Jetzt reagiert auch Dolmetscher Frank Deja, der für den Fauxpas gesorgt hatte. "Ich war überzeugt, ich hätte mich stumm geschaltet. Ich habe aber im Eifer des Gefechts die falsche Taste gedrückt. Wir haben als Dolmetscher sogenannte Räusper-Tasten, mit denen wir uns stummschalten können. Dann geht das eben nicht über den Sender – und meine Aussage sollte natürlich auch nicht über den Sender gehen", erklärt er "n-tv". Seinen Zwischenruf solle man nicht als politisches Statement deuten. "Nein, das wäre ganz verfehlt. Die politischen Inhalte sind nicht das Problem", meint Deja und fügt hinzu: "Ich dolmetsche ständig Leute, mit deren politischen Inhalten ich nicht einverstanden bin. Das Problem bei Trump war, dass er auf einmal anfing, frei zu assoziieren oder dreimal hintereinander dasselbe zu sagen. Diesen wirren Gedankensprüngen zu folgen, ist die Schwierigkeit beim Dolmetschen." Er erklärt: "Wenn ein Redner mit geordneten Gedanken redet, dann kann man, sobald der Satz angefangen hat, schon ungefähr erahnen, wie es weitergeht. Man kann auf dieser Welle weiter surfen. Aber bei Trump ist das unmöglich."

Background for the non-Germans: a German professional interpreter was live-interpreting the TV broadcast of the Trump inauguration when he suddenly broke off in the middle of his interpreting and said loudly, "Tell me, how long do we have to watch this shit?!"

Of course they immediately cut his mic after that, but it was too late :D

Anyway here's my rough translation of the article excerpt above:

Jetzt reagiert auch Dolmetscher Frank Deja, der für den Fauxpas gesorgt hatte. "Ich war überzeugt, ich hätte mich stumm geschaltet. Ich habe aber im Eifer des Gefechts die falsche Taste gedrückt. Wir haben als Dolmetscher sogenannte Räusper-Tasten, mit denen wir uns stummschalten können. Dann geht das eben nicht über den Sender – und meine Aussage sollte natürlich auch nicht über den Sender gehen", erklärt er "n-tv". Seinen Zwischenruf solle man nicht als politisches Statement deuten. "Nein, das wäre ganz verfehlt. Die politischen Inhalte sind nicht das Problem", meint Deja und fügt hinzu: "Ich dolmetsche ständig Leute, mit deren politischen Inhalten ich nicht einverstanden bin. Das Problem bei Trump war, dass er auf einmal anfing, frei zu assoziieren oder dreimal hintereinander dasselbe zu sagen. Diesen wirren Gedankensprüngen zu folgen, ist die Schwierigkeit beim Dolmetschen." Er erklärt: "Wenn ein Redner mit geordneten Gedanken redet, dann kann man, sobald der Satz angefangen hat, schon ungefähr erahnen, wie es weitergeht. Man kann auf dieser Welle weiter surfen. Aber bei Trump ist das unmöglich."

Background for the non-Germans: a German professional interpreter was live-interpreting the TV broadcast of the Trump inauguration when he suddenly broke off in the middle of his interpreting and said loudly, "Tell me, how long do we have to watch this shit?!"

Of course they immediately cut his mic after that, but it was too late :D

Anyway here's my rough translation of the article excerpt above:

Beethoven’s “Hammerklavier” sonata, first published over two hundreds years ago, is notoriously considered one of the most difficult-to-play piano pieces of all time.

In particular, when Beethoven sent it to his publisher in 1818, he allegedly said, “Now you have a sonata that will keep the pianists busy when it is played 50 years hence!”, and much has been made of the fact that it wasn’t publicly performed in its entirety until eighteen years later, by Franz Liszt himself.

Except that’s a bit of a deceptive statistic. See, when Beethoven published Hammerklavier, public solo piano recitals/concerts weren’t really a thing yet. Symphonies, sure; concertos, definitely. But sonatas were “parlor” music—a thing played by amateurs, often skilled amateurs, but amateurs nonetheless, in little sitting-rooms for a bit of entertainment after dinner, or at private salons with a guest list in the low dozens. (And mostly they were meant to be sight-read! The culture of obsessively polishing a piece to make it “performance-ready” wasn’t as much of a thing, back then.) People bought these things the way they bought novels, and, just as someone might buy a copy of Joyce’s Ulysses today and enjoy puzzling over the thing, even if they never read the whole thing or feel like they fully “get” it, well… some folks would enjoy sonatas the same way.

So yeah, Hammerklavier didn’t have its first public performance until Liszt played it in the Salle Érard. But also, Liszt basically invented the format of “star virtuoso pianist hogging the stage for two hours” in order to get a public audience at all.

But in the meantime—I think about how wonderful it must’ve been, tooling around on the piano during that 18-year-span where there was no evidence that thing even was playable, or that, if playable, that the thing even made sense. Beethoven was nearly totally deaf by this point, after all, a fact that was publicly known—had he totally lost it? people had to wonder. And the only way to find out would be… well, trying it out yourself!

It has the sound of a gimmick. And I’ll bet it was, at least a little bit—but just because something’s more interesting to play than listen to doesn’t mean it’s failing in its goal. (Though fwiw it is very interesting to listen to.)

It also has the sound of, like, Dark Souls, to be honest. Proto-video game culture. A new game drops and people are asking each other: can anyone beat this boss? can you beat this boss? do you still consider your time on the game well-spent even if you never 100% it?

Biographies generally agree that Beethoven’s metronome markings (which only appear in his later work, and only *some* of his later work) are preposterous—often borderline-unplayable, and certainly not very musical. I couldn’t find a recording of anyone trying to play Hammerklavier at the marked 138bpm tempo, so I got a computer to do it—and burst out laughing at the result because, yeah, 138bpm is fucking NUTS. But whether intentional or accidental, I love the audacity of its being there, like a taunt: I dare you to do more. I dare you to do better. I dare you to try.

Much has been made of how difficulty’s a way of keeping people out—but it’s also a way of inviting people in, I think. It says: do this hard thing and you will be rewarded. You will be rewarded in the trying. Because the trying is the thing that makes the music live; there is no music without you.

Here’s an old bit from an interview with the game designer Porpentine:

“The purpose of a puzzle [in a game] is to provide resistance. For me, that resistance doesn’t need to be coercive or challenging, just interesting and aesthetic. My mechanics are to be touched. Games are perhaps the most intimate art because the player must remain touching at all times. They must touch or the game does not exist.”

Some AAVE speakers pluralize 'child' as 'childrens'. People get racist about this ("It's already plural!"), but 'children' actually comes from Middle English speakers doing the same thing: slapping their plural marker on word already pluralized by an extinct plural marker.

To oversimplify: in Old English, 'childer' ('ċildra') was the plural of 'child' ('ċild'). Middle English developed an '-en' plural marker, which we see in 'oxen'. Instead of updating to 'childen', people slapped their preferred '-en' onto the end of 'childer' - so now we have 'child-er-en'. AAVE carries on this tradition with 'child-er-en-s'.

"Pure" language is just impurity obscured by the passage of time.

Under the Equitable Building Decarbonization Program, California is providing no-cost, zero-emissions appliances like induction stoves and heat pumps to low-income households. The program covers single family, multifamily, and mobile homes and also include other efficiency upgrades like smart thermostats, LED lighting, and better duct sealing and insulation.

It's the 20th of July! Happy birthday to the boy whose journey was not one of loss, but of growth. Whose story was not about lacking, but about learning. To Oikawa Tooru, 32, who made his talent bloom.