The over-arching question: are digital books as good or better than physical books at protecting you and your rights as a reader?

via Digital Books and Your Rights: A Checklist for Readers | Electronic Frontier Foundation.

via Listen to SXSW ’10 Bands on SHOUTcast Radio | SXSW.com.

In 2009 there were over 1,200 tunes submitted to SXSW. I’ve made it through about 1/3 of them. Most haven’t caught my fancy, but a few (4) have. Catchy enough for me to rate them 3 stars or better. At this rate about 1% will make it into the “make sure we listen to more” list.

In iTunes, a very useful feature is the File » Show Duplicates menu item. As expected by its name, you can use this feature to help weed out duplicates from your iTunes library. However, many people (myself included) have different versions of songs, remixes and such, which will show up as duplicates when using this feature. The solution is to hold down the option key prior to selecting this menu item. When you do, Show Duplicates changes to Show Exact Duplicates. In this mode, iTunes shows only true duplicates, and not remixes or alternate versions.

via Show only exact duplicate tracks in iTunes – Mac OS X Hints:

Oh this is so nice. I can get rid of a few (bunch) tunes that are replicants in so many ways.

Full-length version

The comments suggest that the instruments are “real” and the music is actually played on it.

Entertaining. Not all commercials are obnoxious.

RetroLoop Tuba Man

E-Flat comes back the next night in a three-piece suit with nicely shined shoes. The bartender says, “You’re looking sharp tonight. Come on in, this could be a major development.”

Sure enough, E-flat soon takes off his suit and everything else, and is au natural.

Eventually C sobers up and realizes in horror that he’s under a rest. C is brought to trial, found guilty of contributing to the diminution of a minor, and is sentenced to 10 years of D.S. without Coda at an upscale correctional facility.

via GarageBand ‘09 a boon for guitar players | Creative Notes | Macworld.

Abigail Washburn :: Home.

Track: Encryption (mp3) - Artist/Band: Brad Goode

Trumpeter Brad Goode soars through some wild-sounding Fusion, armed with a psychedelic trumpet, a polytonal mind and a band of virtuoso players. Joining Goode at his dance party are pianist Jeff Jenkins, guitarist Bill Kopper, Ken Walker on bass, and drummer Anthony Lee – a musically daring group of musicians who embraced Goode’s ideas of unconvential harmonic structures as they perform a wide range of originals and soul & jazz standards. The results are captivating to the ear and just strange enough to keep you guessing.

via Free Jazz Downloads.

Uncut “Essential for all fans of stately ambience”

Product Description The first album for 4AD from this Icelandic composer is an expanded version of a performance piece originally written for the dancer and choreographer Erna Omarsdottir, and which has been performed in more than 40 European cities. This new incarnation was scored for a 60-piece string orchestra and the four original movements were joined by a completely new finale. The final mix incorporates electronics and vintage reel-to-reel recordings of the IBM 1401 mainframe computer which inspired the piece in the first place.

Amazon.com: IBM 1401, A User’s Manual: Johann Johannsson, Mario Klemens, City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra, Jóhann Jóhannsson, Erna Órnarsdóttir: Music

 

With only a 4% share of US movie disc sales and HD download capability arriving, the Blu-ray disc Association (BDA) is still smoking dope. Even $150 Blu-ray players won’t save it.

Blu-ray is dead – heckuva job, Sony! | Storage Bits | ZDNet.com.

– Trio da Paz comes from a vital music tradition: Duduka da Fonseca came to the U.S. in the mid-’70s, and Romero Lubambo and Nilson Matta arrived a decade later. Together since 1993, the “samba jazz” band represents the cream of expatriate Brazilian musicians in the U.S., as well as a vital link to the bossa nova years

I let the computer listen to JazzSet on Friday evenings (KUAZ). This show is very tasty.

Led Zeppelin: The Essential Album-By-Album Guide
From the First Album to “Mothership”: An Expert Rundown of Every Studio Album, Live Disc and Reissue

DOUGLAS WOLK
Posted Jun 12, 2008 3:30 PM

The bad news for the hip urban professionals: playing Mozart for your designer baby will not improve his IQ or help him get into that exclusive pre-school. He’ll just have to get admitted to Harvard some other way. Of course, we’re all better off for listening to Mozart purely for the pleasure of it. However, one wonders whether, if playing Mozart sonatas for little Tiffany or Jason could boost their intelligence, what would happen if other composers were played during the kiddies’ developmental time?

LISZT EFFECT

Child speaks rapidly and extravagantly, but never really says anything important.

BRUCKNER EFFECT

Child speaks very slowly and repeats himself frequently. Gains reputation for profundity.

WAGNER EFFECT

Child becomes a megalomaniac. May eventually marry his sister.

MAHLER EFFECT

Child continually screams – at great length and volume – that he’s dying.

SCHOENBERG EFFECT

Child never repeats a word until he’s used all the other words in his vocabulary. Sometimes talks backwards. Eventually, people stop listening to him. Child blames them for their inability to understand him.

IVES EFFECT

The child develops a remarkable ability to carry on several separate conversations at once.

GLASS EFFECT

The child tends to repeat himself over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.

STRAVINSKY EFFECT

The child is prone to savage, guttural and profane outbursts that often lead to fighting and pandemonium in the preschool.

BRAHMS EFFECT

The child is able to speak beautifully as long as his sentences contai n a multiple of three words (3, 6, 9, 12, etc.) However, his sentences containing 4 or 8 words are strangely uninspired.

CAGE EFFECT

Child says nothing for 4 minutes, 33 seconds. (Preferred by 10 out of 9 classroom teachers.)

SCHNITTKE EFFECT

People will run for exits in horror whenever child speaks.

Found this while I was reading about Bill Evans. Sometimes the radio works best ;-)

The MP3 128K stream is tastier than the 64K.

There are a number of “stations” – Smooth, Dinner, Vocal. If you sign up to be a member of All About Jazz you get to download the tune of the day as well.

So, to the listening library I was dispatched. It felt like a punishment even before I clamped on those thumbscrews-for-the-ears they called “headphones” and popped in a tape of Sunday at The Village Vanguard. (Isn’t there a part in all of us that rebels at unsolicited recommendations? Don’t you hate it when somebody gushes, “This is the awesomest, ever. You’ll love it.”) Village Vanguard, I thought, what’s that, some medieval theatre-in-the-round? The way my teacher described it, the experience I was about to receive would be pianistic heaven on earth, Mount Olympus on the 88’s, and god himself would vibe me from those solid grooves. Bill Evans was at that time the summation of everything that was ever worthwhile doing with a piano or a piano trio. Forget Monk – not really a piano player; didn’t he write some quirky tunes? – forget Hines and Tatum – hopelessly old-fashioned, heavy-handed stuff – who? Cecil Taylor? Get out of my sight, infidel.

Bill Evans – The Vanguard Sessions – 1961 – quoted on the last page of this month’s Jazziz Magazine.

I have a “fair bit” of Bill Evans in the collection. Turns out that I have 2 copies (not identical) of the Vanguard sessions – “Bill Evans Trio: Sunday At The Village Vanguard” and “Complete Riverside Recordings (Disc 7)”. They are not identical, but appear to be the same sessions. The former is engineered a bit differently.

I wonder what’s different in the latest “Bill Evans: The Complete Village Vanguard Recordings 1961″ collection? The reviews and description at Amazon illumimnate.

The long tail is famously good news for two classes of people; a few lucky aggregators, such as Amazon and Netflix, and 6 billion consumers. Of those two, I think consumers earn the greater reward from the wealth hidden in infinite niches.

In an unusual educational experiment Curtis has established Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 11 in F minor (Op. 95) as the touchstone of the academic year for its 160 students. Imagine a year of medical school revolving around the liver, or a car repair course centered on the Chrysler LeBaron.

you should not play any notes you have left

1. Everyone should play the same piece.
2. Stop at every repeat sign, and discuss in detail whether to take the repeat. The audience will love this a lot!
3. If you play a wrong note, give a nasty look to one of your partners.
4. Keep your fingering chart handy. You can always catch up with the others.
5. Carefully tune your instrument before playing. That way you can play out of tune all night with a clear conscience.
6. Take your time turning pages.
7. The right note at the wrong time is a wrong note (and vice versa).
8. If everyone gets lost except you, follow those who get lost.
9. Strive to get the maximum NPS (notes per second). That way you gain the admiration of the incompetent.
10. Markings for slurs, dynamics and ornaments should not be observed. They are only there to embellish the score.
11. If a passage is difficult, slow down. If it’s easy, speed it up. Everything will work itself out in the end.
12. If you are completely lost, stop everyone and say, “I think we should tune.”
13. Happy are those who have not perfect pitch, for the kingdom of music is theirs.
14. If the ensemble has to stop because of you, explain in detail why you got lost. Everyone will be very interested.
15. A true interpretation is realized when there remains not one note of the original.
16. When everyone else has finished playing, you should not play any notes you have left. If you have notes left over, please play them on the way home.
17. A wrong note played timidly is a wrong note. A wrong note played with authority is an interpretation.

That’s the play list. Somehow I only had the first 4 saved. Can’t remember where I put the text file that has the list in it, so here it is. Best I can tell is 1979 for vintage.

Publish and Sell Worldwide Lulu is fast, easy and free Publish and sell easily within minutes. No set-up fees. No minimum order. Keep control of the rights. Set your own price. Each product is printed as it is ordered. No excess inventory.

So how about some music. Time to find the copyright holders.

“In a major market, for a classic rock station to change formats is really an anomaly,” said Fred Jacobs, a radio industry consultant from Detroit who helped popularize the classic rock format in the mid-1980s. “You could make a nice, long, healthy list of top five stations that are classic rock,” and several would be No. 1 or No. 2 in their markets, he said. But Mr. Freeman, the Dallas station manager, says he has had his fill of classic-rock bands like Led Zeppelin. “A friend of mine said, ‘They’ve been climbing that stairway to heaven for 30 years, you’d think they’d be there by now,’ ” he said.

Mark Fratrik, a vice president with BIA Financial Network, a financial and strategic consulting firm for the media and communications industries. … But Fratrik said it would not be a good idea for CBS to use its radio stations to get more exposure for the musicians on CBS Records. He said the radio business is now highly formulaic. So it would not be in CBS’ best interest to feature relatively unknown artists while all of its competitors are playing “top 40″ musicians. “Radio is so incredibly competitive that if CBS actually did favor their own artists instead of more popular ones, they would pay in terms of lost listeners. That would be a tough thing for CBS Radio to shoulder,” Fratrik said.

What’s wrong with the “fill-in-the-blank” business is the business thinks that the people with the decisions are nothing but eyeballs, ears, and wallets. They would prefer that there be no decision at all – think subscription service.

Maybe the 20%+ decline in the CD business is due to the increase in formulaic “art” spreading across the globe?

Anyone know of a comparison showing the decline of music sales with the spread of Clear Channel radio stations?