10 Essential David Bowie Songs

Wired: 10 Essential David Bowie Songs to Remember the Iconoclast

DAVID BOWIE, WHO died Sunday at the age of 69, released more than 20 studio albums (and dozens of singles) during a decades-long career that found him infatuated with everything from starry-eyed space-folk to guitar-hero glam-rock to gurgling electronica. Reducing that output to a single best-of list is impossible, but here are 10 tunes that, at the very least, display his verve, his vigor, and his ongoing love of the new:

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Is Vinyl Making A Comeback?

Tech Times: The Turntable Is Alive And Well: Sony Unveils Direct-Drive PS-HX500 To Battle Panasonic’s Technics SL-1200

The turntable is something many audiophiles still enjoy using, and that is not going to change anytime soon, not with Sony pushing its PS-HX500 turntable to those who are interested.

There aren't many differences to the PS-HX500 when compared to other high-end turntables. If you want it to do the regular turntable stuff, this Sony offering will do just fine, but so will other competing products.

What the Japanese giant is betting on is the device's analog-to-digital conversion. Other competing products similar to the PS-HX500 do not come with this feature, so that's a huge defining thing Sony will surely want to transform into a selling point.

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CSN Editor: YES!!!! Being one who grew up with vinyl .... and who still has a large vinyl collection .... this puts a smile on my face because this type of music is great to listen to.

More News On Sony's New Turntable For Music Lovers

It's all about the audiophile as Sony shows off light-bulb speaker, high-tech turntable -- CNet
CES: Sony debuts high-tech turntable, super-thin TVs, 4K video camera -- FOX News
Sony Unveils LP Turntables for High-Resolution Audio Era -- WSJ
This new Sony turntable is turnt -- The Verge
Sony's New PS-HX500 Turntable Will Make You Want To Start A Record Collection -- Tech Times

Why Does Rock Music 'Bring Out The Animal In Us'?

Why Rock Music 'Brings Out The Animal In Us' -- The Telegraph

Rock music such as Jimi Hendrix-style electric guitar excites us because it recreates the sound of primal distress calls and "brings out the animal in us", scientists claim.

Sudden, jarring changes in pitch and frequency play on the same emotional mechanisms as the signals which animals use to alert one another of danger, a study found.

When animals cry out in distress they force a large amount of air through their voice box very quickly, producing a discordant effect designed to grab the attention and provoke an emotional response in other animals.

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My Comment: What does Justin Beiber bring out?

A Head Injury Turns A Man Into A Musical Savant

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Less than six years ago, Derek Amato had only mediocre guitar skills. But after suffering a concussion – and never having a lesson – he became a piano-playing sensation. NBC's John Yang reports.

Head Injury Turns Man Into Musical Savant -- MSNBC

When Derek Amato crashed headfirst into the hard bottom of a pool, he was scared about what he might have done to his brain. But amazingly the fallout from that accident wasn’t all bad. Along with the headaches and other post-concussion symptoms, the accident brought Amato an unexpected gift: it turned him into a musical savant.

Although Amato had always loved music, he’d never been serious about playing any instrument before the head injury. Amato dabbled a bit with guitar before the accident but described his musical ability to TODAY as “on a scale of 1 to 10 . . . like a 2.5, close to 3.”

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My Comment: Truly incredible.

Man's Oldest Musical Instrument Is 42,000 Years Old (Give Or Take)

Looks like our earliest ancestors enjoyed music, too

42,000-Year-Old Mammoth Ivory And Bird Bone Flutes Are Oldest Instruments Ever Found -- Y! Tech/Yahoo News

It looks like our earliest human ancestors enjoyed recreational activities other than painting on cave walls. A study by Oxford University researchers revealed that the oldest musical instruments ever discovered date as far back as 42,000 to 43,000 years ago. These instruments are flutes made out of mammoth ivory and bird bones (above).

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My Comment: One can only wonder on what were the melodies played by early man.

Oldest Surviving Musical Composition

Seikilos Epitaph - Song of Seikilos -- Diana Hsieh

The Seikilos epitaph is the oldest surviving example of a complete musical composition, including musical notation, from anywhere in the world. The song, the melody of which is recorded, alongside its lyrics, in the ancient Greek musical notation, was found engraved on a tombstone, near Aidin, Turkey (not far from Ephesus). The find has been dated variously from around 200 BC to around AD 100.

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My Comment: An incredible piece of music.

Pick The Stradivarius Violin

Stradivarius Violin. Photo: Wikimedia.org.

Double-Blind Violin Test: Can You Pick The Strad? -- NPR

In the world of violins, the names Stradivari and Guarneri are sacred. For three centuries, violin-makers and scientists have studied the instruments made by these Italian craftsmen. So far no one has figured out what makes their sound different. But a new study now suggests maybe they aren't so different after all.

OK, here's a test. Clip one is a musical phrase from Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto in D Major. Clip two is the same phrase. The same musician plays both. But one is on a Stradivarius violin, the other on a violin made in 1980. See if you can tell the difference.

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My Comment: I choose the wrong one .... hmmmm .... and I use to be a professional musician.

Is Music A Powerful Antidepressant?

Making Music Proves To Be Powerful Antidepressant -- Live Science

Making music might help lift more depressed people out of the dumps than common antidepressant medications do, the results of a new study suggest.

That's not to say the people with depression should toss out their meds and pick up a guitar. The music therapy administered to patients in the new study was in addition to regular therapy, and the patients continued their regular medication routines. But about one out of four depression sufferers is likely to respond to music therapy, Finnish researchers reported in August in the British Journal of Psychiatry. In comparison, a 2009 review of research published in the journal Cochrane Database Systemic Review found that doctors must treat between seven and 16 people with tricyclic antidepressant drugs for one person to see improvement.

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How Piano Wires Changed Through The Centuries

Even as the wires used in pianos changed from iron to steel, sound quality has remained largely the same. Getty Images

How Piano Wires Changed Through Centuries -- Discovery

Since Mozart's time, piano wires have changed in content -- but very little in quality, research shows.

* The wire inside pianos has undergone significant changes between the piano's origins in the early 1700s until the late 1880s.
* Research suggests that piano designers used music wire to reach similar harmonic levels despite working with different metals.
* Piano designers balance tension and stiffness of music wire, but many other factors are considered as well.

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Making Music On A Microscopic Scale

Image of the chip containing six mass-spring systems (i.e. six tones). (Credit: Image courtesy of University of Twente)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Sep. 29, 2010) — Strings a fraction of the thickness of a human hair, with microscopic weights to pluck them: Researchers and students from the MESA+ Institute for Nanotechnology of the University of Twente in The Netherlands have succeeded in constructing the first musical instrument with dimensions measured in mere micrometres -- a 'micronium' -- that produces audible tones. A composition has been specially written for the instrument.

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Why Music Is Good For You

From Scientific American:

A survey of the cognitive benefits of music makes a valid case for its educational importance. But that's not the best reason to teach all children music, says Philip Ball.

Remember the Mozart effect? Thanks to a suggestion in 1993 that listening to Mozart makes you cleverer, there has been a flood of compilation CDs filled with classical tunes that will allegedly boost your baby's brain power.

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My Comment: For me .... when there is a melody that I like .... it gives me a sense of relaxation and peace of mind.

Music And lyrics: How The Brain Splits Songs

When tunes and lyrics diverge

From The New Scientist:

Your favourite song comes on the radio. You hum the tune; the lyrics remind you of someone you know. Is your brain processing the words and music separately or as one? It's a hotly debated question that may finally have an answer.

People with aphasia, who can't speak, can still hum a tune, suggesting music and lyrics are processed separately. Yet brain scans show that music and language activate the same areas, which might mean the brain treats them as one signal.

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Was Jimi Hendrix's Ambidexterity The Key To His Virtuosity?

Right (and left) hand man ... Jimi Hendrix. Photograph: Marc Sharratt/Rex Features

From The Guardian:

Guitar hero's 'mixed-handedness' was secret to his genius, argues American psychologist.

Was Jimi Hendrix's ambidexterity the secret to his talent? This is the question explored in a new paper by psychologist Stephen Christman (via TwentyFourBit), who argues that Hendrix's versatility informed not just his guitar-playing – but his lyrics too.

According to Christman, who is based at the University of Toledo, Hendrix was not strictly left-handed. Although he played his right-handed guitar upside down, and used his left hand to throw, comb his hair and hold cigarettes, Hendrix wrote, ate and held the telephone with his right hand. He was, Christman argues, "mixed-right-handed". And this "mixed"-ness, signaling better interaction between the left and right hemispheres of the guitarist's brain, suffused every part of his music.

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Singing 'Rewires' Damaged Brain

From The BBC:

Teaching stroke patients to sing "rewires" their brains, helping them recover their speech, say scientists.

By singing, patients use a different area of the brain from the area involved in speech.

If a person's "speech centre" is damaged by a stroke, they can learn to use their "singing centre" instead.

Researchers presented these findings at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in San Diego.

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Online Music Piracy 'Destroys Local Music'

Photo: Lady Gaga topped the digital download chart of 2009.

From The BBC:

Countries like Spain run the risk of becoming "cultural deserts" because of online file-sharing, the music industry has claimed.

The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) says that global government legislation is essential to the sector's survival.

It cited Spain as an example of a country which does not have laws in place to prevent illegal downloads.

The sales of albums by local artists there have fallen by 65% in five years.

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How Music 'Moves' Us: Listeners' Brains Second-Guess the Composer

New research predicts that expectations about what is going to happen next in a piece of music should be different for people with different musical experience and sheds light on the brain mechanisms involved. (Credit: iStockphoto/Anna Bryukhanova)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Jan. 16, 2010) — Have you ever accidentally pulled your headphone socket out while listening to music? What happens when the music stops? Psychologists believe that our brains continuously predict what is going to happen next in a piece of music. So, when the music stops, your brain may still have expectations about what should happen next.

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New Pipe Organ Sounds Echo Of Age Of Bach

The organ at Christ Church, Episcopal, in Rochester. Stewart Cairns for The New York Times

From The New York Times:

ROCHESTER — The ceremonial pipe organ of the 18th century was the Formula One racer of its time, a masterpiece of human ingenuity so elegant in its outward appearance that a casual observer could only guess at the complexity that lay within.

Each organ was designed to fit its intended space, ranging in size from local churches where townspeople could worship to vast cathedrals fit for royalty. The builders were precision craftsmen celebrated for their skill in hand-making thousands of moving parts and in shaping and tuning metal and wooden pipes to mimic the sounds of each instrument in an orchestra.

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Music Linked To Marijuana Use

From Live Science:

Teens who listen to music that mentions marijuana are significantly more likely to use the drug, a new study finds.

The research was based on surveys with 959 ninth-graders.

"Students who listen to music with the most references to marijuana are almost twice as likely to have used the drug than their peers whose musical tastes favor songs less focused on substance use," said University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine researcher Dr. Brian Primack, who led the study.

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Who Should Be the First Band To Play in Space?

Spandau Ballet

From Popular Science:

This morning an odd story surfaced and began orbiting the Web: Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic signed '80s rock heartthrobs (now aging '80s rock heartthrobs) Spandau Ballet to be the first band to rock out in space. Citing a press release of dubious origin, several blogs and even the UK's Daily Mail reported the story, even naming possible songs the group would play during a five-minute weightless set.

But we can all breathe a collective sigh of relief. The Internet has hoodwinked us once again.

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A History Of Music Sales (Graphical Repreentation)