I’m helping my good buddy Steve Nixon put together a jazz piano lessons site called FreeJazzLessons.com

Check it out!

A few weeks ago, I had the immense pleasure of seeing Bruce Hornsby live for the first time. I have to admit, I wasn’t that excited at first. I was only familiar with Bruce’s work that went mainstream – songs like “Mandolin Rain” were what I thought represented the bulk of Bruce’s creative stylings…and his crossover album with Ricky Skaggs.

BoywasIwrong.

I was absolutely floored to learn that Bruce’s music is a lot more like highly technical jam band/roots rock than the pop stuff I’ve heard on the radio for all these years.

So check out his music, particularly “Noisemakers.” Totally rad. Great grooves. The man is also a jaw-dropping technician…so much so that 2 non-musicians in our group were even overwhelmed by what the guy can do on a piano. But that’s not the point of this post. The point is to talk about what happened after the show.

Thanks to my good buddy Joe Patti, we were lucky enough to spend some time backstage with Bruce himself, where I learned a hugely important lesson that applies to music, business, and life in general!

Some background: Bruce has been touring consistently for 10, 15 years or more. He has very high retention with his band members. In fact, many of the band members have been with him for the bulk of his solo career. I knew this going into the performance because my buddy Steve is a huge Bruce Hornsby fan.

One of the things that really stood out about Bruce and his band was how happy they seem to be while playing. These are guys that have been playing together for many years, many shows, many frustrations and yet they still seem to be so happy to be playing with one another. What gives?

Once we got backstage I had the opportunity to ask Bruce that question. He said it’s really simple. He keeps things fresh by “f***ing with them” all the time. (His words, not mine.)

When asked to elaborate, he said he keeps things from getting stale by changing key signatures, time feels, grooves, bridges, jam sections, tempos, etc. on his guys. He keeps them challenged by keeping it challenging. He doesn’t let them fall into the “yet another day at the office” rut.

The music sounds fresh because it’s fresh. The band looks happy because they’re happy.

The most important portion of this lesson, though, was how he left it. At the end of the conversation, he said that in order to keep things fresh for his band, he has to take a lot of musical risks…risks that could end in the band sounding loose and sloppy. However, the risks are worth it because of what happens when he takes a risk and it works. He said that he is willing to have the band sound okay or mediocre 70% of the time if it means that the other 30% will blow his listeners out of the water.

Great business insight from a music industry monster! You can apply this to site builds, product launches, new hires, promotions…wow!

Questions: Are you okay with letting your employees/business partners/clients/children fail occasionally if it helps them achieve excellence? Have you created a culture at work or at home that teaches that it’s okay to take risks so long as those risks are calculated, and that you are not simply setting yourself up for failure?

Read the full post here.

Interesting stuff, ain’t it?

Take a look at Sungha Jung – awesome young fingerpicker from Korea. Gotta love his determination…he’s young to be this good! He must be working his butt off!

Sungha Jung

Playin’ A Tune:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RVFQwl6n_M

Anyone who has ever worked with SellingSource or PartnerWeekly knows Corey Owens. He initially came out to Las Vegas to work at PW while I was president, tasked with bridging the business development side of the business with technology and operations. He was quickly promoted to VP of Operations, and today runs SellingSource’s entire consumer acquisition division.

I was really happy when Corey moved to Las Vegas – not just because I was going to have a fantastic operations guy and technologist keeping things humming, but also because Corey and I played in a band for 4 years while in Chicago. Our plan was to invade Sin City and kick some internet marketing ass while rocking out.

(Tangent: Mission accomplished.)

I’ve harassed Corey for a number of years about blogging. It seems to make sense that an online marketing heavyweight should blog about his random thoughts, observations, or some other whimsical shit so we can all laugh, cry, and learn together, right?

Wrong.

I attribute Corey’s lack of a blog to several factors:

1. He has a very short attention span.
2. He has more important shit to do.
3. He never learned to read.

Ok, just kidding about #3.

Anyway, he sent me an IM today and let me know that FINALLY he has a blog up. Woo ha! On behalf of the interwebz, welcome to blogging, buddy. Have a great time.

He’s just getting started so bookmark this mofo and check back frequently.

Corey Owens Blog

My buddy Billy Kay is a successful online marketer, Las Vegan, musician, and now – music video star!

Billy’s doing what he loves: Making music and sharing it. Granted, he probably has a bit more disposable income for these projects than most guitar pickers, but still, you gotta give the guy a hand for going after it.

Billy Kay’s latest video is in post at the moment and will feature a very very sexy lady who is also a big time public figure. (I’m not going to disclose who since I’m not sure if it’s a secret.)

Anyway, check out his music at Billy Kay Music. It’s a bright, poppy, country-influenced singer songwriter sound.

And learn a lesson from Billy Kay: Use the internet to pay the bills but don’t forget to spend some time (and money) following your dreams!

My buddy Randy is an awesome photographer. He posts his work at Kochis.net. Check it out, yo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDd-KigrFEo

At the risk of sounding smug (no – me?), life is pretty freakin’ good right now. Work is going great. Deciding to start my own company is one of the best things I’ve ever done. Family life is awesome. My weight is back to an acceptable range. I’m really thankful for all of this and as a result I’m not making any of the usual NY resolutions this year.

That said, there are a few things that I would like to prioritize in 2011:

1. Write music more consistently – I’ve set a goal to write at least 2 songs a month. While this might not sound like a lot, I tend to go through songwriting dry spells that last months or years. I am going to try and work through these dry spells by committing to writing one song every other week, even if I don’t feel like it. I will be posting at least one of those songs here.

2. Give more – I’m not sure if my giving will be of time or $$$ but I think 2011 is the year I start giving back to the Las Vegas community. Things have been great for my family these last few years. Time to start contributing to the community.

3. Slow down – I’ve been working at a frenzied pace for the last 5 years or so. In 2011 I want to re-teach myself how to slow down a bit. Walk a dog. Meditate. Read a book.

Every guitar forum that I’ve ever checked out is chock-full of metalhead douchebags who primarily want to talk about the melodic minor scale, sweep-picking, and Dimebag (RIP man). Imagine my surprise, then, when I found a forum chock-full of guitar players who focus their discussions on productive topics: chord theory, song writing, and the like.

The site is called Chordie. Although I’m very new there, I like what I see. It has a very diverse membership base from all over the world and many different musical disciplines – there’s even a guy who write ambient music on there!

Check it out when you have a second!