Violin-Playing Robot

Okay, dammit. It's not just the banjo players that will be losing gigs. Looks like fiddlers had also better keep an eye on their rear-view mirrors.

I'm almost afraid to look at YouTube these days, lest I see an X-ray-reading robot looking back at me...

The Power of the Pentatonic Scale

An old friend (and discerning reader of this blog) pointed me to the following video, wherein Bobby McFerrin demonstrates the power of the pentatonic scale at the World Science Festival 2009.

As Mr. McFerrin shows, the pentatonic scale is a great scale for improvisation -- it's hard to sing a wrong note. On a guitar, just noodling around on the simple 1-4, 1-3, 1-3, 1-3, 1-4, 1-4 pentatonic pattern is a fine way to spend a happy hour or two. It's impressive how many classic rock and blues licks fall out of this simple scale.

Pentatonicity is also the basis for a number of great old-time fiddle tunes, of which Billy in the Low Ground is an examplar. This version of BITLG shows the Blue Ridge Mountain Boys flinging a tasty torrent of notes about a pentatonic C scale.

I'll have to ask our physicists to program a pentatonic pulse sequence for me to use on our MRI machine. Seems like that ought to be handy for imaging the elusive banjo center of the brain.

(Hat tip to Anita Anderson)

The Future of Folk Music is in Great Hands

My day job is teaching radiology to residents and fellows. This educational model of young whippersnappers learning from the geezers is also pretty common in the world of fiddle music.

It's a huge pleasure to see young radiologists and young musicians coming into their powers, especially when one sees them making diagnoses or playing tunes that even the geezers find challenging.

This was definitely true last week at the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes. It was hard to hear some of the young musicians play without feeling like a giant truck was coming up fast in my rearview mirror. Here are two examples of the many talented teens at Fiddle Tunes:

First, listen to Emma Beaton (cello) and Tatiana Hargreaves (fiddle) play the living heck out of this old fiddle tune...



Finally, watch the 204 Trio, with Lea Kirstein (cello), Scott Leach (fiddle), and Ethan Jodziewicz (bass) play their arrangement of Liz Carroll's tune: "Lost in the Loop".



I'd say that the future of folk music is in great hands...

Capo -- Cool Tool for Musicians or Radiology Residents

If you are a musician, the word "capo" brings to mind the device that we guitar and banjo players clamp on the necks of our instruments to change key.

However, Capo also refers to a new and rather swell Mac program for learning tunes from recordings. Capo does this by playing a torrent of music at a speed slow enough for one to comprehend. Here's the really cool thing: it does this without changing the pitch of the music!

The following screenshot shows Capo playing "Heather Bonne", a swell tune I snagged last week at a jam session at the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes.


As a fiddle player, I learn a lot of tunes from field recordings made at festivals, jam sessions and concerts. Although I'm a quick study, some intricate or especially twisty tunes are a lot easier to learn when slowed down in this way. Then, once I've worked out the notes, I can play along with the original at a slower speed until I've learned it well enough to play it at full speed.

Capo is not the first Mac program to do this job. I've used The Amazing Slow Downer and Transcribe for years. These fine programs work quite well, but their interface clearly shows their original Windows roots. Capo, on the other hand, was born on the Mac, and is simply gorgeous. It also ably meets the classic Mac software test: "Can I use this without reading the instructions?"

How is this relevant to radiology? The fiddler in me would answer, "Bite me -- who cares!" However, the radiology geek in me would point out that music isn't the only thing you can slow down with this application. If I were the sort of person who transcribed lecture notes or speeches, Capo would be a huge help.

I could also imagine using this app for learning other languages. I suspect that Capo would work pretty well in slowing down foreign language broadcasts to a more understandable pace. It may also be useful among native English speakers separated by their common language. As a long-displaced Southerner, I have gotten pretty good at decoding the Uzi-paced speech patterns of Yankees. However, newly displaced immigrants from below the Muffin-Biscuit Line may find Capo handy for this now and then.

But wait, there's more: Capo is currently on sale at half-price. I paid full price when I bought it a while back, but am now considering grabbing a few extra licenses as gifts for deserving pals.

The only thing that would make Capo even better would be to release an iPhone version. I've suggested this to Capo's developer, so don't touch that dial...

Back in the Saddle Again...

I spent much of April through June preparing for many talks at many meetings, which involved 3 trips to the East Coast in one month. Great fun, but a bit draining.

To recharge, I just spent all of last week with my son at the wonderful Festival of American Fiddle Tunes in Port Townsend, WA.

I first went to Fiddle Tunes back in 1985, and have been back many times since. This year I spent my mornings in a truly excellent swing fiddle workshop by Kevin Wimmer, afternoons in an exhilirating bandlab led by the Red Stick Ramblers, and evenings until real-late-thirty jamming with pals. After a week of this much fun, going back to work was actually kind of restful.

Besides spending many hours pushing an analog stick back and forth over an analog sound box, I spent a few hours recording some highlights with my new iPhone 3GS and my Flip Mino HD recorder. In past years, I've taken several bags of technology along with me to this festival. This year, it was mostly a bag of chargers for the items above, and a laptop to dump files to every night.

The 3GS came pretty darned close to being the One True Device last week. Besides tuning my fiddle, its built-in video recorder grabbed a lot of fine musical homework for me for the rest of the year. In previous festivals, I've recorded tons of audio. However, video is light-years better -- the 3GS let me record not only the music, but also the bow strokes, fiddle finger positions, guitar and banjo chords, body language, and smiles of the musicians. It would be pretty hard to go back to mere audio files alone after this.

It's also very nice to have the time and energy to blog again.

Ahhhhh........

Happy New Year!

I'm going to spend the next few days being as non-radiological as possible.

My family and I will be spending this time at a wild rumpus of folk music and dancing with 120 other pals.  We'll ring in the new year with singing, dancing and a ton of fiddle music, while someone else cooks and washes the dishes.  

Best wishes for a great new year to all.

RSNA Survival Kit No. 3

Another tactic for surviving the RSNA meeting: getting some exercise.

One of my favorite ways of exercising in Chicago is to visit the Chicago Barn Dance Company's great Monday night contra and square dance.

After a long sedentary day at the meeting, a group of us are planning to go and shake the McCormick Place dust off our feet by dancing to hot, live, old-time fiddle music at the Bethany Church hall. As the Barn Dance site suggests:

Start the month off right by dancing to the fine old-time fiddling of Aubrey Swift, leading Grand Ol' Aubrey. Jo Mortland presents a mix of squares and contras guaranteed to lower your brain age by years.

Newcomers session is at 7:30 pm. Hope to see you there.

Hoedown Throwdown

This short video was posted to YouTube about 10 days ago by mikehoye, who says:

I got off the subway at Bloor and Yonge last night, and this is what I saw; some buskers with a fiddle and a banjo were playing, and these four other guys just started to pop it and lock it, apparently just for the hell of it. It cheered me right up.

Cheered me up too.

The Banjo Center of the Brain

I've used my banjo in a number of venues, but I've never brought it in to work. Looks like some Nashville neurosurgeons have beat me to it.

Bluegrass legend Eddie Adcock recently underwent brain surgery to treat a hand tremor. During this procedure, his surgeons placed electrodes deep into his brain to stimulate the thalamus at just the right spot to inhibit his tremor.

Alas, the banjo center of the brain is not an area well-known to neuroanatomists. To pick the optimal location for the electrodes, the surgery was performed under local anesthesia while Eddie played his banjo. He was thus able to update the surgeons in real-time as to whether the tremor was better or worse, letting them get the lead placement just right.


The BBC has posted some remarkable video and audio clips recorded during this surgery. The audio beginning at the 3:49 marker moved me the most. In this bit, the BBC interviewer asks Mr. Adcock to play the banjo with his stimulator on and off. The difference is pretty clear, even to the non-bluegrass ear.

Losing the ability to play is a special terror we musicians know, even for those of us who earn our living some other way. I went through this recently following a biceps tendon repair. The first few months were depressing for me because I couldn't bow my fiddle in my ginormous bionic elbow brace. However, once I was able to drape said brace over my guitar and play a few minutes every day, my spirits picked up considerably.

So, here's to the Vanderbilt neuro boys. There are a lot of musicians and music lovers out there who would happily line up to buy them a few drinks. If it would help us to play like Eddie Adcock, I know that several of us would also line up for our own set of electrodes.

(Hat tip to Anita Anderson)

Last Hurrah of Summer

My family and I are heading off later today to the wilds of northern Idaho for a last hurrah of summer. We'll spend the week there camping, swimming, fiddling and folk dancing with pals from multiple states.

While I'm gone, several posts will automatically appear here via the ghostly hand of Google.

Have a great week!

Fluoro Off, Fiddle On!

Happy 4th of July!

I'm off with my fiddle for a week of vacation with my family in a place where the Internet doesn't shine.

We'll be spending the week at a music and dance festival in the foothills of California. About the only thing digital going on there will be fingers playing fiddles, guitars and other musical instruments.

In my absence, I've scheduled a few posts to pop up automatically in this space.

Type at you soon...