Malcolm Gladwell, author of Blink and The Tipping Point says, "Björn Türoque is so good that people with real guitars now have contests to see who can do the best imitation of his air guitar imitation." No joke. And today he's all ours. Dan Crane, aka Björn Türoque, air guitar phenomenon and star of Air Guitar Nation is in the blog and giving away not one, but two prizes to two lucky readers. In my interview with him he'll tell you that one of the most important... READ ON

Was the unofficial national anthem of the United States lifted from a couple different sources? Consider the following: In 1906 a trio of Irish songwriters scored a minor vaudeville hit with the song "When Mose with his Nose Leads the Band." An eighteen-year-old named Israel Baline probably heard the song because he worked as a singing waiter and needed to know all the hits, big and small. One never knew what a table might request. As Jody Rosen says in the liner notes from a recent... READ ON

It's much more common for rock groups to try their hand at classical pieces. ELP, Yes, Led Zeppelin, Spinal Tap, Van Halen, Deep Purple, Rainbow, the list goes on and on. Some of you might even recall another On Music post in which I showed how Sting re-arranged a Prokofiev tune in his song "Russians." Turns out, though, it's a two-way street. Here are five excerpts of recordings I like (for reasons both serious and comical) of rock tunes covered by classical musicians. 1.... READ ON

1. "White Christmas" - While there are more than five Christmas carols written by Jewish songwriters, I thought I'd just cover my favorites, starting with not only the most famous Christmas song written in modern times, but according to the Guinness Book of World Records, the best-selling single of... READ ON