Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2010 February 16

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February 16

Cello Bowing question

My daughter's music teacher is out of town for the next week and she had a question that I had trouble Googling the answer to. There is white tape on my daughter's bow that is a marker for where she should not be playing past (too close to the frog). What is the general reason for that marker? My guess is that it is to maximize and even out the flex of the hair, but I thought I'd see if anyone had a clearer answer.

Thanks! - 66.245.196.195 (talk) 02:41, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm not a bowed string instrument player myself, but I have played in orchestras in my time. I suggest that there are at least two reasons for this: the first is that the sound produced by playing too close to the frog is a lot harsher, not pleasant and only to be played under special instruction. In other words, it's a special effect and most music is written to be played with the main part of the bow. The second reason is that the horsehair would split quicker if the bow was used in this way. Someone with more scientific knowledge than me would explain why - I think it's got something to do with the vibrations. --TammyMoet (talk) 21:10, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Hosting Olympics with no gold medals

With the victory of Alexandre Bilodeau, are there any other countries that have hosted one or more Olympic Games but never won a gold medal at those games? Nyttend (talk) 03:08, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

If you're really interested, it'd be easy to start Template:Olympic_Games here and work your way through. It would only take a couple minutes. APL (talk) 04:11, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Yugoslavia. [[1]] Aaronite (talk) 05:42, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Also, France in the 1924 Winter Games and Switzerland in the 1928 Winter Games. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 08:09, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Of course both of those hosted games at other times, where they won golds. DJ Clayworth (talk) 14:35, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Canada did not gold medal at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal or the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary. They have won golds before, after and between these games, however. Livewireo (talk) 21:58, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

4 nations, 4 flags - same pair of colours

This may have happened many times before, but if so, I've never noticed it.

The first medal presentation at Vancouver featured the countries Switzerland, Poland and Austria (can't quite remember the order now). All three national flags contain the colours red and white only. The host nation Canada also has flag of red and white only. That is, all 4 nations "involved" in the medal presentation had the same pair of colours in their national flags, and only those colours.

Is there a precedent for this, olympovexillologically speaking? -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 08:22, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

That's an interesting trivia question that would take some study, especially as some national flags have changed or disappeared since 1896. One possibility that comes to mind immediately is if Italy and Ireland won any medals together, as I think both of them have orange, green and white "columns" in their flags, just arranged differently. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 08:45, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

The Gallery of flags by similarity page (originally mentioned below) seems to be a good authority here. Baseball Bugs realizes by now, probably, that Italy's flag is Green, White, and Red; while Ireland's flag is Green, White, and Orange. Arranged similarly (three vertical columns), but not the same colors. Kingsfold (talk) 14:43, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I would expect this to have happened many times; there are lots of flags that use the same colors as each other. For example, red-white-and-blue flags include the US, UK, Russia, France, Australia, New Zealand, Norway, and Iceland (and that's just off the top of my head; I know there are a bunch more); and several of these countries are the sort that win plenty of medals. --Anonymous, 09:42 UTC, February 16, 2010.

Frequently-appearing colors are also supposedly the source of the colors of the 5 Olympic rings. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 09:51, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I thought of the red-white-blue combination, which is why my question was about pairs of colours. That is, immediately exclude any flags that have more than 2 colours, or less than 2. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 10:04, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I thought you might have meant that, but after all, with 3 colors there are more possibilities than 2, so shouldn't it be more remarkable if there are 3 colors identical? But you see it isn't, so therefore 2 isn't either. And that's logic, as Tweedledee said. (Exits quickly.) --Anonymous, 19:40 UTC, February 16, 2010.

I'm sure there have been numerous events in which all the medals were won by countries with a particular 3-colour combination, and the event was held in a 4th such country. Red-white-blue would account for most if not all of these. That's probably so common it's not worth mentioning. But all 4 countries having not just exactly 2 colours, but the same 2 colours? There are relatively few countries that have exactly two colours on their flag, and they tend not to be among the top Olympic medal winning nations. This would be much rarer. Possibly even unique. If it makes it any easier, here are the only times this could ever have happened:

• blue and white: Athens 1896, 2004; Helsinki 1952
• blue and yellow: Stockholm 1912 and equestrian 1956
• red and white: St Moritz 1928, 1948; Tokyo 1964; Innsbruck 1964; Sapporo 1972; Montreal 1976; Innsbruck 1976; Calgary 1988; Nagano 1998; Vancouver 2010
• red and yellow: Moscow 1980; Beijing 2008 -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 20:19, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I've narrowed this down to the red-white countries.

• Only 3 blue-white nations (Finland, Greece and Israel) have ever won medals; two of them have been host nations; and none of the others (Honduras, Somalia and Micronesia) have either been host nations or won any medals; so there have never been 4 different nations available.
• There are 4 blue-gold/yellow countries, but the only time such a country was host (Stockholm 1912, 1956), the other 3 countries (Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Palau) did not exist.
• There were 3 red-yellow non-host countries (Vietnam, Kyrgyzstan and FYROM) competing in Beijing 2008, but FYROM won no medals. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 21:01, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

I suspect you're going to have to do the research on this. One thing I looked for was National flag, and it immediately led to an interesting article called Gallery of flags by similarity. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 10:23, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

The only way you could have all countries with a single flag color would be if Libya somehow managed to get a clean sweep in an event. Googlemeister (talk) 21:43, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

And if the Olympics were held in Libya to boot. Probably not at the top of my List of Likely Occurrences. -- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 04:09, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

blues

what r some blues songs where they dont sing just do guitar solos —Preceding unsigned comment added by Thekiller35789 (talk • contribs) 09:20, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

You could start with the list of blues instrumentals on this site - not all are guitar instrumentals, obviously. It would help if you could indicate what sort of blues do you mean, and what sort of guitar? For example, are you talking about country blues before 1950 or so, or amplified blues from the 1950s or 60s, or more recent? Acoustic guitar, or electric? This category - of which this is a subset - may give you some ideas of where to start looking. Ghmyrtle (talk) 14:19, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

IM LOOKing for electric guitar blues from the 60s 70s or 80s —Preceding unsigned comment added by Thekiller35789 (talk • contribs) 00:18, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

hello? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.246.254.35 (talk) 00:16, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Hello. No-one's being purposely unhelpful here, but there are several problems with your question. Firstly, "the blues" is a form of music which, essentially, is defined by its words more than by its music. There are not many great blues songs which are purely instrumental, and most if not all of those are listed in the link I gave above. Most great blues guitarists also sang. This desk isn't here to give advice on general questions - it's here to give information on specific questions. There are plenty of forums elsewhere which discuss blues guitar styles and give ideas as to what you could listen to - or you could come back with a more specific question here, and see if there is anyone else who can give you a better answer. Ghmyrtle (talk) 13:27, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

Artists that daydream and/or are optimistic

Could anyone suggest some artists that declare a love of daydreaming and/or are optimistic and write their own songs? (Eg. Owl City). Artists that don't write their songs but have lyrics that seem that dream-y or optismistic are okay too! : ) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 218.186.8.235 (talk) 10:40, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Daydream by The Lovin' Spoonful, or the different Daydream by the Smashing Pumpkins (although that one isn't so optimistic). Adam Bishop (talk) 18:18, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

And Daydream Believer by The Monkees. Woogee (talk) 19:03, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Well, no, that wasn't written by the performers. Never mind. Woogee (talk) 19:04, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

There is a starter list here. For optimistic singer-songwriters, I'd personally recommend Curtis Mayfield and Jonathan Richman. Ghmyrtle (talk) 16:43, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

John Lennon specifically mentioned how important day-dreaming was to him. (This was in an interview but I can't remember the context; it might have been in reference to the song "I'm Only Sleeping".) Finally, in the song "Watching the Wheels" he wrote "People say I'm lazy / Dreaming my life away," and "I'm doing fine / Watching shadows on the wall." The latter line was also referenced in an interview, in which he described a period of apathy while living at the Dakota.

Barbie careers

I'm guessing Barbie comes under entertainment? Anyway, according to the BBC, Barbie has has 124 occupations so far. The list in Barbie's careers isn't 124 long, its about half that? How come they disagree? If 124, what are the missing ones? -- SGBailey (talk) 12:06, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I did a rough count in our article, counting each iteration of a career (e.g. Barbie was a cheerleader three times), but still only got to 87. Maybe the BBC author would be willing to reveal her sources so we can update the list. --LarryMac | Talk 13:39, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

And upon further review, that BBC piece is utter crap anyway (how'd they make the leap from "computer engineer" to "tech support drone"?). Nevertheless, the 125 number seems to have come from a Mattel press-release (see an example here), but I can't actually get to the Mattel site at this time to see if they have a list. --LarryMac | Talk 13:57, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I wonder if "hooker" is included in Mattel's list? >:) ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:24, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Working on purely logical grounds (as I claim no deep knowledge of Barbie) consider that one could successively follow several different occupations within one career. For example, in a Publishing Industry career one might progress through the occupations of Office Assistant, Proofreader, Copy Editor, Commissioning Editor and Publisher (or variants on those titles, as their applications differ from company to company - I was once a 'Desk Editor', for example). Thus, Barbie could notionally have had many more occupations than careers. 87.81.230.195 (talk) 17:06, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

And how is being a cheerleader a career? My experience has been that cheerleading is unpaid. Googlemeister (talk) 19:57, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Apparently you've never been a Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader. --LarryMac | Talk 20:03, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

If I had, there would be a lot fewer Cowboy fans Googlemeister (talk) 22:22, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Maybe if they wore purple. Meanwhile, there seems to be a built-in assumption that there's only one Barbie. There are millions of them. So having 87 careers is no problem. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:26, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

There is any system that put musical instruments in a list by how they are played?

There is any system that put musical instruments in a list by how they are played? I know that there is Hornbostel-Sachs system, but they are in the list based on how the sounds are created and not by how the musician play the instrument. There is any system, or list on internet, that list instruments by how they are played?187.89.155.100 (talk) 15:11, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

What do you mean by 'how they are played"? Do you mean blowing, fingering, and beating? -- kainaw™ 15:51, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I mean how they are played, if by pressing the keyboard keys only, just blowing, blowing and also putting your finger on some holes.....

An example, in Hornbostel-Sachs list, the piano and the koto, two instruments played in different ways, are into the same category 31 (Simple chordophones or zithers).187.89.171.72 (talk) 16:50, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Well, wait. The koto is actually 312.22(Heterochord half-tube zithers, plectrum), while the piano is 314.122-4-8 (Board zither with resonator box, with hammers or beaters, and a keyboard.) --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 05:20, 17 February 2010 (UTC)