Tag: music

The Industries Disrupted by U.S. Entrepreneur Steve Jobs and U.S. Inventor Thomas Edison

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Steve Jobs affected and subsequently disrupted the computer industry, the motion picture industry, the music industry, and the telecommunucations industry, all within a single lifespan. This achievement places Jobs at the status of a world renowned icon, a person like Thomas Edison who affected all of the same industries as well, swapping only the computer industry for the electric industry. Edison invented the incandescent light bulb for the electric industry, the phonograph for the music industry, and the motion picture camera for the film industry, and improved the telegraph and telephone for the telecommunications industry. Jobs developed the Macintosh computer for the computer industry, the animation studio Pixar for the film industry, the iPod and iTunes for the music industry, and the iPhone for the telecommunications industry

How German Composer Johann Sebastian Bach Inserted His Surname into Musical Compositions

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Johann Sebastian Bach relished inscribing his surname into his music in all sorts of contexts but this can only be performed in German as in English the letter “H” doesn’t exist within music as it does in German. Bach would insert his name with the notes “B”, “A”, “C”, and “B Natural” which is “H” in German. This motif is a form of musical cryptogram and is most well renowned within Bach’s The Art of Fugue (Contrapunctus XIV) composition. These notes when played in unison have an appealing resonance which compliment many musical scores without any need for alteration. Many composers who have come after Bach have also used the BACH motif within their own compositions as a tribute to Bach, his work, and his legacy including composers Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt, and Arnold Schoenberg among others

The Fashion Police of North Korea

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In North Korea, music that is not state approved is illegal, international telephone calls are illegal, smiling in public upon the anniversary of Kim Il Sung’s death is illegal, and perhaps most bizarre, leather coats are illegal, with this last law passed in December of 2021 to dissuade North Korean citizens from imitating Kim Jong Un who wore a black cow hide coat in public on numerous occasions. This style of black leather coat became massively popular after Kim wore it in news media coverage in 2019 and because of this, imitation coats have become more readily available in North Korea. Surprisingly, fashion police are employed by the North Korean state to patrol and search for anyone wearing this style of garment as well as to search and help take down companies found manufacturing the coat

The 12 Gods and Goddesses of Ancient Greece

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The Ancient Greeks believed in 12 gods and goddesses who were understood to reside upon Mount Olympus. These deities included Zeus (pronounced “zoose”) the king of the gods, Hera (pronounced “hare-ah”) the wife of Zeus and goddess of marriage and childbirth, Apollo (pronounced “ah-pol-oh”) the son of Zeus, sun god, and god of music and healing, Artemis (pronounced “art-em-is”) the daughter of Zeus, twin sister of Apollo, and the goddess of the moon and hunting, Aphrodite (pronounced “af-row-dye-tee”) the daughter of Zeus and goddess of love and sexual desire, Ares (pronounced “air-eez”) the son of Zeus, god of war and battle, and lover of Aphrodite, Poseidon (pronounced “po-sai-den”) the brother of Zeus and god of the sea, storms, and earthquakes, Demeter (pronounced “de-me-tur”) a lover of Zeus and the goddess of agriculture and fertility, Athena (pronounced “ah-tee-nah”) the daughter of Zeus and goddess of wisdom and war, Hephaestus (pronounced “heh-fai-sch-tus”) the son of Zeus and god of fire and art, Hermes (pronounced “hur-meez”) the son of Zeus, god of commerce and travel, as well as being a personal messenger for his father, and finally Hestia (pronounced “hess-tee-yah”) the sister of Zeus and goddess of the home and family

The 19th Century Discovery of Perfect Reverberation

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The discovery and application of perfect reverberation within opera houses, theaters, university concert venues, etc. was devised by Harvard University physicist Wallace Sabine in the 1890’s. By playing the pipe organ and using a stop watch, Sabine took thousands of measurements and discovered the perfect ratio between room volume and sound absorbing materials. A reverb time of 1.9 seconds, an application of the Sabine Equation, allows for perfect reverberation so that speech and music is intelligible to all audience members, no matter their position in the venue which would otherwise be impossible (e.g. cathedral reverberation)

The Origin of Film Scores and the Drama Film Scores Add to Cinema

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In the early days of film, soundtracks were implemented to cover up the noise of the film protector as it played film. As time progressed however, movie scores became more and more crucial to the pacing, tensing, and emotion of films (e.g. 1997’s Titanic with Celine Dion singing The Heart Does Go On). Max Steiner’s score for King Kong in 1933 was a watershed moment for cinema as it introduced orchestral music into film for the first time. King Kong demonstrated for the first time that music could be leveraged to add drama or comedy to a scene

18th Century Crowd Wrangling During Theatrical Shows

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18th century music would often open with a strong fanfare of a few short notes, as there was no electricity during this period and therefore theater show lights could not be dimmed down to signal the beginning of a theatrical show. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart particularly enjoyed using this technique as he felt it was a robust way to open his symphonies. During the 18th century, it was not uncommon for people to chat and drink during a performance, even moving between seats if they saw somebody they knew so that a conversation could be started