MuseClouds

I found an excellent post in Smashing Magazine with a selection of 29 really inspiring music videos. The post was made on 21st January but hey, this kind of content never gets old! If you’re in need of some refreshing ideas, give it a shot. You know, music and film are two of the best emotion carriers known to man. That’s why a 3 minute music video can convey such powerful messages, either funny or sad. In the words of Smashing Magazine:

Music has always been an excellent source of inspiration. Particularly if you are stuck with some problem you can’t find a workaround for, a beautiful song can give you a new perspective, let you see the problem from a different angle. And sometimes it’s just useful to make a break — for instance, watching some music videos.

So, open your mind and enjoy the video selection.

Blu is what we can call an expert in wall and mural painting. You probably have seen some of his works as they have a wide circulation on the Internet. In this post I want to share a video of an animation entirely done on public walls. The video description on YouTube states it was made in Buenos Aires and Baden. As you might know, stop-motion is a very time consuming animation technique, because it’s done frame-by-frame, so I’m wondering the huge amounts of work (i.e. time) involved when you choose a wall as your animation surface. Well, the result shure is impressing! Even if you find it somewhat weird, I think it’s well worth your time.

You can check Blu’s website and blog for a look on his other brilliant drawings. He also released a book with his productions from 2004 to 2007, which you can find here.

Eric Whitacre is an American composer born in 1970, whose choral works are simply too good to be missed. I love the way he makes dissonances evolve into perfect powerful harmonies giving me the chills, as well as his use of dynamics and rhythm. It’s not the kind of music where you can always guess what comes next. Strange as it might sound, I simply loved it from the first time I heard “Cloudburst“, back in 2006. Eric Whitacre’s pieces are now standard repertoire and widely used by many choirs across the world. Also of relevance is his new opera “Paradise Lost“, which totally breaks the classical concept of staged opera, both musically and aesthetically. I’ve been following the project as closely as I can, but I’m still eagerly waiting for the release of a CD or DVD, whatever comes first.

Here’s “Sleep”, one of my favorite pieces, as performed by The Counterpoints:

The evening hangs beneath the moon
A silver thread on darkened dune
With closing eyes and resting head
I know that sleep is coming soon

Upon my pillow, safe in bed
A thousand pictures fill my head
I cannot sleep, my mind’s a-flight
And yet my limbs seem made of lead

If there are noises in the night
A frightening shadow, flickering light
Then I surrender unto sleep
Where clouds of dream give second sight

What dreams may come, both dark and deep
Of flying wings and soaring leap
As I surrender unto sleep,
As I surrender unto sleep.

Sleep (Charles Anthony Silvestri)

I have to tell you about one of the best websites to go for inspiration: TED. Almost every speech there can touch you in so many different ways… I just recently got time to watch some new videos, because they’re usually longer than most of the canned content we get to see on sites like YouTube. TED speeches are usually not the kind you can go and watch several in a row, because you start loosing the message you just heard. They are that powerful, and you have to take the time to fully absorb them. Most little gems in life do require our time and attention.

Benjamin Zander is an English-American conductor and the music director for the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra. He’s also an highly regarded interpreter of Mahler and Beethoven. However, he’s a lot more than a conductor or, as the small description on TED says: he “has two infectious passions: classical music, and helping us all realize our untapped love for it — and by extension, our untapped love for all new possibilities, new experiences, new connections”. That’s the most amazing part of his speech besides the music, as he goes on to a deeper level where everything he says can be applied to almost every aspect of our lifes. I would lie if I told you I wasn’t moved by this presentation. He’s someone that truly inspires and I hope that you take the time to watch the entire video.

As a side note, back in 2002, Benjamin published a book which I didn’t know of: The Art of Possibility - Transforming Professional and Personal Life. I’m now certainly interested in reading it!

This post was not really planned, but I wanted to share some videos a friend of mine sent me just a few minutes ago.

Rémi Gaillard is a French prankster, i.e. he shoots videos where he makes fun of others so we can have a really good laugh watching them. To his defense, I must say he’s also very good at making fun of himself so, up to a certain extent, he’s excused.

I don’t want you to think I’m pro-pranksters, especially this kind, whose definition of fun is shooting goals at the nearest police station entrance door! Sometimes, the guy does go a bit too far, but we have to admit he’s really good at what it does! And yes, he’s really great at shooting goals too!

In his website, N’importe qui, he houses lots of videos. They all end with this phrase: “C’est en faisant n’importe quoi qu’on devient n’importe qui” (in english: “It’s doing no matter what that we become no matter who”). You’re about to witness how well that one fits his productions!

Rocky:

Decathlon - Beijing 2008:

Foot 2008:

Gymnastics - Beijing 2008:

If you’re out of business ideas, this guy certainly isn’t. Stepan Pyrnyak is a local undertaker at Truskavets, Ukraine. The city is an ecologically clean zone and a well known spa resort, remarkable for its mineral waters. The most famous is Naftusya, a curative water with unique medical properties. You can check some research on the subject here, here and here.

Well, the inhabitants of the city must be very healthy because they drink those waters every day. That means “no business” to an undertaker. But what can you do when you’re out of customers and your area of expertise is funerals? This guy came up with a somehow strange idea: build a giant coffin (20 meters long, 6 meters wide, 6 meters tall) using 30 cubic meters of wood. Apart from the obvious effort to get this into the Guinness Book of World Records, he wisely carved a door on one of the coffin’s extremes and decided to install a bar inside it. Its name: “Eternity”!

I’m with Vasili Gutnov, a local resident, when he says “it more resembles Noah’s Ark than a coffin”. But inside, that’s a different story: dark ambiance, floral wreaths, candles, funeral music and black-dressed waitstaff. The youngsters are already adding new features to their vernacular, such as: “I saw you in the coffin yesterday” or “Let’s meet tonight at the coffin”. Older people, however, are not so open-minded. After all a coffin is a coffin and it’s made to bury dead people.

Here are some photos of the place (I got them here, but I didn’t understand a word…):

Finally, here’s a video where you can see there’s life inside after all!

Whether you’ve been to Dubai or not, you must have heard about its exotic real estate developments: innovative architecture, sumptuous resorts, gorgeous marinas, man-made islands, rotating buildings, underwater hotels and, of course, skyscrapers. All this in a city, not a theme park!

I don’t usually read about what’s going on Dubai. Like everyone else, I receive e-mails from friends with PowerPoint slideshows depicting amazing structures the city is planning to build. However, a couple of years ago I read about the construction of Burj Dubai which, they were saying, would be the tallest building on Earth. If you read something on New York’s Freedom Tower lately, you know there are still some critical issues regarding its construction that need to be addressed. After all, these are major engineering works and nothing can be left to chance.

Still, after visiting the Burj Dubai webpage, I was surprised to see how fast they have been working on it. In fact, the standing structure is almost finished and from the pictures you can see it’s a lot higher than the surrounding buildings.

It’s a bit difficult to know what will be its final height upon completion, as it aims to be the world’s tallest structure, so they have to keep this secret hidden from the competition. However, rumors abound saying it will be somewhere between 818 m (2,684 ft), its initial projected height, and 940 m (3,084 ft). Even at its projected height it will be considerably higher than any other building in existence. It should reign for some time to come, or so I thought. But how wrong I was! This race seems to have just started. Burj Dubai will be completed in 2009 but there are already several proposals for higher buildings, all of them in the Middle East:

• Murjan Tower in Bahrain - 1,022 m (3,353 ft)
• Burj Mubarak al-Kabir in Kuwait - 1,001 m (3,284 ft)
• Al Burj also in Dubai - between 700 m (2,297 ft) and 1,400 m (4,593 ft)
• Mile-High Tower in Jeddah - 1,609 m (1 mile)

I know there’s a big difference between a proposal and real execution, as these height levels pose enormous engineering challenges to construction. However, all these are on-going projects which means they are more than a mere proposal to the people behind them. I can only wonder if they can really sell/lease all this immense floor space taking into account the enormous costs involved…

View Larger Map

Looking around Dubai alone, there’s an immense unoccupied landmass so there’s no real justification for buildings this high (I know no one thought there was) other than this “mine’s bigger than yours” non-sense war. I mean, millions if not billions are spent building these towers. I know it attracts tourism and it sure makes a great background for pictures. However, there’s always a dark side to all of this, such as the talk that dates back to 2006 on riots over low wages for construction workers, who were being paid something like $4/day. Last week, news have shown another wave of riots protesting against living conditions. It’s not that I don’t like these great buildings and I do know that challenges like this will only take our knowledge further but, what’s the point when the only reason for their existence is pride, self-achievement and self-gratification?

So, if you are planning to build/design the next Everest of towers, don’t aim at the 1 km mark as it will most likely be taken by then. To be on the safe side, I recommend you at least 1 mile (Frank Lloyd Wright proposed The Illinois back in 1956), but don’t forget the purpose. It really should have a greater purpose other than only a “higher” purpose, if you understand what I mean. When billions are spent there needs to be a valid reason and, at least, it should take into account the interest of those involved. As someone posted on one of those riot news: “You can’t build a dream on someone else’s curse”. What a great thought!

Crawling YouTube I just found a video about a new sport: bodyblading. I’m sure there are no official definition or guidelines yet so I can describe it as a form of road riding. The dry-land cousin of bodyboarding on wheels, without the board! It uses a special suit, though. From the video owner comments “the suit is build by the guy, its just simple wheels in certain parts of body to spread the weight, but i’ve heard this is going to become a sport and it wont be soon until u see the suit on any store.” Well, I certainly would prefer riding on the car behind like the one who’s filming. I’m not a fan of adrenaline-based sports and, although the landscape is certainly inspiring, lying on the tarmac without anything less than a full-blown indestructible robocop suit seems a little too risky to me…

Imagine this scenario: you’re coming back from a great family weekend in the Swiss alps. This guy rides so close to the road you can’t even notice him through the rear mirror. If you’re lucky enough, you only get to see him when he overtakes your car at a speed that can exceed 200km/h. He’s got no license plate nor turn signal lights. What would you think? Frightening, uh?

FYI, the guy on the video is Jean Yves Blondeau aka Rollerman. You can also check his Buggy Rollin website, where he announced Jim Carey saw one of his videos and asked him to be featured in Carey’s last film “The Yesman” due next Christmas. This will definitely give the man major exposure.

Stephen Wiltshire is a British architectural artist who happens to be an autistic savant. The savant syndrome first received worldwide attention with the award winning film Rain Man, more specifically with the character portrayed by Dustin Hoffman. In the words of Darold A. Treffert, a researcher who studied it for years: “Savant syndrome is a rare, but extraordinary, condition in which persons with serious mental disabilities, including autistic disorder, have some ‘island of genius’ that stands in marked, incongruous contrast to overall handicap.” He also states that a common trait among savants is a remarkable memory he describes as “exceedingly deep but very, very narrow”. You can read more about this condition on Dr. Treffert’s website.

Although Stephen Wiltshire possesses great painting and drawing skills, his most uncommon prowess is to draw entire landscapes just by looking at them, once! In May 2005 he did a 30 minute helicopter flight over Tokyo. After that he spent the following days working on a giant canvas drawing a panoramic view of the city completely from memory. The result was astonishing! He has since been invited to do the same on other cities across the world, namely: Rome, Hong Kong, Frankfurt, Madrid, Dubai, Jerusalem and London. Everything from memory with exceptional detail. Undoubtedly an amazing feat of the mind! It’s easy to understand why he has been nicknamed “the living camera”.

I checked on YouTube for some videos on this and, as usual, they’re easy to find. I selected one from Tokyo and other from Rome, but there’s more to watch. I also recommend you to visit his website to find additional information together with galleries displaying his work. I personally find the oil on canvas paintings stunning. If you happen to be in London and wish to see his work live and with greater detail you can visit the Royal Opera Arcade where he opened a permanent gallery in 2006.

Tokyo:

Rome:

Well, you’ll forgive me for posting two times about voice on the same day but … I just love voices! At least I don’t bring you opera this time. I bring you a well known gospel singer. It’s not a common genre here in Europe as it is in the other side of the Atlantic. However, I really think the talent portrayed by this performer is nothing short of amazing, even to someone not into the genre/style. David Phelps is a multiple Grammy and Dove (the Grammy of gospel music) award winner, so he’s got his recognition many times. He’s also a former member of the Gaither Vocal Band, a well known gospel/christian music group in the USA. You can visit his website if you wish to know more.

I had two personal song choices from YouTube, but one is a Christmas song, so I’ll better wait until December to post about that one and so many others. That said, I’ve chosen “No More Night”. Just close your eyes and listen! Oh, and don’t forget to click the “play” button.