Music
I do love music. When I was growing up, someone gave me the Time Life 1950s and 1960s collection so I started off listening to the oldies, but they get well…. old quick. My favorite part of those songs were the harmonies the older music had. From there I moved to a few records in the classic rock genre like Eric Clapton, The Moody Blues, and Elton John. The first cd I owned that I liked every song on was Elton John’s “Live in Australia with the Melbourne Symphony” in the mid 1980s.
I also lived in a few places that were near, well lets call it: the hip-hop section of town. Here i got into more R&B, Hip-Hop, and Rap. I still liked the older stuff, but the new music had much more rhythm to it. I also got groups like Boyz II Men (as did everybody else) because I loved the R&B plus the old school style of singing with the close harmonies.
In highschool I got into A Cappella music through chorus class and singing events. The first A Cappella song I ever heard was Africa by the UNC Clef Hnagers off the Safari Album in 1990… I was hooked. I started getting into all the A Cappella groups of the time like The Hullabahoos, The kings Singers from London (they came to Chapel Hill and the bassists stayed at my house) and I even got into the older groups like The Persuasions that took me back to 50s and 60s style R&B.
So by this time I’ve got four of five main styles of music that I really listen to a lot… Classics like Queen, The Beatles, Scorpions, Van Morrison, The Eagles, James Taylor, and Elton John… R&B like The Commodores, Marvin Gaye, Lenny Williams, and Sam Cooke… Hip-Hop & Rap like Tribe Called Quest, Naughty By Nature, Tupac, Dr Dre, Black Sheep… A Cappella Like The Clef Hangers, The Brown Derbies, Socal Vocals. And along the way a few friends got me interested in some great stuff too, like Jimmy Buffett or Country music like Alan Jackson, Alabama, Patsy Clien, and Alison Krauss.
Of course, you can’t forget the radio too. I got into some great mainstream stuff just by turning the dial. Some favorites were, and still are U2, Huey Lewis, Edwin McCain, and Dave Matthews Band.
So with all that in mind, I’ve collected some of my favorite songs from each genre…
U2
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Dave Matthews
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Jack Johnson
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Tupac, Snoop Dogg & Outkast
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Jason Mraz
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Hullabahoos
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Jimmy Buffett
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Lenny Kravitz
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John Mayer
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Clef Hangers
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Hullabahoos
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USC SoCal Vocals
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Sam Cook (A Change is Gonna Come)
The Moody Blues Blues (Your Wildest Dreams)
Rascal Flatts (Broken Road)
Elton John (Tonight)
Bill Withers (Ain’t No Sunshine)
Rod Stewart (The Motown Song)
Barenaked Ladies (When I Fall)
The Persuasions (Looking For an Echo)
Daft Punk (Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger)
Randy Travis (Three Wooden Crosses)
Hullabahoos (Creep)
Radiohead (Karma Police)
Coldplay (The Scientest)