Space (and other educational-ish) Music

[Tuttle]

I have recently been listening to this music again lately. Some people might consider some filk, but it doesn't seem to quite fit it.

http://www.prometheus-music.com/space.html Is a CD that is a song about inspiring people to support space travel, five of the songs are available as mp3s from the site itself.

Surprise is a silly song about sputnick.

Fire in the sky is the most emotional of those songs. My boyfriend talks about not being able to sing the song because he'd be in tears. It's also a song which moved Buzz Aldrin to tears on national tv. I don't know how to describe it, but this is also the most likely song of people liking it seems to me.

The songs about space seem like people might be interested in them, and music about science seems worth sharing here.


(And well there's still always God Wrote in Lisp which is hilarious and being discussed here now )

[Lazy Leopard]

I have recently been listening to this music again lately. Some people might consider some filk, but it doesn't seem to quite fit it.

Prometheus themselves definitely seem to consider it filk, and I know most of the performers and song-writers have attended filk conventions, but the CD itself is a compilation of entries to a song-writing contest the Mars Society held. "Filk" is mainly a handy label to collect a wide range of music written by and for SF and fantasy fans. Never fall into the trap of thinking either "it's filk so it won't be very good" or "it's really good so it can't be filk".

Go burrowing round the Prometheus catalogue and you'll find a whole bunch more MP3s. There are some absolutely cracking songs on Divine Intervention.

Fire in the sky is the most emotional of those songs. My boyfriend talks about not being able to sing the song because he'd be in tears. It's also a song which moved Buzz Aldrin to tears on national tv.

Yes, Buzz quoted from it when he was interviewed on the day Columbia fell...

For pure quirkiness and fun, my favourite on To Touch the Stars is "Dog on the Moon".

[Tuttle]

Oh, I have a bunch of filk music, and am not biased against it. I do however know a lot of people who are biased against it, and we've had this discussion. There was some amount of using the description is that the difference is that folk instead of filk is meant to inspire change, and this is something that is meant to inspire change, even if science fiction fans would enjoy it. That's the reason I don't quite consider it filk een if its from a website of filk music and by filk songwriters.
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I actually have all the free mp3s from prometheus and we've been meaning to buy at least To Touch The Stars as soon as there is money that is spendable.

But it generally seemed to be stuff that people on here should know about and the people who don't listen to filk didn't seem likely to know about it .

[Garrett Fitzgerald]

I've occasionally mused about the possibilities of commissioning Tom Smith to write some YW filk, but that's never actually been anywhere near my price range.

Think "Starlight and Saxophone" for a song about Edrashtekaresket (sp?), or "The Chef They Call Jayne" for a song about Filif going shopping. (I was actually thinking something more like "Operation Desert Storm", but that's not on Tom's Free Oddio page :-) )

P.S. -- speaking of Prometheus, there's a good music video of "Hope Eyrie".

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cVOOXQo22o"]YouTube - Apollo 11 commemoration ("Hope Eyrie&quot[/ame]

[Lazy Leopard]

There was some amount of using the description is that the difference is that folk instead of filk is meant to inspire change.

Hmmm... I think that's a rather unfair distinction. Yes, there's some folk music that's meant to inspire change, but there's a whole lot more that's not, so inspiring change is not a defining characteristic of folk music. I know a number of filk songs which were clearly written to inspire change, and I don't think you'd find any filkers prepared to say those songs weren't filk for that reason, especially as the songs were first heard in filk circles.

It might be better to consider how filk and folk overlap, so you could say "this is a folk song" without having to say "therefore it is not a filk song". I've seen it argued that filk is a subset of folk, but there's filk that sounds like rock, or rap, or country, or choral, or madrigal, or any one of a number of other styles, too.

Folk also has other overlaps, most notably with rock. Did Dylan stop singing folk when he picked up that electric guitar?

I've occasionally mused about the possibilities of commissioning Tom Smith to write some YW filk, but that's never actually been anywhere near my price range.

I've not yet heard any filks based on DD's Wizardry universe being sung in circles, but I presume there must be one or two songs out there, 'cos the series has been going a while now, and I know it gets read by filkers...

...and talking of videos from "To Touch the Stars", there's also a video of "Witnesses Waltz" out there somewhere, probably within a click or three of the one of "Hope Eyrie".

[Tuttle]

It might be better to consider how filk and folk overlap, so you could say "this is a folk song" without having to say "therefore it is not a filk song". I've seen it argued that filk is a subset of folk, but there's filk that sounds like rock, or rap, or country, or choral, or madrigal, or any one of a number of other styles, too.

Yeah, I think that these are all both filk and folk, and some of them rock as well. I hadn't been meaning to imply that it wasn't filk because of being the other, but was tired when posting . I was meaning that while songs can be filk, they are generally also something else when they are meant to be inspirational, not only because of the bias that some people have. I am not quite sure what I think about that definition but it was an interesting distinction when it came up, trying to figure out where people who were biased against filk fell in songs like these. It definitely seems like there is a big bias against filk not being able to be good music in its own right.

There are also videos for fire in the sky and surprise. I wasn't able to see how good they were when we found them because of not having youtube work on my computer. Silly linux.

Tom Smiths commissions are definitely good songs, though it is really weird to hear a song that he's giving away on his website as an example when you know the people its about (also, when they'd broken up before you heard the song, even if it was really good terms that they broke up on). The issue is the price. I wonder how many people would be interested in throwing in a little money. I'd possibly be if I had money.

I haven't heard any YW filk either, though I've not actively looked into it. If they exist, then I definitely would want to buy the songs . It seems like there are many things which could be interesting. A simple one of what wizardry is would itself be interesting, as well as many of the characters. I think the one I'd want to hear most is one about Fred though. Now I'm wondering about the mobiles and if/how that would work though. I don't think any of the people who I know who are big into filk have read the books so none of them would know, or I'd ask. I might should recommend them.

As for other songs about educational topics. I can't help but have Finite Simple Group (Of Order Two) come to mind, even if it isn't anything more than a list of math puns. Its just a hilarious song though, similar to God wrote in Lisp, and those two often come up here with me being a math major and my boyfriend being a lisp programmer.

[Garrett Fitzgerald]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTby_e4-Rhg"]YouTube - Finite Simple Group (of Order Two)[/ame]

Your boyfriend is a LISP programmer? Don't all those parentheses get in the way?

[Lazy Leopard]

As for other songs about educational topics. I can't help but have Finite Simple Group (Of Order Two) come to mind, even if it isn't anything more than a list of math puns.

Which reminds me of "Banned from Aleph", one of the myriad filks of "Banned from Argo", which is about trans-finite numbers and the Hilbert Hotel...