Week #9 - Who needs a boob tube, you got Youtube!

Hello world!

As my loyal readers have realized and known for awhile. I have a Youtube account where I post videos of myself and friends, normally doing some pretty stupid and offensive stuff. Its the performance artist in me to display my "creative" side.

In all honesty, Youtube has helped me greatly as an artist. It has stemmed me to look into learning more about amateur film making. Also it has helped me as a musician. I find clips of trumpet players performing and compare techniqes because not can I just hear them but I can see what they're doing too. Suggesting this tule to anyone that comes in a library looking for video footage of anything can normally find it on youtube. For instance:



This Video is the composer Igor Stravinski conducting the Finale from his Firebird Ballet. This is extremely helpful considering I have an audition this coming week and what do I have to play? The trumpet part from the Finale from the Firebird Suite. This video is very interesting, as most interpretations of this piece (brace yourself for some music geekdom) do not have the brass so staccato in the fast part in 7/4. The composer, who also has total control of the orchestra in this case asks for it to be that way. In the notation of the section, it doesn't specify to play the notes short either. This gives me a major heads up going into an audition, as this performance clears up any vagueness in the interpretation of the piece.

I will wrap up my youtube section of this entry with a video of me playing trumpet on my Senior Recital from April of 2003. I am performing a piece titled "Kryl" by the contemporary composer Robert Erickson. It was inspired by a famous cornetist by the same name, Kryl. The piece is considered one of the most difficult 20th century pieces due to the wide use of extended techniques such as falsetto singing, screaming, and removing pipes from the trumpet. Enjoy!



Now for some talk on podcasts. I like them a lot, mainly because I use them to listen to my favorite radio show that come son 1am-5am here called Coast to Coast AM (http://www.coasttocoastam.com/). It is hosted by George Noory. After 105.7 decided not to be a talk station anymore, Baltimore lost its affiliate for this amazing show. I had no choice but to listen via podcast from WDEL, Wilmington Delaware's AM talk station. I could then listen to it anytime I wanted, not at 1am! Though I am a night owl and prefer to listen to this show from bed due to the amazing positive energy this show contains leads to a sounder sleep. This show is amazing, by the way. It covers topics from UFO's to paranormal activity, current events, and even celebrity initerviews. The show always keeps a positive attitude and approach. During 9/11 and the recent bridge collapse, they allowed relatives and friends of possible victims to call in and plead for their loved ones to contact them. It was touching. Anyways, this podcasting technology allowed me to listen to my favorite radio program until the show got a new affiliate on WCBM AM680. Thats right, I'm 27 and listen to AM radio, deal with it.

This audiobook thing is pretty cool. I have a few friends who use OverDrive, and openly discuss it with me. It is a great asset from their reviews. I'm sure it can help those who can't get into the library. I haven't had time to try it myself, my schedule doesn't supply much time to listen to something that long. I do have an iPod now that I could use for it. Maybe I will look into it. I plan to keep this blog going once I finish this program for the kick of it. I enjoy having someplace to write.

I must say I enjoyed doing this program and assisting my coworkers with this program as well. I did learn some fun things and I think this program will assist me in my future with BCPL. I did have a few issues though. It got a bit tedious by the end registering for all these accounts for things. I fear spam. I have worked hard to keep my staff e-mail account spam free for 3 years and running. This program for the complete noob is quite comprehensive and hopefully did its job in helping our staff get caught up with the ever changing scene of Internet media. The world has changed. When I'm bored at home, instead of putting a dvd on, I go on to youtube and type in a name and follow it from there for a few hours. I haven't read an actual newspaper in years, but I always check news pages like fark.com and digg.com. I go straight to the National Hurricane Center's webpage (http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/) to read the forecasts for tropical storms and such (I'm a closet amateur meteorologist, I wanted to major in it but I couldn't handle the physics, that stupid musician adage of I can only count to 4 is painfully true). The Internet is an amazing tool (duh) but for it to be useful, you need to know where to look, and this program is a great start.

Sincerely and with much peace and meditations to you,
Rich Sigwald, Catonville