From @moogmusic via Twitter, as part of an amusing conversation that also included matrixsynth.
Can you guess which one is the rescue? @matrixsynth @catsynth pic.twitter.com/q0ruxB3v
— Moog Music Inc. (@moogmusicinc) February 1, 2012
@moogmusicinc @catsynth I think the Mini needs rescuing right about now. 🙂 http://t.co/ZG6rdkVLvH
— matrixsynth (@matrixsynth) September 5, 2013
So which one do you think is the rescue, the kitten or the Minimoog?
From Rob Robinson via Facebook.
Quite by accident, starting a new tune with Oberheim SEM Pro and Oberkorn SL16. Puss is helping.
One of the ways to empathize with a place, and by extension its people, is through the things that touch you strongly. So we at CatSynth present images of cats and traditional music from Syria.
[Photo by Arbo Moosberg on Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
The picture above is from Aleppo. Apparently a woman off-frame is feeding them. The next cats are enjoying quite the view of Damascus while having dinner.
[Photo by delayed gratification on Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
These young cats in a garden in Damascus seem quite healthy and contented in their verdant surroundings.
[Photo by Jose Luis Canales from Flickr. (CC BY-NC 2.0)]
Back in Aleppo, we meet a cat named Lulu playing outside.
[Photo by Ali Qasmo from Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
The photographer of the above image, Ali Qasmo, is from Syria – the others were taken by various visitors. Indeed, he has taken quite a few pictures of local cats, which you can see on his Flickr page.
[Photo by Ali Qasmo from Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
Cats do have to cope with the effects of the civil war there, just as humans do. Here we see a cat sitting amongst debris in the city of Homs:
[Photo from Freedom House on Flickr. (CC BY 2.0)]
Syria (like many countries in the region) teems with cats. But it also has a rich tradition of music. String instruments are particularly prominent in traditional music, including the bazuq:
[Photo by xlynx on Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
The above photo comes with a story of the chance encounter between the photographer and the musician, which ultimately included a bit of improvisation together. Here is a video of the musician playing solo:
Channeling my inner music-geek for moment, I found myself looking in detail at the arrangement from frets, which are not monotonically decreasing in distance towards the body as they would on modern Western fretted instruments.
This photo of a traditional musician was taken in the town of Palmyra:
[Photo by James Gordon from Flickr. (CC BY-NC 2.0)]
If anyone knows the name of the instrument in the picture, I would be curious to know, as it reminds me a bit of the Indian ektar that I sometimes play.
And we conclude with an image of a cat and kitten together at the Der Mar Musa monastery in western Syria (near Lebanon):
[Photo by Stijn Nieuwendijk from Flickr. (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)]
From Taki76 on YouTube:
“Meow”
I need to find this cat toy keyboard! It would be great for circuit bending and future performances.
From Michael Van Dijck via our Facebook page.
Here is an example of the Hohner piano in action:
In this video, Chick Corea plays a Hohner Electra piano with Miles Davis. (Keith Jarrett is playing a different electric piano.)
Electric pianos are of course not strictly synths, as they are electro-mechanical rather than electronic. But these instruments are favorites of ours here at CatSynth.
It’s not unusual for Luna to spend most of her day napping in sun puddles, but it’s a rare occasion when I get do so as well. Â This month has been rewarding but also exhausting, with work, the Portland trip, multiple shows and sundry other events and obligations. Â Fortunately, this weekend is largely free and thus a good time to rest as well as attend to health and home. Â Â And of course to spend time with Luna.
The Carnival of the Cats will be up this Sunday at Mind of Mog.
And the Friday Ark is at the modulator.
Today, August 17 is officially Black Cat Appreciation Day. Of course, that could apply to any day here at CatSynth.
My black cat Luna, who was originally adopted from a shelter, certainly gets a lot of appreciation and love.
Black cats are sleek and gorgeous. And I have often found them to be among the most sweet and affectionate of cats. Luna is no exception on either front.
Sadly, black cats are still among the last to be adopted from shelters in the United States. Whether it’s lingering superstition or plain bias is hard to say. I see way too many heartbreaking stories of abandoned black cats in kill shelters reaching the end of their time. Black Cat Appreciation Day is an effort to highlight the plight of black shelter cats but also to celebrate them as wondrous companions. This video, from the Meadow Lake Humane Society of Saskatchewan, Canada, always gets to me:
There are numerous local groups on Facebook and elsewhere dedicated to helping black cats, and I encourage interested readers to check them out.
From kj6bbs on YouTube, via matrixsynth.
“Discovered something new tonite.” [sic]
That is indeed part of the fun of modulars, of electronic music in general. Did you spot the cat in the video?
