Today we have a few major companies deciding what you hear on the radio. This is why independent labels and artists are not heard. As a major of fact, if Rock & Roll started today you would never have heard it at all. Today we have the alternatives such as Pandora where you create your own playlists but that does not expose you to great new music that you might like. We now have satellite radio but to be honest, it’s not much better than commercial terrestrial radio.

It’s not that there are not great radio personalities, we have many but they are not allowed to play what they decide their listeners will enjoy. There are truly great radio personalities like Bob Collins of WRHU in New York and Bubba Jackson of KJAZZ in Los Angeles. These guys love music and respect their listeners. The problem is that they are on NPR stations and their audience is not as large as it should be.

I hope that internet radio is the new frontier bringing back radio personalities who listeners will identify with and can be exposed to great new music by, not just what the major labels are pushing. Internet radio has the ability to be independent and yet reach a worldwide audience. I know that there are quite a few internet stations but we still do not have any break out personalities whose taste can shape the future of music while embracing the roots of great music.

The first poll asked “What Is Your Favorite Music Format?” and gave our visitors the choices of “CD”, “MP3”, “Vinyl” or “I Only Listen To Radio”. The results were surprising: 57.1% Vinyl, 33.6% CD, 4.2% MP3 and 2.5% for I Only Listen To Radio. The fact that more than 50% of our visitors like Vinyl tells me that our music lovers have great sound systems and want the richer sound and that they prefer that over digital music overall.

We always want to give our customers what they want so starting this fall we will be releasing limited edition Vinyl of selected titles from our catalog. These will truly be collectible as they will be numbered, we will also release CD versions but they will not be limited editions.

Our second poll asked “”What Is Your Favorite Music Genre?” and this poll gave our visitors the choices of “Blues”, “Country”, “Jazz”, “Rap”, “Rock” and “Hip Hop”. For the most part the results truly reflect the tastes of our music loving visitors. Jazz received 41.9% of the votes, Blues 27.9%, Rock 23.3%, Rap 4.7%, Country 2.3% and 0% for Hip Hop. The only surprise here is that more people voted for Rap over Country since we have no Rap at all in our catalog but lots of classic country.

We do want to know what you think so if you haven’t voted yet, please let us know your thoughts. We will be posting a few new polls soon and we do hope that everyone will let us know their opinion. That way we can make sure to offer what you want. Remember, you can always write me directly if you have a question or a request. Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter as well – @ShellyLiebowitz

Another classic album from our vaults is “Take It On Home” from Steve Lawrence. Anyone who loves great singers and great songs will want this one. Also we are offering up “Dolly Parton Live At The Boarding House” for our country fans. This is Dolly at her very best and if you are a fan you must own this one. Last by not least, we are bringing you “The Billy Vera Album”. If you are a fan of Billy’s this this is one you will enjoy, it was another lost gem. All of these albums are in our Jukebox and available in our Music Store for purchase.

I hope that everyone will take a minute to visit our Jukebox where you can listen to full song versions from many songs that we currently have for sale. It’s completely free, so pick out what you would like to hear, crack up your volume and enjoy!

Jukebox

You must have the drive to succeed but you also need to be able to take direction from a producer and learn the rest of the craft of being an entertainer because talent is not enough. There are thousands of very talented artists out there who never make it. It takes more and the ones who make it learn from professionals who are willing to teach them.

Getting signed is just the beginning for an artist, its when the hard work begins. You need to learn how to best use your talent, how to work a stage, how to structure a show, how to connect with your audience, how to deal with the media and so much more. It takes time to learn it all plus the desire to learn and the patience and understanding that you can’t learn it all overnight.

There will always be artists who achieve some success without learning to be a real entertainer but they tend to come and go quickly. The ones who last, the artists who are always in demand know how to entertain, with or without current hits. You need to learn how to ‘wow’ an audience so they leave feeling that they want to see you again.

From his early days as the host of American Bandstand, Dick brought the new music known as rock and roll to a mainstream television audience. He also was one of the few television personalities who actually let black artists on his show to perform their songs instead of white acts doing cover versions.

He was often referred to as “the world’s oldest teenager” since it looked like he never aged and he also knew the music as well as anyone. Dick’s love of the music and the artists never changed. Dick Clark will be missed.

Some of you have asked for advice on writing a blog or how I created my blog page – ask my webmaster, Ador at charmingweb.com. Some of you have asked if I would write on other blogs, write articles or even write a book. I am very flattered but I find it hard to find the time to just write this blog. The majority of my time is taken up working as a Producer, which is what I have done professionally for the last 40 years.

As for the aspiring artists who have asked for advice, do what you love, do it because it’s what you have to do and not just for money. Really successful artists all earn their dues by working hard at being the best they can be, working out new material in front of audiences and becoming better and better onstage and becoming better performers as well.

I do love all kinds of music. As Duke Ellington once said, “There are two kinds of music, good music and the other kind”.

Follow me on Twitter: @ShellyLiebowitz

For so many years our schools were the standard by what schools around the world was judged against. So starting in the 1960’s and 1970’s schools in China, Japan, India and the rest of the world all required their students to have music education.

The interesting thing is that all of the research done on the effects of music education on children’s ability to learn has shown one thing, that kids who have music as part of their education tend to do much better in math and science. So why do we eliminate music for our children? Isn’t it interesting how our children now lag far behind children from the rest of the world in math and science scores.

We need to take a hard look at our education system and if cuts need to be made I suggest we look at the school board salaries, perks and overhead, not teachers or our children’s educational needs. If we do not do the right thing by our children we will be raising a generation that will only need to be taught to say “do you want fries with that?”.

One of the rare treasures we just added is Jerry Garcia And The Wildwood Boys. This recording took place prior to his forming The Grateful Dead and it is unusual since Jerry is playing banjo.

We also added a great album by Country legend Hank Williams and a terrific compilation album called Rock And Roll Forever. This compilation contains songs by Roy Orbison, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, Dale Hawkins. Carl Perkins, Etta James, Je Tex and more.

To round out this group of releases we have also added a duets album by Judy Garland. Judy is joined by Tony Bennett, Frank Sinatra with Dean Martin, Barbra Streisand, Peggy Lee, Lena Horne, Mel Torme’ and others.

I hope everyone enjoys all of this music as much as I do. At SRI we try to bring you the very best. Enjoy!

Everyone knows of all Tina Turner’s hits from her early days with Ike Turner to Tiny Dancer but did you know that Tina also recorded a great Country album? Well we have dug deep into our vaults and we now have it available for you.

The Jefferson Airplane is a legendary rock group that exploded in the mid 1960’s and was a major part of the peace and love movement coming out of San Francisco. Buried deep in our vaults were recordings by The Jefferson Airplane before they hit it big. These recordings were recorded live during a show at San Francisco State College. If you are a fan you will love these.

Ruth Brown is a legendary jazz and blues singer whose recordings are treasured by many, so I decided that it was about time that this recording from the 1980’s was available. This is Ruth Brown at her very best.

And last but surely not least, a recording by my friend Sammy Davis Jr. In all the years that I knew and worked with Sammy he proved that he was the world’s greatest entertainer. Sammy could sing, dance, act, tell jokes and do terrific impressions. Everyone knows Sammy’s hits from Birth of The Blues to Who Can I Turn To and The Candy Man but did you know that Sammy recorded a Country album? This is classic Sammy Davis Jr. I miss him every day and listening to this recording once again has brought back so many great memories for me so I hope you will enjoy it too.

All of these albums are now in our Jukebox for you to listen to full songs at no charge plus we have placed them all in our Music Store so you can purchase song downloads of your favorites or order a CD.

Classic music never dies, it’s always here for us to enjoy.

The first videos that I added contain a duet by Frank Sinatra And Dean Martin from my PBS Special, “Judy, Frank & Dean”. I have also added duets by Judy Garland with Barbra Streisand, Tony Bennett and Mel Torme’ from the Judy Duets Special.

I hope you enjoy these and the rest of the videos I have posted for your enjoyment.