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Friday, November 18, 2011

Book Review

wow.. I just finished reading Magic Hour by Kristen Hannah. What a profound and magical book. I've read other books of Hannah's and I know she's a fantastic writer but this book took me to a whole knew level. I couldn't put it down.

This story tells the tale of a child psychologist who is disgraced by the press after  a bad case flees to her childhood home in Western Washington. While she's there, a child comes out of the woods with a wolf pup. What happens in the rest of the book is tale of love, reconnection, and heartache (I was in tears at the end!).

I was reading reviews on Goodreads and there was one that really struck me. The person had defaced her book by crossing out the swear word and was really upset by the sex outside of marriage... I wanted to respond but I didn't but Hannah is not a Christian writer! She's a romance writer...

Rating: 5/5
Highly recommend reading this (or any other Hannah book)

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

measuring the quality: is it really quality over quantity?

So this week has been about how to measure your 2.0 technologies and it got me thinking. Is it really important to measure them or just go with the idea that quality is better of quantity?

In all rationale, yes, it is important to measure your 2.0 technologies. There are a million different ways to do this but I use Google Analytics for this site (even though Blogger does have it's own analysis). From an archival stand point there is Archival Metrics.

On the other hand I also think that sometimes, you should just say screw it. Why? because if you don't stress about the measurement stuff then it becomes less like work and more fun. And I've found when you are having fun, posts for blogs, facebook, twiter, etc. are generally written better. You get into your subject matter. Don't get me wrong, I think it definitely is important to look at your numbers but as JD Lasica said in his post, don't go crazy thinking about them.

Friday, October 14, 2011

Guide to Broadway

A couple of days ago I finished Seth Rudetsky's The Q Guide to Broadway. What a fantastic book! I've known about Seth for sometime, having read his other book, Broadway Nights and his Playbill column. I've been wanting to read this book for some time and I couldn't be happier. Seth gives advice on Broadway (and not really just musicals) from what shows to see to how to get tickets and anecdotes in between! One of my favorite stories that I didn't know was the story of Priscilla Lopez and her mishap one night during A Day in Hollywood/A Night n the Ukraine. Such an amazing story, it had me in tears!

Rating: 5/5 MUST READ

Seth gives two lists to new musical fans of cast records that they should own, one, that I consider "Major" shows and one that is "shows you've never heard of but you should". While I agree with some of the CDs on there (or the order their in) I don't agree with all of them. So I thought I'd give my own list:

1.  Aida
Who's in it: Adam Pascal (From Rent), Heather Headley, and Sherie Rene Scott 
Background: Very loosely based on Verdi's Opera of the same name, Aida (Heather Headley) is a Nubian slave captured by the Egyptian Radames (Adam Pascal), who has been engaged to Princess Amnaris (Sherie Rene Scott). Radames ends up falling in love with Aida but he must choose between his love for her and his love for his country.
Why: The scores (Tim Rice people!) and melodies are just fantastic. While the plot is kind of cheesy, the vocal and orchestral arrangements are not to miss.
 2. All Shook Up
Who's in it: Cheyenne Jackson, Jennifer Gambatese, Alix Korey to name a few
Background: Based on Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, ASU tells the story, using Elvis songs. 
Why: Well for one, the vocal arrangements. There are just some absolutely gorgeous melodies, harmonies, and chorus lines in the entire show. I was so blown that this show wasn't nominated for anything at that year's Tony Awards (Seth explains in the book above that some of it may have been backlash from people hating on jukebox musicals). Plus Cheyenne Jackson's voice is just phenomenal (Surprising tidbit, he was Will Chase's than Adam Pascal's standby than understudy in Aida!). He and Jenn have this amazing connection that comes across even in the cast album
3. Altar Boyz
Who's in it: Ryan Duncan, David Josefsberg, Andy Karl, Tyler Maynard and Scott Porter
Background: The musical is presented in real time as the final concert of the national "Raise the Praise" tour staged by the five-member group the Altar Boyz (Matthew, Mark, Luke, Juan, and Abraham). The Altar Boyz perform their songs, with choreographed dancing in the style of boy bands, and present several scenes concerning the group and its origins, as well as each member's strengths and demons, as part of the concert. During the show, the Altar Boyz repeatedly turn to a machine on stage, the "Soul Sensor DX-12," which has a display that they explain shows the number of burdened souls in the theatre. Their goal is to reduce the number on the machine to zero by the end of the concert. (Source)
Sidenote: Just a random note, Cheyenne Jackson also originated this in many workshops and was going to do the show but then got the offer to do All Shook Up as the lead (he wasn't the original lead in that show).
Why?: The show not only has great catchy songs (like any boy band should) but it's got a great message at the end. However, because it does make fun of many Christian beliefs, I would not recommend this if your easily offended by such things.

4. Assassins (The Original Broadway Cast)
Who's in it: Among a plethora of huge names, Neil Patrick Harris
Background: This examines the people behind the presidential assassinations.
Why: It's written by the great composer Steven Sondheim and while I'm not Sondheim fan in general, this show is absolutely brilliant. 
5. Jekyll and Hyde (The original Broadway cast, though the London cast is excellent as well)
Who's in it: Linda Eder, Christiane Noll, and Emily Skinner to name a few
Background: based on the novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson. The rest of the synopsis can be found at Wikipedia.
Why: The music is done by an absolute genius of a composer, Frank Wildhorn. Just gorgeous melodies
6. Miss Saigon
7. Oklahoma! (I personally recommend the Hugh Jackman version)
8.  Songs for a New World
9. State Fair
10. The Civil War
11. The Light in the Piazza
12. The Pajama Game



Monday, October 10, 2011

Miscellaneous organziation Part two!

This week we covered other miscellaneous organziational stuff via web 2.0. Professor Franks talked about several things in her lecture that I wanted to comment on:


  1.   I heard about the thing in Bozeman (as where I live, we get a lot of news out of Montant) and I think it's extremely wrong and frankly against the law to do that. You're not allowed to ask about age, race, religion, etc on applications. So why should they be allowed to see that sort of thing on social networking sites? It's one thing to ask just for the URLs but to ask for the passwords and log in information? absolutely ludicrious!
  2. Using Evite
    - In a group I belong to we, have virtual gift giving and we use elfster to draw names
  3. Online reporting and ethics
    They may be getting it quickly but it also lowers the quality of the "reporting" and the
    ethical standards should be held on to...
  4. "News Now!"
    I love my NookColor but I still will rather pick up a physical book if I can
  5. Music Industry
    people still "trade" music every single day...
  6. Pandora/streaming music/Music trade
    I love my Pandora... My brother got me into them when they were still a really really small group and I haven't looked back. But I also use my itunes (now that I have it back, whole drama there in and of itself) to play music. It's free and very little ads like Pandora, except I don't waste my Pandora hours

    Great music websites:
    Musicpedia
    Music Map
    Miscovery (Similar to pandora)
    I will still and am on planning on buying CDS. I have an artist who has a new album coming out soon and I plan on buying his CD. Most of my Cd purchases now are by small artists or artists who don't have a big name label behind them.
    Pandora has also shown me new artists who's music I've really enjoyed
Just Cause music was mentioned. One of the most awesome music experiments ever, Joshua Bell in a subway station:

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Book that every person in the world should read

I just finished Full Frontal Feminism by





Tuesday, October 4, 2011

miscellaneous organziation

I'm very organized with my bookmarks... I have to been... have a ton of them... And I'm fastidious about backing them up (every 3 months) because I've lost them so many times... I've also used FireFoxes bookmark back up to store them.

I looked at the links provided and honestly? I wouldn't use any of them right now. I might use the ToDo List in the future if I had to share a project todo list but Windows 7 has a great little feature called StickyNote and I love it. I have several of them. I also like writting down my to do lists, especially in my planner because I get the satisfaction of crossing or checking them off when I'm done (or highlighting if it's a school assignment).

As for the clipping and saving.... I don't know that's just now how I surf the web. If I find a link I like I book markit then I will post it to my private journal (I have a post of links, tagged with just that: links and will post stuff there to remember it). I have bookmarked the LinCut as a possible backup... it looks intriguing.

I also think FireFox has some great tools of users making that work will. I haven't used any of them because a lot of ad ons slows down firefox for me but I highly recommend checking out their user created tools. I have several ones (not for bookmarking) that I love and I don't know what I'd do without. Probably my most favorite at least for school is Zotero. If you don't have this, you should. I don't know what I would have done without Zotero this last year and a half. Its such an great add on.

I have several friends who love Shareaholic (Another Firefox add on). I've never used it but those friends seem to really like it. Another Firefox add on that's being promoted right now by them is Web Clipper. I may try this one, but not at the moment.

Cleopatra...

Today I finished Cleopatra by Stacy Schiff. Schiff takes the reader inside the life of one the most fascinating women in ancient history. Going from her birth to the height of her power to her downfall and eventual death in 30 BCE, Schiff proved a look into a women who for the most part to the records, remains a mystery.

As a historian, I truly truly appreciate the historical research that Schiff must have put into the book. The records, the Latin, the Greek, and other languages she must have to learn in order to do research is amazing. However,. as this book was called Cleopatra (though the traditional spelling is Kleopatra), I was expecting even more about her. I understand that the records about her are sparse. But this book should really be called Cleopatra's Men. This book had more about the men in Cleopatra's life. Yes I understand, that there is more in the history records about them but still. It was rather annoying. Schiff goes on a long diatribe about Herod and what he did to his family and it had absolutely nothing to do with Cleopatra.

The last part of the book, only does Schiff explain her purpose of the book and only then really does she make more of a case. It was rather late and frankly did not help in the over-all feel of the book being more about the men than the actual woman.

Rating: 2/5

Monday, September 26, 2011

Social Networking

While I have been part of social networking for quite some time (almost 8 years on facebook!), I'm very cautious on who I give and/or make public my social networking. Because I am coming towards the end of my graduate career (at least at SJSU), I have created a number of public profiles on social networking sites. I am currently on
Twitter
Google+
LinkedIn
GoodReads
Last.fm
Pandora

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Book Review

I recently finished Jaycee Dugard's A Stolen Life. Such a powerful book. I knew it would be an amazing book but I could not imagine how powerful.

Dugard's book recounts her experience as a kidnap and sexual assault victim from the day she was taken to the day she was reunited with her mother and sister. Jaycee was kidnapped at the age of 11 and was not reunited until she was 29. She looks at where she and her daughters who she had without any sort of medical care lived all that time, her daily life, and then after her reunification, how her therapy works.

One thing I really enjoyed was how her therapist uses equines to aid in that therapy. Its such a unique approach and one that does not get much mainstream media but it's a very useful aid to therapy.

Rating: 5/5 - must read!

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Book Review #2

I knew I would finish this book today and it has been such an interesting book!

The Wives of Henry VIII by Antonia Fraser takes its reader through each wife, how they overlapped and the events surrounding their marriage to King Henry VIII. I wanted to read this book as I am currently about 3 episodes into the final season of the Tudors and I thought it would make a nice compliment to what was being shown on screen.

Never having much English history myself, Antonia Fraser (who herself is of noble blood) provides background on each of the six wives, their connections, and events of and surrounding their marriage to arguably one of England's most famous kings. Fraser brings to life a rich history and makes note of events which many seem to either forget or not know. I found each story interesting but the book was slightly bland. The one thing that I had a hard time with this book was keeping track of how everybody was related and who was related to whom. If I was confused, I'm sure it must have been confusing to those in the 16th century, many of which could not read or write.

Fraser points out in both the preface and epilogue her reasons for writing the book and I feel they are excellent. She wants to put down some of the stereotypes associated with the wives such as Anne Bolynn the temptress. Fraser points out that for the most part, these women were victims of a society in which they were just property. Yes, they may have had some say but at most times they were just pawns in a game played by their fathers, brothers, uncles, nephews, and sons.

What was most interesting is what happened to each wife after her marriage to the king ended. Yes, two of them were beheaded, a third died in childbirth, but the other three lived on.

If you don't know the story of Henry the VIII (This book is as much about him as is it about his wives) or the beyond the scenes stuff of his wives, then this book is a must read.

Rating: 3/5

Book Review!

First book review for this blog, so it's going to be a little rough!

I saw The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway and thought it sounded amazing. It's set during the siege of Sarajevo inn 1992, one of my favorite periods in history. I'm very interested in the Balkans and it's history so I thought it would be perfect story... boy was I wrong! Please note after this there are spoilers for the book so if you intend on reading it, please stop now.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Wikis

I will be honest... I am generally not a fan of wikis. I will say that I am probably biased against them due to the fact my undergraduate history professors were quite against wikipedia. This was due to the fact that wikipedia can be edited by anyone and the information is not really checked. However, after this summer in LIBR 246, I really do see the usefulness of them if they're properly managed. That is, having to have people either register to use or in many cases only letting certain people edit the information. It is one of the reasons I really find this Wiki useful! It has an amazing number of resources for finding books to read and/or recommend!

Sunday, September 18, 2011

YouTube!

Here is a video I uploaded to Youtube... It's of my friends swing dancing several years ago:





See Boys don't always have to dance with girls!

Sorry for the dark quality. The place doesn't use a whole lot of light while dancing :)

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Non Archival post!

So this week it was announced official (though there had been rumors of it before) that Hugh Jackman will be playing the role of Jean Valjean in the new Les Miserables movie. Most of the speculation before this announcement was that he would be playing Javert. Now I wouldn't have minded him playing Javert, but the fact that he's going to be singing "Bring him Home"? EPIC. Here is a video of him singing "Oh, What a Beautiful Morning" from Oklahoma!:

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Entertaining the masses

I was reading our chapter for this week (Ch. 4 Podcasts)... sometimes I wonder about things. they write that podcasts can "be accessed via computer or portable media devices (such as iPods...)" (57). Not the truth. iPods, unless they are iTouches cannot access media via the web. You have to download the podcast via iTunes or other media service (like winamp) and put it onto your iPod :)

I think Podcasts for archives, i particular, highlighting a collection would awesome. Explaining the collection, who donated (if allowed to say), whats in it, and maybe why the collection is important. One of my favorite Podcats, is RadioLab from WNYC. They are awesome, funny, and have some great education podcasts and you learn things even though you don't think you are!

Read Chapter 5 (on using Flickr), it's interesting to me why some institutions decide to use Flickr (or other social photo-sharing site) and others don't. The institution I work at, has a rather large digital collection but is not on Flickr. My guess it is due to the adding photos and not enough staff or time to do it. Our collection, though is easily accessed through our main page and is quite searchable.

LibriVox was talked about this and I loved site. However, sometimes the readers have been hit or miss. But it's great to get the old classics to hear (Which reminds I need to listen to Les Miserables!). Another similar aspect as LibriVox is the Gutenberg Project. Which is Free Ebook!

Lastly, a new technology for all those who like some aspects of Foursquare but not the creepy stalking part. I give you GetGlue! GetGlue, from their website is:
GetGlue is a leading social network for entertainment. Users check-in and share what they are watching, listening to and reading with friends; get fresh recommendations, exclusive stickers, discounts and other rewards from GetGlue partners. 
For me I think an archive and or library could implement something like this into their social networking. Its a fun site and I've gotten book recommendations of it. Plus who, as an adult, wants to get back to their youth and play with stickers?! GetGlue posts pictures of stuff people have done with their stickers and some of them are pretty amazing! 

Monday, August 29, 2011

Back Again!

While I did created this blog for LIBR 220, I'm going to continue to use  to talk about classes (specifically LIBR 284-12), Readers' Advisory stuff from me, and my other interests.

First up, for those of new to my blog, a bit about my blogging past. I started blogging probably about 2002, 2003 on Myspace (oh what an ignorant child I was). When MS started becoming more public, I decided, as I was heading off to college, I didn't really want my parents or family to read what I was writing so I switched to Livejournal where I am still very active. Through all it's faults, LJ is a great place and I've made some very very good friends. The one thing I love about it is its communities. I'm able to discuss things that interest me but my parents think is very weird. I also have a Dreamwidth account as a backup when LJ goes down (whole other blog post).  My LJ is private and by invitation only, so if you have one, message me or email me.

In probably 2006, (can't remember the exact year) I started a gymnastics, figure skating, and ballroom dancing blog called BodyRhythm which was originally started on Blogger but moved to my liking Wordpress better. It's unfortunate that it's on hiatus because I love the subjects but until graduate school is over, it's at that place right now.

So that's my blogging history!

And because I absolutely love this video... have fun with a rant about Pachelbel!



Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Week 14

A Review of the introduction of The Cognition of Basic Musical Structures by David Temperley. I'm kind of glad we didn't have to read this book. The introduction was extremely dry. I don't completely understand exactly what Temperley was talking about but there were a couple things that struck me as interesting. He writes about "these structures are most often simply taken for granted as musical facts" (19). As a musician, there aren't a whole of things that are fact so this statement is interesting. One possible issue that I see is that the says "I speak of the ``correct'' analysis of a piece - as I often will- I mean the analysis that I assume listeners hear" (27). With music, you can never say there is a correct way to analyize a peice or hear a piece. Everybody's going to hear something different.

I have definitely learned some things in this class and a lot of things because of my musical background have been old news. 
So I leave you with a video of Anthony Warlow singing "This is the Moment"


Saturday, April 23, 2011

Charts and Humanity

First thoughts on a article titled: Counting Down to Number One: The evolution of the meaning of popular music charts by Ernest A. Hakanen.

 I think its funny that Ernest mentions ranking human attractiveness . (2). While humans do do it, part of the reason behind it, is that there are scientific studies as to why certain people find others attractive. With straight males, there is a scientific ration for hips to waist, and that subconsciously, men know what this perfect ratio is. There also have been studies with symmetry and what men find attractive. Case in point, on a recent episode of the TV show Criminal Minds, the unknown subject (UNSUB) was attracted to murder those women who had dystopia which means that their eye sockets are not symmetrical. Now granted it caused the UNSUB to murder but in another person it may be found to be attractive.

Hakanen writes "Radio  stations use  them  to  develop  playlists  and  fine  tune their appeal" (4). However, for users like me, I don't listen to the radio unless it's NPR. I do listen to Pandora but those "stations" are based on what the user likes so if I don't want to hear Katy Perry I don't have to. Ever. So I think it a couple of years, a lot of charts that Billboard has will be obsolete because people won't be listening to the radio as much. That being said, it is a little sad for me because every Sunday morning when I was growing up, we would listen to Casey Casem and we got out of church just in time to hear the number one song in the land.

Hakanen goes on to talk about their research models including looking at the the history of "charts" and then what they reflect of the market. One thing to note that has just happened dealing with charts since September of 2010 is that the singles and albums of the tv show Glee have broken all kinds of records... BUT and it's a huge one (:)) is that 98% of the songs on that show ARE NOT original! They're covers. So even though the charts say that Glee is the number one selling band/artist, whatever it's not really true because all their stuff is covers. So it's important to know about the songs on those charts.

Next, a look at the article Human- Centred Musical Studies: Towards a charter of Musical human rights by Gino Stefani
This article looks at whether there should be specific code for human rights in terms of music. . I get where they are coming from but... I don't think they realize the definition of Genocide which is:
"...violent crimes committed against groups with the intent to destroy the existence of the group. Human rights, as laid out in the U.S. Bill of Rights or the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, concern the rights of individuals" (United States Holocaust Museum encyclopedia).
The USHMM also spells out Genocide  as it relates to the UN definition. Unfortunately, I don't think Stefani understands that music falls under human rights as well as part of the underlying definition of genocide is the destruction of cultural property, which music falls under.  To destroy a group, part of what you have to do is tear down their culture against themselves as well as the surrounding populations to get them to see it as a bad thing. An example of this, is that during the Holocaust, the Nazis persecuted Jewish musicians and banned all music that was written, sung, or produced by Jews.

Next an article titled Analysing popular music: theory, method, and practice by Philip Tagg.
This article looks at why popular music should be analyzed and what the point of that analysis is. the first page of the article looks at a pop music conference and the stereotypes that were protrayed in other media (1). While I understand that there is significant studies on popular music, I do think it is a little strange to have a conference on them. The article also mentions physical stereotypes that they thought would be at the conference.
This article also looks at how popular culture has affected different areas such as the communication process as well as looking how the listener interprets the song and how the artist interpret the song which was interesting because they can and more the likely probably are two (or three or four) different things.

For articles, we finally look at Music, History, Democracy by Paul Oliver. This short article looks at short papers presented about how songs are influence by current political events as well as how they influence the events themselves. There was a short obiturarie on Ewan MacColl who wrote one of my favorite songs "The First Time Ever I saw your Face" (though not the Roberta Flack version... I hate that version). Here's Leona Lewis singing it:
 
And a male version




Review of Amnesty International's website
Good site but what do the Beatles have to do with Amnesty International?  I'm very confused why the Music for Human rights page is all about John Lennon... Frankly I think the website is poorly designed as it tells NOTHING about music for human rights... just about Lennon.

Sunday, April 17, 2011

wow

So Seth Rudetksy retweeted this video and I thought I'd share. It's pretty awesome:

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

What makes an artist?

As you read, think about the following questions: based on the topics we've explored in this class, do the authors characterize the future of music as you see it? Do you think their vision of the future is complete? What do they leave out or fail to consider?

It’s interesting that this author separates publicity and promotion (p. 17). To me they’re part of the same cog of the system. To get publicity you have to promote. To help promotion, you get air play and publicity… But then they do say that the four fronts are interconnected which is very true.

In Chapter six they write that with CDs, “Confusion reigns. CDs are thought to be too expensive for what you get one or two worthwhile songs. Prices vary too much from record club prices to store prices” (244). I disagree with at least the first part of that quote. Some of my favorite songs by artists are not the ones released to the public. They’ve been the ones that have been “buried” so to speak on the album. One the best examples I can think of is the song “Gira Con Me” from Josh Groban’s first album, Josh Groban. It wasn’t any of the three singles that came off that album but it’s one of my favorites of his, after 5 albums, it’s still one of those.


The authors write about how artists can use sites like Youtube to promote their stuff (244). Frankly I think “artists” who vigorously promote themselves on Youtube aren’t artists. Anybody can upload a video singing to that site. Look at Rebecca Black. People think that she’s a hit sensation and an “artist”. Not to hurt her feelings (like some were doing) but she’s not. She’s auto tuned, her song has like five words and is tonal. I truly think the mark of a good artist is one who can sing (and belt in the case of females and belt well) is to sing acapella and be on key and tune. It is not easy. See Straight No Chaser do it: 


I think the authors did a really good job in looking at the future of music and they covered more if the internet side of the business than The Future of the Music Business did. I don’t know if their vision is complete; I don’t you can ever say something like this will be complete. The music world is ever changing and so it’s not something so concrete.

Next, review the following Music Markup Language website http://www.musicmarkup.info/ . This site attempts to delimit music informatics to specific technological considerations. Do you think the authors of this site get it right? What do they leave out?

It’s hard to know what the authors of the site got right or what they left out as I have never used XML or any experience with it. I have worked with HTML however. This is such a complicated website and it has a lot of technical jargon on it that goes right over my head… I do like that they have a section describing the project

Thursday, April 7, 2011

Music, culture, and life

Saturday, April 2, 2011

The future of the music business

Chapter 19 in The Future of the music business
 Once again Gordon skirts around the issue of actually writing and just puts another interview for a chapter.  Gordon does make an interesting point in this chapter the model for the music industry has reverted back to an older model in that it's all about buying the single on say iTunes instead of the full album (though that is also possible). Gordon writes that before the Beatles came along in the 1960s, this was the model. Then once the Beatles came, it was all about the album. Then the digital music revolution happened and things went back to the older model. 

Chapter 20 in  The Future of the music business
I'm so glad this book is almost over because this is ridiculous. If you write a book, you should do research and write on the topics of the chapters, not just put interviews. This interview is all about music in "virtual worlds" like Second Life and the virtually reality thing that MTV created after the success of The Hills, which by the way is now defunct.

The first thing that I clicked on I came across this and the project sound really cool. Plus how each artist is connected to each other is amazing! The only thing though, I think the people doing it don't know every music style correctly... I went to new age and close to new age, they had Celtic Thunder. That is not what I consider "New Age". They're more world music if anything... So a problem with that project is who's definition of a category are they going with?

I'm definitely going to check out these sites and try them as many of them seem helpful in finding new music.

One aspect of the music business that I think is also changing is that of Broadway. Musical theatre is a world wide thing but the shows that come to Broadway are for the most part uniquely American. Take for example, one of the current musicals on Broadway, The Book of Mormon. It takes a uniquely American religion and uses the material in it to make a musical (and a funny one at that. I mean it's by the creators of South Park). However, it is getting more and more expansive to make a musical. American audiences expect a lot and it is not just about the performances (though it should be). Take for example, the new (and buzzed about) production of SpiderMan. It costs in the millions to make, yet they're have 4 (or 5) serious accidents in the past 4 months. It's not an easy adventure to take on. So what's the answer? Well for one, Spider man can not continue. The reason for this is that there are just to many problems with it, not just the accidents either. Another thing that needs to happen and even though it's scary, those who write musicals, need to do more original ideas. The American public doesn't need to see 101 dalmatians musical! It's a huge reason I am drawn to The Book of Mormon. It's an original idea! Now granted, there really isn't, for the most part, such thing as an original idea but musicals like The Book of Mormon, RENT, and tick...tick...BOOM! come close. Don't get me wrong, I think some of best musicals in the last couple of  years have been musicals of movies, books, etc. One of my favorites was Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson. While not taken off of any book or anything like that, it was based on the life of President Andrew Jackson and it was hilarious! I was so sad when it closed early.

I think those who work in musical theatre need to look at the history of musical theatre to be inspired. Even though huge musicals like Oklahoma! were not original ideas, the people who were the collaborators were the success to the shows. Not to mention the glitz and glamor and theatrics that certain musicals (ahem Spiderman) seem to think that are necessary for a successful Broadway show.

Monday, March 21, 2011

Music Libraries


Chapter 14 in the future of the music business
This chapter is quite dry because it is yet another interview. While I think it’s interesting, it really should be a supplemental to the book not in it… if I wanted to read the interview, I’d go find it. Anyway, this interview is with John Buckman who created his own record company. What’s new about his record label is that “it offers free mp3s streams, all the of the music don’t have DRM or copy protection, and Creative commons are part of its business model” (265). Another thing that is interesting about this company is that the revenue from cds is split with artists/musicians fifty-fifty (270)

Chapter 15
This chapter discusses creative commons, what is, and what it does. According to Gordons, Creative commons “seeks to foster a more permissive atmosphere in which creators will not be afraid of being sued each time they use portions of existing work to create something new and original” (272). In my mind, the most one that I can think that gets used a lot is the license that says “the creator can also choose a license that permits only noncommercial use, thus retaining financial control over their work” (272). This license is like to get used by those performing or auditioning for things. Also in this chapter is an interview with Thomas Goetz who writes for Wired about Creative Commons in the real world, as well as how creative commons is used a business model (to get promote different artists on one cd)

Chapter 16
Yet again, Gordons has two interviews as part of the chapter. It’s getting really old and very very uninteresting. Both of these interviews are with CEOs of internet record stores (CD Baby and Beyond.fm). It’s a little interesting to read about these websites beginnings but since I have no interest in using either one, it’s rather dull and not really all that fun to read.

10 sites of your choice from the Harvard College Library Online Resources for Music Scholars
Really well done site. Colors are easy to read. Search functions well and how to browse is simple yet effective! This site not only has music but images as well. One thing I didn't like, with the images is that to get the details about the image you had to click a + to get it. It really should up and a user shouldn't have to click anything. Another thing that was hard on this site was to actually found their digital music. It seems that this site is more about the images than music. To find it you had to go to the different library divisons and click on the Music Division.

Good design and colors. Searching and browsing their collection is really easy. However you can't really see or listen to anything as it's all through MTSU so that was rather frustrating. Would be nice if I could see things

Their browsing is fine but the type is super small.  Would make that bigger... You can't hear any of the music but you can see the titles of the sheet music which is neat. Most of the music is from the early part of the 20th century. What is neat about this website is that you can put in your own scans of the music and make your own virtual collection.

Since I like to browse new cites by their index, this site has an index by title which is extremely nice! Its very easy to read and the search function works well. One issue that while you can see the digital collections, it takes forever to load them...I don't know if its because I'm not part of Harvard but none of the digital scores ever loaded which was frustrating.

As someone who loves Balanchine ballets, I was super excited to see and review this site. Not a fan of the color scheme but at least its not black and white. This site includes Balanchine's life, bibliography, videography, and filmography. What's to bad about this site is that there are no photographs, no videos, no sound recordings. Just a catalogue of his works.
 
I heart this site so much. I've really only used it to look up past web pages but now that I know that it does media, I'll be using it even more.  Searching for anything is super easy and love the layout

I love that you can search by Composers, lyricists, names, and shows. Such an easy way to do things! Plus it's Library of Congress, so I know it's going to be a good and trusted site. If you need to see sheet music or scores, this is probably the site to do it (for free). The shows in there are older shows however. It only gives that the LoC has them. 

One of the most well known composers and conductors of all time, this collection, done again, by the Library of Congress, is a landfill of material. It includes material about the man as well as photographs.

Having become reccently more interested in opera, this site is a good one for finding information about different operas. Not a big fan of the opening graphic but hey that's their choice. Lots of different search functions, I chose to browse. Quite easy and ordered alphabetical. One cool think about the Met is you can listen to whole operas on their site through their "Met Player" or on satellite radio if you have it.

Like the Bernstein collection above, this Library of Congress collection has letters, photographs (which you can view) and information on all the music that Aaron Copland composed. Very helpful to research.

 I cannot get past bad website deisgn! Black/gray background with white letter is a web design no no! Just don't do it! This site seems to be geared toward people with smart phones (which I am not one of). So it's very uninteresting to me.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Does radio really have as much influence

I'm watching TV today and also because it's St. Paddy's day, Celtic Thunder and Celtic Women are huge groups (though in the grand scheme of things, a lot of people still haven't heard of these fantastic groups) and have never had any of their songs played on radio! They do tour (I'm hoping to go see Celtic Thunder this fall!) but most of their promotion comes through PBS... Just a thought about how much radio really has nowadays.

Another artist that has success despite not being played on mainstream radio. Yes he's played on adult contemporary but not as many  people listen to it. That artist is Josh Groban... A lot of his big success early was by word of mouth and the internet.

So it makes me wonder how much influence does radio really have and if Billboard shouldn't change their "radio plays" list.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Music Improv

My musical life has been, at times, at odds with each other. When I was younger, music was serious training and no improvising allowed. Classical and traditional Lutheran music doesn't allow for it. When I switched to flute in middle school, I did Jazz band for a semester and while I love listening to Jazz music, not a huge fan of playing it. Its hard to play jazz on the flute. Classical music was all I played in my flute lessons and frankly, it's kind of why I didn't seriously peruse it in college (in terms of joining an ensemble). Don't get me wrong, I love classical music (The "Troika" movement from Lieutenant Kijé is one of my favorite classical pieces) but I had enough of playing it, at least for a while. So when I went to college, I did want to sing (I had been singing all my life) but I wanted something nonclassical, or at least less classical.  The group I sang with definitely did some classical stuff, but we also did other stuff too. When I started voice lessons, because I already had the classical background (which, don't let anybody tell you differently, classical music influences EVERYTHING.), my teacher didn't feel the need to sing that stuff, not to mention he was more a non-traditional voice coach. So what did we work on? Pop songs and musical theatre. I fit so much better into the musical theatre realm. While there isn't as much improv in musical theatre (depending on the show), it's a lot more "free" than classical music.

What's funny is that as a swing dancer, everything is improv. Yes the moves are learned, but what order they're done in and how they're done is up the lead. Yet, I don't mind it... Maybe it's because I'm a follow, but I don't have really any issues with it as a dancer (same with Social ballroom). One improve thing that I love watching is Improv on Ice.

Chapters 11, 12, 13 (part III) in the future of music business
11This chapter looks at how to build a website to show off your music and why its important. I think this chapter should be read by everybody, not just musicians. There are sooo many crappy websites sites out there. Gordon gives examples of "doing it yourself' (213) and while he explains HTML, there are huge range of programs that do the HTML for you (I use and love Dreamweaver!).
Another thing Gordon talks about is using the internet to promote live performance (215) and even that today is out of date. A lot of small artists now give concerts live on the internet. Harley Jay is one of these. He regularly gives concerts and chats on a service called Ustream.

12This chapter is a bunch of interviews with artists who use the technology. The first one is with Will Calhoun who according to Gordon, is a Grammy winning artist (231). Yet, I've never heard of this guy.... can't think he's that well known then... The other interview is with a Jazz artist, whom I've heard of but I'm not a huge fan of....

Not sure which part of chapter 13 is part three... interesting...

Website review:
Wikipedia - Improvisation
I don't go to Wikipedia.  I think it's a worthless place. There are better sites, more reliable sites. A little surprised as to why this needs to be reviewed. Here is a better site to learn about Jazz improve: http://hum.lss.wisc.edu/jazz/


Live Plasma 
Can't access the site


Musicovery
I discovered this site about a year ago from a friend, and while I like it, it's not as broad as you think it would be. It's very limiting in my mind and MUCH more prefer Pandora.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Music economics


In writing about the patient with amnesia (7 seconds remembrance time!), Sacks writes that “a piece of music will draw one in, teach one about its structure and secrets, whether one is listening consciously or not. Listening to music is not a passive process but intensely active, involving a stream of inferences, hypotheses, expectations, and anticipations” (226). This is so true! Even if you’re not actively listening, anybody who listens to music, even half-heartedly, will be engaged with it.

Sacks also mentions Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring in the footnotes which in hindsight, should have been called the Riot of spring because when it was first played, the crowd went nuts, literally and caused a bloody riot. This isn’t the first time that I’ve heard this story. Jad Abumrad & Robert Krulwich talk about it in their podcast: “Musical Language” (From RadioLab). The Rite of Spring is now a famous classical piece and it is hard to imagine why they rioted over it but to the listeners in 1913, it was new, unconventional, and strange.

In Chapter 23 as a footnote, Sacks writes about a woman who sings in “dozens of languages, without knowing the meaning of any of them” (304). This isn’t all that special. I do this as well.  I don’t know them from memory but I do sing in Italian and most of the time, I don’t know what the song means.

Also in Chapter 23, Sacks discusses dreams and music and while I do dream in music, it’s never in fragments like talks about on 306-307. I dream in musicals. Like that I’m in them… 

If you dream in music, do you agree with Massey when writes that “music is the only faculty that is not altered by the dream environment”? (Sacks, 309) At times many of the times I don’t remember my dreams and while I can sing, it seems that I sing much better in my dreams. Or is this just a projection on my part?

Chapters 6-7 are two chapters in the performance manual that focus on the user part of being in a music librarian. In these, distribution, check out, care and keeping audition lists is something a music librarian does. What’s interesting here is that the music library associated with my undergraduate college did not post any audition lists, either for the school or for local events.

Free Press - Who Owns the Media?
http://www.freepress.net/resources/ownership
Interesting website about who owns what media…

downhillbattle.org
http://www.downhillbattle.org/itunes/
Another interesting article about how iTunes is screwing over the artist again

Taxi
http://www.taxi.com/
Being an unsigned artist is extremely hard. This site is a good place to start looking for information

Music XML
http://www.recordare.com/software.html
Good website for comparing all the different types of music software