Friday, June 04, 2004

Of ducks and band

I took this from the Channel News Asia website:

Quack that again? British ducks have regional accents, researchers say

LONDON: To the untutored ear, it might just sound like a load of quacking, but British researchers have discovered that the country's ducks, much like its people, have distinct regional accents, a report said on Friday.

Ducks from London make a rougher sound which resembles shouting so that fellow birds can hear them above the hubbub of city life, whereas their country cousins make a softer sound, the study found.

The differences were uncovered after academics at London's Middlesex University recorded the calls of ducks at a city farm in the capital and at a tranquil location in Cornwall, southwest England, the Guardian newspaper said.

There was a clear difference in sound, English language lecturer Victoria de Rijke told the paper, with the London ducks "much louder and (more) vocally excitable".

"The Cornish ducks made longer and more relaxed sounds, much more chilled out. The cockney (London) quack is like a shout and a laugh, whereas the Cornish ducks sound more like they are giggling," she said.

"London ducks have the stress of city life and a lot of noise to compete with, like sirens, horns, planes and trains."

The result was that the ducks' "accents" mimicked those of the humans in their home region, de Rijke added, noting that the London accent tends to use short, more gutteral vowel sounds whereas those in Cornwall are open and drawn-out. ? AFP

What will they find out next? Cats, dogs with continental accents?

Anyway, I went down to SP Band?s practice last night. As usual, the bandroom was filled to the brim with all the freshies.

The band was so damn loud. I still have an earache/headache up to now.

They had this auditioning for the student conductor. As Leonard puts it, you can tell the calibre in 2 minutes. I think so, except I think you can tell the quality of a conductor the moment he/she steps onto the podium and within 16 bars into the piece. I think the voted one deserves the position. He obviously did his homewok, he knows what he wants and more importantly, I think he expresses himself quite clearly. Good job!
The 2 sight reading pieces were quite fun. As usual, music like Miss Saigon was not to my taste. I just don?t like playing pop/jazz pieces. Too bad for me. I guess. I still have this problem with tempo, needs a lot more of working on!

fjozn at 11:43 AM