XM Radio

From the slightly-off-topic department today: XM Radio really bothers me. I live in Chicago, a fairly large city by most estimations, and technologically progressive one might add. Lately I've been seeing alot of XM radio antennae on most of those overly-large SUV's. So I started doing some thinking while sitting in traffic yesterday (see how bad traffic currently is here) and realized that over the course of a year, you would spend approximately $127 USD a year on the hardware (estimated between $50 USD and $200 USD currently) and subscription rates (approximately $8 USD per month). That cost is assuming the subscription rates stay static and hardware upgrades are required every three years. The wonder of this technology is that it is commercial free. No commercials. Nothing. Thankfully!

Now, does anyone remember how long it was before cable television started having commercials? I figure it was about 10 years before the money-makers realized they could make more money by selling advertising slots. If we figure that to be the case here (and it's a big assumption; no one knows if the XM satellites will even be in orbit in 10 years!) it comes down to approximately $1280 USD being spent per subscriber in a ten year period for commercial-free radio.

Now, compare this to buying a computer for $600 USD ("dude, you're getting a Dell!"), buying an Apple iPod for $200 USD, and paying $0.99 USD per downloaded song. That allows you to download more than 444 songs that you will own (i.e. you can put them on CD, keep them for as long as the CD lasts, etc). Maybe that's better for some folks.

Of course it doesn't mean that you can just go and find anything already offered by Apple, there may be songs that you don't end up finding. But then again, how many songs that you're hearing on XM radio are actually what you want to hear? I'm curious -- so if anyone has comments, please post them. And by the way I have a conspiracy-theory that XM radio is backed by groups such as the RIAA to limit the rights of artists and listeners to obtain good music, free. But that's for another topic...

Tone and Concerto for Pizzicato Piano

I have added some recordings of a couple performances last winter. Listen to Tone for solo vibraphone (performed by Yours Truly) by Ja Young Choi. Then check out Tan Dun's Concerto for Pizzicato Piano and Ten Instruments. Lisa Kaplan of Eighth Blackbird offered an excellent interpretation with members of the University of Chicago New Music Ensemble. I was lucky enough to be the percussionist in this performance. The Tan Dun is one of the more interesting new music pieces I've done to date, and it really required a good effort on the part of the ensemble and soloist to effectively perform.

We're Not Just Musicians

I stumbled across an interesting description of percussion instruments made available from NPR. It's pretty decent for a quick overview as to some basic instruments and I feel it's very correct in stating that percussionists must understand choreographing movements in addition to just playing music.

Pelléas et Mélisande

As a favor, I agreed to do the Fauré and Sibelius Pelléas et Mélisande (opus 80 and opus 46, respectively). It's interesting to see the difference and similiarities of these works. I'm not sure having both pieces on one concert is an effective programming (just because the names are the same doesn't mean the listener will enjoy it!), but I do enjoy both pieces. The story of Pelléas et Mélisande is here.

A funny thing: I learned a while back that some of the older timpanists (Fred Hinger or Cloyd Duff, I can't remember which) would initial the back of their parts. This allowed them to see when they performed the piece in the past. I started doing this trick a while back and didn't think much of it, but when coming to the Sibelius timpani part, my initials and date were on it from 02/1998! It's been a long six years.

What's a zischen?

The word zischen, for purposes of this percussion related website, is taken from Antonín Dvořák's Symphony #9 in e minor, also know as "From the New World". In the final movement of this masterpiece, Dvořák calls for a pair of cymbals to be gently scraped together; in fact, this is the only note that the percussionist plays in this movement.

I started looking around for a translation of the word zischen, or a German to English translation, and came across this link which translates zischen to hiss, fizz, fizzling, sibilance or sizzle. Not quite what I had intended to find, but interesting. Since I have the Internet here at my fingertips, I kept searching and came across this cymbal glossary (copy) published by the Sabian cymbal company. It defines zischen for the percussionist as...

zischen: To create a "zing" sound, scrape the inside of one cymbal with the edge of another.

This is definitely more appropriate in regards to executing the technique desired by composers. Thank you, Sabian, for clarifying that for the Internet as a whole.

Another interesting cymbal technique (since we're on the subject of interesting cymbal techniques) is the frottée, used by Hungarian composer Béla Bartók in several of his works including his Dance Suite and Concerto for Orchestra. A frottée involves two cymbals, much like the zischen; only they are rubbed together to produce a metal-on-metal effect. It's tough to do this and not achieve an air pocket (which eventually leads to the cymbals sticking together), but is fun to do after the fact! The cymbal player needs to be more of an artist at times to achieve these effects without distracting the audience from the overall sound and expression of the entire ensemble. The next time you see someone playing cymbals, be sure to observe them and the techniques they use!

Pesky Left Hand and 5/8" Mallets

My left hand has been strange the past few months. When playing timpani, I've noticed the mallet slipping further and further into my palm away from the fulcrum (I play a ``mostly french'' grip). Normally during rhythmic passages this doesn't bother me but during slow, pianissimo rolls, I've noticed it causes me to not roll smoothly. So my goal is to work on this during rehearsals and stay aware of where the mallet is in relation to fulcrum. Hopefully I can report back something positive about the effort in the near future!

Secondly; we're doing Dvořák #7 at the University of Chicago Symphony Orchestra for an upcoming concert. I use timpani mallets from Carlisle Percussion. I have a variety of pairs, and the oft-used medium ``general'' type of mallets, I have with both 1/2" and 5/8" handles (the 5/8" handles are actually hollow). This evening I realized that I've finally grown accustomed to 5/8" handles and appreciate the increased heaviness they bring. It took about a year of using them regularly to get used to the weight and thickness of the mallet shafts, but they feel good now!

The Anvils of Das Rheingold

Recently I had the opportunity to play Richard Wagner'sDas Rheingold. Das Rheingoldis intended to be a prologue to Wagner's epic Der Ring des Nibelungen, also known as the the "Ring" cycle. Most listeners, and percussionists, find the Descent into Nibelheim before Scene III of this opera to be very unique in it's instrumentation. Wagner calls for a total of eighteen (yes, 18!) tuned anvils to be played simultaneously by various members of the orchestra. This is a representation of the mining of gold in Alberich's dark cavernous domain, forging the Ring. Read more about the Ring Cycle -- it's a very interesting story. Our concert arrangement reduced the number of anvils down to a mere three. To make this come across well in concert, we used four brake drums (as I managed to drop out the timpani low-F roll early and join in to add volume during the crescendo). Another local percussionist, Tina Laughlin-Keitel, brought a pair of railroad spikes to use as beaters on her brake drum. I must say that this idea is superior to plastic mallets which easily will break (yes, even Malletech mallets!). Also, the top-heavy weight of the railroad spike works well for metal-on-metal playing. I'm now looking for my own pair of railroad spikes for future use for playing loud, abrasive metalophones.

My one bit of advice to anyone playing this is to use ear plugs! You may not think the volume will sustain long enough to cause any problems, but often concert performances are much louder than rehearsals due to the excitement, and I had quite a ring in my ears for numerous days after the performance. You can hear a sample of the anvils performed by the University of Chicago Symphony Orchestra (1.2MB download).