provides a treasure trove of practical techniques and ingenious approaches. In this captivating guide, noted artist
Jane Freeman shows readers, step by step, how to use modified kit components, and found and handmade objects to create intensely detailed miniature constructions.
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May 14, 2007
A Tiny Observation
The New York subway system, Beethoven, and West Side Story have something in common. Beethoven was deaf and subways are deafening, but that isn't it. The subway runs on the West Side, where West Side Story takes place--but that's not it. West Side Story immortalizes the rivalry between two gangs; when Beethoven penned this concerto, Vienna was under siege by France. But war isn't it either.
What the subway, Beethoven, and West Side Story share is a little tune of three notes.
For, when almost any subway pulls out of almost any station, you hear three enigmatic tones ... which sound exactly like “There’s a Place [for Us]” by Leonard Bernstein. And exactly like -- what I believe was the inspiration for Bernstein's song -- five notes that come twenty seconds into the Adagio of Beethoven's Fifth Piano Concerto (which came to be called the "Emperor," but not by Beethoven).
So every time I hear a train leave a station, I think of Ludwig and Leonard, two of the great "B" names in music. It goes without saying that those three notes sound on the L and B lines too.
Posted by Jane on May 14, 2007 8:50 PM
