WTF-Beta

@jon-nyc I am so sorry to hear that!

Air travel is so awful these days. Hopefully your new itinerary with UA wasn't too expensive, and suits your travel plans etc.

@wtg said in My "final exam" for piano class this semester:

oh wait, you must mean links embedded in the posts in the thread...

Yep! I was curious about the other arrangement I had linked, I might have it somewhere but I don't recall. But I'm pretty sure the Kaneyasu one I mentioned is (was) a piano recording of the exact arrangement that I have (and play in the video at the top of this thread). I got it from a Japanese music magazine and they had links to performances of the scores. But that link appears to be broken as well.

@jon-nyc said in What news media do you pay for/subscribe to?:

The Dispatch

I hardly ever look at that site, not for any particular reason, only just because it's not on my radar. Do you recommend it?

@wtg said in My "final exam" for piano class this semester:

I love that piece! And very nicely played.

Thank you!! It's super fun to play!

Blasts from the past

Oh yeah!!! Too bad the links are broken. Well at least you can't listen to the Kanemasu version and hear how much slower I'm playing it!

Ok, so that was 2006, and I never did get it playable back then. So, only 19 years later!

What news media (whether online or paper) do you pay for or have a subscription to? Especially traditional outlets, but others as well.

I used to have more paid subscriptions, but I have access to so much through my uni library. I canceled WaPo (on principle) and NYT (bc I get it for free through my uni). Right now I’m only paying for three subscriptions: the Japan Times, the Atlantic, and Pianist Magazine. All online.

Do you pay for any “non-traditional” news media outlets or online sites (e.g., a Substack account or Medium)?

I sometimes donate to Wikipedia and since I read the Guardian a fair amount, I was thinking maybe I should donate to them as well.

@jon-nyc said in 3 hours and 42 minutes:

almost 4 hours of hold music with a ‘your call is important to us’ message every minute.

That is easily the worst thing about waiting on hold!!

How you got everything squared away!!

@wtg wow those are amazing!!! I can't pick a favorite!

@jon-nyc OH NO!!! I'm so sorry!!!

Airline customer service is the absolute worst.

Good luck!!!

@Piano-Dad said in My "final exam" for piano class this semester:

Glad you're continuing to play!

Yep! Sometimes I can barely get 15 minutes to practice, but those 15 minutes make it possible to continue, and then when I have, I can actually make meaningful progress.

You know, I remember a very long thread on PW about that Croatian Rhapsody and all of its variants many moons ago!

You have an excellent memory! I’m pretty sure I started that, and it was probably 20 years ago now! I think I sent some people physical copies of the piece in the mail even?? But I never got the piece playable, so even thought there are still some rough patches, it’s nice to be able to play it now.

@Bernard said in My "final exam" for piano class this semester:

Congrats on taking lessons! It's great that you've found a teacher that you like, so important.

She’s a PhD candidate in the piano performance program here. And she’s easily one of the best teachers I’ve ever worked with, which is. Saying a lot since I’ve had a lot of teachers over the years!

What an interesting piece you played. Who is the composer? I think you did a great job!

Thank you!! There are two places I really flubbed in this recording, and if I worked on it for another two weeks (both in terms of practicing and in terms of jus taking more recordings over several days) I think I could do much better, but there is a deadline and also I am ready to move onto other things!

The composer is Tonic Huljic, who I know exactly nothing about! The piece was made popular in/around 2003 by the pianist Maksim, who is a kind of cheesy “pop classical” pianist who got a lot of attention in Japan but I don’t think attracted much attention in the U.S.

My piano is being tuned Tuesday and I'm thinking of recording the piece I worked on this semester as well.

I would love to hear it if you do! Am I remembering correctly that you’re working on something Chopin?

I want to get my piano tuned as well, it also has a bit of work to be done. There’s a clicking noise in one spot in the action when I pedal, my tuner told me that the keyboard and the action behind it (if I’m remembering that right) both have to come out to fix it. He said it’s a half day job. It’s more noticeable when it’s drier, so he recommended waiting until mid-winter when the internal humidity has been consistent for several weeks. He’ll do that work and then tune it…

I think I might have mentioned that I'm taking piano lessons on campus this semester. It has been great! I love my teacher and I love the structure. We were supposed to have a "jury" (I would perform for three instructors) but the head instructor is on maternity leave, so I have to upload a video instead. I think I'm done, my piano teacher said it doesn't have to be perfect, and if I finish it this weekend, we can spend the last two lessons on Christmas music and other fun things, so I think I'm going to go with this:

@wtg Love it!!! What a beautiful car!

Also: 2500 hours worth of repairs — yikes!!

Congratulations @piano-dad !!!

@dougg what did you do now??

@Axtremus said in AI to take the job of spiritual media too:

Cannot think of anyone I know personally whom I want to see the AI version of.

I was thinking it might be fun to see a version of someone I know (who's still alive!) but the problem is that it's not benign, there's no way to be sure that the data for the AI version wouldn't be sucked up and sent into the ether, only to turn up somewhere else...

@Axtremus OMG I can’t figure out my reaction to that video… it’s terrifying, heartbreaking, sad… I feel like if that were me, it would make things worse.

My mother is 81, and we’re very close. I know she’s not going to be here forever, but I don’t think I could do that video thing….

My father passed away over seven years ago .. I miss him every day, sometimes it’s more painful, sometimes it’s less… and although I wish I could hear his voice again, I want to hear his voice, not a synthesized version of it.

@Bernard said in Windows 11:

not everyone is thrilled with Windows 11 being turned into an AI-agentic operating system

This is a huge pain in the rear for me. My work machine is a Windows 11 machine, and I have little control over most of.

Copilot (MS's AI) wants to insert itself into everything and it's hard to turn off. It's like Clippy. I mostly have figured out how to get it out of my way, but it still tries to get me to turn it back on periodically. It is hugely annoying.

Also, in MS Word, I feel like MS's grammar checker comes up with incorrect suggestions more than it used to. I ignore them, but I notice the inaccuracy more. I type fast and sloppy, so in the past the grammar checker + spell check were pretty helpful but much less so now.

Who’s decorating for the holidays?

We are!! I can share pics later as well. (Although it looks mostly the same as last year)

Mr SK put our two trees up before thanksgiving. And then I got them decorated over a period of a few days (since I’m less mobile than normal I spread it out a bit more).

We have a wreath on the front door and I’m hoping to add wreaths on the garage door carriage lights.

But no big yard lights. That’s the one thing I haven’t figured out yet. The lights of it, I mean. I love outdoor lights though so I would love to have some …

Thanks for posting that!

Self-training AI is a bit scary to me. We (or rather, AI trainers) already don’t fully understand how it does what it does. And quality control, checking for veracity etc. is already an issue. How will we be able to evaluate AI that’s self-trained?

@jon-nyc Indeed!!