Viola organista made by Slawomir Zubrzycki [a la Leonardo da Vinci]

YouTube ^ | Nov 14, 2013 | Sławomir Zubrzycki

[SunkenCiv]

First performance of the viola organista made by Sławomir Zubrzycki. INTERNATIONAL ROYAL CRACOW PIANO FESTIVAL 18TH OCTOBER 2013, Aula Florianka.

[SunkenCiv]

http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/music/leonardo-da-vincis-wacky-piano-is-heard-for-the-first-time-after-500-years-20131118-2xpqs.html

[SunkenCiv]

thanks Renfield.

[Recon Dad]

.....”could they do smoke on the water”?????

[Maceman]

Leonardo’s instrument? No, it’s a reproduction of an obscure German contraption

[Bigg Red]

Da Vinci, the Italian Renaissance genius who painted the Mona Lisa, invented the ‘‘viola organista’’ - which looks like a baby grand piano – but never built it, experts say.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/music/leonardo-da-vincis-wacky-piano-is-heard-for-the-first-time-after-500-years-20131118-2xpqs.html#ixzz2lByrXozn

[Bigg Red]

I often wonder if da Vinci ever had time to sleep. Such an amazing man.

[Youngman542012]

The question of if you could have dinner with three people...Da Vinci is always one of mine

[left that other site]

That is SO Cool!

I studied Art (during the 1960’s) in the Basement of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. At that time, there was a room at the end of the corridor where we had our classes. In that room was a collection of antique musical instruments, some of which dated back to the middle Ages.

I was allowed to play some of them, as I was a student at the museum.

I had the unique thrill of playing my own compositions on a harpsichord that dated back to the time of Mozart.

[left that other site]

You might like this! :-)

[Liberty Valance]

bttt

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks!

[SunkenCiv]

I love the B’M’Fa, haven’t been there in years, but that story fills me with envy. :’) Naturally, I spent all my time (apart from a quick trip to the cafeteria, and I bought a slide and a book at the gift shop) wandering the Egyptian exhibits, and on in to the Greek and Roman areas. They really need to switch that around — after the spendid Egyptian collection they boast, the Greco-Roman stuff looks kinda sick.

[SunkenCiv]

;’)

[SunkenCiv]

He catnapped (that tidbit even made it into a Seinfeld episode), basically stayed up all the time, but slipped into 15 minute or so naps every three or four hours. Aristotle Onassis’ tip on how to succeed was to get by on 5 hours of sleep instead of 8, it gives you a couple extra months a year, something like that. People I’ve known who get a lot done seem to fall in the “never sleeps” category. :’)

OTOH, Leonardo’s mood swings may have been caused by his lack of sleep, and vice versa — he tended not to finish projects. His biggest attempted project was a canal to reroute the Arno River, eliminating malarial marshes, creating a navigable channel for seagoing ships, denying a water supply to archrival Pisa, and creating a large (and taxable) irrigation system to support much more robust agriculture. He didn’t take care of the personnel issues, so the job went to some idiot related to some other idiot in the city gov’t, and it got completely effed up.

[Bigg Red]

The question of if you could have dinner with three people...Da Vinci is always one of mine

I have actually had that same thought, but then I have another thought of possible scenarios:

1) He is so brilliant that I bore the bejapers out of him.
2) He is brilliant but doesn’t want to talk to anyone.

[Bigg Red]

Thanks for that info.

Funny, although I have never really read up on him, I have always pictured him as the absent-minded professor type.

As for being successful by sleeping less, I have my doubts. I have known too many people who burn the candle at both ends, and it’s not pretty.

Some people can get by with less sleep than others, but I find it hard to believe that anyone can be healthy on 5h/night.

[left that other site]

Indeed! The Egyptian Collection at the BMFA is astounding!

[SunkenCiv]

It’s probably something they have and most of us don’t. :’)

The canal story comes from “Fortune Is A River”, which is at least ten years old now, I highly recommend it, it’s two biographies in one, Leonardo and Machiavelli. There’s a description of an actual event which actually sold me on the book. Like most people, I’ll see an unfamiliar (often new, not always) title, pick it up, and either check the index to see how (or whether) the author deals with some issue, or, I just open it at random and start reading.

I happened to flip it open to this scene — Machiavelli and Leonardo are discussing some project, perhaps the canal. While they’re in this large room in a sumptious palace, Michelangelo walks in and joins the conversation.

That one is always in my top three hypothetical fly on the wall moments.

[SunkenCiv]

They’ve got some real Old Kingdom 4th dynasty masterpieces (Zahi Hawass has never to my knowledge made any demands, but it’s clear that he wants those returned to Egypt. And people given hot sauce enemas want some aloe.); the first, uh, couple of times I went, everything was out in the open. The next time, everything, literally, everything in that main hall was roped off because of the wild jackals which pass for third world children, visiting the museum because their parents know it’s cheap to get in and might help their moronic larvae in their education.