There's a serious moral to this, of course, that one needs to be careful about how much certainty to pretend about conclusions reached regarding ancient history. I like to ask students how much they think a future musicologist could conclude about jazz music lacking recordings, but only with written-out arrangements, how-to books, and lead sheets.
All we know about Baroque music is written-out arrangements, how-to books (treatises), and lead sheets (figured bass). Surely when you booked a band for your Baroque party they spent the time improvising on ground basses, but how little we know about what that must have sounded like. And how-to books assume some kind of prior experience listening to the music. That's one of many reasons I'm skeptical of the authentic-performance movement; some of their conclusions might be as ridiculous as the Beatles history shown above.
The relationship between cellphones and music has almost always been a quirky one, producing bouts of the surreal punctuated by an occasional flourish of the sublime. Latest to join the melodic fray are Georg Essl from the University of Michigan and his "mobile phone ensemble." Each of the participating students has designed a noise-making app for his or her iPhone, which is used in conjunction with the built-in accelerometer and touchscreen to make (hopefully beautiful) music. Though we may consider this a gimmick for now, Professor Essl is most enthusiastic about the future prospects of utilizing smartphones to make music with legitimate aspirations. The debut performance of this newfangled orchestra is on December 9, or you can check out a preview in the video after the break.
As musicians, we always have to jam our Christmas shopping in between the Lessons and Carols service on the 20th and the Christmas Eve Final Rehearsal on the morning of the 24th, but here's a little suggestion list for the tiny tots on your list, courtesy of The Week:
FIRST PRIZE: The E-Z Bake Electric Chair
SECOND PRIZE: Mr. Potato Head’s neighbor, Mr. Crack Head
THIRD PRIZE: Text ‘n’ Drive Big Wheel
Selected honorable mentions:
Obstructive View-Master
Trick Bungee Cord
Jihad Joe
Don’t Tickle Me There Elmo!
Free-Range Ant Farm
Hamster Embalming Kit
Baby’s First Bong
Cripps & Bloods Action Figures
Abandoned Refrigerator Secret Hideout
Botched Boob Job Barbie
Co-Dependent Ken
Dart Board with an Automatic Return
Ginsu Hula Hoop
The Hula Square
Subprime Monopoly
The Solid Color Rubik’s Cub
Horny, Horny Hippos
Extra special bonus: Amazon sells the Laptop Steering Wheel Desk. Be sure to read the reviews. And look at the product pictures.
Simon & Schuster is delaying by four months the electronic-book editions of about 35 leading titles coming out early next year, taking a dramatic stand against the cut-rate $9.99 pricing of e-book best sellers.
The choice e-book consumers make, she opines, isn't whether to buy a title in hardcover for $27.95 or as an e-book for $9.99. The choice for e-book users is one $9.99 e-book or no book (or, possibly, a different book).
"Think about it: all your marketing efforts are getting customers to the point of sale…and then you lose them. These readers are not saying, 'Well, that format isn’t available so I’ll just buy this one.'
Nope, they’re saying, 'That format isn’t available so I won’t buy this book at all.'" (H/T Nathan Bransford)
(Look here if you want to read some of the proposed solutions for the book industry by a guy that knows what he is talking about)
What does this have to do with choral music, you may ask . . .
Well, I think that a transformation of the Gutenberg-based choral music publishing business is quite overdue. It's coming, music publishing.
Mr Hudson, of Waterloo Road, Cranbrook, found himself trapped in a toilet after a second hip replacement operation. And after pulling the emergency cord three times to no avail he turned to his trusty vocal chords.
He recalled: "When I was ready I pulled the red chord and I got no response. "I waited a bit more and when I started to get a bit chilly I wondered what I could do if they're not taking any notice of the bell? "I thought, oh well, it's coming up to Christmas, so I gave them the opening verse of the Hallelujah chorus.
"The doors opened very quickly. I like to think it was because they didn't want to disturb the rest of the patients rather than my singing."
In the beginning of November, a new choir that features only topless singers was established in Estonia.
The idea behind new topless choir is to get people more interested in choir singing, explains Peep Kollo, 26 years old choir singer from Vox Populi choir. Women and men are expected to join the new topless choir, but so far mostly men have applied. “We will not perform unless we have more women than men,” so Kollo.
Although new choir will definitely get lots of attention because of the facade, the idea is to make great choir music.
Why are people often ashamed of their bodies? Other animals may perform sexual activities on your car trunk, without feeling embarassment. Even worse, they feel it`s right. Human has to hide their upper and lower body parts in every possible occasion, blushing. Seems stupid? So it does for us…
Why men can be topless without shame and women can`t? If a woman reveals her breasts, she’s a nudist, when a man does it, he`s just a man. We step on the next step of the ladder of human equality. We think that female upper body is at least as attractive as male`s. Why to hide it?!?!
Currently missing from the website are pictures of the choir in performance.
Best Choral Performance
(Award to the Choral Conductor, and to the Orchestra Conductor if an Orchestra is on the recording, and to the Choral Director or Chorus Master if applicable.)
Handel: Coronation Anthems
Harry Christophers, conductor (Alastair Ross; The Sixteen Orchestra; The Sixteen)
[CORO]
Mahler: Symphony No. 8; Adagio From Symphony No. 10
Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor; Ragnar Bohlin, Kevin Fox & Susan McMane, choir directors (Laura Claycomb, Anthony Dean Griffey, Elza van den Heever, Katarina Karnéus, Quinn Kelsey, James Morris, Yvonne Naef & Erin Wall; San Francisco Symphony; Pacific Boychoir, San Francisco Symphony Chorus & San Francisco Girls Chorus)
[SFS Media]
Penderecki: Utrenja
Antoni Wit, conductor (Gennady Bezzubenkov, Iwona Hossa, Piotr Kusiewicz, Piotr Nowacki & Agnieszka Rehlis; Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra; Warsaw Boys' Choir & Warsaw Philharmonic Choir)
[Naxos]
Song Of The Stars: Granados, Casals & Blancafort
Dennis Keene, conductor (Erica Kiesewetter; Mark Kruczek & Douglas Riva; Voices Of Ascension)
[Naxos]
A Spotless Rose
Paul McCreesh, conductor (The Gabrieli Consort)
[Deutsche Grammophon]
Philip posted a great article yesterday outlining the benefits of teaching fine arts in school programs. Sadly, the arts curriculum in the school system of Alberta Canada are currently being revised, and not in a beneficial way:
Alberta Education is currently reviewing the fine arts curriculum for kindergarten to Grade 12 students.
A draft of the curriculum framework released in June highlights a number of possible changes.
One of the most controversial proposals is replacing five credit courses for high school students--where 125 hours is dedicated to an artistic discipline-- with single credit courses with only 25 hours of instructional time.
The intention of these one credit courses is to provide students with choice, flexibility and variety, said Alberta Education spokesperson Erica McDonald.
Many students who wish to try a fine arts course may find it challenging to dedicate a full semester to it when faced with all the other subjects they require to enter post secondary, said McDonald.
"Students or groups of students may choose Arts Education Project courses to extend their learning in an individual arts discipline or to explore the possibilities of combining two or more arts disciplines," the draft curriculum also states.
Read the full article, and how students are protesting the changes here. Protests and petitions are out in vast numbers, but as with most government decisions surrounding the arts, it is virtually impossible to change their minds.
...if volunteer choruses are serving as a canary in the coal mine, the air appears to be better than we thought. Because if old choruses are closing, new ones are springing up to replace them -- with far smaller budgets and more flexible organizations.
1) VOICEBOX, PUBLIC RADIO'S NEW PROGRAM DEDICATED TO THE ART OF SINGING, HAS JUST BEEN AWARDED A $25,000 GRANT FROM THE PHYLLIS C. WATTIS FOUNDATION
2) THE SERIES IS OFFICIALLY LAUNCHING ON KALW 91.7 FM ON JANUARY 1 FROM 10PM TO 11PM
Upcoming programs:
Why do we sing? - January 1, 2010 10pm, KALW, 91.7 FM
Do human beings have an innate ability to sing? When people say they can't sing, should we believe them?
The inimitable Ella Fitzgerald - January 8, 2010 10pm KALW, 91.7 FM
America's First Lady of Song changed the face of jazz vocals. VoiceBox explores the story behind the voice.
Hooray for Community Choruses, January 15, 2010 10pm KALW 91.7 FM
There are more than 500 choruses in the Bay Area and one in five Americans sings in a choir. Why are Americans so passionate about singing for pleasure?
Men with high voices, January 22, 2010 10pm KALW 91.7 FM
Once upon a time, countertenors wouldn't go about publicizing the fact that they sang high. These days, male sopranos and altos are kings of the classical and pop worlds.
Mavens of Cabaret, January 29, 2010 10pm KALW, 91.7 FM
VoiceBox explores the vocal pyrotechnics of the smoothest cabaret artists from the Bay Area and beyond
As musicians, we always have to jam our Christmas shopping in between the Lessons and Carols service on the 20th and the Christmas Eve Final Rehearsal on the morning of the 24th, but here's a little suggestion list for the tiny tots on your list, courtesy of 
1) VOICEBOX, PUBLIC RADIO'S NEW PROGRAM DEDICATED TO THE ART OF SINGING, HAS JUST BEEN AWARDED A $25,000 GRANT FROM THE PHYLLIS C. WATTIS FOUNDATION
