DarrenHayhurst.com

My new Fender Jazzmaster

Darren — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 13:25:19 +0000

Thank you Hubble Telescope

Darren — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 07:00:31 +0000

These are pictures taken by the Hubble Telescope. I am still totally amazing by this. I dont know what amazes me more…. The fact they are there and so beautiful. Or that we can send a telescope into space and capture thier image…

Blog Search Engine

Self Internet Moderation and Warnings

Darren — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 22:37:38 +0000

I am still put out by a video I watched on Facebook of a guy dieing. I am annoyed that there was no warning given. It was just posted for all ages to see. Now it affected me so I would hate to think what it would do to those others who were not expecting it. I think it is up to the individual to at least put up some sort of notice to those who may watch it, that there are images that may offend some viewers. We do it on TV and Movies. People get sacked from radio stations for comments. Why can we not also use some sort of control on Internet posters. Its not right that people can do this.

“Slap to the back of the head I say” Slap to the back of the head……

Are Aussies Hard to make friends with?

Darren — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 09:44:15 +0000

I just had a long and in depth conversation with a friend that was new to Australia. He was telling me how hard he was finding it to make friends with Australians. I was a little bit taken back by this, being an Australian!!! But he was adamant that Aussies were hard to be-friend. He was saying that he has a lot of friends considering he has only been here 6 months but a crazy small percentage were Australians. Is it because he is new and looking for friends, where as most people who have already lived here for a long time dont have the need to search? Or is it because people like to mix with like minded and other with cultural similarities?

I have travelled to a lot of different places around the world and have never had trouble meeting friends. People are always open and kind when i meet them and I dont remember any bad experiences meeting and greeting people. Why so do others have trouble when they come here?

What do you think?

Do you think Aussies are hard to make friends with, if you are new to this country??

It’s worth thinking about. So I will.

What do you think??? Are Australians hard to make friends with??

How many new Australians do you know as a friend?

21,760,570 Australians permanent residents.

7.3% up on the year before.

Considering that 205940 New Australians joined our shores in 2008.

149365 “New Settlers” (People living overseas who applied for a Visa and were accepted)

56575 who were already in Australia on temporary Visa.

Only 2222 (3.9%) were refugees or humanitarian entrants. So its fair to say the 203718 others are living, working and integrating. That means 0.91% of people living in Australia are “New Australians” so for ever 101 people you know 1 will be a New Australian.

What do you think!!!

Chickenfoot Gotta Love it

Darren — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 09:02:37 +0000

OK so here is another great example of an Awesome Joint Venture. What a great way to take a new direction….. The power of Joint Venture….. Oh yeah they also sound great together… Joe Satriani.. Chad Smith.. Michael Anthony.. Sammy Hagar. http://www.chickenfoot.us/ Check it out

visit chickenfoot.us for more info

Music Theory 1 for Guitarists

Darren — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 12:56:05 +0000

Music Theory 1 for Guitarists! You can jump around through these lessons but I advise to follow them in order so you don’t have gaps in your learning. Have your Guitar in your hands and go through what your reading as you read it. So go pick it up and lets get started. I want to keep these lessons short and easy to grasp. If you have questions leave me a comment and I will help.

This is where it starts. Thick E string… From the open Fret to the 12th Fret. This is one octave. From the open string to the 12th fret you have 12 notes. They are… E, F, F#, G, G#, A, A#, B, C, C#, D, D#, and E again. REMEBER THIS!!! E and B have NO Sharps, NO #’s. This is important. Its not hard just remember it. E and B have no sharps. Play each of these notes and call out the names as you go. Starting Open, play each note sliding up one each time. E, F, F#, G, G#, A, A#, B, C, C#, D, D#, and E again. You have just played One octave. This is a scale, its called the chromatic scale and in my mind it is the most important scale to know. All other scales are created from this scale. All chords are created from this scale. In fact EVERYTHING in music is taken from this scale. In my mind it is the most important scale to know. As you will find out in the coming lessons this scale is very important to know. Seems easy just sliding up and down the neck but then Music Theory is VERY easy. A lot of intellectuals and music teachers make it seem hard and take you the long way around but music theory is VERY easy.

So does this make sence? 12 notes = 1 Octave. E, F, F#, G, G#, A, A#, B, C, C#, D, D#, and E again. Its called the chomatic scale. E and B have no sharps.

Now for the practice. This is an important scale and will be used more than you could ever imagine. Play it, up and down. Dont worry about how you play it just slide your finger up and down and learn the names of the notes. I cant stress how important it is to know the names of these and where they are. We will use it to name Chords, Scales, Start positions, Ending positions, so many different things.

Some points to help learn these notes… Open is E… The first dot on top of your neck is the 3rd (on most Guitars) This is G… The 5th is A… If you slide up 1 fret from the A your playing A#. If this seems really simple its cause it is. Music Theory is not hard at all. Its all very simple. Just take your time and make sure you practise.

If you think this is too easy for you thats great. Stick with this and you will learn more than you could imagine. With in a very short time you will be playing different inversions, modes, embelished chords, understanding Harmony and Theory and composing complex music. All lessons are this short and this easy. All Music Theory is easy. And this is all aimed for Guitarists. Remember at any stage if you have a question, chances are someone else is thinking it so ask here in the comments section and I will answer.

Cheers

Darren

P.S. Subscribe so you recieve the new lessons in your email.

Music Theory, A basic understanding for guitarists

Darren — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 13:07:36 +0000

For so many years now i am still amazed at how many Awesome Gutiar Players dont know anything about music. On so many occasions I have said to fellow axemen “Play the 6th chord” or “You play the 3rd” and im looked at like a freak! I get why they dont, and in many ways that is one of the reasons the guitar is such an awesome instrument to play. The guitar is tuned in 4ths and this basicly means you can learn a shape on the neck ie an “E” chord shape and then using a bar with you first finger, move it anywhere up or down the neck and play any other like shaped chord. It works with every shape chord “A” like double bar chords “A-” chords, what ever. The very cool part is it works with Scales, Riffs, Runs etc. What ever you can play can be moved to a new position and then play it in any key.
Now this is going to be the first of Many Many posts on this topic because it is huge and encompasses so much important information. I have taught this very same information to my all my students, purely because it is so important. I love to see them go from being a Riff playing guitarist playing purely by TAB and ear, to being able to compose, transpose and play what they actually hear in their head. I hope to use this to be able to do the same from you. I would how ever like your feed back on how clear it is to understand this information as I give it. The advantage of teaching one on one is that I can see when the light goes on for my students and move at thier pace. This information is by no way hard and I have taught it to everyone from 8 to 80, but like everything in life there are concepts to grasp and once you get them everything clicks. But sometimes those alone can be tough to get. If you want this information Subscribe so you can get the lessons as I make them. Understand that once you get this your playing and more so your understanding of “How” to play will explode. If your keen to learn how to write and take your playing to a new level subscribe and let me help. This is by no way new information but if its new for you it will blow your playing out to a totally new level.

Cheers
Darren

Lyric Writing understanding Structure

Darren — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 23:33:42 +0000

This seems to be a very common question. “How do I write Lyrics?” This is such an easy, yet difficult question to answer. Writing lyrics is Not hard. But it is so much more than just siting down and writing what comes out of your head. Today I want to talk not so much about the content of what you write but more about how you put your lyrics down, and more so what structure you use. I have previously written on this exact topic so check out a more detailed Blog on My Blogger Page. Basically, its the same as how you phrase your musical structure. When ever you write anything you create a feel and a flow. The trick is to understand how you can use this emotion and movement created by the structure to influence your listener. Check it out and leave me a comment if you need any more clarification. Enjoy How to Write a song Understanding Structure. Cheers Darren

Amalgamation of Music and Media

Darren — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 11:53:39 +0000

Well it has been alot of work but im here.
Darrenhayhurst.com is done.

My plan here is to have a place that has all of my interests.

Rant… This is my space to rant, a place to unwind my mental frustrations and to be able to put them down.

Social Media… Here you can follow what I do and when I do it on Twitter and FaceBook. Add me if you like and I will approve it.

Amalgamation… This is where you can find the work I do with Animaiton. I love animation, its my passion to amalgamate music and media. Working with animators is a huge honor and my craft is to bring them to life with music and sound. One of the things I love most with animation is it is silient, there is no noise at all. I get the privilage of being able to create everything you hear.

Learn… I have been a musician most of my life. I have been studying, performing and teaching for 3/4 of my life. The one thing I do well is gather and then pass on information. Though my main instrument is Guitar I share knowlage on all sorts of topics. Guitar, Theory, Software, Mixing, Producing, Performing, Creativity etc. To many to list here.

Bolg… This is my blog for interests, issues, news and things other than Music related.

Link… Here are a list of links of useful links to information and people worth knowing.

Contact… Here you can email me about anything you need, or want to know. Feel free to email me ideas or issues on the website or if you need to contact me regarding work.

The Power of Focusing on a Purpose

Darren — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 13:09:51 +0000

I consider myself to be quite experiential, by this I mean if I have a thought or believe something to be true I like to try it out and live with it for a while to prove conclusively that it is what I think it is. I think the only way to really benefit from something it to live it. Things always look different when your living it. This obviously has some downsides, for instance, its hard to live your life trying a new belief system whilst you carry around the permanent creations created from the previous belief system. This also means you have to have the courage to try things that you believe to be untrue to prove that they actually are untrue. During this life long quest I have been introduced to some interesting ideas. The one I am talking about now is one that I didn’t believe and it wasn’t until I tried it, with the purpose of discounting it that I found, no matter how hard I tried, it was in fact true in my reality. Now I’m not saying that this is the same in anyone else’s reality, but I do suggest you try it on for size and see if it is true for you as well.

It was during a search for a better understand of my reality that I was asked if my life had a purpose. My answer straight of was “sure of course” but then when I was asked what it was that I was stumped…. I didn’t have a purpose. So I shrugged it off and continued on justifying to myself and anyone who asked that I didn’t need one and that I believed in fate or a pre destined plan. I was pretty comfortable with this because it didn’t require much thought and I didn’t really need to take responsibility for anything. I was always able to blame it on something else.

So then I after having this thought running around in my brain for too long popping its head out when I least expected it I thought it best to sit down with a pencil and try to work out some kind of way to determine which was best. Is it better to live my life With… or Without… a Purpose….

My first obstacle was how do you work it out. Now I found that pretty easy to do. I just asked myself do I have a purpose. I went through a number of different thought processes and came to the fact that I didn’t. Now I am for the most part pretty happy with my life and the way it has unfolded. But could it be better and if so could the point of having a purpose make it better. So obviously the only way I could find out was to find a purpose and live my life with that purpose firmly implanted for some undefined period of time and compare the results. Obviously there are variables that need to be considered and some points that needed to be defined so I had a firm point to measure on.

This left me with a few problems…

Firstly… If you don’t have a purpose how do you go about getting one. Secondly… if I do define a purpose and implement it how do I know that it is not simply a worse choice, their for giving more negative results than living a life without….

The only way this could be done was to work out a way to define ones purpose.

I found some other peoples ideas and my first thought was to model mine off there’s but I did see a lot of problems doing this so I set out to find a way to define my own purpose. Surprisingly it turned out to be relatively easy.

I decided to basically ask myself what it was. Sounds simple but really who better to ask than myself. So I grabbed my trusty note pad and pencil and began to write. Now I was pretty familiar with this process as I have used it many times before to solve many other problems I have been faced with and I have always found it a great way to find the truth about things reasonably quickly. So I titled the page “What it my life’s purpose?

The first things that came out was just a list of jobs I have had. Then things like a Father, Mentor, Teacher, etc. But it wasn’t until after about 10-12 mins of writing that I started to get honest with myself. I wrote “To Create”. Now when I wrote these two words down I felt something that I hadn’t felt before. It was a very strong attachment to it. I felt it in my chest in a way that was totally unexpected. To be honest it felt like I was going to cry. This felt right but it didn’t feel complete. Next I wrote “To help others to Create” I turned to a new page and wrote…. “To Create and Help Others Create”. I tore out the page and got up from my chair and walked around looking at the page. I think I had found a purpose. A purpose that felt right, that felt true. I went back to my desk and started to ready back through my other writing and in the 3 pages of words these were the only ones that felt write. Now I wasn’t at that time the type of person the acted on instinct but this was the first time I felt I should. So I had it… A purpose. I still wasn’t sure if it was my purpose but it was a purpose and it was a purpose that seemed to fit with most things I had been striving for throughout my life. So why not. I figured this was at least a start.

So now I had a purpose. The next problem was how am I meant to live my life by this statement?!?!?! I left this for a few days and allowed it to all just sink in and decided to come back to it with a fresh thought process. After a few days I sat back down with the intention to work out how I could live my life with this purpose and record results and compare if my life was “Better” with or without a/this Purpose. Again I wrote page after page of ideas and came up with soooo many. To my surprise this was amazingly easy. I had hundreds of ways of using my strengths, I could create and help other people create. To my surprise again Every single one of these had potential to first make money and second were awesome projects that just seemed FUN.

So at this point I was sold. I had to throw myself in head first and start living my life with a purpose. So I decided that I wouldn’t take on any work unless it first and foremost contained this purpose or I could apply it to it.

Taking the list I had, I wasn’t short on ideas. More so what was amazing, was the people I started to meet once I took this on. An amazing amount of creative people. The thing that affected me most was my point of view. Basically I could have continued my life almost the same as it was but with a renewed sense of purpose. It meant every project I took on in my business and personal life was a driven one. It meant that each piece of work I took on contained that drive, that passion. The quality of my work improved immeasurably. I was no longer working for someone else under their regulations. I was working under my own, for my own reasons. New work I took on became fun, it became my passion, it became my purpose for being here.

The improvement caused a shift in my mental state and it was more than I ever could have imagined. I find myself even now years on from this change passionate and powerful. Not for any other reason than everything I do I do for one main reason, because its my purpose. The fulfillment I feel from completing tasks is more than I could ever have imagined.

So my conclusion is very simple. In my reality it is better to live my life with a purpose. I would encourage everyone one to try this and see if it works for you.

First… spend some honest time with yourself working out what your purpose is. Its not hard but it does take some relaxed, honest time. Just write until you feel it. Trust that you will know when its right. Don’t be afraid that you wont find it. Just start it and your already succeeding.

Second… make it your focus and start your thinking always from that newly installed purpose.

Third… Enjoy the fruits of your purpose. Always be grateful for finding it and find ways to share what you achieve with everyone with out expectation of it being returned.

Try this and let me know if you find the same types of results as I have. Let me know if you are currently on this same type of journey and what your outcomes have been. And if you find it works share this with someone else you think might enjoy it.

Cheers
Darren