tip

.
Compose your LJ entries in a text editor, then paste, because if you hit the right two keys together, your browser will take you somewhere else, and all the stuff you just wrote won't be there any more. It won't be anywhere. You'll save valuable minutes re-writing all your posts, not to mention the jail time you'll get if you end up on the roof with a powerful rifle again.
.

bach to the future

.
Something prompted me to look at IMSLP.org again for piano transcriptions of Bach. I've been a fan of the 2nd trio sonata since I first heard Biggs play it on the pedal harpsichord, and my attempts to play the third movement from the organ score I have never have paid off. Somehow, this time, they actually had something for me!

August Stradal is mostly known for one piece, a piano version of Bach's organ version of a Vivaldi concerto. I was glad to see that he also turned his attention to this, and I eagerly downloaded the PDF, pausing only twelve hours because the file wouldn't download at first. Uh oh. It looks like the copy scanned from must have been so yellowed as to have been nearly brown — and after scanning, the brown parts became a thick halftone; darkest at the edges, but present in every part of the score. Challenge.

I put the first page of the movement into Photoshop, erased the outside edges completely, tried lightening to see if it would make the dots go away, tried filtering for noise. Nothing would do but 'the hard way.' I set to work; there were nine pages. I loaded comb-punched paper in the printer and started printing pages as I went along.

After two pages, the printer, which started complaining about toner after about a week, refused to print any more. I took the cartridge out, shook it and replaced it, and was rewarded by having it pretend it was about to print for a minute or two. Then I went online and found a place where someone told how to disable the "quit printing when cartridge is half empty" feature. As usual, each new page took longer than the one before as I forgot my intention of cleaning lightly and not trying to get every single jot. I finished around 10:30 last night and put the pages into my 'works in progress' book and played through it one time. Needs practice, of course, but it was promising.

I had also put the last page of the file into Photoshop, but didn't need to touch it. It was the back cover of the original sheet music, and it had a list of other Stradal productions. Two were original pieces, and the rest were transcriptions. Among these, I found Bach's fifth Brandenburg concerto. This prompted me to look again at IMSLP to see if that was there as well. It wasn't, but there was a two-hands version by somebody else, which turns out to be a fresh, clean typeset. It's also 27 pages long, so I'm leaving it for later.

Anyway, what a haul! Two of my long-time requests, filled the same day. Truly, it is an age of marvels.
.

get patriotic!

.
Let's all get in the mood for a patriotic USA holiday! Come on, readers in many lands! It'll be fun, I promise!

Horowitz plays his stunning transcription of Sousa's "The Stars and Stripes Forever." Dad saw him play this on stage and says he never heard anybody get that much volume out of a piano. Just when you thought he couldn't play louder, he did. In the 'live' version, which is for some reason heard more than the studio version, the recording equipment can't get it all, and it distorts. This video shows the music as well, which only makes it more impressive how he puts a singing voice (or two) into the middle of all the ornamentation, including his octave-skipping trills. This may be my all-time favorite piano transcription.

Years ago, I saw Chet Atkins on "Soundstage," and he introduced this piece by mentioning that there was this 17-year-old kid in Louisiana who just worshipped him. He played all of Chet's records, and played along with them until he could match every note. "Nobody told him that I multi-tracked those things in the studio," Chet said. Then he played Van Duser's guitar solo version of "Stars and Stripes Forever" (here played by Mr. Van Duser) almost to the end before jokily terminating the performance (which is also on YouTube, of course).

[edited to add: Vess L. Ossman's banjo band version of "Stars and Stripes Forever" (mp3 — sorry, on listening again I see that the file has been filtered since I got my own copy, and the formerly scratchy but listenable track is now overshadowed by mp3 artifacts, and you can barely even tell that you're hearing banjo music)]

More patriotism from Albert Brooks! "Rewriting the National Anthem"
("Nobody sings it on the way to work any more…")

AND "A Phone Call to Americans" (with Harry Shearer)
("We play the Star Spangled Banner at ball games, but still, one team always loses!!")

<i>unrelated and possibly unpatriotic — Here's the bit Albert did the first time he was on Ed Sullivan, as the last ventriloquist act you'll ever need to see, "Dave and Danny"
("Well, why don't ya have a cigarette? That always calms ya down!")</i>

Posted earlier in slightly different form at "Making Light." Edited because all my HTML was showing, duh.
.