[00:02.170 --> 00:05.730]  Alright, so thank you guys for coming in on the last performance of the day.
[00:05.970 --> 00:08.790]  This is a history of music from handle to house.
[00:09.030 --> 00:09.990]  My name is Randy Narain.
[00:10.110 --> 00:11.150]  I'm going to be playing for you today.
[00:11.850 --> 00:14.350]  And this talk, you know, really comes full circle to me.
[00:14.870 --> 00:20.050]  Almost 15 years ago, a buddy of mine asked me to, you know, help him bring some equipment to some show in Manhattan.
[00:20.050 --> 00:21.310]  I had no idea what it was.
[00:21.410 --> 00:22.990]  I wasn't working in security at that time.
[00:22.990 --> 00:25.070]  We drove up to Hotel Pennsylvania.
[00:25.650 --> 00:28.770]  I went in and I experienced HOPE for the first time.
[00:28.910 --> 00:31.030]  And I was helping him as he did his chiptune set.
[00:31.890 --> 00:36.470]  And then now, you know, years later, I'm working in cyber security and I'm getting to perform at HOPE.
[00:36.650 --> 00:37.230]  So that's great.
[00:41.420 --> 00:42.320]  So, thank you.
[00:42.920 --> 00:48.760]  So to give kind of an introduction of what I'm going to do, there's a QR code that I have at the bottom of the piano.
[00:48.780 --> 00:53.560]  If you can zoom in, you can take a picture of it and you'll get a list of all of the songs I'm going to play.
[00:54.040 --> 00:56.440]  Starting with, you know, music from the classical era.
[00:57.020 --> 00:58.300]  There's different types of classical.
[00:58.500 --> 00:59.680]  I'll start with classical baroque.
[00:59.820 --> 01:02.520]  Then romantic era classical, late 20th century.
[01:03.180 --> 01:06.780]  Then breaking it up with ragtime, which is like 1910s.
[01:07.540 --> 01:11.120]  Then going into the birth of jazz, which is like 1920s and onward.
[01:11.580 --> 01:13.320]  And then from there, you have blues.
[01:13.600 --> 01:16.580]  And then after that in the 50s, you have a lot of standards.
[01:16.940 --> 01:21.960]  And then 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, I just picked, you know, the top songs from each decade.
[01:21.960 --> 01:23.560]  Because there's a mix of different genres.
[01:24.420 --> 01:30.940]  And then I put a lot of stuff into the 2000s and then finally ending with a few songs up to the year 2025.
[01:31.960 --> 01:35.160]  Behind me, I have a MIDI visualizer.
[01:35.160 --> 01:41.420]  So MIDI is a protocol that you... it's like a music information protocol.
[01:41.800 --> 01:46.380]  And I have a broadcaster on the bottom of this keyboard that's broadcasting to the laptop.
[01:46.680 --> 01:50.200]  And then every time I play a note, you can see it behind me.
[01:50.200 --> 01:53.160]  On the keyboard here, you'll see the note name and everything else.
[01:53.260 --> 01:55.620]  And then you'll see two different visualizations.
[01:55.620 --> 02:02.080]  On the left, you'll see the dynamic range, which is when you play loud or soft, you'll see the dots go...
[02:02.080 --> 02:05.400]  And they'll rise as I go with more volume.
[02:06.000 --> 02:10.520]  And then on the right, there's a circle that's depicting the melody and all the chords.
[02:10.560 --> 02:12.420]  And it's going in a continuous circle.
[02:12.420 --> 02:14.900]  So it's kind of generating art at the same time.
[02:14.900 --> 02:16.420]  And I'm also recording the MIDI file.
[02:16.700 --> 02:20.420]  If you want the MIDI file for the performance, I can give it to you after the talk.
[02:20.600 --> 02:22.240]  I'm just going to hit record and start.
[03:47.000 --> 03:48.400]  And
[03:51.500 --> 03:56.020]  that's when should we try?
[04:17.340 --> 04:18.740]  Then we come right.
[04:52.590 --> 04:53.450]  So there is a reference.
[04:53.450 --> 04:53.490]  So now Ephraim Repert has the sentence.
[04:53.490 --> 04:53.590]  So there is a looked at the sentence.
[04:54.510 --> 04:54.630]  It Channade is sent and then marking again why we JS is Chung's starting rap.
[04:54.690 --> 04:54.730]  We are안�
[06:03.320 --> 06:03.380]  At the same time we are trying to awaken each other.
[06:03.440 --> 06:03.480]  At the same time we are later.
[06:13.480 --> 06:31.620]  The point on the
[12:33.200 --> 12:33.220]  question.
[12:33.260 --> 13:35.070]  The question comes is the first sentence.
[21:47.640 --> 21:47.760]  Ummm...
[21:49.280 --> 21:50.700]  Your Jesux One says Jojima, their Darkness is swift.
[21:50.800 --> 21:52.740]  The next one...
[22:49.560 --> 22:50.040]  We are a little but we are not going to lie.
[22:52.930 --> 22:53.490]  Let's talk about this.
[22:53.550 --> 22:53.950]  We have a second sentence.
[22:53.950 --> 22:54.290]  What's going on?
[27:47.890 --> 27:53.490]  We are a fifth sentence.
[28:22.390 --> 28:28.570]  We have a second sentence.
[33:07.300 --> 33:07.820]  Thank you.
[33:08.380 --> 33:09.900]  That was a lot harder than I thought.
[33:10.440 --> 33:12.740]  And I flipped the page too early a couple times.
[33:13.020 --> 33:15.460]  But how much time do I have left?
[33:17.960 --> 33:18.280]  Bonus!
[33:20.040 --> 33:22.700]  So what I like to do also, I'm going to put the tablet away now.
[33:22.860 --> 33:24.800]  I like to improvise music, create music.
[33:25.720 --> 33:29.740]  When I used to have a lot of students, you know, they would tell me all I have to practice was the book.
[33:29.880 --> 33:30.540]  And I'm like, no, you don't.
[33:30.620 --> 33:31.740]  You can make your own music.
[33:32.380 --> 33:33.340]  That's the power of music.
[33:33.340 --> 33:35.880]  You know, there's three tenets, rhythm, harmony, and melody.
[33:36.080 --> 33:44.240]  But you can shape those into whatever you want to be and have that reflect any emotion, any memory, any sound you want.
[33:44.380 --> 33:54.500]  So what I'd like to do now, if anyone has a memory, a feeling, you know, even something that sounds like another song, you can go to the mic right there.
[33:54.520 --> 33:55.880]  I think I have time for probably two.
[33:56.860 --> 33:59.360]  And just describe what you want it to sound like.
[33:59.380 --> 34:00.500]  And I'm going to try to improvise.
[34:00.980 --> 34:02.960]  And make it about a minute, a minute or two each.
[34:19.010 --> 34:25.030]  So, HOPE used to be hosted at this old hotel called Hotel Pennsylvania.
[34:25.350 --> 34:26.730]  I don't know if you've been there.
[34:27.010 --> 34:27.550]  Yeah, I have.
[34:27.550 --> 34:32.410]  So, it's a building that is over a hundred years old.
[34:32.770 --> 34:37.710]  It used to be powered by DC power before AC became the standard.
[34:38.210 --> 34:42.670]  It was, it had a really big, a really nice jazz scene.
[34:42.890 --> 34:44.570]  There was like a song written about it.
[34:44.790 --> 34:46.250]  It was in midtown Manhattan.
[34:47.170 --> 34:52.510]  It had some floors that were just like abandoned, not renovated for a couple of decades probably.
[34:54.190 --> 34:59.330]  You could go up on the roof and there was like this gnarly AC scene up there.
[34:59.430 --> 35:05.050]  And you could see all around midtown and New Jersey and Brooklyn and great views.
[35:05.050 --> 35:13.890]  And it was so beautifully dirty and grimy and quintessential midtown.
[35:15.170 --> 35:24.410]  And I don't know if you remember like the marble floors on the first floor in the lobby and the rooms and like the...
[35:24.410 --> 35:25.830]  The smell.
[35:26.050 --> 35:26.950]  The smell.
[35:27.350 --> 35:35.370]  The smell of the, you know, many decades old rooms like the thousands and thousands and millions of people that had been through that hotel.
[35:35.810 --> 35:40.970]  The old doors that had like the service, service door inside the door.
[35:40.970 --> 35:43.490]  And I don't know what else.
[35:43.710 --> 35:55.270]  It's those elevators, the little office cubby hole where you could like reboot the PCs and get free access to them.
[35:55.530 --> 35:57.990]  Or find cards that people left behind.
[35:57.990 --> 35:58.550]  I don't know.
[35:58.650 --> 36:02.710]  And all the tourists and midtown Manhattan right outside.
[36:04.230 --> 36:06.550]  And it went 24-7.
[36:06.770 --> 36:08.730]  And there were like people smoking outside doors.
[36:11.590 --> 36:14.190]  And I love this place too.
[36:14.570 --> 36:16.070]  And I just want to...
[36:16.070 --> 36:17.670]  That was the first thing that came to mind.
[36:18.070 --> 36:18.670]  Yeah, yeah.
[36:18.810 --> 36:23.110]  I think something like jazz day, something kind of sleazy, but New York.
[36:23.710 --> 36:24.310]  I'll try.
[38:13.770 --> 38:15.250]  That's the first one, so...
[38:16.830 --> 38:18.750]  You might have noticed like New York, New York.
[38:19.050 --> 38:23.350]  So what you can do, and what I love to have students do, you can change that from major to minor.
[38:23.630 --> 38:25.230]  And you have a completely different sound.
[38:30.930 --> 38:32.690]  And then you can do so much more with that.
[38:34.030 --> 38:34.770]  Thank you for that.
[38:35.050 --> 38:36.570]  You can call it Ode to Hotel Pennsylvania.
[38:37.350 --> 38:37.710]  Yeah.
[38:38.490 --> 38:39.130]  Oh, that's like...
[38:39.130 --> 38:40.390]  And I think I have time for one more.
[38:41.090 --> 38:41.450]  Grand.
[38:41.950 --> 38:42.270]  Okay.
[38:44.730 --> 38:46.310]  Oh, I enjoyed this so much.
[38:47.830 --> 38:50.950]  And my inspiration is a bit of a departure.
[38:55.880 --> 39:02.220]  The adventure of life has had me in the state of North Carolina for a couple of weeks.
[39:04.720 --> 39:29.540]  And while I was there, I met a queer person who had been contending with their long-term love of church and gospel music, with their queerness that they have come to accept deeper and deeper over many years.
[39:29.540 --> 39:42.760]  They no longer live in North Carolina, but we were both in the same community, which was a community of return for them and a newer community for me.
[39:42.760 --> 40:00.680]  And in the converted loft of this barn, we were singing gospel music together, but with like a very queer and self-accepting lens.
[40:00.680 --> 40:14.260]  And so it was a real pleasure to be in a accepting holy space, even for folks such as myself who have different narratives around religion.
[40:15.760 --> 40:27.640]  So I'm curious if you would, you know, take a shot at queer gospel home loving on each other with music kind of riffing.
[40:28.040 --> 40:29.200]  How does that sound?
[40:29.500 --> 40:30.240]  I can try.
[40:30.240 --> 40:32.100]  I hope I don't offend anyone in the room.
[40:32.460 --> 40:34.420]  I'm an atheist, so I don't know too much gospel.
[40:34.580 --> 40:38.440]  I know like two pieces, but I'll try to do like an ABBA flair on gospel.
[40:38.960 --> 40:39.400]  Yes.
[40:39.600 --> 40:41.020]  I'm into that.
[40:41.320 --> 40:41.560]  Cool.
[40:41.860 --> 40:42.340]  Thank you.
[40:43.100 --> 40:43.800]  Let me just play.
[42:23.840 --> 42:27.360]  That's like joyful, joyful if maybe Freddie Mercury sang it or something.
[42:28.080 --> 42:28.800]  Thank you so much.
[42:28.800 --> 42:30.880]  But thank you guys so much.
[42:31.320 --> 42:32.740]  That's all the time I have tonight.
[42:33.160 --> 42:35.620]  I'm going to save the MIDI file that you see recording.
[42:35.840 --> 42:37.280]  If you want it, feel free to email me.
[42:37.280 --> 42:39.080]  My email is in the QR code.
[42:39.660 --> 42:41.080]  And you can have the file MIDI.
[42:41.240 --> 42:41.720]  It's a lot of fun.
[42:41.820 --> 42:42.740]  You can play around with it.
[42:43.020 --> 42:45.500]  Get a lot of visualizations like this.
[42:46.180 --> 42:49.580]  And if you have Instagram, if you've got any videos or pictures, feel free to tag me.
[42:49.880 --> 42:51.060]  Mine is on the keyboard right here.
[42:51.180 --> 42:52.000]  It's Passport Pianist.
[42:52.480 --> 42:53.880]  Again, thank you for coming out.
[42:54.000 --> 42:55.280]  This is the last performance of the night.
[42:55.420 --> 42:56.960]  I really appreciate an audience.
[42:57.620 --> 42:59.080]  And I hope you guys have a great HOPE.
[42:59.760 --> 43:00.100]  Yeah.
[43:07.570 --> 43:08.050]  All right.
[43:12.720 --> 43:14.700]  I'll play it in a lower octave so it's deeper.
[43:15.220 --> 43:15.820]  All right.
[43:16.000 --> 43:16.380]  All right.
[43:16.800 --> 43:17.000]  All right.
[43:17.180 --> 43:20.580]  All right.
[43:20.580 --> 43:20.660]  See you later.