With over 135 opera companies alive and well in the United States, more and more people are rediscovering this classic music genre, or discovering it for the very first time. Many of these opera companies are moving away from the old perceptions of attending an opera, making it more casual and accessible for a new generation of music lovers.

One person who did more to create a musical revolution in the early days of electrical musical instruments was Clarence Leonidas Fender, or rather, Leo Fender. He and C. O. (Doc) Kauffman worked together to make and market a guitar and amplification system that had a clean, clear sound without feedback at higher volume. Before their successful solid body guitar, the electronic pick-ups would get vibrations from the guitar's sound box as well as from the strings. By eliminating the sound box found on classical, Spanish-style guitars, they were able to control the feedback caused by secondary signals to the pick-ups. Amplifiers were then able to just get the vibrations from the strings which were clean and defined. That pure sound was then able to be amplified by the vintage guitar amplifiers.

The world of karaoke machines can be very complicated. Adding to the confusion is the fact that there are so many different types of karaoke machines. They do not all use the same type of equipment. Different machines have different features. Plus they don't even use the same type of technology on their song disks! How do you make sense of it all?

What do music, chili peppers, bamboo, wine, watermelon, ice cream and Eeyore the donkey from Winnie the Pooh have in common? They all have festivals devoted to them in Austin or nearby towns. In fact, there are so many festivals of all kinds in the Austin area that it is difficult to keep track of them.