Why I didn't play this harpsichord sooner | Hacker News Reader

Why I didn't play this harpsichord sooner

taylor.town

57 pointssurprisetalk37 comments

If you want to attract other humans with a harpsichord, ditch the Church durges and reach instead for an operatic form. They're just more dynamic.

Benefits:

* recitative form allows you to freely speak-sing to get through a lot of content for your listeners. It's like carbo-loading but for syllable count. And the harpsichord has been the instrument of choice for recitatives for at least a few hundred years.

* aria form generally allows you to linger in the melodies much longer than with hymns. And since the recitative delivers most of the substantial text, the aria doesn't have to cycle back through myriad boring verses like hymns. They tend to be more expressive on the whole, and the most popular ones are singable even by a group of troglodytes

* because operas can include Church or Church-like scenes, you get the Church fare as a subset if you still want it.

* it's not too difficult to figure out the basic recitative chord patterns to improvise a recitative-- and perhaps even an aria-- based on your audience or situation.

For any out there having trouble in the dating department, that last part is key (heh). Honestly, I'm surprised recitativo-aria isn't a genre on pornhub.

Edit: clarification

Could you link to some examples (on youtube or the like) of what you have in mind? I know my baroque keyboard-solo literature okay, but beyond that it gets a bit hazy.

Related, a couple of my favorite harpsichord albums:

https://youtu.be/VOcGy4z8l0w?si=9w1vMO56ODJ9YqKB

https://youtu.be/u7wwYlScTrY?si=FNOJgFPChi2jzI6B

While we're on E. Power Biggs, he did a couple of amazing albums of Scott Joplin:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gz4UvTJLrgg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pa5EhAZie3M

The crisp harpsichord sound seems to fit perfectly with the music.

Yes, those are great too. It’s an amazing instrument and he’s a great player.

Scott Ross was also a genius if you’re unfamiliar (you have to like Scarlatti though, which apparently isn’t universal!)

When you say a performing musician is a genius, it is a little mystifying since, as Bach wrote, "there's nothing to it -- just press the right key at the right time". All of my teachers felt that the true skill of musicianship consists in identifying problems and devising solutions -- and a genius is just much better at doing these two things.

I once watched a video of Ross giving a lesson where he just had the student change a fingering and I got shivers at the result (was also impressed with that student, too).

Scott Ross + Scarlatti's Cat's Fugue: https://youtu.be/kGJivsqbrz8

Who could not like it? I just read the wiki article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_fugue) and didn't realize Scarlatti really claimed the theme came from an "improvisation" of his cat.

It's the "right time" that's the rub! Ross was a true master of the micro articulations, the microsecond precise speedup or delay in between the notes that adds something magical to the music. It's funny, when you listen to a Scarlatti sonata in midi form that has been prepared through software sequencing and is metronomically precisely "correct," it sounds utterly dull, flat, and boring. The quick attack of the harpsichord and its lack of dynamics makes this the only way to add the emotion and excitement to the music that gives it a special feeling. I'm sure I'm not telling you anything you don't know, just thought others might find it interesting.

Some more early jazz performed by Don Angle:

https://youtu.be/QcsHc7zxsfM

https://youtu.be/ST1zZdNEvy8

And he was important in the history of programming language theory, as an influence on Alan Kay (so Kay has said in talks - see YouTube passim).

I was bored today and was playing "Maple Leaf Rag" on an electric piano while cycling through the voices, and happened to discover exactly this when I chanced upon the harpsichord!

I only came across it because I subscribed to a weird idealistic music service back in the day, but I really liked Janine Johnson's harpsichord albums. It turns out she is a harpsichord builder first and foremost, which I suppose where why her albums were on Magnatune in the first place.

I've found that I really like it when instrument builders record music on their own instruments. They know their instruments intimately, and that makes up for maybe in theory being 1% less technically brilliant than the star performers.

I've started probably thirty blogs over the years and never made a 3rd/4th/5th post. I started one again recently, then promptly caught COVID again and was knocked down for a week, then got some bad job news and have since focused on trying to sell myself.

This latest blog feels different, though. More honest.

I guess on some level I was deluding myself with some kind of specific mission statement: "oh, I'll start a blog of poems I write" or "oh, I'll start a tech blog" or "oh, I'll start a blog with my weird code issues I've debugged" or "oh, I'll start a blog with my little DevOps snippets I liked."

This time, I was like "I'ma just write about whatever I'm freaking out about lately -- the sixth extinction, my new interest in pentesting, whatever -- and more geared at producing something that I myself would want to read: just some schmuck somewhere else in the tubes rattling into the void.

I need to get back on that.

I have lots of thoughts about lots of things and can be interesting (and/or long-winded) at parties, but when it comes to writing a blog post my mind sort of blanks and I write about the most banal crap even I don't care about. It's like I'm making shit up just to have something to say rather than actually sharing my actual thoughts. To make matters worse, I can't stand the voice I write my blog in, but can't seem to use any other voice.

Ricky Gervais: Write about what you know.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTJyDe7a2bo

TL;DR: Give yourself room to write about boring stuff, as long as it's honest.

Harpsichord is to my ears the bourgeoise cousin of banjo. I would start playing one when I intend to become annoying. Same with blogging.

Harpsichord is one of the few instruments I actively loathe. Others include the piccolo and bagpipes.

(Incidentally I like the banjo and the accordion)

Banjo and accordion are my two favorite instruments. Can't stand piccolo, though.

Horses for courses. I've spent a lot of time playing in song circles at places like Luchenback, TX and for that my usual thing is to bring an accordion and a banjo- both of those really can cut through a bunch of guitars. And when I go busk, the accordion is a great instrument.

That said, both of those instruments really need a time and a place where they can fill a good role, and it's pretty easy to overdo either- I can busk effectively with an accordion only because I never see folks for more than 2-3 minutes. If I am playing a show it's piano or guitar.

To the grandparent post, though, please consider the harpsichord part on Stevie Wonder's "Superstition". I mean, technically it is a hohner clavinet, but that's just a modern portable harpsichord. That setting for harpsichord is super satisfying to me- I love playing that kind of growling funk. You might not like it, but it's a long way from most of what people think of as "harpsichord" music.

Yeah, I came to the accordion via Tom Waits. But I know what you mean. I think it's a... bit narrow instrument, at least nowadays. I got into some Scandinavian folk music, too, so I'm slowly broadening my expressive range. I try to avoid the oom-pah stuff.

But truth is, I'm an absolutely wretched musician. I never really got my clawhammer sounding good. The only thing I'm decent at is probably bass, and I think my tone is absolute crap.

This page links to https://potato.cheap/ which contains the bit,

"Software has become too complicated to stay honest."

Much respect to the author who is crotchety like me in many ways and has assembled a thoughtful collection of observation, down with JS bloat for it's own sake. That is a little gem and I'm going to quote it in every possible context from now on, just to get people to wonder what I really mean by it. I could launch into many possible rants from there (eg, "don't be evil").

I once asked an early client of ours, an experienced web person himself, why the prominent image on his real estate home page was a broken gif. He said "It generates emails, conversations, correspondences and finally, sales."

> Outside of Adventist bubbles, musicians are comparatively rare in Los Angeles.

Hmm. Compared to what? It seems like there are plenty of people who play music as amateurs and professionals in LA. I know I'm ignoring the actual point of the article here, but this just seems like an odd sentence to me.

I don't think it's comparing LA to anything other than their Adventist upbringing.

Yes. If one is from a culture where almost everyone plays something, even if not especially well, then most other places will feel barren in comparison.

Hi, author here.

The epicenter of SDA is in Loma Linda, California, which is a ~2h drive outside of Los Angeles. After spending lots of time in both places, it was surprising to me how many more casual musicians I met in Loma Linda over Los Angeles. This still surprises me, considering how big the music industry is in LA.

but sample size of 1, obviously :)

I went in a slightly different direction and got myself a 49 key midi MPE keyboard. Made a huge positive impact on my mood and life.

I have the Osmose wiggly-key synth and it is an absolute blast - and this is spoken as someone who spends 50% of keyboard time playing classical-ish stuff in Pianoteq.

Related to the metaphor: are SDAs not allowed to use pianos because they strike strings like a drum, but plucking or wind instruments are fine? Or am I looking too deep into the metaphor?

Looking too deep into the metaphor, but great question!

If I remember correctly, the restriction on drums is really a way to prevent dancing, which is a way to prevent sinful/lecherous temptations? That's just my guess -- many of these things are unspoken rules

But I think any instrument could be taboo if played with too much groove; drums were just a non-starter in most churches

Gotcha! I was wondering if harpsichord and organ were referenced for specific reasons.

Which is strange, considering that Psalm 150 specifically encourages drums and dance in religious worship.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psalm_150

To be fair “no drums” is not a modern take. Also drums would not be as useful as accompaniment for as piano and organ for the old hymns which used to be sung.

There was a time - late 19th, early 20th c - when pianos were associated with Music Hall, and therefore secular, music. So there were SdA (and other American protestant) people who eschewed them for that reason. Pianos stopped being much of a controversy (in SdA-ism, not sure about elsewhere) by the mid-20th c.

Drums, though? Yah. Drums are still a bit taboo. Well, not drums per se, drum kits. Banging a base drum or playing snare or whacking on a set of bongos is just fine, but only if there's a 1:1 musician to instrument ratio. A multi-tasking percussionist, however, has a whiff of rock and roll.

(Source: also an apostate SdA.)

so is he keeping the harpsichord at his church? seems like a great way to: attend service, play in public, and share it with others

enjoyed the article!

It's an extended metaphor... the harpischord is the author's blog, the church is the community of readers and other bloggers.

Drat, I also thought he was actually building and playing harpsichords.

Author here!

My wife (also raised SDA) saw this article and literally told me,

"Oh, my aunt built a harpsichord from scratch when I was a kid"

Looks like my metaphor wasn't so farfetched haha

I... completely didn't get that it was a metaphor.

I also still very much agree with Joe. Everyone derives pleasure from other avenues.

For me it's playing an actual musical instrument with other people. Not writing blogs.

I also thought this was an actual harpsichord rather than a metaphor, until I followed the hyperlink back to your blog.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com