I recorded 4 in-between-show segments for the YTV show The Zone‘s “Musical Week” with my accordion this afternoon, and they went quite well. The hosts, Sugar and Carlos, are just as warm and friendly as they are on TV, as were the staff and crew. If you’ve got access to a TV set between 4:00 p.m. and 6 p.m. tomorrow, tune in to catch some accordion action.
Back at Crazy Go Nuts University, I used to say that “If this computer craze blows over, I might try getting into children’s television”. The computer craze didn’t fade away, but I am getting my first appearance on tween/teen television a week from now on YTV’s show, The Zone:
For those of you who don’t live in Canada or aren’t familiar with YTV, it’s a Canadian speciality television channel aimed at youth viewers. My American readers might want to think of YTV as the Canadian answer to Nickelodeon. I assumed that YTV was short for “Youth Television”, but the YTV “About” page says this isn’t so (although one should not take the word of marketers or TV executives — and especially marketers who works for TV executives — as gospel).
The Zone is YTV’s flagship “show”: an afternoon programming block featuring some of their more popular cartoons interspersed with segments featuring two PJs (“Program Jockeys”), Sugar (Stephanie Beard) and Carlos (Carlos Bustamente). You can find out some interesting facts about The Zone and its PJs — including the fact that Sugar was the voice of “Rini” from Sailor Moon — in its Wikipedia entry.
Next week is “Musical Week” on The Zone, and through the machinations of my friend Sandra Kasturi (at whose wedding I played back in 2002), I’ll be appearing on it with my accordion. The other musical guests will be a few members of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and a local mariachi band, which suggests that the theme will be running from the sublime to the ridiculous. I never cared much for the sublime thing, anyway.
I have to show up at the YTV studios — thankfully only a couple of blocks away from the office — next Wednesday at around two-ish. It should be fun, and I’ll definitely blog the event.
In case you were wondering: yes, I actually did bring the accordion to Wednesday’s all-candidates meeting (you know, the one with the now-infamous Bulte video). Its purpose was strictly visual: I was simply making my presence known.
Paul Nielsen pointed me out to this photo album of shots taken from that meeting, which includes the pic on the left of yours truly with the trusty “street” accordion at my feet, diligently taking notes.
Dave “Dave’s Picks” Polaschek reminded me via email that today, January 13th, is the anniversary of Anthony Faas’ filing of a first U.S. patent — number 11062 — for accordions, or more accurately, “certain new and useful Improvements in Accordions”.
(The oldest patent for the accordion belongs to Cyrill Demian from Vienna; that one is dated May 1829. I’ll celebrate that day later this year.)
Pictured below are Anthony Faas and the result of his work, approximately 150 years later…
From Faas to Kick Aass! Left: Anthony Faas of Philadelphia, US patent holder for “certain new and useful Improvements in Accordions”. Right: Yours truly rockin’ out at Kick Ass Karaoke. That’s Jeff Kahl holding the mic.
The US Patent site seems to mangle the images of Faas’ patent, so I’ve posted them in an Accordion Patent photo album, which you can view in either album or slideshow format.
I recommend that you celebrate this day with some accordion music. If you don’t have any, give The Decemberists’ The Mariner’s Revenge Song [6.0MB, MP3], one of the big indie rock songs of 2005, a listen.
I’ve just received an invitation that should result in this year’s appearance on television, a regular part of my life since 1999. It has nothing to do with politics, either — this appearance is about The Instrument that Leads to Adventure and Free Beer: the accordion and rockin’ out on it.
Rest assured, as the World’s Most Humble Egomaniac™, I’ll go on about it well before it airs. More updates as events warrant.
Thanks to Peter Marmorek for the photo!
