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Art About Music: Vincent van Gogh’s “Marguerite Gachet at the piano” (1890, 1928)
“The wall in the background green with orange spots, the carpet red with green spots, the piano dark violet. It’s 1 metre high and 50 wide. It’s a figure I enjoyed painting – but it’s difficult. [Dr. Gachet]’s promised to get her to pose for me another time with a little organ. I’ll do one… Continue reading
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Notes On Analog
From around the 1950s to the 1990s, when most music was recorded either in studios or concert halls, its continuous waves of sound were mostly captured by microphones, sent into a mixing console, and printed onto magnetic tape. While the sources being recorded might be acoustic (e.g. an orchestra) or electronic (e.g. a synthesizer), the… Continue reading
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On Tempo
Tempo—or bpm: beats per minute–is music’s invisible engine. As listeners and makers we focus on the music’s rhythms, and if it has one, its beat. We hear the syncopations and steady-pulse timelines. We hear the time (typically) divided up among low and high pitched instruments like kick drums, snares, and hi hats. And specific rhythms—four-on-the-floor… Continue reading
