· Winner: Bela Fleck & the Fleck tones won for Best Pop Instrumental Album (Jingle All the Way).

· Sheryl Crow was nominated for Best Pop Vocal Album (Detours).

· Neil Young was nominated for Best Solo Rock Performance (”No Hidden Path”).

· The Ditty Bops were nominated for Best Recording Package (Summer Rains).

· Aimee Mann was nominated for Best Boxed or Special Limited Edition Package.

Cuban diva Omara Portuondo and renowned pianist Chucho Valdes won Latin Grammy awards during the 10th Latin Grammy Awards ceremony held on Thursday night at Las Vegas’ Mandalay Bay Events Center.

The Johan’s Brother jam to their hit song “Burnin’ Up” with the legendary StevieWonder at the 2009 Grammy Award held at the Staples Center on Sunday in Los Angeles.

Three Indian musicians are vying for a gramophone trophy each at 2009

Year’s Grammy Awards to be held in Los Angeles on Sunday.

One of India’s leading jazz musicians Louis Banks has earned two Grammy nominations in the best Contemporary Jazz Album category for his work in the albums “Miles from India” and “Floating Point”.

Performance Award for  his “Pipa Concerto” this year. Tan Dun has made an indelible mark on the

Hidden Dragon”, Tan’s creative repertoire breaks the boundaries between the eastern and western.

If you desire some gratitude for your current level of piano and violin playing, then simplest and most feasible option is to take a graded exam. Generally these exams are conducted by Trinity Guildhall which is an associative board of royal schools of music. This is a well appreciated board which holds piano and violin exams all around the world for citizens to take.

Trinity guildhall board graded examination consists of 9 exams include initial grade, grade 1 and grade 2 and so on until the ending one is at grade 8. On the other hand, you must pass all the grade exams in and grade 8 exam is the most important one which is a theory exam.

Almost every trinity guildhall board exams you are marked on 7 different subjects include 3 pieces, arpeggios and scales, sight reading, ear tests (listening), viva voce (signing). Every subject has a maximum mark which adds up to 100. You can easily pass these tests, but 2 types of grades which you are able to attain. The two types of grades are distinction and merit that show you have passed the exam with a higher level score.

There are three levels of trinity diploma study commonly taken to become a good teacher. The qualifications in ascending order are:

-          ATCL Recital, or ATCL performance

-          LTCL Recital

-          FTCL Recital

The theory exams are all on the subject of understanding, writing, and analyzing music by knowing about different transposing, clefs, melodic intervals, naming chords, and naming keys.

Music is a god gift, and for passing this grade exam you require a suitable teacher. Whether you are a beginner or an advanced student possessing a qualified responsible music teacher is very important. If you clear all the above mentioned diplomas, you can start teaching from now.

Ilayaraja‘s first movie was “Annakkili” in that he fused Tamil Folk Music and Tamil Film Music and he was the first to do that attempt and got succeeded. The National Best Film Music Composer award was bagged by him for three times and bagged many awards in regional level. Also he is the first Asian to compose a full symphony. He composed this to Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO). After his Symphony he was known to everybody in TamilNadu as Maestro Ilayaraja. His music was of great uniqueness as he blended Western and Indian instruments.

In his symphony for Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO), he composed Thiruvasagam, which is an old Tamil Literature. He did this symphony mainly to attract younger generations to India’s spiritual traditions. This was released on June 30, 2005 in a grand manner at the Music Academy in Chennai. The CD of this Symphony by Ilayaraja was also released in US in the Tamizhar Thiruvizha.

Ilayaraja composed this symphony with a high-profile team of musicians and sound engineers and they are Budapest Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Laszlo kovacs and Oscar winning Lyricist Stephen Schwartz along with five time Grammy-award winner for sound engineer, Richard King.
Ilayaraja is still composing music for Tamil films and he also composed many albums other than that of film albums which was also very popular among his fans.

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.

Michael Jackson was born in Gary Indiana, as the seventh of a family with nine children. He and four of his older brothers showed premature talents for singing, playing music as well as dancing, and all these were encouraged by their parents. When he was five, the later pop king Michael Jackson made his certified debut as the lead singer of a band named The Jackson Five. The band became working performers, and they had no time for some normal experiences or youthful pursuits. After a contest that was held at New York City’s famed Apollo Theater, Jackson Five began the collaboration with the prestigious Motown Records label. They sold more than 100 million records in their years together, from 1964 – 1981.

It seemed only normal that Michael Jackson would have a solo career. Michael Jackson went on to chase a career of amazing heights as a choreographer, writer and singer and many other activities. There were times when people were crowding around the TV set with friends and family every time Michael Jackson came out with an innovative video. Everyone would hurry home and discontinue no matter what they were doing, in order to see this icon. Each time he amazed us with his inexplicable talent and we were so much admiring this man they call the pop king Michael Jackson. As kids, many of us tries to imitate his moves and his dancing.

The personality of Michael Jackson was tremendously unique and he touched the souls of all people on this planet. He brought joy and excitement to the life of hundreds of millions of people and he will not be forgotten for that.