My sister-in-law, Dr. Kathryn Duffy has a PhD in Musicology, and is having a birthday today. Knowing she teaches and performs music, I'm bringing some to this post-al card/party.
Two of the educational institutions where she's applied her advanced degree in musicology are:
Grand View University in Des Moines, IA
Simpson College in Indianola, IA
Curriculum Vitae (About)
"My favorite part of working at Grand View is working with students who understand the impact they can make in improving the lives of others around them through music."
Kathryn's Grand View University Bio
--includes choir tours in Europe and the US.
Betcha didn't know dept...
[from the next link] Katheryn Duffy is a Music professor at GVU who is a daily and avid listener of music. Of course, being a Music professor, this is no surprise.
Duffy grew up in a musical family in Nebraska, singing songs in church and taking piano lessons at a young age because music was so valued in her home. In college, Duffy did not want to do something with music for a career. Instead, she wanted to do something even more interesting.
“I wanted to be a scientist. I didn’t want to do music as a career,” Duffy said. “I went to college thinking I was going to be working on rocketry and moon trajectories and work for NASA, but I had a calculus class, and I could not stay awake.”
At the end of her freshman year, Duffy realized she was loving her music classes and decided to stick with it.
“I really enjoyed the study of it, the theory and the history in addition to making music,” Duffy said.
Duffy, being a fan of classical music of any century, bluegrass, folk music and new country, loves to listen to music through apps like YouTube. She finds YouTube easy to use while listening and doing work by herself or showing students examples in class.
For a continuation of her early interests in space, see "Science & Music" below.
Musicians are Storytellers helping us connect to others...
Monterey Mishek, a senior at GVU who loves the Lumineers, said:
“They always tell a story through their music; they aren’t just a band, they are storytellers!”
Given that February celebrates the stories of Black people...
Music and singing played a critical role in inspiring, mobilizing, and giving voice to the civil rights movement. “The freedom songs are playing a strong and vital role in our struggle,” said Martin Luther King, Jr., during the Albany Movement. “They give the people new courage and a sense of unity. I think they keep alive a faith, a radiant hope, in the future, particularly in our most trying hours” (Shelton, “Songs a Weapon”).
As it tells its story...Music Connects Us
Simpson offers this survey of music around our shared globe.
MUS 210 - Music Across Cultures
A survey of music cultures across the globe that frames music traditions within their social and cultural context. This course will tease out the implications of ethnocentricity on the perception of music and offer skills to understand music through a culturally informed perspective.
Playing for Change: Moving songs across our home planet
I've included this preeminent grouping of music makers in many posts. Due to their support from many of the world's top performers, they have been able to build schools so children in underserved parts of our shared world can have access to arts education.
I selected this next example for Kathryn's greeting because it features children singing together in choirs.
This next song describes the importance of rhythm to a healthy brain. This will be addressed near the end in the "Music as Medicine" section.
Science & Music
In consideration of one of Kathryn's early aspirations, we explore the intersection of these two branches of knowledge and experience. "Aspirations"...
FYI - Kathryn understands the German language.
"Ad astra per aspera" is a Latin phrase that has been used for centuries to inspire people to reach for the stars, even in the face of adversity.
Its origins are unclear, but it is believed to have been first used in ancient Rome. The phrase was later adopted by various organizations, including NASA, which used it as the motto for the Apollo 1 mission.
The Symphony of Science: a view of our universe through the prism of music.
[from the article link that follows] The series puts a new spin on science by remixing lectures, documentaries, and movies into music videos celebrating the most mind-blowing knowledge we have. The videos have been used in classrooms around the world as a means to get people interested in science.
Since its launch in Fall 2009, Symphony of Science has been featured on CNN, NPR, Wired, Adult Swim, and more, attracting over 50 million views online. The first single, A Glorious Dawn, found release on Jack White's Third Man Records label as a special 7” vinyl single.
The series is the brain child of melodysheep, a musician and filmmaker living in the Pacific Northwest. His work spans from television and music production, having done extensive work with Disney, National Geographic, PBS, and many other collaborators. A TED guest and Webby Award winner, he strives to evoke a sense of awe with his work by celebrating the musicality of life, nature, and pop culture.
The next link a must-see from this series. It documents our world's first efforts to communicate who we are to....any extraterrestrials who encounter our interstellar spacecraft.
One of the songs includes this encouraging refrain:
--[From video creator melodysheep] My tribute to one of the coolest objects mankind has ever produced - the Voyager Golden Record. Knowing that a billion years from now these two messengers will still be out there is mind-bendingly awesome. I can't imagine a better representation of humanity.
The record also had the inscription “To the makers of music – all worlds, all times” hand-etched on its surface.
Humankind's first extra-planetary Gold record...
[from the next link] The “Golden Record” would be an upgrade to Pioneer’s plaques. Mounted on Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, twin probes launched in 1977, the two copies of the record would serve as time capsules and transmit much more information about life on Earth should extraterrestrials find it.
Though war is a reality of human existence, images of it might send an aggressive message when the record was intended as a friendly gesture. The team veered from politics and religion in its efforts to be as inclusive as possible given a limited amount of space.
Over the course of ten months, a solid outline emerged. The Golden Record consists of 115 analog-encoded photographs, greetings in 55 languages, a 12-minute montage of sounds on Earth and 90 minutes of music. As producer of the record, Ferris was involved in each of its sections in some way. But his largest role was in selecting the musical tracks. “There are a thousand worthy pieces of music in the world for every one that is on the record,” says Ferris. I imagine the same could be said for the photographs and snippets of sounds.
Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode”
According to Ferris, Carl Sagan had to warm up to the idea of including Chuck Berry’s 1958 hit “Johnny B. Goode” on the record, but once he did, he defended it against others’ objections. Folklorist Alan Lomax was against it, arguing that rock music was adolescent. “And Carl’s brilliant response was, ‘There are a lot of adolescents on the planet,’” recalls Ferris.
[From the NASA link that follows. Click the link to explore links it contains]
The remainder of the record is in audio, designed to be played at 16-2/3 revolutions per minute. It contains the spoken greetings, beginning with Akkadian, which was spoken in Sumer about six thousand years ago, and ending with Wu, a modern Chinese dialect. Following the section on the sounds of Earth, there is an eclectic 90-minute selection of music, including both Eastern and Western classics and a variety of ethnic music. Once the Voyager spacecraft leave the solar system (by 1990, both will be beyond the orbit of Pluto), they will find themselves in empty space. It will be forty thousand years before they make a close approach to any other planetary system. As Carl Sagan has noted, “The spacecraft will be encountered and the record played only if there are advanced spacefaring civilizations in interstellar space. But the launching of this bottle into the cosmic ocean says something very hopeful about life on this planet.”
The definitive work about the Voyager record is “Murmurs of Earth” by Executive Director, Carl Sagan, Technical Director, Frank Drake, Creative Director, Ann Druyan, Producer, Timothy Ferris, Designer, Jon Lomberg, and Greetings Organizer, Linda Salzman. Basically, this book is the story behind the creation of the record, and includes a full list of everything on the record. “Murmurs of Earth”, originally published in 1978, was reissued in 1992 by Warner News Media with a CD-ROM that replicates the Voyager record. Unfortunately, this book is now out of print, but it is worth the effort to try and find a used copy or browse through a library copy.
Steve Martin's (Martian?) SNL prediction about the first message we got back from extraterrestrials.
On April 22, 1978, Saturday Night Live spoofed the Golden Record in a skit called “Next Week in Review.” Host Steve Martin played a psychic named Cocuwa, who predicted that Time magazine would reveal, on the following week’s cover, a four-word message from aliens. He held up a mock cover, which read, “Send More Chuck Berry.”
Exercising to Music
Variations on a Theme...Stuff I picked up all the way while fillin' out this birthday card...
Thank G-d I'm a country boy...
In the previously-cited 4/17/24 Grand View University "Viewfinder" newsletter interview, Kathryn said she enjoys country music...So...
"Just an old country boy, wearing my Osh-Kosh boots
Walked by the trailer factory, every day on my way to school
And early on in life, the only thing I wanted to do
Was buy me a trailer and move it down to Grandview"
Here's John's marriage proposal:
Travesties in A Major: a Day and Night at the Opera
Dueling batons...
Reader Musical Assignments (i.e., "homework")
Movies+ (tOM & Eileen's offerings)
--August Rush tells the story of a charismatic young Irish guitarist (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) and a sheltered young cellist (Keri Russell) who have a chance encounter one magical night above New York's Washington Square, but are soon torn apart, leaving in their wake an infant, August Rush, orphaned by circumstance. Now performing on the streets of New York and cared for by a mysterious stranger (Robin Williams), August (Freddie Highmore) uses his remarkable musical talent to seek the parents from whom he was separated at birth.
Alive Inside is a joyous cinematic exploration of music's capacity to reawaken our souls and uncover the deepest parts of our humanity. Filmmaker Michael Rossato-Bennett chronicles the astonishing experiences of individuals around the country who have been revitalized through the simple experience of listening to music. His camera reveals the uniquely human connection we find in music and how its healing power can triumph where prescription medication falls short.
--Based on the extraordinary true story of Andrea Bocelli, a blind boy, who against all odds becomes one of the most world renowned opera singers. To date, he has sold over 80 million records worldwide.
--Set in the influential New York music scene of the early 60s, A COMPLETE UNKNOWN follows 19-year-old Minnesota musician BOB DYLAN’s (Timothée Chalamet) meteoric rise as a folk singer to concert halls and the top of the charts – his songs and mystique becoming a worldwide sensation – culminating in his groundbreaking electric rock and roll performance at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965.
Both Timothée Chalamet and Edward Norton (Pete Seeger) add to the story's realism by playing their instruments and do all their vocals.
--history, cover-up, music, romance and amazing stories of these brave astronauts...
Eileen feels Scarlett Johansson must get the Oscar.
Music as Medicine: Music & Neuroscience combine
--Drummer Mickey Hart has worked for years with neuroscientists like Dr. Adam Gazzaley to use music to awaken parts of our brain. In 2018, I attended their live presentation at NYC's Hayden Planetarium.
This next video includes a side-by-side look at the brains of a world class drummer and a world class neuroscientist:
--Mickey Hart, Grateful Dead percussionist, and neurologist Adam Gazzaley, M.D., Ph.D., professor at the University of California San Francisco made history by becoming the first to sonify and visualize brain activity in real time in front of a live audience. The two did so at the closing session of Life @50+, the AARP National Event & Expo in New Orleans on September 22nd. For more, see the description under the video.
Related Musical Posts
NOTE: ALL my posts feature "#music"...and MOST include "#humor".. Here's a recent one:.
SKIN DEEP SONG - includes a Chicago children's choir:
#music #humor #KathrynDuffy #GrandViewUniversity #SimpsonCollege #PlayingForChange #LouisArmstrong #MickeyHart #DrAdamGazzaley #NASA #SNL #AARP #medicine #science #melodysheep #SymphonyOfScience #ChuckBerry #exercising #SteveMartin #CountryMusic #JohnMellencamp #MarxBrothers #opera #MissionImpossible #opera #movies #BuddyGuy
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