all started singing along to Madonna in my teenage years.



SANDY:Let's start spending some words about SL :how did you discover SL? what brought you inworld?
SAINTESS:I discovered Second Life through a couple of musician friends of mine Lexie Luan & Blindboink Parham  that were already performing many shows. They helped me get set up and I began doing some open mics and speaking to venue owners and quickly I was up and running as a performer.



SANDY:Did you ever think to use your real name for what you usually do in Second Life?
SAINTESS: think right now it suits me to be Saintess Larnia as I used to sing on another chat program with the name Saintess and I am making connections here on SL from people that knew me on there too.



SANDY:Can you describe your experience in SL:what did you like to do when you were not playing?did you like to go to live music events or to art exibits?

SAINTESS:When not performing I love to listen to other musicians and of course go shopping! I remember trying to rez my guitar and it ended up stabbing me through the stomach and my hair was flying beside me. I was giggling for quite a while about that.


SANDY:What has influenced you to get your to where you are today musically?
SAINTESS:I spent time listening to other live musicians and that inspired me to learn the guitar and they all helped me along the way.

SANDY:Do you think SL could  be a valid showcase for your RL works?
SAINTESSI think Second Life is perfect for promotion of RL albums because  the people listening are real fans in either world.I have written my first song called ‘Faded’ which has been really exciting for me as it has inspired me to write further. I wrote ‘Faded’  about a situation where someone’s personality is affected by another and how they feel themselves fading away.


SANDY:How would you describe your style?
SAINTESSI would say I have an original style and like to put my own twist into songs with power yet add delicateness. I play acoustic guitar and I feel this brings out extra creativity in me.


SANDY:Which are the sources of your inspiration?

SAINTESS: Many artists have influenced me but Eric Clapton & Serena Ryder are the main ones that really taught me about music and imaginative songwriting.
. I will be recording my first song shortly.



SANDY:Do you use other kind of digital promotions?
SAINTESSWhen I record my first single I hope to make it available to purchase through the main online music download websites.



SANDY:Where do you see yourself a year from now:will Second Life still exist?
A year from now I hope to have a first album and lots of original material to share. Second Life will exist and the live music scene will be stronger than ever.

Samples of my music can be found at www.myspace.com/saintesslarnia

---

sound & dintorni in second life

La musica in SL e' affascinante ma talvolta puo essere frustrante quando l'artista si trova di fronte ai problemi tecnici : la qualità del suono è senza dubbio il primo obiettivo di tutti i musicisti e di questo argomento vogliamo parlare pensando di fare una cosa gradita ai tanti musicisti RL che sarebbero interessati ad iniziare una carriera in SL ma anche perche' no a chi in SL gia' ha iniziato a fare i suoi primi concerti.
Innanzitutto bisogna sfatare la convinzione che per avere un buon  setup sia indispensabile disporre di un budget molto elevato ...si può ottenere una buona qualita'del suono con costi del tutto accessibili!

QUALITA' DELLA CONNESSIONE
Naturalmente dobbiamo iniziare parlando dello streaming: affinche' siano raggiunti buoni livelli qualitativi l'encoding dello streaming deve essere di 128kbps 44.1 KHz Stereo: tuttavia a volte emergono incompatibilita' con la reale connessione di cui il musicista dispone, ecco perche' bisogna essere assolutamente sicuri della reale banda di upload di cui si dispone.Ecco qui di seguito i rapporti ideali fra la ampiezza della banda e l'encoding:
128 Kbps Upload Bandwidth = Encoding 64 Kbps
256 Kbps Upload Bandwidth = Encoding 96 Kbps
512 Kbps Upload Bandwidth = Encoding 128 Kbps
Disponendo di tali valori non  si incontreranno i tipici problemi come la perdita del segnale:in ogni caso si consiglia sempre di fare un soundcheck prima del concerto sia perchè non tutti i server di broadcasting sono uguali fra loro e sia perche' la distanza fisica dalla locazione del server puo causare problemi: non dimentichiamo che sulla piattaforma virtuale di SL si verifica spesso che l'esibizione di un artista avvenga in un altro continente rispetto a quello in cui il suo segnale viene trasmesso!

QUALITA' DEL SUONO
La qualita' del suono  naturalmente si puo' perfezionare facendo ricorso alla giusta tecnologia:come abbiamo detto questo non significa affatto sobbarcarsi costi eccessivi, e se l'artista dispone gia' di un project studio sicuramente non incontrera' alcun problema.
Un  setup semplice ma efficace si puo ottenere con una scheda audio professionale o semiprofessionale esterna (USB o firewire non importa). Questo elemento e' davvero molto importante per cui il suggerimento, nel caso in cui si faccia uso di una scheda audio standard on board e' quello di cambiarla: decisamente tale scheda non e'fatta per essere usata per produzioni musicali!
Comunque se ne possono trovare di ottime sul mercato, semi professionali, a meno di 100$. Un suggerimento può essere quello di disporre inoltre di un mixer tradizionale (o meglio ancora un mixer con interfaccia audio ed effetti on boards se non volete spendere poi capitali in effetti esterni!) con il quale gestire gli ingressi esterni.
 
Ingressi Esterni
Un esempio tipico di setup può essere:
- un ingresso determinato dall'uscita dell'effetto rack della chitarra (o basso o altro strumento),
- un ingresso determinato dall'uscita del pre microfonico (o anche dal microfono stesso);
- un ingresso determinato dall'uscita delle tastiere;
Con questos setup si ha un solo segnale input sul software del mixer della scheda audio: è preferibile usare il mixer come superfice di controllo nelle performances live in sl in quanto è molto più semplice gestire i livelli agendo direttamente sui controlli tipo volume, equalizzazione, livello di input, ecc..
Con un  mixer  esterno(da 200$ a 800$ per restare in una fascia diciamo a budget controllato) si possono aggiungere strumenti esterni facilmente controllabili con un unica interfaccia hardware.
Naturalmente controllate sempre i cavi di ingresso (suggerisco di utilizzarne di buona qualità) che in genere sono sempre la causa di fastidiosi rumori di fondo.

Mixing ingressi esterni e fonti interneL'utilizzo di tracks registrate rende possibile suonare da casa propria come se si avesse a disposizine una intera  band , facendo la felicita' dei propri vicini!
Si puo usare un sequencer (Cubase, Sonar, Fruityloops etc), ma anche utilizzare track già registrate in formato wav/mp3 files. Un sequencer da l'opportunita' di cambiare qualcosa nella  performance in real time, aggiungendo magari qualche effetto VST. In questo modo avrete un mix tra sorgenti esterne suonate o cantate live ed una base avanzata pre-registrata (naturalmente anche quella suonata precedentemente).
Nell'utilizzo di tracce preregistrate è preferibile usare  la minore compressione possibile perchè il broacasting prevede già un ulteriore encoding e questo non fa che incidere sulla qualità generale del suono con classici effetti quali perdita della dinamica, minori sfumature nel range di frequenze udibili ed in generale un certo livello di compressione sonora.

A questo punto potete cominciare a diffondere la vostra musica in SL (e nel web) in diretta, comodamente da casa vostra!
Buon divertimento!

Sandy's Mood

One of the major stake that indie musicians have to deal with on the web is visibility. Web brings up a lot of opportunities for indies musicians, but as a matter of fact, we daily experiment that the web brings anonymity at first.

How can a musician can be visible when lost among thousand of others in huge musician directories ? How can he or she put up a social network which works, when thousand of others musicians are harassing the members of places like myspace ?

And if we try to watch things on the public point of view : How can people make a difference between real indie musicians, those who are mature enough in their art, and "bathroom singers" when anyone can register anywhere as an artist ?

- A good way to get more visibility is to gather in a group of high quality artists, give a name to that group, so that people can be sure that they will get something good when they will listen or buy some music of a musician refering to that named group.

- The high level of quality of the group has to be preserved, so we need to have simple and clear rules for attendance and acceptation of new artists in the group.

- Online live music is still an unknown territory whose best pionners are already involved in Second Life. At the same time, on line live music can surely be a good strategy to get some visibility on the web, on virtual worlds like SL, but also on other places, using web tv, as well as web radios, and other media that we dont know yet.

- Virtual worlds are also good places to experiment new relationships between artists and public, and to find out new ways to build social networks that really works.

- We have to use the best of the new technologies and put up some tools that will be helpfull for each artist joining the group. Those tools have to use the latest features of web 2, rss automatic feedings for exemple, so that we can interconnect what each one is already doing on his or her side, instead of trying to do doing something new, which would be too much time consuming. Thoses tools could be : a weblog, a webradio, a tvchannel, a 3D place in SL, and so on ...

spotlight on Sonorous Break

 Fife based band, Sonorous Breaks rock hard enough to please, with melodic female vocals adding depth and meaning to well crafted, catchy originals to their own take on well known covers. Andrea, originally from California, provides a much needed feminine touch to Sonorous Breaks in the male dominated scene.

Sonorous Breaks are Andrea (Violet Whybrow) who plays ,as she says, her “vocal awesomeness”, Martin (Biggus Asbrink)at the drums , Dale (Chupacabra Beaumont) who plays just bass(even if he’d like to learn the trumpet though),Angus (Geo Yohogania) plays mainly guitar but dabble on the keyboard, (“II would say drums -he says-but my band members would debate that “)
 
They play in SL for the love of music, just for tips...respecting maybe the pristine sense of SL as the perfect place to create and  share creativity with others.

Andrea only is from Petaluma California, while the others band members come come directly from Sunny Fife in Sunny Scotland .

They’ve been involved in music from different time:Andrea has been playing music for 25 years,Martin almost 7 years Angus about 18 years, while Dale got his bass for Christmas 2002, but he never really started 'playing' music until 2004.

They describe their style basically as a sort of grunge rock with a bit of metal melody and madness mashed together:definitely their sound is just energetic and lively,not too flashy, but at the same time a little unique.

Since I’m always very interested in the process of musical creation Ia   asked them  how long does it take to write a song or piece of music.
“It depends,-Andrea says- sometimes it ‘s fast and some take months and some songs evolve over time.” Dale instead just  usually needs about 30 minutes to create a new song, even if of course it takes longer to perfect it though”

“It all depends on how inspired I am or how we feel.-Angus says -I can have an idea for a whole song just pop into my head and that's it but some take a little more development with help from the guys when its just an idea for a riff”.

Angus thinks of himself as being a good but not great songwriter,although he’s versatile ,as he was classically trained, so he finds he can switch styles of playing very easy. He’s quite proud to be  one of those rare breeds of rock musician that can actually read music!

Except Dale, who just writes music (“ I wouldn't be trusted to write lyrics!”) the others band members are equally involved both in doing lyrics and music

Then I asked which acts have most inspired them.
“As a child Madonna -Andrea says-as I got older I would say the Black Crowes, Hole and Nine Inch Nails.”

Without any false modesty Martin says “Me personally(he laughs) but also Foo Fighters, Tool, 36 Crazyfists, Rage Against the Machine”.

Dale has been inspired by Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave but soon he learned to play bass and develop his style by listening to them.

Angus says:” The Black Crowes, is my favourite band ever, but also Rage Against the Machine, Skunk Anansie, Nirvana, Alice in Chains, Faith No More, 80's/ 90's cock rock ...oh and not forgetting the musical powerhouse Britney Spears!!! (he says laughing)”

 
For these guys everything can be a source of inspiration and ideas for songs or pieces of music just come up with things, their lyrics come from experiences and other peoples stories.

Angus says :”Anywhere really can inspire me:I could be doing the most mundane thing and an idea just pops in there and I've gotta go get something down before I forget it. Most of the time I find things just happen when I'm just messing around on my guitar and Annie says she likes what I did....then I have to work out what that actually was “

For Dale everything starts from the music “ I usually just try to work around the guitar..”:”Playing gigs and seeing people enjoying our music inspires  to play more..Angus got his inspiration from his mood and Dale  says:”My source of inspiration are...peanuts. I suffer as Charlie Brown suffers!”he jokes



Definitely they influence each other as a band, “When it works it’s magic and everyone can feel it in the room.
they play together because they feel a sort of urgency that shows through Angus words:”i have  a need to play. If I'm not in a band making and playing musical I get a bit stir crazy!!! I just need to do it.

Then i asked which song would they most like to have written, Andrea chooses Evenflow by pearl jam its song perfection!! Martin: Everlong - Foo Fighters.
Dale’s choice is  Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14, also known as the Moonlight Sonata. (I wish I wrote that.he says)
Angus: Ooh this is a tough one but probably "Groove is in the Heart" by Deelite, I love that song it makes me happy lol Shocking choice as it's not a rock song but hey it's my song yo!!!!

Then we started  spending some words about SL first I asked them how did they discover it.

Andrea is the one who first discovered it off a music forum and then she introduced  this amazing virtual stage to the others band members and shelped her band mates to create their avatar as well.

What basically  brought them inworld has been their urge to do music on another platform.The idea of live musicians playing in virtual clubs intrigued them all so they had to check it out.



When they are not on stage they love exploring all around SL:
Andrea is a model, a designer,  a  builder and she wrote for a magazine and fashion stuff all as my r

Angus tends to go see other musicians play and that's about it.
“Concerts mainly or any cool sims that people suggest to me, I like well built and creative things.-he says”


All the Sonorous Break agree that SL can be a valid showcase for their oRL works    because of its worldwide audience!!
“It's a good promotion tool for people to listen to your music all round the world. an-Martin says-and to top it off its free to do that!”
“It has potential... -adds Dale-people have shown an interest, so if we work hard I think it can be.
Angus: Absolutely. It's an outlet to a worldwide audience and we tend to get more attending our SL shows than RL ones l”
The main reason by the way is just that they have a lot  fun and they like to let people hear theirmusic,.”Of course Anrdrea says-if we can gain anything from it,that would be awesome. AySorry for the cliché”




Finally my last question:”Where do you see yourself a year from now:will Second Life still exist?”
“Second Life will still exist and we will conquer the world!!!-Andrea says and Martin: I “hope the band will be more established in real life and in second life. Yeah i think it will till be around as more people hear about it everyday.”
Dale adds“Definitely! I think we'll still be playing on Second Life - maybe even more often. The more we play, the more people will hear us. The more people that hear us, the more fans we'll acquire! And the more we play, the more fun we'll have. “
Angus ends our conversation with a personal wish!”A year from now we will rule the world playing mariachi music and SL will still exist!!!”