This picture was shared on Facebook but I'm not sure where the original site is to give appropriate credit.
It's too good not to share, though! Many thanks to the artist and the author.
Organmaster Shoes began in 1976 when an organist, Carol Carlson, struggled to find shoes that would work for organ pedaling. She knew that many organists, like herself, were playing in bare feet or slippers. Normal dress shoes did not allow the organist to FEEL what note the foot was touching and were too slippery on the pedals. After years of searching, she finally decided to design the perfect organ shoes and sell them herself!
Her shoes for Toe-Heel Pedal Technique have a FULL HEEL providing solid contact with the pedals and 1 ¼ inches high to avoid injuring a leg muscle.
The shoes are very secure on the foot while playing the pedals. The women's shoe has an elasticized strap with a buckle and the men's shoe is a lace-up dress oxford.
However, it is the SUEDE LEATHER SOLES on the bottom of the shoes which make her shoes so special and which her customers rely on to tell what note the foot is touching. The shoes slide over the pedals, but don't slip off because the suede provides just the right amount of grip allowing the organist to FEEL his or her way across the pedal board. The shoes also play silently on the pedals.
The shoes were an immediate hit producing an overwhelming response by organists. Very soon the shoes were being shipped all over the world. Many organ teachers tell us they require their students to wear our shoes as well.
"Bob is, indeed, using them (his shoes) - because he is wearing them, with his black cassock, a rosary in his hands and a Phillies' hat on his head. Sure hope St. Peter isn't a Yankees fan!"
At first, I wasn’t quite sure how I’d use it other than checking the web and the usual iTunes-y kind of things. I didn’t think I’d be able to edit any of my websites and the apps for those aren’t too great yet. Maybe someday they will. But I can post on message boards, other blogs and such and that’s good. Maybe when I can edit Joomla/HTML sites it will be perfect.
But I wasn’t expecting the iPad to be such a wonderful music tool. I’ve always had a metronome on my iPhone and that’s been very handy. I also have a pitch pipe that’s worked well. Recently, I got an app called Cleartune to tune my violin but I haven’t played enough to really make that useful for me. Maybe soon, I can spare the time to whip out the violin and get it in tune :)
Anyway, the iPad – wow! I have apps that will let me play full-sized piano keys with very accurate sounds – and other instruments, apps that include hundreds of compositions, games that will teach music to others, videos demonstrating piano techniques, apps to compose music. So much good stuff, so son. What will come later?
I can just set the iPad on the piano and I have nearly a thousand pieces to play anytime I want. The only drawback I see right now (and I’m sure someone will fix this sometime) is that I can’t add fingering, highlighting and so on to a piece.
One app, forScore, allows for general notes about a piece but nothing ON the piece. It would be nice if there was an index of notes I’ve made to easily find them rather than looking at individual compositions but that’s a something for another post.
As I get more and more familiar with these apps, I’ll write individual posts about them.
Right now I have:
Stay tuned for more on these – and maybe more! – apps.
September 13
More information about Schumann
Read quotes by and about Schoenberg
More information on Schoenberg
• 1894 ~ Alexis-Emmanuel Chabrier, Composer, died
More information on Chabrier
• 1911 ~ Bill Monroe, ‘Father of Bluegrass Music’, Country Music Hall of Fame, singer with The Bluegrass Band, songwriter
• 1916 ~ Dick (Richard Benjamin) Haymes, Singer
• 1917 ~ Robert Ward, American composer
• 1925 ~ Mel Torme,‘The Velvet Fog’, Grammy Award-winning singer and songwriter of The Christmas Song
• 1931 ~ Vaudeville star Eddie Cantor was heard for the first time - on NBC radio.
The Chase and Sanborn Hour became one of the most popular radio shows of the 1930s.
• 1941 ~ David Clayton-Thomas, Singer with Blood Sweat and Tears
• 1944 ~ Peter Cetera, Bass guitar, singer with Chicago
• 1952 ~ Randy Jones, Singer with The Village People
• 1954 ~ The cover of LIFE magazine was adorned with Judy Garland’s picture, with the caption, "Judy Garland takes off after an Oscar." Garland had been nominated for her role in A Star is Born.
• 1956 ~ Joni Sledge, Singer with Sister Sledge
• 1968 ~ Clarence Carter received a gold record for his million-selling hit Slip Away. Carter earned two other gold records for Too Weak to Fight and Patches. The singer from Montgomery, Alabama had been blind since age one and taught himself to play guitar by age 11.
• 1969 ~ John Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, presented the Plastic Ono Band in concert for the first time. The appearance at the Toronto Peace Festival was Lennon’s first in four years. The first hit by the new group, Give Peace a Chance, made it to number 14 on the charts.
• 1977 ~ Leopold Stokowski conductor: Philadelphia Orchestra, passed away
More information about Stokowski
• 1986 ~ Captain EO, a 17-minute, three-dimensional, musical, science-fiction flick starring Michael Jackson, made its gala premiere at Disneyland in Anaheim, CA and at Disney’s Epcot Center in Orlando, FL this day. The innovative movie cost approximately $1,000,000 a minute to produce.
• 2001 ~ Barbara Matera, who made costumes for Broadway shows, the New York City ballet and the Metropolitan Opera, died of a cerebral hemorrhage. She was 72. With her husband, Matera founded Barbara Matera Ltd. in 1968, which produced costumes seen in the current Broadway productions of The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, Aida, Kiss Me, Kate and 42nd Street. As the costumer for the American Ballet Theater, Matera outfitted performers in productions including Swan Lake and Othello. Her film credits include The Great Gatsby, The Addams Family, Moonstruck, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, The Age of Innocence and Death on the Nile. Matera also created the purple crystal-encrusted gown that Hillary Rodham Clinton wore at her husband's first presidential inauguration.
Tuesday July 07, 2009, 8:30 AM
Courtesy Photo Mark Braun rides his "Joybox Express," a bicycle that carries his 352-pound piano
FLINT, MICHIGAN -- When it comes to the piano, Mark Braun knows how to boogie.
But for the next six days, the youngest inductee to the National Boogie Woogie Hall of Fame will begin a different kind of music adventure -touring lower Michigan with his 352-pound piano fastened on the back of his bicycle.
Locals may spot Braun riding his 11-foot-long, 4-foot wide Pedi cab today while pulling his Baldwin Acrosonic piano through town.
The musician kicks of a unique six-day tour in Flint, starting at the home of his father Phil Braun and making a stop at Mott Community College's Bear Bistro for a noon concert that will raise money for MCC athletes.
"When I was 22 years old, I imagined building some type of bicycle that could haul a piano all across America, from coast to coast, playing for people I'd meet along the way," Braun, 52, said in a prepared statement.
Thirty years later, Braun said he's achieved a "scaled down version" of the original plan.
The MCC concert is free but the MCC Foundation is taking donations to help raise money for student athletes who need financial support. The Bear Bistro is also donating a portion of luncheon proceeds to the benefit.
Braun will continue on from his hometown Flint to wheel his piano to Lansing for several shows and then to Chelsea for a benefit concert. He plans to end his journey with a large group of cyclists who will ride with him to downtown Ann Arbor for the "Townie Party" hosted by the Ann Arbor Street Art Fair.
For details: (810) 762-0425
From http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2009/07/boogie_woogie_pianist_mark_bra.html
Sony introduced its Walkman portable cassette player thirty years ago this week, kicking off a revolution in the consumer electronics industry by changing the way people enjoy music.
Photograph: Rick Rizner
Until its introduction, the only way people could enjoy their own choice of music while on the go was to lug around a larger, heavier cassette player, but the Walkman brought music to the belt-clip, purse or pocket.
The first Walkman, the TPS-L2, cost ¥33,000 in Japan and US$200 in the U.S., but despite the relatively high price tag the reception was enthusiastic. In 1980 The Wall Street Journal called the Walkman "one of the hottest new status symbols around" and noted that prospective U.S. owners faced a month-long wait because of a backlog in orders.
The player had several features that were innovative for the time including dual headphone sockets, independent volume control for the left and right audio channels and the distinctive orange "hotline" button on the top that faded the tape output and engaged a microphone so the listener could talk to someone nearby without stopping the music or taking off their headphones.
The design and much of the mechanics of the TPS-L2 was based on a model that came out in 1978 but was never branded as Walkman. The TCM-100 was a portable cassette recorder aimed at people who needed the ability to record audio clips on the go, such as business people and journalists. The TPS-L2 brought the technology to the mass-market.
With the success of the Walkman a product line was born that would go on to become one of the world's best-known brand names -- but that global branding almost didn't happen. Fearing that "Walkman" wasn't proper English, Sony initially chose the brand name "Soundabout" for the U.S. market, derived from the word walkabout, and "Stowaway" for the U.K. It wasn't until a year later, in 1980, that Walkman became the global brand name.
Within a few years the products were developing fast.
The WM-2, introduced in 1981, was notable for its styling, which was much more modern that of the TPS-L2 and also offered in several colors to suit personal tastes. By 1983, just four years after the launch of the Walkman, Sony introduced the WM-20, which was the same size as a cassette case. Then in 1984 the Walkman line expanded with the introduction of the D-50, the first CD Walkman.
For much of the eighties and nineties Sony reigned supreme in the personal audio space. It sold hundreds of millions of Walkman players and was the standard by which most competing products were judged. However, things started to change with the arrival of digital music.
Sony's first Walkman to accept digital files, the NW-MS7, was introduced in Japan in December 2000 and went on sale elsewhere the following year. The product tied Sony's MemoryStick flash media format with its ATRAC file format and MagicGate copy protection.
Sony didn't know it at the time but the formula would prove disastrous to Walkman's leading position in the portable audio market.
The introduction of digital music didn't just mean more convenience for users. It lowered the entry barrier to the player market and suddenly companies that had never made a digital audio player before could throw together a few chips, add some buttons and a display -- or more likely find a Taiwanese contract manufacturer to do this for them -- and launch their own player.
Users were rallying around downloaded music or ripping CDs into the MP3 format and there was no shortage of companies lining up to sell them players. In contrast Sony was requiring users convert MP3 files to ATRAC before they could be loaded on the Walkman.
Apple's entry to the market in 2001 with the iPod was the first step in a what would be a short journey to replace Sony as the most fashionable brand name in portable audio.
In recent years under CEO Howard Stringer Sony has been attempting to reinvigorate its Walkman line and sales have been rising. Sony sold 7 million Walkman digital music players in the financial year that ended in March, up from 4.5 million in 2006. For the current financial year it expects to sell 6.3 million units, a lower number due in part to the poor economy.
Sony's latest flagship model, the NW-X1000, packs noise cancelling, a bright touchscreen display, mobile TV, and the ability to surf the Internet and watch YouTube videos. It's already on sale in major markets and supports Sony's ATRAC format but also MP3, Windows Media and Linear PCM in addition to AVC, MPEG4 and WMV9 video files.
From http://www.pcworld.com/article/167692/happy_birthday_the_walkman_turns_30.html
Globe Staff / May 24, 2009
ASTORIA, N.Y. - The brides-to-be wore black, were very well-tempered, and weighed in at a sleek 990 pounds. The question was which to fall for.
Searching for the perfect concert piano can be a lot like searching for the perfect mate, or so a delegation of piano faculty from the New England Conservatory found when they traveled to the Steinway factory on Long Island to choose a new grand piano for Jordan Hall.
Everybody likes a looker, but character is what really matters. Does the instrument exude warmth and balance, and thrill with its brilliance? And what about depth? Does it seem made for a long-term relationship or better-suited for a fling?
Bottom line: You can't have it all. But when that piano is going to cost upwards of $100,000 and its keys will be tinkled by some of the finest pianists in the world, you have to try.
And so the conservatory team set to work, their afternoon unfolding like a weirdly provocative reality show set to Chopin and Philip Glass: six wildly different suitors trying to settle on The One.
Even the banter in the instrument-filled Selection Room seemed steeped in the language of romance.
"Piano Two has a sustaining quality that makes you want to linger, even though the sound is not physically as beautiful as some of the others," said department chairman Bruce Brubaker, a contemporary music champion.
"This one laughs. It smiles!" gushed Veronica Jochum, a convivial grande dame who could have been describing herself.
Victor Rosenbaum, who specializes in 19th century Viennese composers, noted that "Four has power, but also warmth. It has a soul."
"Piano One is for a fling," pronounced Gabriel Chodos, an imposing figure with a ferocious keyboard attack. "Four is for marriage."
Nobody much cared for Three and Five. Still, between lunch and dinner, everyone spent time with each of these 9-foot beauties.
The pianists circulated from instrument to instrument, playing passages both tender and forceful, taking breaks to pow-wow with their colleagues, query the technicians, and consider context, priorities, and potential. Most were seduced early on by one or another distinctive quality: a burnished tone, a responsive touch. And then they changed their minds.
For added drama, Russell Sherman, the conservatory's distinguished artist-in-residence , and his wife, Wha Kyung Byun - who is also on the faculty - missed their plane and had to drive down. The pair arrived at the factory - tired and testy - after closing time.
"This is very different from choosing a piano for yourself or for a particular concert," said Brubaker.
"I started to believe at the end of the day that one's own response to playing the instruments may have been less important than what you get hearing everyone else playing."
Each of the faculty members - esteemed concert pianists all - went into the process with personal agendas: Chodos is drawn to a brilliant sound, Byun insists on evenly balanced keys, and Rosenbaum went in looking for roundness and warmth. The other three had their own clear preferences.
But the collective task was to find a piano that would best serve the hundreds of artists who perform in Jordan Hall each year, and whose repertoires span the aesthetic spectrum. Versatility had to be the instrument's defining characteristic.
By midafternoon, the group had zeroed in on two instruments. Everyone seemed pleased, with the exception of Jochum, who had bonded with a different piano.
"My poor Number two," she moaned.
A pair of Steinway technicians rolled both pianos (the casters alone cost $3,000) away from the wall and into the center of the room, where the sound would more closely approximate that of a concert hall.
In fact, whichever piano they choose will sound dramatically different in the 1,000-seat venue where it's headed, which is why the New England Conservatory sent along its own piano technician, John Von Rohr, to assess the instruments.
In his estimation, one piano was too bright and raucous for Jordan Hall and the other was too dark and muted. But with voicing and regulation - adjustments to the piano's hammers and keys to heighten or dampen particular qualities - Von Rohr could, he said, make either one work.
Amazingly, everything changed with the pianos' new placement. A minute earlier, Rosenbaum had felt he could push for consensus ("perhaps we can all agree on Number Four?"), and then it shifted.
Sherman and Byun, meanwhile, were stuck on the Triborough Bridge.
An hour passed. Steinway's sales director agreed to stay open past the 4:30 closing time, and the pair finally arrived. Sherman played. Byun commented.
"This one has a little acidity," she said.
"Like tomato sauce?" he replied.
And so it went, until Sherman stood up and announced the end of a strange day. Jochum and Rosenbaum were long gone, Chodos had left the room, and if you weren't paying close attention you might easily have missed the decisive moment, when Brubaker, standing next to the first in a line of five exquisite pianos with five remarkably distinct personalities, quietly said: "I think this is the one."
Jordan Hall's new grand piano will make its debut this fall. With hard use and the stresses of New England weather, it has an expected life span of 10 to 15 years. And it will have some good company: a $180,000 German Steinway, to be selected when Brubaker leads a small delegation to the Hamburg factory this summer. (It's nice, he says, to offer touring artists a choice, and European pianists often prefer a more familiar instrument.)
Yet for all the care and thought that goes into the selection of these instruments, there is also an element of faith. Like people, they develop and change over time.
"You go with your best gut about what you can live with over the long haul," said Rosenbaum, "but it's ironic to think about how quickly a piano can turn from the beloved new thing in your life to, 'How soon can we get rid of this?' "
Joan Anderman can be reached at anderman@globe.com.
