Category Archives: Curiosities

by | September 18, 2015 · 6:00 am

The vocal tract organ

vocal tract organ

 

The vocal tract organ is a new musical instrument that consists of three-dimensional (3D)-printed vocal tracts (throat and mouth) for individual vowels sitting on loudspeakers to enable static vowel sounds to be produced.

The acoustic excitation from the loudspeakers is a synthesized version of the typical waveform produced by the vibrating human vocal folds during pitched sounds, which enables the instrument to be played from a keyboard.

The vocal tract organ will become an instrument in its own right, and it could be used as a direct replacement for the vox humana organ stop, given that its acoustic output is a much closer representation of the human vocal output than that from a vox humana organ pipe. The 3D-printed tracts may also be used  in vocal and choral workshops as well as degree-level music technology education.

This according to “The vocal tract organ and the vox humana organ stop” by David M. Howard (Journal of music, technology & education VII/3 [2014] pp. 265–277).

Above, an illustration from the article; below, a composition by Professor Howard.

Comments Off on The vocal tract organ

Filed under Curiosities, Instruments, Science

Tagged as ,

by | September 9, 2015 · 6:00 am

Halka in Haiti

Halka in Haiti

Inspired and provoked by the title character in Werner Herzog’s film Fitzcarraldo, two artists and a curator decided to revisit the mad plan to bring opera to the tropics.

With an eye to undercutting Fitzcarraldo’s colonialist Romanticism, they decided to confront a particular set of historical and socialpolitical realities by staging Stanisław Moniuszko’s opera Halka, which is considered Poland’s national opera, in the unlikely locale of Cazale, Haiti, a village inhabited by descendants of Polish soldiers who fought for the Haitian Revolution in the early 1800s.

On 7 February 2015 a one-time-only performance of Halka was presented to a rapt local audience on a winding dirt road in Cazale. A collaboration between Polish and Haitian performers, the event was filmed in one take to be presented as a large-scale projected panorama in the Polish Pavillion at the 2015 Venice Biennale.

This according to Halka/Haiti: 18°48’05”N 72°23’01”W: C.T. Jasper & Joanna Malinowska (Warsaw: Zachęta: Narodowa Galeria Sztuki, 2015).

Above, a still from the film featuring a local extra (more stills are here); below, the Biennale installation (the music starts around 5:08).

Comments Off on Halka in Haiti

Filed under Curiosities, Opera

Tagged as ,

by | August 20, 2015 · 6:00 am

Ballet manga

ballet manga

Ballet manga, in which the heroine withstands numerous trials to become a notable dancer, is very popular among Japanese girls and women, and has greatly contributed to the establishment of ballet in Japan.

The genre emerged during the 1950s; with an increase in its popularity, more children began attending private ballet classes, since Japan had no official ballet schools. After some decades now, many Japanese dancers have begun winning international dancing competitions.

While most ballet manga is fictional, some examples have been based on the lives of famous ballet dancers such as Vaclav Nižinskij and Maria Tallchief.

This according to “The relationship between ballet and manga in Japan” by Yukiyo Hoshino, an essay included in Writing dancing/Dancing writing (Birmingham: Society of Dance History Scholars, 2014, pp. 103–106).

Above, the first volume of Swan, a popular serialized ballet manga from the 1970s; below, the related genre of ballet anime.

1 Comment

Filed under Curiosities, Dance, Visual art

Tagged as , ,

by | August 17, 2015 · 6:00 am

The riddle of the tortoise and the lyre

Clavecin_flamand

The inscription Dum vixi tacui, mortua dulce cano on an early 18th-century Italian spinet in Edinburgh is identifiable with the second line of a riddling couplet found in Nikolaus von Reusner’s Aenigmatographia (1599). The literary ancestry of Reusner’s couplet is traceable to a traditional Greek riddle about the tortoise-lyre, where the tortoise becomes vocal only after its death.

Many examples from classical authors and imitators in later European literature and popular tradition can be found. The motif was transferred to instruments made of wood, and Reusner’s couplet was much used as a motto on early violins; the famous luthier Gasparo Duiffopruggar particularly appears to have been associated with it.

This according to “The riddle of the tortoise and the lyre” by Edward Kerr Borthwick (Music & letters LI/4 [October 1970] pp. 373–87).

Above, a harpsichord in the Flemish style that includes the inscription; below, an instrumental work inspired by the original four-line poem.

Comments Off on The riddle of the tortoise and the lyre

Filed under Curiosities, Instruments, Literature

Tagged as

by | August 14, 2015 · 6:00 am

Steve Martin, banjo ace

 

Steve Martin’s love of the banjo dawned when he first heard Earl Scruggs on a record in 1962, when he was was 17 years old and living in the no-bluegrass-zone of Orange County, California.

Though the actor and comedian was drawn to the instrument’s high lonesome sound, it served as a prop in his early comedy routines. His influences included John McEuen (later a founding member of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band), Doug Dillard of the Dillards, and David Lindley (banjo player for the Mad Mountain Ramblers, an acoustic ensemble that Martin heard during a stint at Disneyland).

This according to “Banjo: Obsession is a great substitute for talent” by Mr. Martin, an article included in The Oxford American book of great music writing (Fayetteville: University of Arkansas, 2008, pp. 402–406).

Today is Martin’s 70th birthday! Above, Steve Martin, 2017-08-11 is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Below, performing in 2018.

Comments Off on Steve Martin, banjo ace

Filed under Curiosities, Humor

Tagged as , ,

by | July 16, 2015 · 6:00 am

Dumbo and psychedelia

 

Some commentators have suggested that the films of Walt Disney led to the emergence of the youth counterculture in the 1960s.

The Disney film Dumbo (1941), particularly the sequence in which Dumbo the baby elephant mistakenly drinks alcohol, has a psychedelic dream, and learns to fly, is a case in point. The song Pink elephants on parade can be interpreted as an unleashing of Dumbo’s creative potential.

This according to “Disney psychedelisch: Musik und Rausch im Zeichentrickfilm” by Gregor Herzfeld (Acta musicologica LXXXVI/1 [2014] pp. 125–146). Below, Dumbo’s dream.

Comments Off on Dumbo and psychedelia

Filed under Curiosities

Tagged as , ,

by | June 9, 2015 · 6:00 am

Carl Nielsen, band musician

Carl_Nielsen_ca_1880

From 1 November 1879 to 31 December 1883 the teen-aged Carl Nielsen was employed as a bugler and trombonist in Odense, with the 16th battalion and the 5th regiment, respectively.

In the long run his modest position in the military could not satisfy him, so he traveled to København to continue his musical training at the conservatory. However, in many ways his time as a military bandsman in Odense was a particularly good basis upon which to build his future.

This according to “Spillemand Carl August Nielsen” by Ida-Marie Vorre (Fynske Minder 2008, pp. 49–63).

Today is Nielsen’s 150th birthday! Above, a photograph from ca. 1880; below, Helios, op. 17, a work in which the orchestra’s brass section figures prominently.

Comments Off on Carl Nielsen, band musician

Filed under Curiosities, Romantic era

Tagged as , , ,

by | May 28, 2015 · 6:00 am

Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, visual artist

Fischer-Dieskau self portrait 1985

When Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau was a little boy he was, as he described himself, “shy, clumsy, obedient, and uninterested in sport.”

He started piano lessons when he was nine, and these led indirectly to his second great artistic pursuit, drawing and painting. It took many years for him to try his hand at oils, but by the 1970s his two homes were filled with many testimonies to his skill. “It helps to release the tensions and strains of my profession,” he told an interviewer.

This according to Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, mastersinger by Kenneth Whitton (New York: Holmes & Meier, 1981, pp. 16–17).

Today would have been Fischer-Dieskau’s 90th birthday! Above, a self-portrait from 1985; below, a brief film presenting several of his portraits.

BONUS: Fischer-Dieskau’s much-celebrated recording of Schubert’s Die Winterreise with Gerald Moore, from 1962.

1 Comment

Filed under Curiosities, Visual art

Tagged as , , , ,

by | May 6, 2015 · 6:00 am

From oilcans to old-time

Wayne's Body Shop

For more than 40 years—ever since Wayne Willis discovered that he could play the guitar and wanted some people to play with—Wayne’s Body Shop in Portsmouth, Virginia, has hosted a regular jam session.

Just about everyone who can play old-time, country, bluegrass, or gospel music in southeastern Virginia and northeastern North Carolina has jammed at Wayne’s. The first rule is that there is no hierarchy and no noninclusion; everyone gets a chance to participate.

This according to “Saturday night at Wayne’s Body Shop in Portsmouth, Virginia” by Dan Margolies (The old-time herald IX/3 [Spring 2004] pp.14–18).

Above and below, Saturday night at Wayne’s.

Comments Off on From oilcans to old-time

Filed under Curiosities

Tagged as

by | April 2, 2015 · 6:00 am

Crunching ballads

punch cards

In the 1940s Bertrand Harris Bronson became one of the first scholars to use computers for musicological analysis.

For one of his projects he encoded melodic characteristics of hundreds of tunes collected for the traditional ballad Barbara Allen on punch cards, so a computer could ferret out similarities. His project resulted in four groups of tunes, members of which came from both sides of the Atlantic with varying frequency.

This according to “All this for a song?” an essay by Bronson reprinted in his collection The ballad as song (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969, pp. 224–242).

Above, an illustration from the article (click to enlarge); below, the classic recording of the song by Jean Ritchie, a singer Bronson deeply admired.

3 Comments

Filed under Curiosities, Ethnomusicology

Tagged as , ,