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Theremin Cats

From Brian Sacawa: Sounds Like Now:

The context for this picture is Sacawa's lament that early theremin virtuosi concentrated on trying to get the instrument to play traditional western tonal music, rather than exploring the radically new ways of organizing pitch and structure afforded by the instrument. This is indeed something that concerns me about many of the efforts going on to “de-experimentalize” computer music and simply turn it into another tool for traditional classical or popular forms. The great promise of electronic instruments is to allow people to break with the traditions of acoustic music. But Sacawa concludes:

Maybe if more cats–unlike humans, who are so grounded in western tonal music–played the theremin we might witness the instrument's full potential.

And thus we have theremin-playing cats.

Check out this feline thereminist from YouTube:




Clintons take Mount Kisco

Our friend jelly pizza recently wrote:

speaking of sopranos, have you seen the clinton knock-off? i bet you'd recognize the diner given half the chance. i did on the first viewing, shouting “hey, that's the blank blank diner!!!”

Well, here's the Clinton's Sopranos knock-off video:


You can see the full-size version here.

Well, yes that is the “blank blank diner”, or more specifically the infamous Mount Kisco Coach Diner, on E. Main Street (Highway 117) in Mount Kisco, New York:

Mount Kisco is just north of Chappaqua, the “home of CatSynth and Hillary Clinton”, and this diner was one of the local late-night hangouts. It was easy to reach via either 117 or the Saw Mill Parkway, our local excuse-for-a-freeway.

It's great to see the Clintons making use of the hood for Hillary's campaign. And whatever other merits her candidacy may or may not have, Chappaqua, Westchester and New York would be a quite a change from that ranch in Texas…

It's also cool to see an ad sticking to a hip and minimal pop-culture reference with none of the usual schlock, like silly speech clips or waving american-flag graphics. Some seem to think that this is elitist – see the much reposted article by Ann Althouse. I'll avoid the sexual symbolism and focus on the charge of elitism, which seems to apply to anything that's not available at WalMart or a megachurch. To me, this simply seems like mainstream culture on the coasts. And if it is elitist, so what? It's refreshing for candidates to have decent taste (Giuliani is a big opera fan, I've heard). For some real elitist options, see this response by film critic Glenn Kenny:

The scene I most would like to see the Clintons reenact with their own particular spin is, of course, the finale of Michelangelo Antonioni's 1961 La Notte, with Marcello Mastroianni and Jeanne Moreau.

I haven't yet seen La Notte, but it's going onto my Netflix queue (far ahead of any Sopranos DVDs). Antonioni's L'Avventura is among my favorite films, period. I love the completely disjointed yet still narrative story, and of course the crisp visuals of both the people and scenery are amazing.

Hmm, since they have some experience with diners now, how about recreating a scene from Seinfeld?

WCB 101: Video tribute for TeaCup, and Kitty Love

Megan and family have put together this wonderful video entitled Good Night Sweet TeaCup

Very sweet and touching, and also quite amusing at times. I particularly love the pictures of him sitting inside the red fish bowl.

This tribute to TeaCup seems a fitting segue into Weekend Cat Blogging #101. He was in our thoughts a week ago during WCB100, and now a week later we remember him and keep his family in our thoughts. We have seen so many in this online community come together around this one little soul. He was indeed more than “just a cat.” As all our little animal companions are. They are family, we enjoy and honor them in life, and grieve for them when they pass. How could it be any other way? It's sad that some people refuse to accept or celebrate that. The recent pet-food contaminations have added to the sense that our animal companions are precious, and also served to remind others in society of their value. I hope that Luna and I will have many years together before we need to think about such matters ourselves, and in the meantime I am proud to “love my kitty” here in this public forum. She certainly deserves no less.

The recent pic on the left was taken with the built-in webcam on my MacBook, I was probably posting something to CatSynth at the time.

And of course, check out the other cats who are very much loved at Weekend Cat Blogging 101. This weekend's roundup is being hosted by Sher, Upsie and Sundance, who remind us all to be good to our mothers this Mothers Day weekend. We at CatSynth will be making the call back to New York on Sunday. Mmmm, Sher and friends have some delicious looking cheese, too.

And don't forget that all CD sales in May will benefit the family of TeaCup and Bad Kitty Cats. Please help support them and support new music at the same time. I will post this info to the right-side column so it won't get lost in the depths of blogging.









Weekend Cat Blogging #91: Enjoying the outdoors from indoors

Just a nice quiet day for us here at CatSynth to relax and do, well, not much of anything, except of course taking photos and videos and posting them on Weekend Cat Blogging.

Here, Luna gets comfy near the glass doors downstairs:

This week, we also have some Catster videos to share. Hear Luna's cute “hunting noises” and watch her tail go and she enjoys her favorite view out the bedroom window:

Videos, Movies, Pet Profiles, Catster

Another video from today over at Catster has Luna responding loudly to getting pet while surveying her domain…

Hehehe…let's crack open a window!

Click on the image above to enlarge, you can see another kitty outside (you can be sure that Luna sees him, too).

The big WCB roundup is being hosted over at champaign taste, where Louis' enjoyment of the outdoors turned into a scary “Lost Cat” story for a day. Thankfully, he returned in the evening and everything is fine. We're glad the Louis made it home safely. Go read his story and check out the other kitties this weekend.







Nora, The Piano-Playing Cat

This wonderful video features Nora, the piano-playing cat. Not a synthesizer, but it is a keyboard instrument.

In addition to the simple cuteness of a cat playing piano, I actually found myself listening to music itself. Clearly a lot of major and minor seconds, mostly because they are easy to reach with a single paw, but there is also the strong repeating rhythm. And she seems remarkably consistent over multiple brief “performances.”

I recommend listening to Nora's music without observing the video, as I am now, and you will hear an interesting minimal atonal piece that stands on its own. Many detractors of atonal and free-rhythm music often argue that “their five-year old could do that” or even that their pet could do that, but perhaps the fact that it captures childlike and cat-like innocence is part of the charm such music.

CatSynth pic: Freddie chilling on the Serge

Submitted by Knox Bronson at SunPopBlue:

Bronson has collaborated with Gustvo Lanzas (who provided the recent video of Apu the “Acid Cat”) on an interesting improvisation featuring the Serge (and an E-MU SP-1200!) called Where The Bees Are. Check out the free mp3.

And there is still more fun with Freddie at SunPopBlue. Check out his video Sleep (An Homage to Andy Warhol):

Ah, wasn't it only a day or so ago that we were again reminiscing about New York in the 1970s?