Sting, Sarah McLachlan are hiding in your Garage(band)

Is it possible to upgrade just GarageBand and not all the components of the iLife suite? I don't really wanna shell out the extra money for programs I don't use.

Good lord, you've certainly got a myopic view of music. I'm almost certain that your determining measure of songwriting quality is the amount of sonic polish that was added in post-production, which had little to nothing to do with the songwriter themselves.

Sarah Mclachlan is a pop hack who writes songs that, while good, are nothing more interesting than the likely VANILLA ice cream she wrote a song about.

Norah Jones on the other hand... this is useless. People like you keep my radio shitty.

"I miss Sarah McLachlan -- it's hard to believe we had someone that was even more bland than Norah Jones.

But excuse my musical snobbery"

In your case, musical snobbery == arrogant, condescending talentless twit?

You should go back to high school kid where you believe your opinion actually mattered.

I care about Schramm's personal music tastes about as much as I care about Tom Anderson spamming me with reports about which bands he's added to his MySpace music player, and about the political opinions of whoever the hell was calling the Phillies/Nationals game last night on MASN (they were bagging on about Senator Arlen Specter's political party switch—just STFU about politics and call the ball game already!!!).

The learn-to-play lessons have been a stupid "feature" of GarageBand from the very start. They coded a cash cow into the application when they should have added several much-needed features. THAT'S what you should be whining about, Schramm, not the artists that Apple is trotting out to try to suck even more of the ever-dwindling reserves of flexible cash out of our collective pockets.

Oh, and what do you mean, Mike..."How young you *were*?"

You still are, whippersnapper! ;o)

Hey no name blogger dude. Your not a music snob. If you were you'd respect Sarah McLachain.

I agree. There's a difference between being witty and being a douchebag. The blogger took the latter choice.

It sure seems like Apple is going as slow as possible releasing these. I was hoping there would be 20-30 songs available by now, there are now ... 11 I think?

I own the Ben Folds one, and its pretty cool. It is really neat learning a song from the person that wrote it (in Ben Folds case anyway, not sure if the rest are songwriters as well). And yeah, it won't help you become a true "musician" but it is neat to be able to sit at any old piano and play a song that most people recognize.

Hey Mike, while I disagree with your Sarah comment, it gave me an unexpected laugh and, unlike the other readers, I welcome a little personality in blog posts.

Sarah is overplayed and overvalued by many. However, if you've never seen her in concert, you're missing out. I was surprised when a date dragged me to a show. There's a lot more to the artist/woman/musician than one might infer from her music videos and constant radio play.

I came here for news about Apple and their products, not douchebaggery. If I wanted that, I'd go to Engadget.

@phlavor - these are new lessons.

+1 for William Beem