MUSIC MATES

Archive for the ‘Rock music’ Category

Jordan Charles Rudess, a famous Rock Keyboardist member of the Metal band Dream Theatre. He was born on 4th November 1956 in a Jewish family. During his school days his second grade teacher identified his piano playing skill and from that onwards he was trained by the professionals. He entered into the Juilliard School of Music at his age of nine, which is a Pre-college Division for classical Piano training. Then Jordan Rudess turned his interest towards the progressive rock music and synthesizers. Even though his parents and tutors are not interested in rock music he tried his best as a solo progressive rock keyboardist.

His confidence, passion and continuing efforts made him to survive in this field with great compassion. He performed many programs from and did various projects during the 1980’s but he got his recognition only in 1994 for his solo album “Listen” which gained him the “Best New Talent” in the Keyboard Magazine Readers. After that two bands in America called The Dixie Dregs and The Dream Theatre offered him the chance. He chose to move with Dregs and performed many shows with Rod Morgenstein. Later they two performed together in all shows and became popular as Rudess/ Morgenstein Project or RMP.

Rudess and Morgenstein both got chance in Dream Theatre’s band as a support slot in their North America Tour and after that in 1997 Mike Portnoy formed a team for Dream Theatre in that he chose Jordan Rudess to fill the keyboardist place. Jordan Rudess also performed Liquid Tension Experiment’s two albums for Dream Theatre. He performed in a stunning manner hence Portnoy and John Petrucci, a colleague of Dream Theatre, decided to make Jordan Rudess as a permanent Keyboardist of Dream Theatre.

He became a full time Keyboardist in Dream Theatre from 1999 and from that onwards Jordan Rudess performed and composed many albums.

Rock as a genre of music may have been born relatively late as far as music is concerned, considering that they played the fiddle and the harp since Alexander the Great. But rock like the youngest kid of the family has been the most spoilt, most fickle (where sticking to rules is concerned) and also probably the most loved. The musical format can be best described as being “restless” and it is therefore extremely difficult to define. Electric guitars, drums, bass, strong vocals and deep lyrics are some of the terms that can be thrown together and somehow give a tentative definition. A closer look at the history would at the closest give one an idea of its evolution, interpretation of how that comes together to form the music genre is left entirely up to personal taste.

Rock music owes its origins to the 1940’s as a decade.  Country and Jazz was the order of the day at that time and the two morphed together aided by some electric guitars to produce a new kind of sound. 1950’s rock music pioneers like Chuck Berry were one of the first to merge some guitar with classic blues and be successful at entertaining the crowds at the same time. It was by the early 1960’s that Berry’s followers began to expand the scope of rock, these included The Rolling Stones. Rock music in their hands was beginning to become cultural symbols with their freedom with sex and youthful energy.

The 1970’s brought along new experiments as far as the sonic territory was concerned. Led Zeppelin helped kick start a new branch of rock that came to be known as Heavy metal, which was darker and heavier than what their predecessors were creating. Pink Floyd also began to gain popularity around that time and they added their psychedelic arrangements that have often been credited with egging on the progressive rock movement in music.

Punk was also soon born around the late 1970’s, when bands like The Sex Pilots and The Clash brought rock down to its basic instruments, loud singing and enraged playing of instruments and an over all attitude that spelt RUDE. Industrial rock soon came to the forefront with their unconventional use of instruments like drumming machines. However, the 1980’s again began to toy with the genre as every decade had been doing. English bands such as Depeche Mode began to demonstrate a post – punk style of song writing. REM as an American band began to absorb a similar style and these bands became popular as the “College rock” because of its popularity with the college radio stations.

It was in the 1990’s that rock began to settle into a different mould, one of an alternative style with bands like Nirvana and Soundgarden bringing the genre to mainstream music. The 1990’soon dwindled back to the past with a more traditional mainstream style of rock returning Linkin Park and 3Doors Down and Foo Fighters. Even though on the surface they might sound like hip hop-rock, contemporary and grunge, the spoilt kid remembers its roots.