Mark Heimonen

Our MySpace friend, Mark Heimonen, describes his "band" as consisting of "little more than me, my guitar, a 15 year Roland D-20, a Radio Shack mike, and my computer." Whatever he uses to produce his music, I think it is lovely, relaxing, and very enjoyable listening. Mark Heimonen is from Ann Arbor, Michigan. He classifies his music as Acoustic/Indie/Classical.

The four pieces available to listen to on his MySpace page, are Anxiety First, Second and Third Movements, and Hopes and Dreams. All are piano driven and rhythmic, melodic pieces. It would be difficult for me to choose a favorite from the four; I like them all. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that my state of mind is so often one of anxiety that I am a little more drawn to those three samples of Mark's music. But, Hopes and Dreams forms a nice combination with them.

Yoshiki

Sometimes it is hard to know much about an artist just from their MySpace page. Samples of their music are available to hear, but unless you are already familiar with the musician, if the information is not included on the MySpace page, you don't know whether they are doing the performing, the composing, or exactly what. This is the case with one of the friends of music2work2, Yoshiki. The pieces of music are very beautiful; piano driven, very melodic. My favorite is "Without You Piano ver." "Tears" is also a very lovely piece; it has lyrics in English and Japanese, I believe, and is available on the MySpace page in an unreleased version, as well as a recording done live at the Tokyo Dome.

In an attempt to find out more about the person responsible for this beautiful music, I read the blogs by Yoshiki. Apparently Yoshiki has lived in Japan and Los Angeles, is a composer/pianist, and has several movie scores and songs used in movies to his credit. The most interesting fact I found out is that Yoshiki is doing research into the relationship between music and the human brain. Of course, since Music 2 Work 2 is based on the premise that music is good for you, and beneficial to human beings in many ways, I was intrigued by this.

Yoshiki is a musician I would be interested in learning more about and whose music I would also like to hear more of.

More Thunderstorms

I am really going to have to start writing this blog earlier in the day! Once again we are into our pattern of thunderstorms every evening. The thunder is rumbling and I am beginning to see flashes of lightning, so it's time for me to shut down the computer. Not knowing how long this one will last, I wanted to just write a quick note; if it is possible to write more later, I will.

I love summer and the warm weather - - thunderstorms are a part of summer I could do without!