The ButtCradle in action at ISB 2009
I’m a big fan of the ButtCradle–a stool cover for bassists that will make practicing and gigging a much more pleasant experience. I even recorded a demo of how the ButtCradle works realier this year. Ashley Eidbo (creator of the ButtCradle) was at the 2009 International Society of Bassists Convention, and I got a chance to chat with her briefly while I was there. Check her covers out at ButtCradle.com.
dsdsgddg
Ira Gold plays Vanhal Concerto
Today, we’re featuring a live recording (accessible through the player above) of National Symphony bassist Ira Gold performing the Vanhal Concerto with the Eclipse Chamber Orchestra. Ira has also been an interview guest on the podcast–check out his interview if you haven’t before. Details about this performance are listed below, and this recording is also available through the Contrabass Conversations podcast, so if you subscribe to the podcast (iTunes link) you’ll receive it automatically.
New York Philharmonic bass section, circa 1941
Double bassist Kirsten Paige (a University of Chicago student and former pupil of Tim Cobb) sent me the following photo and information recently–I found it to be quite cool. She writes:
I have been doing some work lately in the NY Philharmonic archives, and I recently came across this photo of the 1941 NY Philharmonic bass section. I thought you might find it of interest.
The photo shows the following players (Left to right):
Fortier, Anselme
De Angelis, Joseph
Zimmerman, Frederick
Brennand, Robert
Tivin, Emmanuel
Raviola, C.
Mensch, Homer
Schlossberg, Max
Rybb, D.
PBDB: Beware the Outliers, Part 1
(crossposted at PBDB)
Outlier: a data point that falls far from most other points; a score extremely divergent from the other measures of a set.
I first became familiar with the concept of “outliers” when my brother came home from his new job wearing T-shirt of the company softball team – it was their team name! (This job was at a DC policy think tank so I suspect that a fairly high nerd factor went into the name choice…) The term is a basic one in the study of statistics, and is based around a core phenomenon when one takes any kind of survey, or does a scientific experiment, or simply collects data of any kind on a large group of people. A classic example comes from sports judging. In sports like diving or skating, where the competitors are scored by a panel of judges, the highest and lowest scores are usually thrown out. Why? Well, what if the scores happened to be : [7,8,8,6,1,9,6]? The average of these scores is 6.28. But if I eliminate the highest and lowest scores, the average is 7, which is within one point of the scores of all the remaining judges. In this case, the low score in particular is a classic outlier example – it throws off our ability to see the opinion of the majority of the group.
Read more
Teaching and tech posts from Peter Tambroni
(click the player above to hear a segment of Pete’s Contrabass Conversations interview)
In addition to being one of my good friends and an excellent teacher and bassist, Peter Tambroni (former Contrabass Conversations guest) is a prolific blogger. Here are some of his most recent posts from MostlyBass.com and The Evolving Educator, his two blogs:
- Pete’s Top Mac Apps – Pete is a big fan of the Mac (as am I), especially in terms of productivity software. He shares his top 11 apps for the Mac, many of which I use as well.
- Assignment sheet for private lessons – Looking to organize things for your students? Pete’s got a PDF you can use for keeping things organized for your students (and for you!).
- How much should you charge for lessons? – Pete’s got an interesting formula for this.
- Practice stagnation – A few quick tups for getting out of a practicing rut.
- Rubrics suck! – I’ve used rubrics frequently as a faculty member for juries at different institutions, as well as being graded by them as a student (especially during my teacher certificate program). Pete’s got some strong opinions about these particular tools.
You can check out all of Peter’s former blog contributions here, and I hope to have him on for some new Contrabass Conversations episodes (iTunes link) in the near future!
Sponsors:
Subscribe to our podcast!
Blog highlights
Network with us!
-
-
