Explorations in Music

When someone mentions a violin, viola, cello, or double bass, you likely picture a wooden instrument with strings in that distinctive hourglass shape. But there's something just as important that many gloss over: the bow. As seen above, just as the shape of each instrument is the same, the shape of the bows are the same. In fact, the make of standard bows hasn’t changed since 1800! So what was going on before this, and how did we arrive at the bow we use today? The Baroque Period In Western music history, the time period that comes just before 1800 is the Baroque period, covering the 1600s and 1700s. The style of bow used during this time is appropriately named the “Baroque bow.” Even though tweaks were being made over time, 2 traits were apparent: the wooden stick had a convex shape, and they were shorter than modern bows. In the image below, compare the modern violin bow on top to the recreation of a violin bow from the 1600s. Top to bottom: modern bow, classical bow (1750-1900),...

Videogames were a big part of my childhood, especially playing them with my older brother. Our favorite game was Nintendo’s “Kirby’s Return to Dreamland,” a cute, stylized 2-D platformer released in 2011. It was part of a larger franchise with many other games, but this was the only one we owned, so we played it all the time. You can imagine we eventually got to the final boss and beat the game. And while I never noticed as a kid, the background music, titled “C-R-O-W-N-E-D,” is very intricate and sets the perfect tone for a grand finale. This piece, along with the whole soundtrack for the game, was composed by Hirokazu Ando and Jun Ishikawa. They’ve worked together to compose for several other games in the Kirby franchise. Ishikawa has said that he writes music with the intention to “entertain players,” keeping it isolated within the game and not with the intention of “performing live” (Wikipedia). We will get into all of the entertaining details in a moment, but first, what are ...

I moved for the first time when I was nine years old. It was from the east coast to Alaska, somewhere totally unknown to me. But I knew at least one thing would stay the same: I would be joining a dance studio. Among all these changes, I had something familiar to hold on to. So, what a wonderful coincidence that the first ballet dance I learned at my new studio was to the song “Anchor” by Mindy Gledhill. The first verse is something that’s stuck with me through all these years: “When all the world is spinning ‘round like a red balloon way up in the clouds and my feet will not stay on the ground you anchor me back down.” Lyrics The main idea that I find in the lyrics is the narrator feeling lost, and something is helping them find reassurance and stability. Some more lyrics that jump out to me are “restless soul,” and “when I’m lost, I feel so very found.” I’ve seen that different people relate to this song in their own way, and interpret the “something” anchoring them down as some...