@ztsamudzi there are various pan-european dances found all over the continent, e.g. polka, schottish, waltz, mazur/mazurek/mazurka, polska, slängpolska/polonaise/ländler/steyrer/wickler (modern term), minuet, quadrille, etc. Each dance form typically retains the same basic step everywhere but has regional variants, or is related to dances from different areas, as the dances and music travelled along trade routes. Many fascinating examples exist of tunes or dances which are found in parallel sources in many different areas, which is a nice way of getting rid of nationalists who try to appropriate this stuff for nationalism. A lot of these dances made their way over to America too, and in a lot of cases (IIRC) mixed with black dance+music culture and became the basis for a lot of n. american traditional dances.

Most of these were danced a lot in Europe over the past 300 years but then more or less died out in the 19th century (as the style of music changed and Europe started to import and appropriate e.g. latin dances), before being rediscovered as part of the various folk revivals in the 70s. Now they’re danced casually as “balfolk” or “eurodance”. Not widespread in the mainstream, but not totally obscure either (e.g. google “balfolk”) with widespread events and a more and more progressive pedagogy.

@rknLA @free_bear_rides impuse response sample as in for conv. reverb? Not sure what you mean, the hurdy gurdy isn’t a space you can sample (…is it?) Such a recording almost certainly doesn’t exist already, but I might be able to make you one if I know exactly what it is you need…

@aaronpk thanks! Drone and trompette (buzzing) sound are acoustic, the melody is just the synth. Magnets in the keys + hall effect sensors on a board underneath, a magnetic rotary encoder on the shaft controlling noteon/off and expression, and an arduino inside the keybox putting it all together and sending MIDI signal out. The whole thing is built into the instrument, which also works great acoustic or amplified. There are a lot of improvements to make, but I think this is a good start!

@quinnnorton I have observed this too on varying scales, call it the “pendulum effect”. Pushing a society/group/individual really quickly to one extreme of an axis seems to result in it “swinging” to the other extreme, and (in theory?) back and forth. GDR and aftermath is one good example of this. Usual disclaimer: not an expert/historian, someone else probably figured this out in much more detail than me already.

@debcha yes yes yes! books which keep on giving; with every re-read, they reflect or highlight something new depending on what’s happening in my life/what I’ve learned since reading them the last time. Rare works which are not only great in themselves, or a great mirror of the reader, but both simultaneously

For those unfamiliar with #puredata, the equivalent in python would be creating a script which, in order to get user input, writes another python script containing a reference to the first, which, when run by the user, sends its output back to the first script. Which then launches another python process (based on the results of the first sub-script), and manages it’s status.

It’s a programming paradigm which makes absolutely no sense in any other environment, but in puredata is surprisingly elegant — a pleasant side-effect of the programming environment and end-user environment being effectively the same.

Btw, this is the first experimental step towards the most exciting project idea I’ve had in quite some time… watch this space!

@aaronpk classic case of uneducated, path-of-least-resistance response to time-pressurised tech problem :/ saw key was expired, wanted to fix it, didn’t know only public keys expire not private ones, no obvious public key renewal UI flow in GPGTools UI, so made a new keypair. I suppose I’m stuck with the new one now as I revoked the old one. It’s a pity, as I actually got a few people to sign my old key, not that that seems to have a practical use case…?

@jkphl sounds like you had a great time! Sad I couldn’t make it this time, other projects got in the way. Definitely want to attend/help organise IWC stuff in Germany in the future!

@w03e agreed, my favourite way of describing Iceland was always “an island on every edge”

@benwerd if you want to come visit an old German mill w/ organic garden and musical instrument building workshop, drop me a line :)

So we just have to hope UPS doesn’t suddenly “pivot” ;) The package this email was about might be of interest to you… I’m getting an X-Carve! Mainly for hurdy gurdy making, but all kinds of ideas for silly stuff to make for IWC… stamps? wooden badges?

@isislovecruft I read that as “POSITION LENS” the first time round, which is somehow more poetic? and makes about as much sense

@AbbeyFenbert I believe gorm is what is gained when we live gormfully? i.e. not gormlessly?

@benwerd probably time for an ear irrigation! They’re super fun and afterwards you can hear EVERYTHING.

@aaronpk so are you still planning to blog about the process?

Hello Steffen! Hopefully this reply will show up…

whoooooooooooop!

Thanks to everyone who came to the workshop on Saturday! It was great fun to dance with you all, and to get some international perspectives on polka traditions :) I hope you all had as good a time as I did!

If you missed it, didn’t hear about it or want to do it all over again, we’ll be running a similar workshop at this year’s Vaka festival in Akureyri (15th-18th June), and there’ll be all sorts of other nice stuff going on too.

Until then, keep up the nice music and dancing in Reykjavík, I’m looking forward to being back :)

P.S. if anyone took photos, it’d be great to have copies — posted here is fine, emailed in high resolution to barnaby@waterpigs.co.uk is even better!

Woohoo, die beste Drehleierspieler und Schalmeispielerin werden in Hamburg spielen! Verpass das nicht, Norddeutsche freunde :)

@realscientists I always thought those were ankles, and their anatomical “knees” are buried inside what appears to be their bodies?