Apple II Bits

I know some classical musicians who are quite up in arms over virtual orchestras. Why hire a violinist or flautist to interpret your sheet music when you can simply set your composition software to flawlessly perform your digital score?

This is not a new phenomenon: the player piano, invented in 1895, requires no human operator, either. The last time I saw such an instrument was at Hildene, the summer home of Abraham Lincoln’s son, Robert. The estate’s player organ boasts an extensive collection of vintage music scrolls, most of which are now too brittle to be used. But to keep the organ fed, it has been modified with a USB port through which the scrolls’ digital equivalents can be loaded.

This isn’t the first time player piano and computer technologies have been integrated. In the 1980s, the Apple II often played a critical role in creating music for these automated performers, as seen in this profile.

The Apple II has only a brief visual cameo and little mention in the narration. But fear not! A more exhaustive look at the Apple II can be seen in a similar video I shared here eight years ago.

Pianos don’t need computers to make music; and, with the power of MIDI, computers don’t need pianos. But no matter the era, the two together are an inimitable duet.

(Hat tip to rryland on reddit)

Almost two years ago, filmmaker Glenn Aveni concluded a successful Kickstarter to produce a documentary about the Us Festival, a concert held today in 1982 and organized by Steve Wozniak. The final DVD was ambitiously scheduled for production for just seven months later, in July 2017. But Kickstarters rarely run on schedule, as good art takes time. So it’s just this summer, a year later than planned, that we’re seeing the first trailer for the documentary.

While the main attraction for readers of this blog may be Woz, the focus of the documentary is on the festival, not its organizers. While Woz makes appearances in original interviews conducted for this film, the musicians and concert appear to take center stage. That’s not surprising — the event was called the Us Festival, not the Woz Festival, after all.

But Kickstarter backers have not received an update since November 2017, and I can’t find a website or release date for the film. It’s being distributed by MVD Entertainment Group, whose website says the film was released on August 10, 2018 — but they’ve not responded to emails or tweets indicating where the movie can be seen or purchased.

I’m hopeful the trailer is evidence that the movie is not vaporware and that we will soon have our glimpses of the musical, event-organizing sides of Woz.

(Hat tip to Martin Kielty)

Registration for KansasFest 2018 is now open. I’ve now signed up for the 30th, and my 21st, annual Apple II expo.

A highlight of KansasFest used to be the celebrity roast, in which a member of the community was lovingly raked over the coals by his best friends and peers. That tradition has been replaced by the Apple II Forever awards, which let me off the hook for coordinating the annual roast.

But the awards themselves are not… entertaining. To make up for that, committee member Steve Weyhrich has taken to riffing on pop songs, creating original music videos and lyrics that are astounding displays of creativity and passion. There is no better representation of the enthusiasm and unique nature of the Apple II community and its annual convention than Dr. Steve’s productions.

These videos usually debut at KansasFest, but this year, Steve has decided to leave his camera at home. We instead get to enjoy his video four months early, with the opening of this year’s registration coinciding with the release of "The KFest Show", a parody of “The Greatest Show" from the Hugh Jackman movie The Greatest Showman:

Holy cow, Steve. Had I known you were capable of such impressive feats, I would’ve resigned from the committee sooner and given you my seat!

Steve Wozniak is many things: a technical genius, an entertaining speaker, a movie character, a wax figure. But one of his many accomplishments is often overlooked: music festival organizer.

In 1982, Woz created the Us Festival, a counter to the previous decade’s "me"generation. It was designed to bring people together and inspire them with some of the greatest musical names of that era, such as The Grateful Dead, Fleetwood Mac, The Police, The B-52’s, and more. The event was even livestreamed to Russia, despite the ongoing Cold War. The event recurred just months later in 1983, archival footage of which is now available on iTunes.

But what prompted Woz, a known inventor and prankster, to bring his fame and fortune to bear on the music industry? Attending or watching the concerts won’t tell you; for that, you need to go behind the scenes. And that’s what filmmaker Glenn Aveni plans to do with his documentary, The US Festival 1982, now on Kickstarter.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1900037279/the-us-festival-1982-a-feature-length-documentary

This project is looking to crowdfund $60,000 by December 20, and it’s on track to do so: at the time of this writing, it’s more than halfway there. The funds will be used to procure rights to even more archival clips and finish production of the film, which includes interviews with many of the concert’s surviving musicians.

I’ll support almost anything Woz does. Not only is backing this documentary a way to belatedly support his concert, but Woz himself was interviewed for Aveni’s movie. I look forward to hearing tales I haven’t heard before about this side of Woz!

(Hat tip to Chris Torrence)

Jonathan Mann has been producing an original song every day for over seven years. That’s 2,572 consecutive songs, a streak that’s landed him in the book of Guinness World Records.

To create so many songs, Mann draws his inspiration from everywhere, especially pop culture. Apple is a popular source, producing not only one of my favorite songs, "That’s Just the Woz", but also more infamously, "The iPhone Antenna Song"

Steve Jobs was never one to take criticism lightly, so you’d think this music video would’ve landed Mann on Apple’s blacklist. Perversely, just the opposite happened: Apple opened their "Antennagate" press conference with Mann’s music video.

What was it like when Mann got the call from Apple, seeking permission for this public performance of his critical work? And what could’ve motivated the mercurial Steve Jobs to own and embrace what he normally would see as a cruel jab?

In episode #7 of the podcast Welcome to Macintosh, host Mark Bramhill interviews Mann himself about his history with Apple products and the Apple community, his experience working with Apple to arrange this performance, and his theories as to why Jobs not only played his music, but danced to it.

Steve Jobs was a vision and a genius, and neither Apple nor the Apple II may ever have existed without him. Yet this genius was marred by incredible cruelty and apathy. In this episode, Mann puts himself in Jobs’ shoes and imagines how Apple’s co-founder might’ve felt to have the iPhone lambasted so mercilessly, and how Mann’s music video might’ve reached past that into some human core of Jobs. It was a humanizing and empathetic perspective, and one I appreciated hearing. I recommend you listen to Mann’s interview for a more complete picture of Steve Jobs.

(Full disclosure: I back Mann on Patreon)

Since his passing (and well before), Steve Jobs has pervaded popular media, appearing in dramatizations, documentaries, and graphic novels. Now his memory is set to invade another artistic medium: the opera.

Russell Contreras of the Associated Press reports reports that the Santa Fe Opera has commissioned The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs for their 2017 season. Rather than the drama and grandstanding of Jobs’ public life, the opera will deal with the character’s more human elements:

The production will examine Jobs facing his own mortality and circles back to the events and people in his past that shaped and inspired him… the story of Jobs is a great intersection of creativity, innovation and human communication. His relationship with those who helped him along that journey also will help tell the story in the opera.

I’d expect a show like this to come out of San Francisco, not Santa Fe. But New Mexico makes a feeble attempt at relevancy to Jobs’ life:

New Mexico in recent years has worked to honor it connections to technology innovators like Jobs and Microsoft founder Bill Gates. For example, a Route 66 motor lodge in Albuquerque where Bill Gates and Paul Allen lived while launching Microsoft Corp. is being redeveloped into apartments as part of a neighborhood revival project.

While Gates worked on his project, Jobs operated from in his garage in Los Altos, California, and with partner Steve Wozniak released the compact Apple II at the time Albuquerque was a technology hub.

It’s unlikely such a show would remain limited to New Mexico; I predict a touring a company will launch within a year of the opera’s debut. That leaves us years to ponder whether opera is the best venue in which to explore Steve Jobs. Unlike a musical, which intersperses song with spoken dialogue, an opera is almost entirely sung or accompanied by music. It need not be in Italian or another foreign language — Gilbert & Sullivan’s operas, such as The Pirates of Penzance, were in English.

Unlike the unnecessarily dramatic soundtrack of the Ashton Kutcher film, perhaps some meaningful music will bring Jobs to life as we haven’t seen him before. Says the Santa Fe Opera: "The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs seeks to capture the buzzing creative realm of Silicon Valley with a kinetic electro-acoustic score, lush vocal writing, a compelling non-linear narrative, and a production as innovative as the man himself."

Anything is possible! Consider this creative reinterpretation of a traditionally tragic scene:

Bet you never thought of it quite like that before, eh?

(Hat tip to Showbits and Zachary Woolfe)