Library of Further Miscellany

The Basic Impetus  An a-capela version of a song known by various titles, but in this case, "The Humours of Whiskey" as sung by Hozier was pushed to me one night by the Facebook algorithm. It made a deep impression, and I decided I wanted to learn the tune on violin. This sent me down a long and twisting rabbit hole.  Here is a link to the Hozier version -  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQ-UItNBoMw  . This is a traditional tune, and so there are many sheet music versions out there (e.g., in different keys and different rhythms), none of which I like as much as the Hozier version. The Hozier Transcription is in the key of D – having a C♯ and F♯.  But Hozier's gift is just one verse. I wanted to know the full song.  There are many YouTube covers of this thing, and it goes by several titles, including: The Humours of Whiskey; The Humors of Whiskey; Come Guess Me A Riddle; and Paddy's Panacea.   As far as I can tell, the oldest recording ...

ABC Notation of music is a method of representing sheet music with text. There are programs that can turn a sheet-music tune into ABC Notation, and vice versa. The website (and app) notabc.app provides a nice sandbox for experimenting with ABC Notation -- note: the title of the website is "Nota ABC" but the url only has one 'a' - "notabc.app". The Celtic Room - " The home of traditional Irish music in Indonesia" provides a good beginning  guide for writing music using abc notation .  Wikipedia has a comprehensive article here . There is an effort to keep ABC notation standardized and also advancing with new capabilities. A main website for this effort is ABC Notation wiki found at  https://abcnotation.com This is a very limited summary. The objects of ABC coding are 'tunes'. For example, this tune...   ... which can be represented in ABC Notation as follows: X:10 T: Father O'Flynn T: Top of the Cork Road C: Trad. O: Ireland R: jig M: 6...

My while-back Buddhist e-friend (never met in person) Jordan Fountain, made me a shakuhachi from hardware store piping as a memento of undergoing Jukai (taking the Buddhist vows).   Shakuhachi is a Japanese front blown flute named for it's traditional length of one shaku and eight (hachi) sun (pronounced - "suhn" - not pronounce like our local star).  1. Chin supports flute. Don't press flute to chin to support it. A simple tilt of the head should cause the flute to drop.  2. Embouchure - is not a puckering of the lips, nor a whistle blowing position. It's a little pronouncing the letter "T". A slight tension at the corners of the mouth. The embouchure is like a small grain of rice in the center of otherwise sealed (in a relaxed way) lips.  3. Good posture - see point 1. 4. A feeling of air moving into your mouth is dammed in (like water) by your lips and is under controlled release. Maybe this is like my "puffing" or "spouting" when ...