The original one is the English version sung by June Havoc in a comedy “Hi Diddle Diddle” (aka Diamonds and Crim) in 1943.

The French version of this song was recorded for the movie “Inglourious Basterds”, which is performed by Samantha Shelton & Michael Andrew. The music video follows June Havoc’s style. (WP doesn’t allow me to embed this video here )

Personaly, I like the French version, which sounds cuter. And amoung these two French versions, I like China’s. It’s too bad that I couldn’t find the French lyrics of this song. Will love to learn to sing it.

Recently I got to know Pink Martini’s song “Sympathique”. Well, don’t laugh at my ignorance, since what I listen to is almost all classical music. I liked that song, so I looked up more their songs in YouTube and ended up getting all their albums.

I have lots of things to say about Pink Martini, but here let’s stick with the topic. When I first heard of “New Amsterdam” from “Splendor In the Grass” (2009), I noticed something familiar… I heard similar melody before. What was it? I identified the composer from my mental search and then it only took me a little time to find out that song.

Here is the beginning bit of “New Amsterdam”.

Now compare this “Ich bin eien arme Verwandte” (by Teresa Stratas) and focus on the singing part (the voice comes in at 0:26). Don’t they sound a little bit similar? To me, they do. (Or, am I dreaming?) That song (Fennimore’s Lied) is from”Der Silbersee” (aka The Silver Lake, a musical by Kurt Weill to a German text by Georg Kaiser). Only that part sounds familiar, which is also the central part of “New Amsterdam”. The rest of  “Ich bin eien arme Verwandte” is quite different..

So, who composed “New Amsterdam”?

New Amsterdam
Written by Louis Hardin, aka Moondog
Moondog was a blind, homeless composer based in New York. He stood at Columbus Circle for 30 years, where he was known as “The Viking of Sixth Avenue,” but very few people knew he was an incredible avant-garde composer. This was a song on one of his last albums, recorded in 1995, and I used it as the leitmotif of the soundtrack I did for Chiara Clemente’s Our City Dreams. The original calls for nine saxophones. I think it’s the most beautiful song ever written about New York City (from Interview Magazine)

You can hear the whole songs here.

I typed the French phrases or sentences I learned from Pimsleur so that I could practice later. From typing them, I could also check the spelling part. The only drawback was that I couldn’t practice listening and speaking. Anki does have option to let you add audio files to each card. If you have a phrase book that comes with mp3 files, then it is not a big issue. But what if you don’t have? What if you just want to learn whatever text you input (such as new words from a book or an article)?

Google Translator can translate the text from one language to another and it offers “text to speech” option below the text box. It’s very handy and I use that option sometimes. Mr. Fragoso wrote a small program (GoogleTTS, i.e. Google Text to Speech) to let you generate audio files (mp3) from the text in each card, or play it on the fly (connected to the internet).

This is exactly what I need.

However when I first tried it, it took me sometimes to get it work. Part of the reason is that the documentation is not very clear, especially difficult for the Anki newbies. Hopefully the following instruction can be useful for them.

Installation

In Anki desktop software (I’m using Windows version), File\Download\Shared Plugin…

After download the plugin, restart Anki and it’s ready to go. You can find the plugin shown in Settings\Plugins\Startup. Click at “Open Plugin Folder” to locate GoogleTTS.py file. Open the file using a text editor (like Notepad++), and read the information (usage) on the header.

In “Tools/GoogleTTS”, you can set the language used in Google TTS

The default setting is English. You can change the default setting in GoogleTTS.py ( TTS_language = ‘en’). In my case, I change it to French (fr).

How to Use GoogleTTS

1. Play over the Air

(a) Use hot keys

• F3 – get the [GTTS::] tags in the Question pronounced
• F4 – get the [GTTS::] tags in the Answer pronounced
• F6 – get the whole Question pronounced
• F7 – get the whole Answer pronounced

The easiest way is to use F6/F7 hot keys, provided that your card model  is “Basic” and only use one language for each field. For instance, below is my French Test. Pressing F7 GoogleTTS will pronounce “l’eau minérale” in French.

However, if Question and Answer (Front/Back field) use different language, then you’ll need to change language every time when you switch field. That’s very inconvenient. You can solve this using the following method.

(b) Use [GTTS::] tag

In Card Layout (visible when you’re reading one of cards or through “Browser” from “Edit\Browse items…”), you can add “<!– [GTTS:en:{{Field Name}}] –>”. Currently I use this method for my French learning. You can download my example “French Numbers“.

Here I want it to pronounce the whole Answer in French. This way will also hide the [GTTS::] tag and everything inside it, as seen in the preview.

You can tells GoogleTTS which section of the text in one field to pronounce by using [GTTS:language_code:text].

Here beside the Arabic number I add English pronunciation in the Question (Front field). It will first pronounce “zero” in English, and then “zéro” in French when clicking “Show Answer”.

Notice that this tag will be visible when viewing the card. The only way to hide it is to set the font color as white.

You now can press F3 to play it again. If press F6 instead, you will hear the whole Question including the tag.

Decks using [GTTS] tags will not be pronounced when viewing them in mobile devices or in AnkiWeb. You’ll need the next method.

2. Generate MP3 Files

(a) Generate MP3 file(s) in one or multiple cards

Highlight the ones you want GoogleTTS to generate MP3 files and choose (A).

Then choose the language, and set the source and destination fields. If I want it automatically to generate MP3 files for the answer, this is how I should set. However, this way also replace the French word in the Answer with the sound file link. In other words, you won’t see the French word, when clicking at “Show Answer”. With [Sound] tag, it makes the file link invisible.

(b) Generate MP3 file(s) by entering the text

In Question or Answer text box, clicking (B) brings up this window.

Enter the text and choose the language you want. You can hear the pronunciation by clicking “Preview”. Clicking “OK”, it will generate the MP3 file and put the file link in place.

Some Notes

This covers the basic of GoogleTTS usage. But if you want the pronunciation working in your mobile devices or in AnkiWeb, you need to do few extra steps. Read this section “Syncing Media” before start generating audio files for your deck.

Below is “Les Moulins de mon coeur” arranged for two pianos, harpe and violin from July 21, 2010 in Ramatuelle, France, with Martha Argerich (piano) & Michel Legrand (piano) & Catherine Michel (harpe) and Geza Hosszu-Legocky (violin)

You can see the other videos from the poster. (Thank you! )

[Update] Too bad that this account was deleted later.

As said at 2 min 11 sec. (the link with specific time doesn’t work in WordPress.com)

Accentus will release the DVD of the concert by Martha Argerich, Mischa Maisky and Neeme Järvi conducting Luzerner Sinfonieorchester.

It features Rodion Shchedrin’s Double Concerto for piano, violoncello und orchestra, “Romantic Offering”. New York Times reported this world premier before. Here is the article from Luzerner Sinfonieorchester’s web site (is that background photo the Great Wall in China? )

I’m amused at that comment from Shchedrin in the rehearsal practice.

Well, this interactive feature from New York Times can show you how the computer can beat you.

When starting the game, you can choose either the novice computer or the veteran one. The novice computer only studies from your choices, while the veteran one is backed up from previous experience of over 200,000 rounds.

Interesting, isn’t it? I gave it a try with the novice computer. The above picture shows the result after 21 rounds, that is, I won the game. In the beginning I didn’t do well, but later I learned how the computer predicted my choice.

After 21 rounds (it suggests at least 20 rounds before restart the game), I couldn’t wait to compete with the veteran computer.

After seven rounds, I was still learning how this computer reacted. You can see how the computer is thinking after five rounds.

Then I got better. After 11 rounds,

Sometimes I was ahead of the computer, sometimes not. After 18 rounds,

Then I lost three rounds to the computer. I tried to think how he did and fought back.

I wasn’t too bad, was I? Well, I think that’s enough, let’s call it off since I already won.

In the note, it said, if you play it with random choices, then you and the computer have 50/50 winning chance with 1/3 of rounds tied. If you play it not truly randomly — in fact, it’s hard for human to bet randomly, then the computer can study your behavior and tendency.

Give it a try and see whether you can beat the computer or not.

This interactive feature is part of the article in New York Times, discussing how the computer is used in analyzing mass data and is far more efficient and economic than doing by human: Armies of Expensive Lawyers, Replaced by Cheaper Software.

Last night while I browsed the trailers at Apple site, found this.

I first noticed Bill Cunningham’s works was his report on Cyclists/Pedestrians’ day on Park Ave in New York City. Since then, I have enjoyed watching his On the Street slideshows. Even though I don’t go after the fashion but love to see how real people actually wear in the city.

Therefore this documentary is interesting for me to see who Bill Cunningham, besides the voice over the On the Street, really is. And I love his bike！

Anthony Tommasini, the chief music critique of New York Times, explores what makes a classical-music composer great in his series of videos. You can also vote your top ten composers there.

Currently, the top three from NYT readers’ votes are Beethoven, Bach and Mozart. It’s still too early to call Beethoven as number one, since their votes are pretty close. The fourth, far behind the top three, is Brahms.

Among these top ten picks by readers, Haydn and Debussy are not my favorites. I have few recordings on Haydn:

• Piano Concerto played by Argerich & Faerber  — but I like Shostakovich’s in this album
• Cello concertos by Harrell & Marriner — I bought this to expand my cello concerto collection. I found something interesting in one Adagio.
• Two songs performed by Janet Baker from her Philips & Decca recordings (1961-1979)
• Piano Sonata by Richter

I have more recordings in Debussy, mostly in chamber music and piano works through my favorite performers. However, I still cannot appreciate his music much. At least, for now; I might change my tastes when I grow older.

I have read Anthony Tommasini’s book about opera. It’s not bad for an opera newbie for me. But some reviewers in Amazon don’t agree with his choices of recordings.

I have been baking bread every Saturday for a while. Tried the 100% whole wheat sandwich bread three times. Last week I used the regular recipe of 33% whole wheat for small batards. I found that I am pretty bad in handling wet dough.

This week I wanted to do something different. While browsing in The Fresh Loaf, I noticed SylviaH‘s posts about Scali bread and decided that this would be this weekend’s task.

The recipe is from King Arthur (here is their blog post). I didn’t follow the exact recipe because I prefer leaner bread.

Biga:

• AP flour 120.5g
• Water 75 g
• 1/4 tsp yeast (1)

Mix to form a ball, refrigerate over 24 hr and then continue at room temperature for 9 hr.

Final dough:

• All biga
• AP flour 241 g
• 1 1/4 tsp salt
• 2 tsp yeast
• Milk 153 g (2)
• 1/2 Tb Olive oil (3)

Mix to form a ball. Following Sylvia’s method, I did S&F three times with 30-40min apart. Shape. Rest for 1.5 hr. In the last 30 min, I brushed the egg wash (egg white + 1Tb water). Then baked at 425F, first 15 min with cover and another 15 min without.

Comments:

(1)  KA recipe said “pinch”. I didn’t know how much the pinch is. I then checked The Artisan’s Bread Page and went for 1/4 tsp. breadcetera used 1/8 tsp and 12 hr. Next time I’ll use 1/8 tsp

(2) I didn’t have dry milk powder so I used 1% milk instead. KA’s recipe calls for 157.3 g. I used less because breadcetera used only 145 g. However, after this trial, I would increase the water a little bit, maybe 160g.

(3) KA recipe uses 2 Tb, which would be too much for me. Initially just wanted to use 1 Tb but forgot the correct amount. Next time I’ll use 1 Tb.

Before baking

After

It’s darker than what I expected. So was the bottom.

My bread didn’t have smooth skin… (was like that before baking )

However, the crumbs looked good. I wasn’t confident in kneading. But this time it wasn’t too bad.

Thoughts:

This time it took much longer than my previous baking. Therefore by the time when the bread was ready for my lunch, it’s already nearly 1pm! I did my best to be patient!  My bread has thicker crust than the ones you find in the supermarket, but it’s not too bad. The crumbs were soft but also quite elastic. The leaner taste suited me well.

Every time my bread comes out with a dark bottom. Next time I would reduce the baking temperature by 25F.

I often see this kind of bread in the supermarket here but I didn’t notice its name. I thought it’s called Italian Bread. Are they the same.

PS: The remaining egg wash and egg york became scrambled egg with tomato and onion for my dinner, accompanied with this bread.

(also posted in The Fresh Loaf)