Tag: Music

The Secret Behind the Iconic MacOS Sound “Sosumi” | June 12 2026, 11:47

Did you know that the MacOS notification sound had a name, and it was Sosumi? It was used from 1991 to 2020, then replaced by Sonumi. It has an author. It’s Jim Reeks — an Apple sound designer, and there’s a secret that wasn’t disclosed until 10 years after he left the company.

So, there was Beatles’ Apple Corps. The logo — also an apple. They had a lawsuit with Apple Inc. => Apple Inc. could use the name, but with no right to enter the music industry. When it came to creating OS sounds, lawyers got tense: Reeks, no names like “Chime” or anything, no melodies in the sounds. As a result, in OS appeared sounds like Frog, Funk, Glass, Hero.

Reeks worked long on the boot sound and created a C major chord 🙂 He writes that while creating the C major chord he was inspired by The Beatles’ song “A Day in the Life.” (I don’t know why I’m laughing here). He then jokingly suggested the name “Let it Beep” in the style of The Beatles song. It didn’t fly. Someone said it would lead to a lawsuit. Reeks: “So sue me”! He claims he sold it to the management as a “Japanese word, having nothing to do with music.”

In macOS Big Sur, the sound is now different — Sonumi. The sound file itself in /System/Library/Sounds/ is still called Sosumi.aiff.

Exploring Meta Oculus Quest: A Gamified Fitness Revolution | June 10 2026, 19:27

I finally got to the Meta Oculus Quest and it’s really something! FitXR (that’s a fitness game) is particularly sweaty. Objects of various shapes fly at you to the beat of the music and you have to punch them with different movements, using hands, legs, and torso; the pace is high, almost no time to think, and after 10 minutes, you’re totally worn out. That’s the kind of gaming I like!

Pianos for Small Hands: A New Trend in Keyboard Design | May 23 2026, 18:04

WOW, there are and are sold pianos with narrower keys for small hands. I play the piano a bit, so the topic is close and clear to me. But my hands are not small, yet now I’m studying Chopin’s Nocturne in C# minor and I understand the pain 🙂 So, I learned that the modern “gold standard” for key width was established in the late 19th century under the pressure of large factories and exclusively for large male hands of European virtuoso pianists. It is believed that because of this, almost all female pianists suffer, plus a quarter of men, and it is physically uncomfortable for them to play complex repertoires, constantly risking chronic tendon injuries. It would seem, well… oops. What else can you say here.

However, as it turns out, there is a solution and it’s actively being sold — these are so-called Stretto pianos or instruments of the DS Standard with slightly reduced keys. These are two new sizes: DS6.0 (universal reduced) and DS5.5 (for very small hands).

Manufacturers have learned how to make interchangeable keyboard blocks, which can be installed into a regular piano in just 5 minutes. Interestingly, a pianist’s muscle memory adjusts to the new size in just half an hour. Honestly, I can’t imagine it. But the fact is – the International Stretto Piano Festival is already taking place worldwide, where they play only on narrow keys.

Such pianos are produced by many,

On the other hand, Martha Argerich, for instance, with her small hands does the impossible (she’s about to turn 85 and she survived fourth stage cancer in her youth; she’s a very cool lady)

The Art of the Unresolved Finale: Viewer Frustration as a Narrative Tool | April 20 2026, 13:27

We finished watching the series “Pete”. It seems like TV directors do everything to ensure that the last episode offers no answers, resembling just a regular mid-season episode. In many TV shows, the second-to-last or third-to-last episodes answer the questions, while the final one rarely satisfies, always adding a multitude of hooks and new questions, probably serving as an invitation to a next season that may never come. Or it might, but for now the director doesn’t know what it will entail and leaves much unsaid. However, the likely goal is to irritate viewers so that they flock to Reddits and Facebooks to discuss what they’ve seen. A logical end was only seen in the series Chernobyl, it seems.

Boney M Beyond the Stage: Unveiling the Voices and Ventures | March 07 2026, 15:11

It turned out that my childhood group, Boney M,

1) is still touring. Concerts in 2026. But from the whole group it’s only

2) Maizie Williams who is lighting it up now, she’s 74 years old. But on none of the Boney M records from those times is her voice found. They let her sing in concerts, yes.

3) Frank Farian, the group’s creator, is a white guy from Germany who assembled exotics” in 1974. A couple of years ago he died in his home in Florida.

4) And “that black guy” – that’s Bobby Farrell, who was a DJ from Aruba before Farian hired him to lip-sync the male parts recorded by Farian himself in all Boney M songs. Seriously, listen to Boney M and pay attention to the male parts. Now that you know who actually sang them, you won’t be able to unhear Farian’s strong German accent 🙂

5) Boney M were the first Western group (from FRG!) to penetrate the Iron Curtain.” They had concerts as early as 1978.

6) Remember their song “Rasputin”? Bobby Farrell died on the same date (Dec 30) and in the same city (in St. Petersburg) as Rasputin. At the “Ambassador” Hotel, which is literally a few minutes’ walk from the Yusupov Palace, where Grigory was killed.

By the way, Frank Farian was the king of “lip-sync” projects. Ten years after Boney M’s success he pulled the same stunt with the duo Milli Vanilli. But in the case of Boney M, he got away with it (everyone understood that it was a show), but with Milli Vanilli, there was a huge scandal: the group’s Grammy Award was revoked when it turned out the pretty model-boys on stage hadn’t sung a single note.

Exploring the Tango Vibes: Astor Piazzolla and Beyond | February 23 2026, 06:31

A few days ago, I decided to Google whether Astor Piazzolla’s music would be performed anywhere nearby, and saw that this very weekend, close by in Strathmore, there is a Tango After Dark show featuring Piazzolla’s music, accompanied by an Argentine orchestra and Argentine tango dancers. Really cool, but I didn’t bring any recordings here.

While Googling what this exotic instrument the local soloist was playing – the bandoneon – I stumbled upon a very very very cool concert of Mario Pietrodarchi accompanied by the Minsk Orchestra. This concert occupies the top five spots in the most popular recordings of the Belarusian State Chamber Orchestra – just go to popular and listen to everything, all of it’s great. You’ve probably already heard Libertango and Oblivion without me, they are ubiquitous, so I’m attaching Angel’s Dance (Milonga del angel) in the comments.

Theremin Tones at Splean’s Concert: A Musical Blend | December 05 2025, 23:29

Thereminvox at a Splin concert yesterday. It turns out that this seemingly borrowed word doesn’t exist in English. Instead, the name of this musical instrument is theremin because the generic family name of Lev Theremin had French roots and was spelled as Theremin. The thereminvox was nicely incorporated into the arrangement, although it was played quite simply by a musician from Rostov, and the thereminvox itself had only one antenna.

Among the musicians, Meshcheryakov, the drummer, really stole the show. The most melancholic was the guitarist, Vadim Sergeyev. He just stared motionlessly into the crowd, almost immovable, but performed his part very precisely – evidently, professionalism can’t be diluted.

Lost in Translation: Modernizing Opera Subtitles | November 19 2025, 02:31

This must be about my tenth staging of Le Nozze di Figaro. And I still can’t understand why no one ever bothers to make modern, well-constructed subtitles instead of something that resembles a product of prehistoric “Google translate”. Every single line is translated from Italian in such a barbaric way that it’s about to make one’s eyes bleed. And for what reason? The Italian is certainly not modern either, but if you undertake to translate, then do so in a way that the meaning can be grasped within those tens of milliseconds when your eyes dart to the screen. Now, you land on a text that takes a minute to chew over… Every woman makes me change colour… Instead of make me blush or make me pale… If you are fain to dance… And all that stuff.