robertDouglass's blog

Bach's Goldberg Variations, complete with score

robertDouglass — Sun, 25 May 2014 16:08:26 +0000

Here is a YouTube playlist with the entire recording of Bach's Goldberg Variations, performed by Kimiko Ishizaka, with the musical score, following along note-by-note. I made these videos by recording the video from MuseScore's Open Goldberg Variations iPad app, and then replacing the audio with the CD quality recording from the Open Goldberg Variations CD. Enjoy.

Tags:

Music

I want to show you a photograph

robertDouglass — Tue, 22 Apr 2014 23:50:36 +0000

"I want to show you a photograph."

She got her glasses, sat down next to me.

"This is what great photography looks like."

"Why?" she asked, after a pause.

"Well, look at it. The lonliness. The disconnection. The only connection between them is the unbearable weight they're carrying inside of them."

A longer pause. I continue: "In a moment they'll have disappeared, slipped out of view, into the mist, never to be seen again. This photo, where you see so little, says so much."

"I just can't do that," she said, "seeing such a big story. I see Gorbachev, Carry Grant, and Sherlock Holmes. That's all!"

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"Three Men" - by Steve Shapiro

YouTube Data API v3 : How to get $DEVELOPER_KEY

robertDouglass — Wed, 25 Dec 2013 22:43:13 +0000

In the PHP example code for Google's YouTube Data API v3 there is a variable that calls for a developer key. Without this key the example code won't work, but getting that key is not obvious due to recent changes in the cloud console interface. Here's how you get it.

First, the name of the key that you're looking for isn't "developer key" anymore, it's an "API key" for "Public Access". This is opposed to the OAuth credentials. If you want to do something that requires authenticated access, you'll need the OAuth credentials. For searching and listing videos, you don't.

In the Google cloud console, to to APIs & auth > Credentials. In the "Public API Access" section, click "CREATE NEW KEY". This is what it should look like:

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_crop","fid":"226","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","id":"media_crop_8028238657861","media_crop_h":"0","media_crop_image_style":"600-wide","media_crop_instance":"91","media_crop_rotate":"0","media_crop_scale_h":"0","media_crop_scale_w":"0","media_crop_w":"0","media_crop_x":"0","media_crop_y":"0","typeof":"foaf:Image"}}]]

For the "Edit allowed IPs", I used Google to find my public IP address since I'm developing locally and get a new IP from my ISP. When I deploy this onto the web I'll have to update the allowed IPs.

Kimiko Ishizaka plays Bach at the Manifold Recording Studio

robertDouglass — Thu, 28 Nov 2013 13:17:44 +0000

1. 0:28 Prelude in C-Major BWV 846
2. 2:47 Fugue in C-Major BWV 846
3. 4:38 Prelude in C-Minor BWV 847
4. 6:30 Fugue in C-Minor BWV 847
5. 8:24 Prelude in C#-Major BWV 848
6. 9:37 Fugue in C#-Major BWV 848
7. 12:06 Prelude in C#-Minor BWV 849
8. 15:04 Fugue in C#-Minor BWV 849
9. 17:42 Prelude in D-Major BWV 850
10. 19:16 Fugue in D-Major BWV 850
11. 20:59 Prelude in D-Minor BWV 851
12. 22:34 Fugue in D-Minor BWV 851
13. 24:40 Prelude in Eb-Major BWV 852
14. 28:00 Fugue in Eb-Major BWV 852
15. 29:48 Prelude in Eb-Minor BWV 853
16. 33:47 Fugue in D#-Minor BWV 853
17. 37:33 Prelude in E-Major BWV 854
18. 39:04 Fugue in E-Major BWV 854
19. 40:23 Prelude in E-Minor BWV 855
20. 42:29 Fugue in E-Minor BWV 855
21. 44:02 Prelude in F-Major BWV 856
22. 45:04 Fugue in F-Major BWV 856
23. 46:28 Prelude in F-Minor BWV 857
24. 49:20 Fugue in F-Minor BWV 857
Encore:
26. 54:34 Fugue in F#-Major BWV 858

UPDATE: The new Well-Tempered Clavier website is online, and in March 2015, that is where you will find Kimiko's recording of the entire Book One, made in the Teldex Studio, Berlin.

Tags:

Kimiko Ishizaka

Music

J.S. Bach

Your turn: help blind musicians have music to read

robertDouglass — Wed, 09 Oct 2013 11:34:26 +0000

Did you know that blind musicians are just as capable as sighted musicians? Of course you did! Stevie Wonder and Ray Charles made sure of that. But they didn't have to read music to achieve their success. Blind musians who need to read notes, to play Bach, Beethoven, or Mozart, need scores in braille format. Guess what? These scores don't exist in adequate numbers. Blind musicians give up on their ambitions to study, not because they can't play, but because the world hasn't provided them the scores they need to read. I consider this an outrage and a tragedy, and I propose we fix it.

We can fix it by developing a technical solution that translates digital scores in standard formats into braille. Then blind musicans can read the music on devices that display braille. It's not science fiction, as you can see in the video with Eunah Choi, a blind teacher from Korea who made me aware of this problem. But nothing is going to happen without some financial resource, which is why I want you, right now, to go and support our Kickstarter campaign by ordering a CD of the Well-Tempered Clavier, or a copy of the original artwork that we're commissioning (which will also be embossed in braille), or by dedicating one of Bach's glorious Preludes or Fugues to someone you love.

That's right, I'm leaning on you to take action. In order to achieve great things, like enabling blind people to read music, you need your friends to jump in and help. Do that now, please!

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Tags:

Music

My contribution to the DrupalCon opening session

robertDouglass — Sun, 29 Sep 2013 13:48:49 +0000

I wasn't in Prague on the first day of DrupalCon, but that didn't stop me from contributing to the opening session. Here is the "song" that I "sang", with all of the lyrics. Enjoy!

My contribution to the DrupalCon, Prague, opening session.

I am the very mo-del of a Dru-pa-list de-vel-o-per

I’ve pu-blished code, and had some beers with every core con-tri-butor

I know the seven function stack, I’ve got it in my memory

From al-tered forms to en-ti-ties, oh these are el-e-mentary!

I’m very well a-cquain-ted too, with da-ta-base ab-strac-ter-y

and all the boot strap sta-ges through, of that I have a mas-te-ry

Debug-ging is my mi-ddle name and o-o-p my favorite game

An object can in-stan-ti-ate from this here sta-tic fac-tor y !

For clear-ing cache I’ve got a trick, a

py-thon script that's really slick it

it-er-ates on foreign keys,

and JOINS them using P-H-P

While laun-ching sites I say out loud

Your code de-serves to see the cloud

Where sca-ling is co-mmod-i-ty

and ba-ckups come for al-most free

If selling's what you want to do

I have the best most modern clue

you kick-start sales and save time too

when co-mmerce is your sho-pping tool

And now you are at Dru-pal-Con

where code sprints form a ma-ra-thon

and A-cqui-a and Lull-a-bot and Co-mmerce Guys and Wun-der-kraut

Are won-de-ring day in and out

what Dru-pal 8 is all about

Are won-de-ring day in and out

what Dru-pal 8 is all about

and A-cqui-a and Lull-a-bot and Co-mmerce Guys and Wun-der-kraut

Are wondering day in and out

what Dru-pal 8 is all about

A web site needs some mo-du-als to get you lots of vi-si-tors

a task that Drush makes tri-vi-al but make sure you have sem-a-phores

And theming is a sim-ple task with C-S-S and Ja-va-script

but Eaton says you should not use the en-ti-ty con-stru-ction kit

Now if you want some firm advice you need not ask me even twice

I’ll offer it at half the price because I see you’re rather nice

A warning stems from ancient lore

That junior devs should not ignore

The wrath of Dries and much much more

befalls thee should you hack on core

I am the very mo-del of a Dru-pa-list de-vel-o-per

I’ve pu-blished code, and had some beers with every core con-tri-butor

I know the seven function stack, I’ve got it in my memory

From al-tered forms to en-ti-ties, oh these are el-e-mentary!

Tags:

Drupal Planet

Open Source Music - Video from the DrupalCon Session

robertDouglass — Sat, 28 Sep 2013 20:14:59 +0000

The "Bach to the Future" session at DrupalCon Prague was fun, and a success, I think. Together with my wife, pianist Kimiko Ishizaka, I presented the concept of open source music, showed how Drupal is enabling the MuseScore project to thrive and treat musical scores as semantic content, and gave a demonstration showing the cool things you can do with digital scores and live performances. Kimiko Ishizaka played a selection of pieces from the Well-Tempered Clavier on the venue's Steinway grand piano, and it was a lovely way to start the final day of DrupalCon.

Here's the video of the entire session, as well as a link to the related project - The Open Well-Tempered Clavier - which is our latest contribution to open source music. Enjoy!

Tags:

Drupal Planet

Music

The Open Well-Tempered Clavier: Bach for everybody

robertDouglass — Sat, 21 Sep 2013 20:55:44 +0000

I have come to love the music of J.S. Bach more than I thought would ever be possible. Every day when I listen to music, whether on iTunes, Spotify, or drawing from my CD collection, I am saddened that the one recording that I most desperately want to hear is not available to me. That's because it doesn't exist yet. The recording I so yearn for is Kimiko Ishizaka's recording of the Well-Tempered Clavier. She has found a level of profound beauty in these 48 pieces that is breathtaking. I can hardly wait for the world to hear it. Please support us in making that a reality by backing our Kickstarter project. Thank you!

Tags:

Music

New DVD Trailer: The Fractal Zone

robertDouglass — Fri, 16 Aug 2013 22:30:28 +0000

Landscape Windscreen has released a second trailer for the "Project Goldberg: A Fractal Journey" DVD. There's still time to back the project on Kickstarter and order your DVD or HD download of the video. Enjoy!

Tags:

Music

Kickstarter

Last weekend I took Kimiko Ishizaka to the greatest geek event I've ever been to

robertDouglass — Sat, 10 Aug 2013 20:29:21 +0000

Observe. Hack. Make. That was the name of the event that drew over 3,000 people to a pasture in northern Holland last week. Every attendee is considered a volunteer, and the atmosphere of cooperation and collaboration is palpable and refreshing. So was the utter concern with the state of privacy, freedom of speech, human rights, and the future of the internet. The conference started off with an address - delivered remotely - by Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, and it just got better after that. Here's a selection of some of my favorite titles. I wish I could have attended them all:

Lockpicking, a primer
Introducing Biohacking
How To Build A Trading Robot With Open Source Tools
How to legalize drugs using only 13 years and 10 million US$
Molecular cooking
3D printing and Metal Casting
Drupal Commerce and the Bachkoor Holland
Finance and The Future Beyond Bitcoin
Reports from the Frontlines: The Digital War on Civil Society
Tempo/Rhythm Detection and Musical Nearest Neighbors
9 Billion People: an engineering consideration of climate, poverty and justice
Open Source Food
Modeling and Control of Rotary Winged Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
New Human Interfaces for Music
Decoding memory dumps of mobile phones and navigation systems (workshop)

After four full days of such programming, the attendees were ready for some pure geek entertainment, and that's where Kimiko Ishizaka, the Open Goldberg Pianist, came in. The organizers had carefully planned the final concert in the main tent, including having a forklift ready to haul a concert grand piano from the nearest road to the main tent in tent in the middle of the field (imagine a space the size of a small city filled with tents - big ones for the events and individual tents for the people who camped out for four days to attend). With a full crew of volunteer camera, light, and audio technicians on hand, Kimiko played over an hour of Bach and Chopin for nearly 2,000 very enthusiastic hackers. The mood in the tent was electric, with everyone paying rapt attention to the performance, and encouraging Kimiko with multiple standing ovations and hearty cheering. In the video of the performance you can start to hear the shapes and lines of Kimiko's Well-Tempered Clavier, and sense what a fantastic recording of the piece she's going make in 2014. You also get to hear her first ever performance of all 12 Chopin Études op. 10. One particularly magical moment happened when Kimiko finishes the last Bach piece, the Fugue in Eb Minor, and goes straight into a Chopin Prelude, also in Eb Minor. She planned this transition, purposely grouping them together, and the effect is striking.

OHM2013 also coincided with the announcement of Kimiko's "Twelve Tones of Bach" tour, and her ongoing Kickstarter campaign to support the tour. The recording was done under a Creative Commons license in the spirit of Open Source Bach. Many many thanks to Hans de Raad, Paul Krischer, Walter van Holst, Nancy Beers, Etienne Heemskerk, and the many others who made this event possible.

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2,000 people @ohm2013 totally silenced by Kimiko Ishizaka playing Bach and Chopin. Beautiful festival, great people. pic.twitter.com/Pfxij6r2Wy

— Silkie Carlo (@silkiecarlo) August 3, 2013

#ohm2013 closing ceremony: 1536 geeks, Kimiko Ishizaka and her grand piano pic.twitter.com/vPU6SqRRQY

— Joakim Lundborg (@joakimlundborg) August 3, 2013

Kimiko Ishizaka's live concert at #OHM2013, excellent performance, standing ovation. Bach & Chopin. @KimikoIshizaka pic.twitter.com/liKUXibzA0

— Aschwin Marsman (@aschwinmarsman) August 3, 2013

Tags:

OHM2013

Kimiko Ishizaka

Music