Mozart’s Requiem
December 2022 The time seems right to write about Mozart`s Requiem, as there have been several performances recently and some discussion. A Requiem Mass in Catholicism is a Mass in honour of the dead. Mozart was very depressed at the time of writing it, partly because he thought it was heralding his own death and […]
Handle’s “The Messiah”, arranged Mozart
From a talk to the University of the Third Age on Baroque music Mozart was a great admirer of Handel. Mozart’s reason for arranging of Handel’s Messiah was not because he thought he could improve on Mozart, but because, 50 years later, Handel’s music was out of fashion and Mozart was attempting to arrange […]
Using music therapeutically in a high-tech way
… but not ’Music Therapy’ which is a procedure used by “music therapists” This comes in three parts Part A. Identifying the music which is therapeutic for the person This vitally important. Fortunately, many people know themselves what type of music is therapeutic for them. Caution: it is not necessarily music that they would normally […]
Motorcycling exploits
Early trail bikes The Honda XL125 suited me fine probably because it was light and nimble and was such a fantastic improvement on the Bianchi and getting away from the various problems of the BSA B40SS90. It started first time and never missed a beat. When I went riding with the TRF (Trail Riders Fellowship) […]
Skiing exploits
Learning to ski At school I was absolutely useless at football, cricket and indeed all ball games but I always had a notion for going skiing. However my parents weren’t well off and couldn’t afford to buy me skis, ski bindings and ski boots. So made my own skis … my skis were solid pieces […]
Kayaking exploits
Kayaking on rivers I have done a great deal of Kayaking in rapids in white water rivers Warfe Nidd, Swale and Upper Tees. These rivers may be placid enough in low water but, when at spate, they are highly challenging and even dangerous. This is especially so for the Tees, where you are at real […]
Sample of expressively played music created in the Vistamusic system
Sample files from my Vistamusic program. Click on the small triangles to play. 01 Spoken – Schumann’s Traumerei 02 Traumerei 1 03 Spoken – Expresion 04 Traumerei 2 05 Spoken – More expression 06 Traumerei 3 07 Spoken – Complete performance 08 Traumerei 4 9 Spoken Mozart Piano Sonata in C 10 Mozart 1 11 […]
The Vibro Acoustic Chair
The vibro acoustic chair is a comfortable reclining chair with built in vibro acoustic units. The mounting of the units is important for two reasons. The active surface of the unit should be as flat as possible against the body. This means flexible mounting and secondly we don’t want to transmit vibrations to the body […]
Helping Hard Of Hearing People
NOMENCLATURE It is very important that we do not insult the people we are trying to help. Deaf people do not like to be known as hearing impaired. Deaf people like to be called deaf not hearing impaired because they don’t consider themselves to be impaired people. When talking about deaf people, they prefer to […]
Attempts To Help With Greater Deafness
VISTA MUSIC This is software I developed standing for visual and tactile music. This is the name I gave to software I developed myself for people who were going extremely deaf. It contained all the features described in “helping with hard of hearing” in a particularly convenient form including means to control relative volumes. It […]