I have lost three composers.
The latest edition of the BBC Music Magazine arrived today in its silver plastic bag to ensure that I got my CD safely. I rarely listen to a music centre any more so the disc is whisked off to the computer to be fed into iTunes so that it can be downloaded onto my ipod(s).
It says something for my galloping gadget getting that I have three ipods with a combined capacity of 300GB. There is a very good reason for my having all three machines but it takes more than the description in a blog to convince; you need to be present to be bowled over by my informed enthusiasm in person!
The disc was duly fed into the computer and the BBC being the BBC had already downloaded the track details to the great librarian in hyperspace so all I had to do was click a button and the whole process was automatic.
The only problem came when I tried to find where the music was in my collection. The three composers’ names failed to bring the pieces to the screen. The titles of the pieces all failed too. I then noticed that the relevant information was being sorted on the name of the orchestra and the number of the disc. I could find the individual tracks by typing in their names, but who knows individual names of the tracks of ‘Pohádka’ (?) or even from the rather better known ‘Mother Goose Suite’ or ‘The Love for Three Oranges’? And when I raised one track I couldn’t get the whole album to appear!
I realise that I am not usual in having the whole of my CD collection of over a thousand discs on my ipod. And the way in which the albums are listed follows the learning curve which I went through in getting them on the drive. Some pieces of music are merely listed by track number; others are written (inexplicably) in Chinese; yet others are ascribed to the leading composer on a compilation irrespective of the range of composers found on the disc. Others are so oddly arranged that I sometimes just set the ipod to play ‘tunes’ and am constantly amazed by the eclectic wealth of music that emerges from the ear pieces as pop abruptly changes to plainsong; sonatas to sixties trash; Sibelius segues to the Sex Pistols and Glass stumbles into Greig. Outsiders observing me quietly sitting reading listening to my ipod must assume I am subject to mild fits as I jerk convulsively at some particularly wide jump in musical idiom as one ‘tune’ changes to another.
As far as I can tell the music I have just loaded has gone into that musical limbo which must feature on most ipods which are not loaded with pre packaged electronic pop where the ipod’s inadequate labelling of tracks fails miserably to cope with the multi headings of the classical. To say nothing of the various spellings of Cyrillic names like Tchaikovsky!
I am sure that there are people out there who can text at the speed at which I can type who pity my lack of sophistication in the way that I approach my ipod. Those people who never have to read a handbook no matter how complex the electronic machinery they are called on to work, assume that the machine will do what they want it to as long as they ask in the right way. I, alas, cannot understand the grammar needed to arrange the language which might lead me to a question, let alone browbeat a machine by a multiplicity of key strikes.
But I do still have the disc. And I know that I have an old fashioned machine - like an ordinary computer - that will play it. I will not be defeated by the electronic black hole into which so much computerised information falls and which constitutes the majority of the memory space on most peoples’ computers.
Free the BBC 3!
I’m working on it.
Some of my work was appreciated this morning during the last Spanish lesson of the term. In a (generally) vain effort to get us to talk in Spanish the desks in this conventional class room have been arranged in a ‘U’ format so that we can see each other clearly. As I usually, well, invariably sit at one end of the ‘U’ I am subject to being taken first in any of the innovations of a linguistic nature that the teacher decides to inflict.
Today was the Day of the Welsh Cakes.
We were all supposed to bring in something to eat which was characteristic of the way in which we celebrate Christmas. The Welsh Cakes prompted the teacher to start with me and cross question me (in Spanish) about the way in which we approach the festive time. This turned out to be more of a cross examination and to be far more extended than my vocabulary can stand. When I was asked to describe how to make the Welsh Cakes themselves and having to describe ‘bake stone’ I went, like Pooh Bear, “delicately to pieces!”
I was reminded of Clarrie who during the exchange visit between a German opera company and WNO who when taking a group around the buildings in the open air museum at St Fagans in Cardiff was asked what a circular, open sided, thatched structure was. Clarrie’s German translation was, “This is a circus of the male of the hen.” This was her take on ‘cockpit!’ My attempts to get the message across were certainly on a par with hers!
The important thing however was that the Welsh Cakes were well received.
Other students brought in things which were also almost entirely composed of calories and more calories so that by the end of the lesson we were all suffering from various forms of sugar rush. It was probably just as well that we were not able to drink coffee as well as the double boost would probably have encouraged some of us to start teaching Spanish ourselves!
Luckily our little feat finished before anyone has over stepped the mark of linguistic limitations!
But it’s only a matter of time.
The latest edition of the BBC Music Magazine arrived today in its silver plastic bag to ensure that I got my CD safely. I rarely listen to a music centre any more so the disc is whisked off to the computer to be fed into iTunes so that it can be downloaded onto my ipod(s).
It says something for my galloping gadget getting that I have three ipods with a combined capacity of 300GB. There is a very good reason for my having all three machines but it takes more than the description in a blog to convince; you need to be present to be bowled over by my informed enthusiasm in person!
The disc was duly fed into the computer and the BBC being the BBC had already downloaded the track details to the great librarian in hyperspace so all I had to do was click a button and the whole process was automatic.
The only problem came when I tried to find where the music was in my collection. The three composers’ names failed to bring the pieces to the screen. The titles of the pieces all failed too. I then noticed that the relevant information was being sorted on the name of the orchestra and the number of the disc. I could find the individual tracks by typing in their names, but who knows individual names of the tracks of ‘Pohádka’ (?) or even from the rather better known ‘Mother Goose Suite’ or ‘The Love for Three Oranges’? And when I raised one track I couldn’t get the whole album to appear!
I realise that I am not usual in having the whole of my CD collection of over a thousand discs on my ipod. And the way in which the albums are listed follows the learning curve which I went through in getting them on the drive. Some pieces of music are merely listed by track number; others are written (inexplicably) in Chinese; yet others are ascribed to the leading composer on a compilation irrespective of the range of composers found on the disc. Others are so oddly arranged that I sometimes just set the ipod to play ‘tunes’ and am constantly amazed by the eclectic wealth of music that emerges from the ear pieces as pop abruptly changes to plainsong; sonatas to sixties trash; Sibelius segues to the Sex Pistols and Glass stumbles into Greig. Outsiders observing me quietly sitting reading listening to my ipod must assume I am subject to mild fits as I jerk convulsively at some particularly wide jump in musical idiom as one ‘tune’ changes to another.
As far as I can tell the music I have just loaded has gone into that musical limbo which must feature on most ipods which are not loaded with pre packaged electronic pop where the ipod’s inadequate labelling of tracks fails miserably to cope with the multi headings of the classical. To say nothing of the various spellings of Cyrillic names like Tchaikovsky!
I am sure that there are people out there who can text at the speed at which I can type who pity my lack of sophistication in the way that I approach my ipod. Those people who never have to read a handbook no matter how complex the electronic machinery they are called on to work, assume that the machine will do what they want it to as long as they ask in the right way. I, alas, cannot understand the grammar needed to arrange the language which might lead me to a question, let alone browbeat a machine by a multiplicity of key strikes.
But I do still have the disc. And I know that I have an old fashioned machine - like an ordinary computer - that will play it. I will not be defeated by the electronic black hole into which so much computerised information falls and which constitutes the majority of the memory space on most peoples’ computers.
Free the BBC 3!
I’m working on it.
Some of my work was appreciated this morning during the last Spanish lesson of the term. In a (generally) vain effort to get us to talk in Spanish the desks in this conventional class room have been arranged in a ‘U’ format so that we can see each other clearly. As I usually, well, invariably sit at one end of the ‘U’ I am subject to being taken first in any of the innovations of a linguistic nature that the teacher decides to inflict.
Today was the Day of the Welsh Cakes.
We were all supposed to bring in something to eat which was characteristic of the way in which we celebrate Christmas. The Welsh Cakes prompted the teacher to start with me and cross question me (in Spanish) about the way in which we approach the festive time. This turned out to be more of a cross examination and to be far more extended than my vocabulary can stand. When I was asked to describe how to make the Welsh Cakes themselves and having to describe ‘bake stone’ I went, like Pooh Bear, “delicately to pieces!”
I was reminded of Clarrie who during the exchange visit between a German opera company and WNO who when taking a group around the buildings in the open air museum at St Fagans in Cardiff was asked what a circular, open sided, thatched structure was. Clarrie’s German translation was, “This is a circus of the male of the hen.” This was her take on ‘cockpit!’ My attempts to get the message across were certainly on a par with hers!
The important thing however was that the Welsh Cakes were well received.
Other students brought in things which were also almost entirely composed of calories and more calories so that by the end of the lesson we were all suffering from various forms of sugar rush. It was probably just as well that we were not able to drink coffee as well as the double boost would probably have encouraged some of us to start teaching Spanish ourselves!Luckily our little feat finished before anyone has over stepped the mark of linguistic limitations!
But it’s only a matter of time.
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