Voice Post

One thing that I’ve been trying to convey throughout my blog has been to present a subject most people would consider to be dry, into a more engaging and adventurous topic. To accomplish this I have looked to outside sources to find the right voice and way to approach my musical instrument travel blog. I have modelled most of my posts after the show “Bizarre Foods” combining the voice of Andrew Zimmern with my own. In the blog world, I found it difficult at first to find a blogger that presented the topic of musical instruments in an interesting manner but eventually found one that contained a unique voice.

The blog’s title instantly grabs your attention as being some rebellious, out-of-the-blue take on musical instruments. With a title like “Fuck Yeah Musical Instruments” what can you expect? The blogger, Beth, uses photos primarily to convey her topic across. However, it could be seen the type of voice she presents when she writes.

“Thank you all for following my instrument porn blog, as sparsely as it updates. I love you alllllll. SO as any good blog would do when they hit a milestone like this, it is time to embarrass myself greatly

To show my appreciation for all 1002 of you, I will make a ridiculous video for you. I post a lot of instruments but can I play them all?

Well, that’s for you to decide. Reply to this post with an instrument you’d like to see me play and I’ll do my best to get my hands on one and play it. Results will probably be hilarious, because I am still learning a lot of them and you can laugh at me being like “HOW THE FUCK DO YOU FINGER A G I DON’T GET IT” and yeah. I’ll suffer for your lols.”

It could be seen that Beth uses a casual tone when she addresses her audience. The use of the extra l’s when she says “allll” demonstrates the tone of voice that is used. As the title of her blog and the content of her posts show, she is okay with using “F**k” in order to convey a sense of excitement as well as disdain toward a certain topic. Although in her blog she does not go into detail about the instruments she is presenting using words, the photos themselves speak for her.

Another blog that I stumbled upon is by Alexander Zakharov and is titled “Unusual Instruments.” It may not have as intriguing as a title as Beth’s blog but it contains more information for the reader’s.

A laser harp is an electronic musical instrument consisting of several laser beams to be blocked, in analogy with the plucking of the strings of a harp, in order to produce sounds. It is famously used by Jean Michel Jarre in his concerts.

The term "laser harp" and the first working laser harp were invented and made by Geoffrey Rose in 1976.The first model was constructed with a matrix of 5 X 5 laser beams in an octagonal frame. It has subsequently been used in a number of different designs, including a MIDI version invented by Philippe Guerre, and a recent one created by Yan Terrien. They have also been used in public art installations such as those created by Jen Lewin on display at Lincoln Center in 2000 and Burning Man 2005.

A laser harp is generally built using a single laser, splitting its beam into an array of beams in parallel or fan arrangement. When a beam is blocked, this is detected by a photodiode or photoresistor, which is connected to electronics activating the relevant note. Playing the actual sound is usually handled by connecting the laser harp to a synthesizer, sampler or computer.”

The tone in Alexander’s posts are generally more formal than Beth’s. Both of the writers’ emotions are always shown in their respective blog posts, even though it may be presented in a completely different manner. They both present sufficient visual evidence in getting the reader’s involved in the topic, instead of just providing “raw” information.