CatSynth

Today we at CatSynth publish our  1000th Post!

To mark this milestone, I created this mosaic featuring a few of Luna’s appearances:

[click to enlarge]

A few fun statistical facts about our first 1000 posts:

• Luna has appeared in 238 posts almost 25%.
• To date, there 270 cat-and-synthesizer posts.
• As of this writing there are 5439 comments, or an average of 5 comments per post.
• Over 150 Weekend  Cat Blogging posts.
• 115 Wordless Wednesday posts.
• Approximately 10% of posts feature our current hometown of San Francisco.

Here are the top 25 terms:

This past Thursday I attended the latest installment of the Full Moon Concert series: the “Long Night’s Moon”, in anticipation of the winter solstice.

Both sets played off the theme of the perception of time, perhaps an allusion to the passage of time as one moves through the longest night of the year. However, time is represented and perceived quite differently in each.

The second set was a public performance of the 2009 60×60 compilation, featuring 60 one-minute pieces by 60 different composers in a variety of styles. The performance was very precisely timed, beginning at exactly 9PM with each success piece starting on the next minute until 10PM. A clock projected onto the wall showed the exact time, so one could watch the individual seconds tick while listening to the music. However, within this very precise presentation of time, the perception of time remained fluid. Some pieces seemed significantly longer than others, and the seconds appeared to pass more quickly or slowly. For example, one piece with a lounge/jazz feel seemed to pass more slowly, while several more experimental pieces based purely on timbral evolution seemed to go by much faster. I think it was the quick succession of phrases that made it seem longer, as if the piece was a more standard three-minute duration. Some others, such as #53 and #54 by Andrew Willingham and David Morneau, respectively, went by quite fast.

Indeed, with such short pieces, the transitions between them became significant elements. I particularly liked the transitions between pieces 12, 13 and 14, by Danny Clay, Alvin Curan and Christophe Petchanatz, respectively. Similarly, the transitions between #46 (John Maycraft) and #47 (Les Scott) was very fluid and seamless. Other notable pieces included the toy piano performance in #16 by Jane Wang (I instantly recognized the Jaymar toy piano( and the “meditation” in steel and metallic sounds in #27 by Diana Simpson. I of course instantly recognized the spoetry in Polly Moller’s Abdominal Cyclist Ultra (#36) from my work with Reconnaissance Fly. The frenetic beats in #56 (Arran Krister Kohnson), interleaving of speeches by Barack Obama and Martin Luther King, Jr. in #58 (Ben Boone) and the final “Daddy, what are you doing?” in #60 (Richard Hall) brought the set to an energetic close.

In the preceding set, John Hanes presented a very different perception of time. His piece for the Long Night’s Moon was “an attempt to celebrate the promise of light internet in the darkest night and the rhythm of the turning of the year.” Unlike the 60×60 performance, which made one hyper-aware of the passing of individual seconds, Hanes’ performance invited listeners to “suspend” their perception of time and meditate on the graduation changes in sounds. It began with bells and metallic sounds, which were eventually joined by strong (and synthetic) resonances. A few tones reminded me of prayer bowls. The long tones of the metallic and synthetic sounds formed gradually changing chords and harmonies that suggested a vocal or choral arrangement. Occasionally the rather complex harmonies would suddenly drop out, leaving a unison of different timbres on the same pitch. There were some complex minor harmonies in between the unions, and some points where the harmonies seem to draw to a traditional cadence. All along were ebbs and flowers and timbre and dynamics, with some strong crescendos towards the conclusion of the piece.

This is actually not the first time we have encountered John Hanes at a Full Moon Concert. He also appearned in Myles Boisen’s Past-Present-Future at the Blood Moon Concert in October.

Luna and I welcome everyone to Carnival of the Cats #299.

We have unfortunately been experiencing technical difficulties with the main Blog Carnival submissions page. So this week’s Carnival is a little on the spare side. But we’re here for all the cats who made it, and we will leave the Carnival open for submissions through Monday by leaving a comment on this post. So without further adieu, here are the cats:

First up, Nikita reports on his recent visit to the Vet at Musings of a MadMacedonian. Looks like Nikita survived the experience and came home with a little less fur, but a few more “rewards” waiting for him. We at CatSynth also like the artwork in his vet’s office.

At Laurence Simon’s This Blog is Full of Crap, Piper is remembered and missed. Check out the video of Piper lashing her tail. “She was such a strange little cat.”

At Mind of Mog, Meowza demonstrates advanced yoga positions as part of his Wordless Wednesday offering.  He also reminds us that cleanliness and wordlessness go together. On the complete opposite end of the spectrum is his reaction to receiving his secret paws package today.

One thing that comes with the holiday season is an increase in sickness. This seems to hold true not only for humans, but cats as well, and the cats a When Cats Attack are dealing with the own round of plague and pestilence. We certainly hope they recover soon.

Sniffie and the other cats at Friends FurEver wish their canine family members a Happy 9th Birthday. We can’t think of a better present for a pair of handsome dogs than to be featured in a blog article devoted to cats .

Sounds like things are getting a bit cold in Houston, and although Momma Grace and Company received almost no snow, it sounds like they got a decent covering of frost. Frost and snow are certainly pretty, but the cats have the right idea by staying toasty warm inside.

That concludes the Carnival of the Cats for now. If we missed you due to our technical difficulties, or you would like to be included, please let us know.

Today I had a rehearsal for next week’s Pmocatat Ensemble performance at the Luggage Store Gallery. Pmocatat stands for “prerecorded music on cds and tapes and things”, and among the prerecorded sounds I plan to use this time are some recordings of Luna:

The name of the microphone I used this morning to record her is also called Luna. It is a pretty decent microphone, though recording a cat is going to be challenging with any equipment. Here is a recording of her purring:

You can hear a recording here.

I also used the audio from Luna’s chattering videos.

For those “in the business,” I would like to mention that using Pro Tools (my default option) to extract the sounds from the video did not work at all – it was difficult to do and produced really noisy results – while using Final Cut Pro plus the free program Audacity worked great.

All this preparation work got us rather tired, so time for a nap:

Weekend Cat Blogging #235 will be hosted by Kashim, who stepped in at the last minute.

And don’t forget that Carnival of Cats will be hosted tomorrow right here at CatSynth! To participate, please submit your post here.

From our friend Eric Pochesci at Polynominal, another picture of Mimi, this time with an Elka Synthex:

You can find out more about the Synthex here.

This morning I brought Luna home. She immediately went about reacquainting herself with her domain:

In addition to being reunited, we marked her birthday with gifts and treats. She also received a card from a far-away friend of ours:

Doesn’t the cat on the card bear a striking resemblance?

We also had a belated Thanksgiving, complete with leftover turkey from New York:

It’s great to be home together again.