New iMac for Me!

Yes, I finally did it.  I finally made the official switch to Mac today.  I've been carrying around this quote from the Apple store for weeks resisting the urge but I finally broke down after spending two days getting my stupid Dell with Vista, yeah double my fun, working again with the wireless printer and the sound card.  I've had to reinstall the drivers for both of those suckers no less than 5 times in 2010.  They usually stop working after a power outage or a Windows update - both are unpredictable and potentially catastrophic! 

So I went in with the notion that I'd get one of the laptops... maybe just the MacBook Pro since I don't really need a desktop replacement (which I've never had anyway).  I always buy laptops because they typically have all I need.  I prefer clean spaces and a desktop is just too big. I even though about the mini Mac but in the end, the cost of the monitor, keyboard and other peripherals would have been really expensive.  The iMac with a 21.5" monitor/cpu was the same as the MacBook Pro so it was pretty obvious that if I was going to go Mac, it would be the iMac.  I got my new baby home around 3pm, had some lunch before I broke open the box.

Now, a side note.  Earlier today, I sent out a note asking some friends if they wanted to see a movie and get some dinner this weekend.  I had every intention of going to a matinee and relax until I got some responses.  Well, that quickly changed once I bought the iMac.  Luckily everyone was busy because by 330p I was buried in my office, reorganizing the desk to make room for my new jem and shuffling the damn Dell to the other corner of my desk only for as long as it would take to transfer the files over.  Yeah, it's been about 10.5 hours now and I've only stopped to eat a little bit while I was surfing, copying, pasting, shuffling, listening and watching just about everything I could possibly spend my time doing in one sitting!  Yeah, I'm hooked already - this baby rocks!  It only took me about 15 minutes to get the hang of the mouse and the way the folders and system structure work. 

Thank god for Firefox and Delicious!  Those two apps are the best ones I've ever had for what they were meant to do.  My only struggle now is getting my Outlook calendar and iCal set up.  I think I might be taking a trip back to the Apple store for that one because there are so many problems with outlook invitations and iCal invitations.  OK I must stop and take a break... I mean go to sleep. It's 2:44am and I'm still typing away!

Music & Technology - Match made?

The debate and struggle in the school system over music education may get a little twist.  Students from the Stanford Laptop Orchestra create music with their laptops instead of instruments. Ge Wang, the orchestra's founder, has worked with students from music to engineering to develop their own software language, Chuck, to create and generate the unique sounds and equipment necessary to build a sound unlike anything you've heard.  This musical group has been performing at colleges and city parks as you'll see on YouTube.  There's a performance at Macworld and Apple has even dedicated a page on Musical Macs.  Although the sounds they produce may not be a symphony or pop tune you can pick out, it goes to show you that even the most technologically minded people get together to be creative, they might call it music.

The real reason I wanted to write this blog was not to share yet another link to YouTube or Apple.  I wanted to pose the question to encourage thought about musical expression and how you may define it.  It goes without saying everyone has a different idea of what good music is but we usually agree that it's music.  

So what defines music?  Does it require an instrument? What defines an instrument?  Can a computer or software program replace an instrument like a piano or a flute?  I would challenge the assumption that music requires an instrument at all.  Child prodigy August Rush heard music in a field of grass and created sounds I'd never heard from a guitar he didn't even know how to play.  Yes, the movie is fiction but the message is very real.

Music is an art. Art is interpretation.  You may interpret what you hear differently one day to the next but the vehicle that produces that sound isn't restricted to only the ones you know today.  Sound can be a means of expressing a feeling or a tone whether it is in the form of a song or simply the inflection of your voice.  So it must mean that like beauty is in the eye of the beholder, sound is music to the listening ear.  So what have you heard from your toaster today?