hello world

So diverging from my usual topics, I just had to bring this up. Guess where I'm writing this post from? My Blackberry, while I'm sitting in the Kaplan testing centre in Leicester Square. This could open so many opportunities- on the go blogging, telling the world what you think as soon as the thoughgts pop into your head. (Sorry for the spelling errors, this really is quite a small keyboard).

I mean, Twitter and Facebook is a form of micro-blogging, but accessing Blosser from my phone is actually blogging...it's kind of cool.

First EVER audio recording

Back in March 2008, a clip of a woman supposedly singing the classic "Au Clair de la Lune," recorded in 1860 by the French inventor Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville on his "phonautograph" machine, which looks like this:

"When I first heard the recording as you hear it ... it was magical, so ethereal," audio historian David Giovannoni, who found the recording, told AP. [photo and quote from here]

It was previously thought that the oldest recording in history was of Thomas Edison singing a children's song, from 17 years later in 1877.

This is incredible!! Can you imagine, finding a 150 year-old, previously-unheard clip? I didn't think they had the technology so far back...to put it in perspective, that's BEFORE the Civil War.

You can listen to this amazing, tiny slice of audio history, with commentary from the head scientist afterward, at the BBC site here (let it play a bit...you might not hear anything at first, but then let it load and go back to the start in order to hear it)

Caught in a Bad Romance

OK, so I've gotten on Julia Nunes' case for being awful, so for the case of being fair to all YouTube stars, this is AMAZING.

It's Lucas Silveira of the Cliks' version of Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance," and wow. This is what I'm talking about!!!

I wish I had this when I was in 3rd grade...

This is really cool. It's a PDF/PowerPoint presentation on this inner-city school in New York City, around Central Park, that has been using state-of-the-art music technology in their classes, with help from a pretty darn passionate teacher, Ms. Karen Garrett.

The basic premise, at least at this school, is that a select number of third-graders (around 50-100 each year) get to go into the lab for an hour a week, and just use the whole array of keyboards, computers, and internet services at their own speeds. They learn how to use the keyboard and read, write, compose, print, and publish music using a computer...something that is simply amazing, something that I thought only well-to-do schools like mine would be able to afford and provide for.

Supplementary to that, Garrett has created an online website at Music Technology where she and her associates put up links to help other music/tech teachers with their classes. There are a whole array of music lessons, quizzes, and how-tos, and for her hard work she was voted TI:ME teacher of the year.

This is amazing. I love music, and I really do think there is a strong, positive correlation between music use by kids and their quality of life. Music makes me happy - there is scientific proof that there is a connection between our emotions and the music we're listening to...just read this. By bringing music into the classroom, you're really bringing happiness to the kids, and that's something really wonderful. The fact that they're using technology to push it to that next level is even better.

There's a place for us....

I know, I know, tech blog and all that, but I'm on such an X-Factor kick right now! I sang this song for the musical two years ago, so I know how much determination and vocal stamina it takes to sing this, and Stacey just blows it out of the water. Wowza. Wait until the end, it's perfection.