The latest fitness craze to sweep the country is, without a doubt, dance cardio. From early inspiration (that would be your mom?s ?80s aerobics classes) to the first ?trendy? incarnations (like the method made famous by Gwyneth Paltrow?s trainer, Tracy Anderson), the movement has evolved into classes like 305 Fitness.
305 Fitness is not a workout studio; it?s the name of the company, and the classes are held at dance studios and other private spaces in several major cities. In New York, that?s Stepping Out Studios in Chelsea, where you?d usually expect to find a lot of salsa-ing and Foxtrotting going on. But after the 6:30 p.m. ballroom dance class at Stepping Out Studios wrapped up, a very different crowd was waiting to fill up the room last Thursday. Including me.
The ballroom dance students, in their proper dance shoes and tights, filtered out into the waiting room, where young girls (and one guy) in sweats, cut-off t-shirts, and a sprinkling of Lululemon were waiting for 305 Fitness to start. The teacher, 305 Fitness founder Sadie Kurzban, was carrying a set of fluorescent disco lights. The DJ (yes, classes have a live DJ) was armed with a playlist of Pitbull, Swedish House Mafia, and Timbaland.
Courtesy of 305 Fitness
I wasn?t quite sure what to expect when Kurzban sauntered in to face her impressive crowd. At first glance, Kurzban is petite, young, very fit, and very self-assured. She ripped off her shirt within the first 5 minutes of class, dropped a few F-bombs that caught me off-guard, and even made a point of saying that everyone should get wild. Like, real wild. Like, Girls Gone Wild-style wild. I wasn?t too sure what that meant, but knew that my shirt was staying on.
The class began with everyone playing follow-the-leader to Kurzban?s minimally-cued moves. Step touch? Grapevine? Lunges? I knew these moves. The class continued with non-stop choreography, and Kurzban took it to a deliberately sexier and sassier place with a lot of air-humping, fist-pumping, and Zumba-like sections.
At first, I was worried Kurzban could be annoying. Kind of like the girl in your college lit class who always talks about feminism. Or the girl who runs on the treadmill for half an hour at 10.0 in tiny booty shorts in the middle of the gym. And she kind of embodies both; a graduate of Brown?s class of 2012, Kurzban is ?obsessed with running? and used to teach Zumba back in Providence. But after completing the class, I can say this: I?m not annoyed at her at all. In fact, I can?t wait to go back.
If you live in New York City or Providence, like dancing, and are looking for a fun way to burn extra calories, take a class. It will be fun, I promise. In fact, you might even see me there.
"Pepper's ghost" isn't the sort of phrase you hear very often at a show like SXSW. In amongst all the latest generation technology, there aren't too many folks discussing hundreds years old optical concepts. But the the idea's a driving force in the Palm Top Theater, an iPhone case that turns smartphone videos into a miniature 3D viewing experience. The peripheral utilizes three small drop down displays -- the rear is a full mirror with two half mirrors in front it, reflecting images from the phone display into what appears to be a three-dimension object -- and really, it a stunning little effect.
The Palm Top requires the use of a proprietary file format that essentially splits the displayed image or video into three parts. The company's providing some video for users, as well as a converter app to make custom footage. The device is available now for around $36 -- not super expensive, though it's hard to see such a device as anything but a niche product, especially since the opening makes for a fairly limited viewing space. It would be extremely cool to see this on a larger space, but in the meantime, you're stuck with a little window into the technology.
"Sequester" sounds significantly sexier than it is. As in, "Sequester"? I don't even know 'er. See, I was right. For far too many Americans wondering what's going on, there's nothing at all sexy or funny about this rather shameful moment in American history and about the pathological failure of our government to work together and work big things out. So with that exceedingly depressing thought in mind, here are my Songs For The Sequester -- along with a few free suggestions from my followers at www.twitter.com/Wildaboutmusic. As always, whether you are Bob Woodward or Gene Sperling, please feel free and safe to make your own cost-effective additions to this playlist below.
LOW BUDGET - The Kinks MONEY AIN'T A THANG - Jay-Z BROTHER, CAN YOU SPARE A DIME? - Bing Crosby @klassyo FREE MONEY - Patti Smith BLUE MONEY - Van Morrison NO MONEY DOWN - Chuck Berry MONEYGRABBER - Fitz & The Tantrums CUT IT AWAY - Jackson Browne PAY FOR IT - Lloyd Cole CASH ON THE BARREL HEAD - The Louvin Brothers WHEN THE MONEY'S GONE - Cher AMERICAN PIE - Don McLean @MelindaBoum BILLS. BILLS, BILLS - Destiny's Child MR. BILL COLLECTOR - Bone Thugs N Harmony M-O-N-E-Y - Lyle Lovett TAXMAN - The Beatles @jena_fuller MONEY, MONEY - Liza Minnelli MONEY, MONEY, MONEY - Abba SHE WORKS HARD FOR THE MONEY - Donna Summer MONEY CHANGES EVERYTHING - Cyndi Lauper IF YOU'VE GOT THE MONEY, I'VE GOT THE TIME - Willie Nelson PRAISE THE LORD & SEND ME THE MONEY - Bobby Bare TAKIN' CARE OF BUSINESS - Bachman-Turner Overdrive MONEY'S TOO TIGHT TO MENTION - Simply Red IT'S MONEY THAT MATTERS - Randy Newman DOLLAR BILL BLUES - Townes Van Zandt
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Follow David Wild on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Wildaboutmusic
Disabled kids inspire musical instrument anyone can play Public release date: 1-Mar-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Nancy Salem mnsalem@sandia.gov 505-844-2739 DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. Not everyone can play music. You need timing and rhythm, an ear for pitch and notes and an ability to interpret sheet music and symbols. You need physical coordination to apply those talents plus control of lungs, lips, arms and fingers to match the mechanics of a musical instrument. And you need strength and stamina to sustain the sounds you create.
Taos, N.M., musician Dan Daily can do all that. But he knows plenty of people who can't. "My mom had a daycare center for severely disabled children when I was young. Those children impressed me," Daily said. "They were pretty much regular people but with disabled bodies. That stuck with me."
It inspired him to come up with a way for anyone to make music on an electronic instrument that got a boost with technical help from a Sandia National Laboratories researcher.
Daily, raised in a musical family in Chicago, went on to learn 20 instruments, from woodwinds such as flute, saxophone and clarinet to keyboard and bass. He earned a bachelor's degree in music from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a master's in music education from Indiana State University.
But he never forgot the challenged kids cared for by his mom, a registered nurse. "When I realized how difficult traditional instruments are to play, I thought there had to be a way to make things easier and more accessible for people without the gifts I had been given," he said.
Daily had a feeling electronics might bridge the gap between people with fine motor control and those without. Electronic instruments require the same techniques and coordination as regular ones, but Daily found he could separate the way notes are selected from how the instrument sounds. "With traditional instruments, note selection is intricately connected to the way the instrument is devised," he said. "With electronics you can divorce those."
Daily created a new instrument consisting of a microcontroller-based system that sends signals through a USB connection to another electronic device, such as a sound module or computer, which then produces sound. He named it MidiWing, a nod to the revolutionary MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) protocol, a set of commands that allows electronic musical instruments, performance controllers, computers and related devices to connect and communicate with each other.
MidiWing is a small box containing circuitry with several inputs that connect to switches and sensors, such as a joystick, mouse, slider or fader, that produce sound when moved. "You can plug in whatever control is appropriate to the person's physical condition," Daily said. "It sounds like any number of different instruments. The range of pitches can be narrowed or expanded, so the device can be made easier or more challenging as the person uses it and gets more familiar."
He started work on MidiWing in 2000, six years after moving to Taos. His first prototype and pilot projects were completed in 2004.
Then Daily hit a wall. The microprocessor chip he used was discontinued and he didn't have the resources to find another for the next prototype. "I was in a bad situation," he recalled.
Daily turned to the New Mexico Small Business Assistance (NMSBA) program, which pairs entrepreneurs with scientists at Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories. The state-funded program established in 2000 by the New Mexico Legislature helps small businesses get free technical support from the labs. It has provided $29.8 million in assistance to 1,876 companies in 33 counties.
Daily joined forces with Kent Pfeifer, a Sandia microsystems engineer who coincidentally has a background in music. Pfeifer plays trombone, piano and banjo, and was in his high school marching band. "I do understand music," Pfeifer said. "I know how scales should sound and how notes are produced."
Pfeifer helped Daily build a new prototype that uses an advanced, much more capable chip. "The idea was to build an instrument that has a whole bunch of different types of interfaces with the ability to run off a mouse, joystick or other kind of device that can be configured to the abilities of somebody with a disability," Pfeifer said. "You can play it with your mouth, your feet or a single hand."
Daily said Pfeifer took the concept and ran with it. "The implementation is all new," he said. "MidiWing has a lot more inputs and can be configured in a number of different ways. There are more ways to control the instrument."
The advanced microcontroller circuitry inside the MidiWing musical instrument can calculate the many different frequencies or pitches that produce complex musical sounds from the position of a joystick, mouse or other input. (Photo by Randy Montoya) Click on the thumbnail for a high-resolution image.
Pfeifer reprogrammed and modernized MidiWing with advanced microcontroller circuitry that made it smaller and more functional. "MidiWing works with the synthesizer software in a computer," he said. "A USB cable sends a series of hex commands built around the MIDI standard. The software in the computer interprets those and turns them into sounds."
MidiWing can calculate the many different frequencies or pitches that produce complex musical sounds from the position of the joystick or other input. The instrument simulates frequencies that are normally produced by the technique of the musician, for example, by the pressure of a player's lips on a brass instrument. "We know mathematically the frequency difference between note steps. We can write an equation," Pfeifer said. "That's programmed into this."
Pfeifer was more than just an adviser, Daily said. "He was pivotal. It was an incredible collaboration because Kent is a musician," he said. "The key to the whole project was that he understood what I was trying to do from a musician's standpoint. He was perfect. He has a music background and designs microcontroller products. I can't imagine how it could have gone better."
Pfeifer and Daily work together a few hours a month and are close to having an inexpensive product that can be manufactured for schools, hospitals, therapy and rehab centers and other places where people want to make music. "My motivation is to bring music-making to more people," said Daily, who founded a company, Musicode Innovations. "I've tested MidiWing mostly with children and disabled people. Children are perhaps the most successful. They are able to play far beyond what other music programs have ever produced. In a short amount of time they sound great."
MidiWing earlier this year was named one of 10 NMSBA projects that delivered outstanding innovations through the program during 2011. Some 340 small businesses participated last year.
Pfeifer said he enjoys the MidiWing as a musician. "I come into the lab sometimes and just play it," he said. "Then I'll think, 'Ah, I can make a change,' and start programming. I want to make it even better."
###
The New Mexico Small Business Assistance Program offers no-cost technical assistance to for-profit small businesses via lab staff at Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories. Assistance is provided in amounts of $10,000 or $20,000 depending on company location. NMSBA is accepting applications for 2013 at its website, www.nmsbaprogram.org. The program will issue a call for proposals in early February for leveraged projects that allow several qualifying businesses to join together for technical projects worth up to $100,000 in assistance. For questions or to get on the NMSBA mailing list contact Genaro Montoya at gmontoy@sandia.gov or 505-284-0625.
View videos of people playing the instrument at http://www.youtube.com/midiwing.
Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-program laboratory operated by Sandia Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lockheed Martin company, for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration. With main facilities in Albuquerque, N.M., and Livermore, Calif., Sandia has major R&D responsibilities in national security, energy and environmental technologies and economic competitiveness.
Sandia news media contact: Nancy Salem, mnsalem@sandia.gov, (505) 844-2739
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Disabled kids inspire musical instrument anyone can play Public release date: 1-Mar-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Nancy Salem mnsalem@sandia.gov 505-844-2739 DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. Not everyone can play music. You need timing and rhythm, an ear for pitch and notes and an ability to interpret sheet music and symbols. You need physical coordination to apply those talents plus control of lungs, lips, arms and fingers to match the mechanics of a musical instrument. And you need strength and stamina to sustain the sounds you create.
Taos, N.M., musician Dan Daily can do all that. But he knows plenty of people who can't. "My mom had a daycare center for severely disabled children when I was young. Those children impressed me," Daily said. "They were pretty much regular people but with disabled bodies. That stuck with me."
It inspired him to come up with a way for anyone to make music on an electronic instrument that got a boost with technical help from a Sandia National Laboratories researcher.
Daily, raised in a musical family in Chicago, went on to learn 20 instruments, from woodwinds such as flute, saxophone and clarinet to keyboard and bass. He earned a bachelor's degree in music from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a master's in music education from Indiana State University.
But he never forgot the challenged kids cared for by his mom, a registered nurse. "When I realized how difficult traditional instruments are to play, I thought there had to be a way to make things easier and more accessible for people without the gifts I had been given," he said.
Daily had a feeling electronics might bridge the gap between people with fine motor control and those without. Electronic instruments require the same techniques and coordination as regular ones, but Daily found he could separate the way notes are selected from how the instrument sounds. "With traditional instruments, note selection is intricately connected to the way the instrument is devised," he said. "With electronics you can divorce those."
Daily created a new instrument consisting of a microcontroller-based system that sends signals through a USB connection to another electronic device, such as a sound module or computer, which then produces sound. He named it MidiWing, a nod to the revolutionary MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) protocol, a set of commands that allows electronic musical instruments, performance controllers, computers and related devices to connect and communicate with each other.
MidiWing is a small box containing circuitry with several inputs that connect to switches and sensors, such as a joystick, mouse, slider or fader, that produce sound when moved. "You can plug in whatever control is appropriate to the person's physical condition," Daily said. "It sounds like any number of different instruments. The range of pitches can be narrowed or expanded, so the device can be made easier or more challenging as the person uses it and gets more familiar."
He started work on MidiWing in 2000, six years after moving to Taos. His first prototype and pilot projects were completed in 2004.
Then Daily hit a wall. The microprocessor chip he used was discontinued and he didn't have the resources to find another for the next prototype. "I was in a bad situation," he recalled.
Daily turned to the New Mexico Small Business Assistance (NMSBA) program, which pairs entrepreneurs with scientists at Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories. The state-funded program established in 2000 by the New Mexico Legislature helps small businesses get free technical support from the labs. It has provided $29.8 million in assistance to 1,876 companies in 33 counties.
Daily joined forces with Kent Pfeifer, a Sandia microsystems engineer who coincidentally has a background in music. Pfeifer plays trombone, piano and banjo, and was in his high school marching band. "I do understand music," Pfeifer said. "I know how scales should sound and how notes are produced."
Pfeifer helped Daily build a new prototype that uses an advanced, much more capable chip. "The idea was to build an instrument that has a whole bunch of different types of interfaces with the ability to run off a mouse, joystick or other kind of device that can be configured to the abilities of somebody with a disability," Pfeifer said. "You can play it with your mouth, your feet or a single hand."
Daily said Pfeifer took the concept and ran with it. "The implementation is all new," he said. "MidiWing has a lot more inputs and can be configured in a number of different ways. There are more ways to control the instrument."
The advanced microcontroller circuitry inside the MidiWing musical instrument can calculate the many different frequencies or pitches that produce complex musical sounds from the position of a joystick, mouse or other input. (Photo by Randy Montoya) Click on the thumbnail for a high-resolution image.
Pfeifer reprogrammed and modernized MidiWing with advanced microcontroller circuitry that made it smaller and more functional. "MidiWing works with the synthesizer software in a computer," he said. "A USB cable sends a series of hex commands built around the MIDI standard. The software in the computer interprets those and turns them into sounds."
MidiWing can calculate the many different frequencies or pitches that produce complex musical sounds from the position of the joystick or other input. The instrument simulates frequencies that are normally produced by the technique of the musician, for example, by the pressure of a player's lips on a brass instrument. "We know mathematically the frequency difference between note steps. We can write an equation," Pfeifer said. "That's programmed into this."
Pfeifer was more than just an adviser, Daily said. "He was pivotal. It was an incredible collaboration because Kent is a musician," he said. "The key to the whole project was that he understood what I was trying to do from a musician's standpoint. He was perfect. He has a music background and designs microcontroller products. I can't imagine how it could have gone better."
Pfeifer and Daily work together a few hours a month and are close to having an inexpensive product that can be manufactured for schools, hospitals, therapy and rehab centers and other places where people want to make music. "My motivation is to bring music-making to more people," said Daily, who founded a company, Musicode Innovations. "I've tested MidiWing mostly with children and disabled people. Children are perhaps the most successful. They are able to play far beyond what other music programs have ever produced. In a short amount of time they sound great."
MidiWing earlier this year was named one of 10 NMSBA projects that delivered outstanding innovations through the program during 2011. Some 340 small businesses participated last year.
Pfeifer said he enjoys the MidiWing as a musician. "I come into the lab sometimes and just play it," he said. "Then I'll think, 'Ah, I can make a change,' and start programming. I want to make it even better."
###
The New Mexico Small Business Assistance Program offers no-cost technical assistance to for-profit small businesses via lab staff at Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories. Assistance is provided in amounts of $10,000 or $20,000 depending on company location. NMSBA is accepting applications for 2013 at its website, www.nmsbaprogram.org. The program will issue a call for proposals in early February for leveraged projects that allow several qualifying businesses to join together for technical projects worth up to $100,000 in assistance. For questions or to get on the NMSBA mailing list contact Genaro Montoya at gmontoy@sandia.gov or 505-284-0625.
View videos of people playing the instrument at http://www.youtube.com/midiwing.
Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-program laboratory operated by Sandia Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lockheed Martin company, for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration. With main facilities in Albuquerque, N.M., and Livermore, Calif., Sandia has major R&D responsibilities in national security, energy and environmental technologies and economic competitiveness.
Sandia news media contact: Nancy Salem, mnsalem@sandia.gov, (505) 844-2739
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
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Public release date: 1-Mar-2013
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