HN Theater @HNTheaterMonth

Ha! On that composition: I have no ear for Western classical music, and familiarity with neither the organ as a musical instrument nor the Bible's Book of Revelation, but even so, I can guess this project is… unique. He calls it (https://cs.stanford.edu/~knuth/fant.html) a "somewhat literal translation" of the book into music. So for example he goes over each verse of the book, and (almost) each time it mentions "angel" he plays an 8-note arpeggio, every time it mentions "blood" he has "coagulated" (clustered) notes, and so on, setting up "dictionary" of 100+ motifs (https://cs.stanford.edu/~knuth/motif-dict-utf8.html). He explains it in these videos (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JvdanSygfg, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1R9eY-8jL4, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_1a6bHGQGo). Looking through his list of musical allusions (https://cs.stanford.edu/~knuth/rev-cite) I see things like Bruce Springsteen, even a washing machine's power on/off cycle sound. He mentions a couple of pieces of rap music for verse Revelation 3:20; maybe the reason is the same joke as https://xkcd.com/133/? Overall, the project seems so crazy (is this the way anyone writes music?) that one can't help being impressed.

The full performance is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjxsZa3Ylao — haven't listened to it, but online I've seen both some extremely negative and some extremely positive comments. :-)

I have heard that he is a skilled organ player as you said; just earlier while searching for something else I saw a blog post about Rajeev Motwani's memorial (http://blog.geomblog.org/2009/09/rajeev-motwani-memorial.htm...) which mentions “Don Knuth was the organist for the entire ceremony, and played pieces you didn't think could be played on a church organ”.

Here's a great talk Knuth did at CCRMA @ Stanford last year, on writing pipe organ compositions using Constraint Based techniques.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_1a6bHGQGo

> I agree, but I'll go further than you - I don't think this essay is confusing at all. It's simply nonsense - the kind of thing someone clever writes when they're discussing a subject completely outside their area of competence.

I'm not sure what you're implying here, but Knuth does know what art is, as he almost majored in Music. See this for some recent work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_1a6bHGQGo

⬐ randomsearch

> I'm not sure what you're implying here, but Knuth does know what art is, as he almost majored in Music.

What are you implying? That studying some Music makes you an artist?

⬐ thealphanerd

This was held at the ccrma stage! So many great talks and concerts have been held there. I have used that room to stream phish shows and watch cabin in the woods in 5.1 :D

If you are in the bay area you should definitely go check out one of the events, they are all free and open to the public.

--> https://ccrma.stanford.edu/

⬐ brudgers

A comprehensive autobiographical video interview with Knuth from a few years ago:

http://www.webofstories.com/play/donald.knuth/1

⬐ boomzilla

Does anyone notice Don's piano belt :)

⬐ None

None

⬐ xaqfox

I would wager a bet that it is a pipe organ belt.

⬐ jvandonsel

The word "eccentric" springs to mind. (I mean that in the nicest possible way)

⬐ jschwartzi

He reminds me of a Physics professor I had in college. She was taught by Catholic nuns, and she had a lot of the same mannerisms.

⬐ likeachamp17

Gotta love this Christian.

⬐ nocman

Don is such an interesting and humble person -- and oh so very sharp.

I ran into this short video after watching the music one, which shows what a very hard worker he was and still is:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9514350

⬐ ten7

I don't understand this.

⬐ jeffreyrogers

Don Knuth is a Christian, as he sometimes mentions in talks or things he's written. He also wrote this book which discusses each 3:16 verse in the bible http://www.amazon.com/3-16-Bible-Texts-Illuminated/dp/089579...

⬐ Dewie3

A white American being Christian is so common that I wonder why the original poster felt that this was worth emphasizing.

⬐ tokenrove

As Knuth himself acknowledged in "Things a Computer Scientist Rarely Talks About", it's rare among CS researchers.

⬐ ten7

Thank you for answering my question.

⬐ jonhohle

Through some odd twist of, who knows what, I attended the same high school as Donald Knuth. When I learned this, I asked my grandmother if she knew him - she (and my late grandfather) were involved with school since was formed. Not only did she know exactly who he was, but had read one of his books! (Not a CS book, of course; 3:16.) I'm glad that I get to tell people that even my granny has read Knuth.

⬐ laichzeit0

Not meant to be insulting or disparaging but I'm curious: Does Knuth have some form of highly functional autism or related? His body language is very weird to me. Staring at the floor a lot, seems to be lost in thought, etc.?

⬐ bitwize

The man built a career out of thinking and you bring up the oddity of him getting "lost in thought"?

He might have some sort of cognitive abnormality, but at this point who cares what it is? He's Donald freaking Knuth.

⬐ laichzeit0

I know. I get that. I love the man and his work. He's one of the hardest working intellectuals I've seen and his contributions to computer science are of the highest order.

⬐ anewhnaccount

Because he's not some CEO bounding on to the stage and projecting him self with his chest puffed out?

⬐ olau

If you find yourself starting a sentence with an excuse, it's a good sign you are on the wrong side of polite behaviour. He's 77 years old.

⬐ laichzeit0

I didn't start with an excuse, I qualified my question in such a way that I had hoped these type of responses wouldn't follow.

⬐ yxvgbnhn32

Music starts at 1h5m42s: https://youtu.be/e_1a6bHGQGo?t=1h5m42s

⬐ reedlaw

Can't see who's playing. Is it a recording or some sort of MIDI performance?