Slick tracking shot in the new OK Go video

The group OK Go performed at the opening of my university’s academic year back in late August and the lead singer said that they had just returned from Japan. It looks like they spent some time while there creating the video to accompany the release of their new single I won’t let you down. The group has developed a reputation for creating highly choreographed complex videos that are done in a single take and the new one follows that pattern, with a lot of people engaged in high-precision maneuvers on nifty little motorized unicycles that I had not seen before, though they seem like they are way cooler than the Segway.
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Bolero

There is something deeply hypnotic about listening to Ravel’s Bolero. It is like getting engrossed in a mystery novel and not wanting to stop until you know how it ends. In this performance by the London Symphony Orchestra, we get to see close up the increasing intensity of the musicians at the climax approaches. I wonder how hard it is for the percussionists to keep that steady tempo for 15 minutes, because that is crucial.
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Valuable church organ burned in fire

One thing that you have to give credit to Christianity is that it gave us some great organ music and some wonderful organs were built to play them. But via a reader, I learned of a historic church organ in our region that was destroyed by fire. The reader has a personal connection to the organ that increases his sense of loss, because his father was one of the people who was instrumental in getting the organ installed. He adds:
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Songs for spring

I first heard the song Everybody’s Talkin’ by Harry Nilsson when it was part of the soundtrack to the film Midnight Cowboy and it immediately struck a chord with me, both the words and music. I came across this performance by Nilsson on the web and thought I would share it with those of you who may have never heard it. Like George Harrison’s Here Comes the Sun when he was part of The Beatles, it is a song that I think of when we are emerging from the cold of winter.
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The Israel-Palestinian issue in rap

The so-called Middle East ‘Peace Process’, which needs to be relabeled to the more accurate ‘Delay and Deny Palestinian Rights Process’, has been called off for the umpteenth time since the Israeli government objects to the fact that the Palestinian Authority, that governs the Occupied Territories in the West Bank, has applied for recognition from various international agencies and has also arrived at a unity agreement with Hamas that governs Gaza.
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