32 GB memory stick

[Gene E. Bloch]

Wot do you mean *finally*? It is the simplest thing in the world to do!
-- choro

That seems a complete non-sequitur. What does "simple" have to do with
it?

By finally, I meant, of all things, *finally*: e.g., after a good bit of
time had elapsed, or in this instance, after a good many posts had grown
like Topsy.

That's not my complete definition of the word in this context, but maybe
you get the idea from this example.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

(Though I recommend his Rondo alla Turca played with vigour on a
"Turkish" piano, like the one at the Finchcocks collection near
Goudhurst in southern England:

is the instrument and
performer I have in mind, though I don't know why the still there is
chosen. This is actually a rather restrained rendering: if you get the
chance to hear him live while he still lives, do - as, sadly, his
deafness and frailness increase, the performances have become more,
shall we say, individual, and certainly lively.)

Well, I found the percussion superfluous[1]...And I wouldn't want to
march that fast, but I have bad legs these days

There's an English Country Dance (or at least, it's a set dance), I
think called Good Man (or Men) of Cambridge, done to that movement with
a piano and band. I dislike the music until near the end, where it gets
very jazzy, which in my view partly absolves the players for their
corruption of Mozart's music. This is *my* taste; others like it.

[1] I am speaking with restraint

 

[Mack A. Damia]

Yet there are people who just don't like Schubert's music...

There are some very dull people in the world........

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Just listened to your recommended version of the Alla Turca by Mozart.
But I am afraid that even though the Turkish percussion had become all
the rage in central Europe at the time, the pianist is NOT bringing out
the spirit of the piece which Mozart wrote in regular 4/4 time in a very
good effort to bring out the actual 9/8 time in Turkish marches which go
1& 2& 3& *4*&a with the accent on the *longer* beat 4. Only one pianist
manages to bring out the spirit of the actual Yenicheri (Janisssary)
marching rhythm.

I'm not sure I'd like to march to a 9:8 rhythm. Even though I really do
*stumble*, I still prefer to march in a duple rhythm. In short, I don't
think a march would be in 9:8.

There are plenty of dances from Asia Minor and the Balkans that use a
9:8 rhythm, usually quick-quick-quick-slow (four beats counted
2-2-2-3:8), sometimes Q-S-Q-Q or Q-Q_S-Q, but they aren't marches.

There is a dance family called "pajdu¹ko" in a Q-S rhythm (5:8) in
Bulgaria and nearby. I'm told that the word means "limping" (the "pajd-"
part relates to the Indo-European root for foot).

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

(Though I recommend his Rondo alla Turca played with vigour on a
"Turkish" piano, like the one at the Finchcocks collection near
Goudhurst in southern England:

is the instrument and
performer I have in mind, though I don't know why the still there is
chosen. This is actually a rather restrained rendering: if you get the
chance to hear him live while he still lives, do - as, sadly, his
deafness and frailness increase, the performances have become more,
shall we say, individual, and certainly lively.)

Well, I found the percussion superfluous[1]...And I wouldn't want to
march that fast, but I have bad legs these days

[]
(It wasn't me that mentioned marching, Janissary or otherwise. Unless
rondo means march, and I don't think it does.)

The following is my attempt at regurgitation of what the usual spiel is
at Finchcocks, so I have no independent knowledge as to its veracity: At
the time of the composition of that piece, the area where it was
composed had lots of itinerant musicians who played in a certain style;
they were referred to by the locals as Turkish musicians, without the
term necessarily being strictly accurate (much as we might inaccurately
refer to "Gypsy musicians" here). The style involved much embellishment.
The piano was referred to as a Turkish piano, not because it had
anything to do with Turkey as such, but because it had the novelty
attachments ("bells, cymbal clash and a drum mechanism striking the
soundboard"). There is strong implication - I can't remember if they
actually baldly say it - that the "Rondo alla Turca" was actually
composed for such an instrument; certainly its being called "alla Turca"
suggests, to me, that it was indeed. As such, the percussion can't
really be "superfluous", I would say. (I guess one would have to see the
manuscript to be sure - though even then only if the composer explicitly
notated the extras.)

(Just to reiterate: the percussion wasn't additional, but was - is -
actually built into the piano itself! I'm not sure if I could actually
see how the performer operated it - presumably extra levers, pedals, and
the like.)

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Just hook up your computer sound output to your hi-fi using any unused
input on the hi-fi such as your AUX input.

Help me understand how that would cut down on the mess of wires.

To follow your suggestion, I'd have to run the audio output cable from
the computer to another room, bring the speakers from that room to the
computer room, and finally run the speaker wires from there to the
computer room. Not only more cables, but now I'd have to find room near
the computer for two large speaker enclosures, and moreover, I would
thereby lose the speakers in the other room.

You missed my point completely. Let's try again. I *have* decent
speakers connected to my computer, but they use a lot of wires. I
thought of getting a pair of speakers that only use one cable, but
listening online to BWV 565 in response to several suggestions in this
monster thread brought home to me that I would not enjoy the reduced
sound quality, so I decided to stick with *what I already have*.

 

[Peter Jason]

Just listened to your recommended version of the Alla Turca by Mozart.
But I am afraid that even though the Turkish percussion had become all
the rage in central Europe at the time, the pianist is NOT bringing out
the spirit of the piece which Mozart wrote in regular 4/4 time in a

I agree: as I said above, that seems to be a rather restrained rendering
(bordering on the boring). I can only assume it was done that way to be
part of an album illustrating several of the instruments in their
collection, and some years ago. I have seen this particular pianist
perform it two or three times more recently. He is, sadly, very frail -
walks, just about, with _two_ walking sticks - and very deaf; however,
when he sits at that piano and plays that piece, he comes alive, and
certainly brings the piece to life, generally getting considerable
applause. Possibly no longer with the accuracy of that recording, but
definitely with much more feeling.
[]

Some of those old fortepianos are quite interesting actually in the
range of tone colors they produce as opposed to modern concert grands.

http://www.finchcocks.co.uk/pages/instruments.html is well worth a visit
if in Kent: unusually among such collections, most of the instruments
are _not_ roped off from the public! Best visited at a quiet time, when
you might get personal guidance, though if visited on one of their
events (not all musical), the admission price is lower.
[]

Let's skip this. I like to refer to a realistic volume rather than
loud, which to me has negative connotations. And an orchestra can be

OK, I'm with you, I think.

very loud. Have you ever played in an orchestra in front of or facing
the brass section?

No, I'm afraid that though I like to think I have a musical ear, I don't
have much actual playing ability: I reached grade 3 piano achieving just
the pass mark (100 out of 150 IIRR), at which point I could see I'd
reached my limit. (Didn't help that my brother father and mother all had
considerable ability, though in very different ways.) I can hear when a
chord is just not quite right (thinking mostly of melodic popular music,
i. e. the tunes that everyone knows but few can play the chords really
well), but that doesn't mean I can necessarily find it myself.

About the brass: I remember once reading something like "there are two
sides to a trumpeter. There is the side that likes to play with vigour,
tattering all the other instruments into shreds in his wake; and then
there is the dark side." (I like a good bit of brass - Sibelius wrote a
few ...)
[][/QUOTE]

I bought an electric piano a while ago, a Kawai CA18 with normal piano
wooden keys. The tone and touch is good and the volume can be varied.
Also it has various piano tones, harpsichord & organ. I took it
apart to fix a sticking key and took photos of its guts. These are
here........
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/64/kawaica1816.png
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/841/kawaica180.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/842/kawaica181.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/820/kawaica182.jpg
[http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/845/kawaica189.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/803/kawaica188.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/820/kawaica187.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/443/kawaica186.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/24/kawaica185.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/695/kawaica184.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/405/kawaica183.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/214/kawaica1810.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/39/kawaica1811.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/249/kawaica1812.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/32/kawaica1814.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/21/kawaica1813.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/714/kawaica1815.jpg

 

[choro]

On 18/11/2011 15:07, Ed Cryer wrote:
[....]

I think you are indoctrinated! Learn to be a free thinker!
-- choro


You would have got on well with those early Romantics, choro. You even
use the terminology of the era; "free thinker". Beethoven, Byron and
others like Coleridge were heroes to some, hate-figures to others. Even
Wordsworth wrote of the outbreak of the French Revolution; "bliss was it
in that dawn to be alive, but to be young was very heaven".

The times have changed; the battle is long won. The very idea of the
solitary genius, the socially alienated artist starving in an attic
while portraying society's ills through art has disappeared off the
scene. As I say, the battle was won long ago.

Ed

More's the pity! But it might, just might, be coming back!
-- choro

The battle has been won but "art" has been degraded in the process; made
accessible to the masses. A pile of bricks, neon tubes on a wall, a
rotting sheep, an unmade bed, a big crack in a floor.

Back to the times when "art" still encompassed a reaching out to
something higher.
In my humble opinion the greatest of all the great "starving in a
garret" composers was Schubert. Shy, tubby little Schubert. Schubert who
saw Beethoven striding through Vienna, never got introduced to him but
helped carry his coffin. Schubert who wouldn't have known what to do
with fame and public recognition if it had blocked his doorway.

I could make a serious case that the "Unfinished" is just about the
greatest symphony ever written; and it wasn't composed while striding
along country lanes and conducting trees; no, it was composed in a
humble little room in between doses of mercury to cure syphilis, then
posted to a Music Society, lost for almost 40 years, and then discovered
(only 2 movements by then) and performed.

If I think of Beethoven dining and drinking in cafe back rooms, where
he'd throw bowls of soup into waiters' faces, I think of Schubert hiding
outside in the bushes and staring in at his great hero.

Ed

I believe you have been brainwashed.

First things first. Composers were NOT starving in the garret. They were
doing very well, thank you in the employ of the aristocracy.

And second point, art has not been reduced to a pile of bricks on the
floor or an unmade bed with knickers and a prophylactic on it. There is
still a lot of great art if you look for it. What about the musicals,
the films, fine paintings, the books, the music including film music etc
etc?

And thirdly, what is the point of art if you have no access to it? Try
explaining the finer points of French or Italian or Chinese cuisine to
someone starving who has probably not even had a decent meal in all his
life? Or to those children on the point of death due to famine!

We can now enjoy the art through the centuries thanks to modern
technology which makes this art available to all. Or would you rather
have been the semi-starving manual laborer of the 18th century with no
notion of fine art? Where would you have had the chance to listen to
Schubert's Impromptu played by Horowitz which we can now all enjoy with
a flick of the mouse as posted further down in this very thread?

Count your blessings, sir, count your blessings and be thankful that
these days you still have the leisure time to devote to finer things in
life and stop complaining about bricks on a museum floor passing as art.
For art it is NOT!

And please, please do not expect the 200 greatest works of art of a
century like the 19th century, say, to be created every decade in this
century. The movie of the month will probably NOT be a great work of art
but the movie of the year might especially when the whole world's film
industry is put through the sieve to select the best movie of the year.

But being realistic, I'd rather enjoy second rate art rather than living
in a world where I neither had the time to enjoy great art nor the
chance to admire great art.
-- choro

 

[choro]

One could say that up until the complaints about non-snipping, it was
a conversation between thee and me. Therefore it was up to us to snip
- if that's what we wanted.

If somebody else wanted to add something, he/she could have snipped
and started their own sub-thread, no?

When friends sit around a table and start talking the conversation
sometimes roams from one subject to another. And this is what is
happening here. We are being chummy and carrying on a pleasant
conversation. What is lacking is some "meze" and some "ouzo" or "raki"
on the table which will complete the scene.

But we can settle for beer, if you wish.

Or how about "tapas" instead of "meze"?

I fancy some pickled octopussy! (You don't know what you are missing if
you haven't had pickled octopus washed down with a cool glass of lager
or preferably something a bit stronger!)

-- choro

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

There are some very dull people in the world........

I agree

I chose to skip the video...That old impromptu is very dull. To me.

You have forgotten, apparently, that not everyone has the same taste.

 

[choro]

I'll try to remember your recommendation.

Ooops! There I go top-posting this time. Another cardinal sin!
-- choro (-:

PS. I believe I have taught myself to read what I edit once over
before posting the message. I'd advise you to do the same.

Lesson Number Uno: In edited passages what you *think* you see is not
what is actually there!

Yes, good snippage should still make it clear who said what and when;
hacking other people's text to make them appear to say what they did not
is definitely bad.
[snip]

The trouble with snipping text is that it takes some effort to do a good
snip. It necessitates some thinking. It is easier NOT to snip.
-- choro

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Count your blessings, sir, count your blessings and be thankful that
these days you still have the leisure time to devote to finer things in
life and stop complaining about bricks on a museum floor passing as
art. For art it is NOT!

[]
Who are you to say it isn't?

(Note I'm playing devil's advocate here: the bricks don't do much for me
either. But the question is still valid ...)

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

On 18/11/2011 20:33, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: []

Yes, good snippage should still make it clear who said what and when;
hacking other people's text to make them appear to say what they did not
is definitely bad.
[snip]

The trouble with snipping text is that it takes some effort to do a
good snip. It necessitates some thinking. It is easier NOT to snip.
-- choro

Not a lot, with a little practice. Certainly for posts rather than
email, snipping by the poster is one person's effort, whereas scrolling
by the readers can be many people's effort (at least, if there is only
one reader, the conversation should move to email anyway). If you say
scrolling (or Ctrl-End ing) is trivial, then I'd reply that so is
snipping.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

(Though I recommend his Rondo alla Turca played with vigour on a
"Turkish" piano, like the one at the Finchcocks collection near
Goudhurst in southern England:

is the instrument and
performer I have in mind, though I don't know why the still there is
chosen. This is actually a rather restrained rendering: if you get the
chance to hear him live while he still lives, do - as, sadly, his
deafness and frailness increase, the performances have become more,
shall we say, individual, and certainly lively.)

Well, I found the percussion superfluous[1]...And I wouldn't want to
march that fast, but I have bad legs these days

[]
(It wasn't me that mentioned marching, Janissary or otherwise. Unless
rondo means march, and I don't think it does.)

Mea culpa. You are quite right about the name; I was thinking of it as
Marcia alla Turca, which is either off the wall completely, or the name
of another piece of music that I've heard of, and I was possibly
influenced by others' remarks in the thread.

But maybe I'm not wrong:

Here's one by another composer you might have heard of

(I'm not used to hearing this as a piano work, it's part of the Ruins of
Athens, an orchestral work.)

Rondo is the name for a piece of music that has a chorus part that
repeats in between other parts that may be different, i.e., a pattern
like A-B-A-C-A-D-A. The A part is called the ritornello, the thing that
returns.

The following is my attempt at regurgitation of what the usual spiel is
at Finchcocks, so I have no independent knowledge as to its veracity: At
the time of the composition of that piece, the area where it was
composed had lots of itinerant musicians who played in a certain style;
they were referred to by the locals as Turkish musicians, without the
term necessarily being strictly accurate (much as we might inaccurately
refer to "Gypsy musicians" here). The style involved much embellishment.
The piano was referred to as a Turkish piano, not because it had
anything to do with Turkey as such, but because it had the novelty
attachments ("bells, cymbal clash and a drum mechanism striking the
soundboard"). There is strong implication - I can't remember if they
actually baldly say it - that the "Rondo alla Turca" was actually
composed for such an instrument; certainly its being called "alla Turca"
suggests, to me, that it was indeed. As such, the percussion can't
really be "superfluous", I would say. (I guess one would have to see the
manuscript to be sure - though even then only if the composer explicitly
notated the extras.)

I should have qualified my original remark. I don't mean it as a
universal truth, but as a statement of my own likes and dislikes. Unlike
how some other posters in this group *seem* to think, I do know that
when it comes to musical preferences, YMWV, your mileage *will* vary,
for all possible values of "you".

(Just to reiterate: the percussion wasn't additional, but was - is -
actually built into the piano itself! I'm not sure if I could actually
see how the performer operated it - presumably extra levers, pedals, and
the like.)

I wasn't referring to where the percussion was, but only to how I liked
it (namely, not!). After a bit, it did become clear from the related
material that the sounds came from the piano, not from a drummer sitting
nearby.

 

[Mack A. Damia]

I agree

I chose to skip the video...That old impromptu is very dull. To me.

But the essence of the beauty of it is watching Horowitz play it.

You have forgotten, apparently, that not everyone has the same taste.

We can agree that there are piano players and then there are pianists.

 

[choro]

About the brass: I remember once reading something like "there are two
sides to a trumpeter. There is the side that likes to play with vigour,
tattering all the other instruments into shreds in his wake; and then
there is the dark side." (I like a good bit of brass - Sibelius wrote a
few ...)
[]

Yes, he did, didn't he? And did you know that as a composer he was being
supported by the Finnish state. May be Ed Cryer should make a mental
note of this fact.

Music for the masses, I say, not just for a court! Who was that American
composer who composed "Fanfare for the common man"?

And about the brass section... If you want your ear drums burst, just
sit in front of the trombones and French horns. They can get much louder
than trumpets or strumpets!
-- choro

PS. Q- What do you do if you want two piccolo players to play in perfect
unison?
A- Shoot one of them!

 

[choro]

I'm not sure I'd like to march to a 9:8 rhythm. Even though I really do
*stumble*, I still prefer to march in a duple rhythm. In short, I don't
think a march would be in 9:8.

There are plenty of dances from Asia Minor and the Balkans that use a
9:8 rhythm, usually quick-quick-quick-slow (four beats counted
2-2-2-3:8), sometimes Q-S-Q-Q or Q-Q_S-Q, but they aren't marches.

There is a dance family called "pajdu¹ko" in a Q-S rhythm (5:8) in
Bulgaria and nearby. I'm told that the word means "limping" (the "pajd-"
part relates to the Indo-European root for foot).

Ah, but you should see how they march. I know this 9/8 tempo seems a non
starter for a march but once you have seen a Janissary march, you begin
to understand it. I saw them once in real life and once on TV when they
appeared at the Edinborough Tatoo years ago. And one day I came across a
Janissary march video, probably on YouTube and I sat down analysing the
tempo and rhythm + the steps of the march. That's how I know.

You are right about 9/8 time. But it can be very interesting. Witness, a
lot of Flamenco stuff is in 9/8 rhythm (with one longer beat = 3 quavers
or 1/4 notes as the Americans say) and it is not always the first beat
of the bar that is accented.

In fact I did fool around a bit on a flamenco guitar in my early 40s.
But that was ages ago. It requires a very agile RH in addition to an
agile LH. I used to love listening to Paco Pena. And there was a
Scottish chap, rather small in stature, who used to play a superb
flamenco guitar. I forget his name. I must do a search on YouTube. I am
sure I'll remember his name when I see it.

Oh, yes. David Russell. That was his name. Eventually he settled in
Spain. If you ever get a chance to listen to him live or to his
recordings, do so. Actually he was a very nice fellow too.
-- choro

 

[choro]

(Though I recommend his Rondo alla Turca played with vigour on a
"Turkish" piano, like the one at the Finchcocks collection near
Goudhurst in southern England:

is the instrument and
performer I have in mind, though I don't know why the still there is
chosen. This is actually a rather restrained rendering: if you get the
chance to hear him live while he still lives, do - as, sadly, his
deafness and frailness increase, the performances have become more,
shall we say, individual, and certainly lively.)

Well, I found the percussion superfluous[1]...And I wouldn't want to
march that fast, but I have bad legs these days

There's an English Country Dance (or at least, it's a set dance), I
think called Good Man (or Men) of Cambridge, done to that movement with
a piano and band. I dislike the music until near the end, where it gets
very jazzy, which in my view partly absolves the players for their
corruption of Mozart's music. This is *my* taste; others like it.

[1] I am speaking with restraint

Think of it as a curiosity. For it was a fad in those days to have Turkish

percussion instruments attached to pianos. Much like today's bricks passing
for "art" in modern "museums"!
-- choro

 

[choro]

(Though I recommend his Rondo alla Turca played with vigour on a
"Turkish" piano, like the one at the Finchcocks collection near
Goudhurst in southern England:

is the instrument and
performer I have in mind, though I don't know why the still there is
chosen. This is actually a rather restrained rendering: if you get the
chance to hear him live while he still lives, do - as, sadly, his
deafness and frailness increase, the performances have become more,
shall we say, individual, and certainly lively.)

Well, I found the percussion superfluous[1]...And I wouldn't want to
march that fast, but I have bad legs these days

[]
(It wasn't me that mentioned marching, Janissary or otherwise. Unless
rondo means march, and I don't think it does.)

The following is my attempt at regurgitation of what the usual spiel is
at Finchcocks, so I have no independent knowledge as to its veracity: At
the time of the composition of that piece, the area where it was
composed had lots of itinerant musicians who played in a certain style;
they were referred to by the locals as Turkish musicians, without the
term necessarily being strictly accurate (much as we might inaccurately
refer to "Gypsy musicians" here). The style involved much embellishment.
The piano was referred to as a Turkish piano, not because it had
anything to do with Turkey as such, but because it had the novelty
attachments ("bells, cymbal clash and a drum mechanism striking the
soundboard"). There is strong implication - I can't remember if they
actually baldly say it - that the "Rondo alla Turca" was actually
composed for such an instrument; certainly its being called "alla Turca"
suggests, to me, that it was indeed. As such, the percussion can't
really be "superfluous", I would say. (I guess one would have to see the
manuscript to be sure - though even then only if the composer explicitly
notated the extras.)

(Just to reiterate: the percussion wasn't additional, but was - is -
actually built into the piano itself! I'm not sure if I could actually
see how the performer operated it - presumably extra levers, pedals, and
the like.)

I am afraid you are right on this subject for Turks did not even have
pianos or indeed keyboard instruments. But persussion instruments such
as cymbals etc were borrowed from the Turks. It's their addition to
Western music, if you like. To this day, the most famous cymbals are
manufactured by Armenians who emigrated to the USA from Turkey.
Zildjian! Zil meaning bell, zildji is a "beller" (either a bell player
i.e. ringer or a bell maker/seller etc) and the -ian suffix is the
equivalent of -son as in Peterson.
-- choro

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

But the essence of the beauty of it is watching Horowitz play it.


We can agree that there are piano players and then there are pianists.

Indeed. I agree with you on that issue and related ones.

However, we might still not sort a set of people who play the piano into
the same bins

That's badly phrased. What I mean is after you and I sort the same bunch
of such people into the two bins, our bin contents might not match each
other.

With luck, a majority of people will be binned the same, but I'm sure a
few will be different (and that goes for any two judges, I daresay).