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Survivorship Bias: Why classical musicians might not want to think like rock bands
Published on June 5, 2014 October 12, 2014 by Jon Silpayamanant
This is going to be the first in a series of posts exploring narrow ideas of "Success" in discussions from some Classical Music Crisis folks.
Survivorship bias also flash-freezes your brain into a state of ignorance from which you believe success is more common than it truly is and therefore you leap to the conclusion that it also must be easier to obtain. You develop a completely inaccurate assessment of reality thanks to a prejudice that grants the tiny number of survivors the privilege of representing the much larger group to which they originally belonged.
This comes from a piece by David McRaney on Survivorship Bias and could typify the "Classical Music Crisis" stance that Pop Music models for success in Classical Music is the way to go. One of the latest pieces in this vein is by Ivan Trevino, drummer for alt-Classical Cello Rock group Break of Reality, and his recent piece in the Strad Magazine. The article, "Classical musicians should think more like a rock band,"* is filled with anecdotes that John Chittum has challenged relatively thoroughly here so I won't rehash most of what he says. I'm much more interested in the type of reasoning and biases that create this way of thinking. McRaney's piece does a wonderful job of outlining the bias that drives how we view success and the models for it we've uncritically accepted.
Survivorship Bias and WWII Bombers
Abraham Wald's diagram of bullet damage before (left) and after (right) the flight. Shaded areas indicate the locations of bullet damage to returning aircraft.
McRaney tells the story of how mathematicians and statisticians came to be heavily used during World War II and gives a vivid example of how one of them, Abraham Wald, prevented the US military from committing the Survivorship Bias in the problem of armoring bombers which, during the early years of the war had a roughly 50% chance of returning home after a run.
As McRaney explains it:
How, the Army Air Force asked, could they improve the odds of a bomber making it home? Military engineers explained to the statistician that they already knew the allied bombers needed more armor, but the ground crews couldn't just cover the planes like tanks, not if they wanted them to take off. The operational commanders asked for help figuring out the best places to add what little protection they could.
The military looked at the bombers that had returned from enemy territory. They recorded where those planes had taken the most damage. Over and over again, they saw the bullet holes tended to accumulate along the wings, around the tail gunner, and down the center of the body. Wings. Body. Tail gunner. Considering this information, where would you put the extra armor? Naturally, the commanders wanted to put the thicker protection where they could clearly see the most damage, where the holes clustered.
That's exactly what the Survivorship Bias would lead us to conclude. If the surviving bombers had damage in areas that are visible, then it would make sense to add more armor plating in those spots to increase their chances of surviving. To make the analogy with Rock Bands: If surviving (i.e. successful) Rock Bands show strengths in certain areas, then all Rock Bands should mimic (i.e. "add more armor") to those areas to increase their chances of surviving.
Not so, says Abraham Wald. As McRaney explains:
Do you understand why it was a foolish idea? The mistake, which Wald saw instantly, was that the holes showed where the planes were strongest. The holes showed where a bomber could be shot and still survive the flight home, Wald explained. After all, here they were, holes and all. It was the planes that weren't there that needed extra protection, and they had needed it in places that these planes had not. The holes in the surviving planes actually revealed the locations that needed the least additional armor. Look at where the survivors are unharmed, he said, and that's where these bombers are most vulnerable; that's where the planes that didn't make it back were hit.
Taking survivorship bias into account, Wald went ahead and worked out how much damage each individual part of an airplane could take before it was destroyed – engine, ailerons, pilot, stabilizers, etc. – and then through a tangle of complicated equations he showed the commanders how likely it was that the average plane would get shot in those places in any given bombing run depending on the amount of resistance it faced. Those calculations are still in use today.
The military had the best data available at the time, and the stakes could not have been higher, yet the top commanders still failed to see the flaws in their logic. Those planes would have been armored in vain had it not been for the intervention of a man trained to spot human error.
A question should be forming in the front of your brain at this point. If the top brass of the United States armed forces could make such a simple and dumb mistake while focused on avoiding simple and dumb mistakes, thanks to survivorship bias, does that mean survivorship bias is likely bungling many of your own day-to-day assumptions? The answer is, of course, yes. All the time.
Most Rock Bands aren't "Superstars"
The Economics of Superstars has been studied nearly as long as Cultural Economics has been a field. Back in 1981, Sherwin Rosen opens his seminal piece with three examples of the economic disparities of Superstars in the fields of full-time comedians, bestselling elementary textbooks on economics, and classical music.
The market for classical music has never been larger than it is now, yet the number of full-time soloists on any given instrument is also on the order of only a few hundred (and much smaller for instruments other than voice, violin, and piano). Performers of first rank comprise a limited handful out of these small totals and have very large incomes. There are also known to be substantial differences in income between them and those in the second rank, even though most consumers would have difficulty detecting more than minor differences in a "blind" hearing.
We love our idols, i.e. Superstars. They feature prominently in media (both traditional and now digital) and we have more info about them than we could ever hope for even when much of it might be speculation. The thing is, there can only be so many superstars in any field at any time and in addition to getting disproportionate amount of revenue in their fields they often get a disproportionate amount of media attention. We don't usually do feature articles on the Classical Superstars that never happened.
Neither do we often have features on the local Rock Bands that never break out into a regional, national, or international level. In the context of the Survivorship Bias, these are the bombers that never made it back home. By focusing on the success stories and what conditions made those happen, we leave out the stories of the much more numerous musicians who don't have those levels of success, and as a result we're informed by a biased sample of what success entails which leads to a situation where, as McRaney states, "the difference between failure and success may also become invisible."
"You succumb to survivorship bias because you are innately terrible with statistics."
I've discussed Sampling Bias, Publication Bias, and other reasoning errors in "Classical Music Crisis" discussions at this blog, and the Survivorship Bias certainly falls within the first. McRaney gives tons of wonderful examples from various fields (even Science) where this reasoning error happens.
He also illustrates how this could happen in the arts:
Similarly, photographer Mike Johnston explains on his blog that the artwork that leaps from memory when someone mentions a decade like the 1920s or a movement like Baroque is usually made up of things that do not suck. Your sense of a past era tends to be informed by paintings and literature and drama that are not crap, even though at any given moment pop culture is filled with more crap than masterpieces. Why? It isn't because people were better artists back in the day. It is because the good stuff survives, and the bad stuff is forgotten. So over time, you end up with skewed ideas of past eras. You think the artists of antiquity were amazing in the same way you associate the music of past decades with the songs that survived long enough to get into your ears.
In the end, "If you spend your life only learning from survivors, buying books about successful people and poring over the history of companies that shook the planet, your knowledge of the world will be strongly biased and enormously incomplete."
And obviously, if we use anecdotal evidence from a few successful Classical Music groups which have adopted a Pop Music model, I think we should wonder how many "failures" there have been amongst those who have also done the same. This is related to the selection bias that seems to be rampant in discussions of the future of classical music that I've discussed relative to what we even consider to be classical music in the first place and how we can make claims about anything as long as we define the terms in our favor.
*The article seems to be an adaptation of a post at Ivan Trevino's website.
*EDITED for content, clarity, and minimization of polarizing langauge*
Categories Aesthetics, American Classical Music History, Arts Education, Audiences, Cello, Classical Music Crisis Crisis, Economics, Local Culture, Orchestra Reform, Post-Pop, Psychology, Rock•Tags Entrepreneur, Entrepreneurship, Music Entrepreneurship
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6 thoughts on "Survivorship Bias: Why classical musicians might not want to think like rock bands"
Eric Edberg says:
As I said on FaceBook, fascinating.
As I prepare the "State of the Art" course for DePauw, I will be sure to include the topic of case studies of individual, small group, and large organization failure, and this topic of survivorship bias. The challenge, I imagine, will be finding enough material on the careers that didn't take off. Looking at why NYC Opera collapsed, for example, is easier to document.
It's important to analyze as much as we can what works and what doesn't.
I will say, too, dear admired friend, that in general the use of dismissive labels ("chicken littles," "Classical Music Crisis Pundits," "climate change deniers," etc.) on both "sides" seems to me to be polarizing and to diminish meaningful dialogue. It may be fun to call each other names for a while, but I don't see where it helps move the discussion forward. (Of course, I'm a mediator type and uncomfortable with even minor conflict!)
Jon Silpayamanant says:
It might be interesting to track, say, all the new opera organizations formed since 2000 I've been listing here to see how well they're doing in a few years (at least one of them has already folded, for example). The best data we have will be whatever includes all organizations and tracks them longitudinally (though even that can pose some problems as this example shows).
I'm trying to stay away from that polarizing language (I try not to use Chicken Little Think Tank anymore) because, yes, it isn't very helpful to create meaningful dialogue. I'll have to try harder–thanks for the gentle reminder! 🙂
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Greg Robin says:
I also think that media has a very narrow definition of success. To me, if you can compose and teach music, buy a nice little house and feed the kids-you are a success. To me, making a living as an artist is success.
Right, Greg–and unfortunately, that particular view of success then goes on to become the default normative view simply because the media commands so much attention!


Arts Council England have developed a new arts-based segmentation of English adults comprising 13 distinct groups. The segmentation provides new insight into how and why different kinds of people engage with the arts in England today. It can also be used as a source of insight and ideas for building new audiences for the arts.


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De Bredgletsjer is een gletsjer in Nationaal park Noordoost-Groenland in het oosten van Groenland. De gletsjer ligt in het zuidoosten op het eiland Traill Ø en komt uit ten zuiden van de Mountnorrisfjord.

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Zie ook
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Q: Canceling $r$ when finding the slope of a polar curve Original problem: find points where the tangent line is vertical or horizontal for the curve $ r^2 = \sin(2\theta)$. My work so far: $$ r^2 = \sin(2\theta) \\ 2r\frac{dr}{d\theta} = 2\cos(2\theta) \\ \frac{dr}{d\theta} = \frac{\cos(2\theta)}{r}$$
By the formula for the derivative of $y$ with respect to $x$:
$$ \frac{dy}{dx} = \frac{r\cos(\theta) + \frac{dr}{d\theta} \sin(\theta)}{-r\sin(\theta) +\frac{dr}{d\theta} \cos(\theta)}$$
$$ = \frac{ r\cos(\theta) + \frac 1 r \cos(2\theta)\sin(\theta)} {-r\sin(\theta) + \frac 1 r \cos(2\theta)\cos(\theta)}$$
$$ \frac {dy}{dx} = \frac {\dfrac{r^2 \cos(\theta) + \cos(2\theta)\sin(\theta)}{r}} {\dfrac{-r^2 \sin(\theta) + \cos(2\theta)\cos(\theta)} {r}}$$
Can I cancel the $r$ without losing any points with horizontal or vertical tangents? How do I know if this is an acceptable operation (meaning that the operation does not alter the equation)? Any help is appreciated. Thank you

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Lineberry Factory carts are among the most popular vintage pieces from the workplace, all part of the "industrial style furniture" movement. This is but one fine example of a Beautifully Restored and Repurposed Lineberry Factory Cart by our master craftsman, Billy Leeka.
Seen here is Peter getting started on an old Lineberry Factory cart.
Charles Francis Lineberry founded the Lineberry Foundry & Machine Company in N. Wilkesboro, NC. in 1900, but the company didn't start to manufacture factory 'trucks' as he called them until around 1942. While Lineberry is considered the flagship brand among factory carts there were other companies that manufactured them, such as the John Watson Manufacturing Company and Nutting Truck and Caster Co. Charles Francis Lineberry died in 1947.
After constructing a new top for this cart using reclaimed Mahogany, Billy Leeka begins the finishing process.
"Production of carts continued at the factory on N.C. 16-18 for about a decade after Lineberry was sold to Vermont American in 1980, but it ceased when Emerson Electric and Bosch purchased the operation in 1990… The operation was closed down by 2000." Wilkes Journal Patriot.
Billy applies the first coats of stain to the cart.
"For much of the 1900s, Lineberry Foundry and Machine Co. sold "three-wheel carts" to furniture, textile and other factories across the Southeast about as fast as the company could produce them in North Wilkesboro and later in Wilkesboro." Wilkes Journal Patriot.
This beautifully restored Lineberry cart is nearly finished.
Our master craftsman, Billy Leeka enjoys working with authentic Lineberry Carts because of their rugged durability. All Lineberry carts were manufactured using primarily hardwoods, like Red and White oak and heavy cast iron hardware and wheels. Billy used reclaimed Mahogany for the top, and Mahogany stain.
This angle shows the rugged construction of a Lineberry Factory Cart.
This is "The Foundry" Model, C108, Lineberry Factory Cart which is extremely rare.
This particular cart is "The Foundry" Model, C108, Lineberry Factory Cart which is extremely rare and much sought after by collectors.
Billy explains the rich history of the Lineberry Factory cart to TV camera crews.
From that old tattered sofa, to those vintage candelabra's, to those architectural salvage moldings and rough hewn timbers, and yes, even those old factory carts, every relic has a story to tell. It's that history behind those unique items that connects us to our past in a very tangible way.
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Worldwide Open Mic Thumbnail Guide
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In Memory of Jim Haynes: End of an Era, but not of a Philosophy of Life
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Jim Haynes
PARIS – Not long into reading Jim Haynes's autobiography, "Thanks For Coming!" in 1984, shortly after it was published, I said to myself, "I am certain I will meet this man." I lived in Paris, as did he, I was interested in the expat literary and cultural world, and he was at the center of it, and my bookstore of choice was "The Village Voice," on the rue Princesse, which it seemed impossible that he would not know. A meeting had to happen.
As it turned out, sitting in the back of that same bookstore, drinking a coffee and eating a brownie, and reading Jim Haynes's book, who should walk in but Jim Haynes. With his big moustache, and slightly drawling accident, he was easy to recognize. I wasted no time in approaching him and telling him of the coincidence that there I was reading his book at that very moment and in he walks! So began a 37-year-long friendship that came to an end two days ago when Jim died at the age of 87. In fact, as anyone who knew Jim knows, it was not just Jim who left us, but a whole chunk of cultural life in Paris (and dare I add a cultural life of the 1960s and 70s in Britain too), and a living, walking, smiling philosophy of life.
Thinking about his life in the last few days since he left us on 6 January, it struck me that Jim was born in the same year that Hitler took power in Germany, and that he should die in a hospital in Paris at the same moment that the Capitol Building in Washington D.C. was being raided by violent haters, was very significant: Nothing could be further from Jim Haynes's philosophy of life than the hatred that both Adolf Hitler and Donald Trump knew so well how to manipulate in their followers. Jim was all about love and togetherness and sharing; and if that sounds like some kind of 1960s hippie peace sort of dreamy approach to life, well, not only was it just that, but Jim successfully – and contagiously – lived by it right to the end.
I will not spend time on this blog post reiterating the events of his life. That has been well handled all over the place, including in this obituary about Jim Haynes published in The Guardian, or on Jim Haynes's own web site. The only thing I feel I can bring that would serve any purpose beyond what everyone else – and he himself in that autobiography as well – would say, is my own experience of Jim. And I look forward to reading many more such accounts by the other legions of people from every walk of life who knew him.
Even so, in a nutshell: Born in the U.S., in Louisiana, after coming to Europe in the military, he decided to live in Scotland in the 1950s, where he created the first paperback bookstore, then helped found the now-famous Traverse theatre, before then moving to London where he founded the Arts Lab theatre space, and the International Times newspaper. He then came to Paris on a teaching assignment at the University of Paris, and stayed the rest of his life here, writing, holding Sunday dinner salons for more than 40 years, creating his publishing company, as well as many other manner of homegrown artistic thing.
Jim Haynes Autobiography
Jim also, by the way, wanted to meet and know everyone in the world, and it was for that reason that I had no qualms about introducing myself to him in that bookshop. After that first meeting, we had many different kinds of meetings or communications over the years, never as close friends, but always as welcome friends. In the early years he would periodically call me up while I was working in the library of the International Herald Tribune – a newspaper that he read daily – in order to find some clip or other fact that he needed for whatever purpose. We would talk for a while, I'd find what he was looking for, and life went on.
I met him on occasion at the various book launches and small press nights at The Village Voice, at Shakespeare and Company or other meeting points during the period of the 1980s when it felt as if the literary expat world of Paris of the 1920s and 1930s or even the 1950s had returned. Several young expats from the English-speaking world decided to create their own literary magazines, and Jim, who had his own Handshake Editions at the time helped to encourage many of those young people with their literary magazines and actions. "Frank," by David Applefield, was one of those, John Strand, who went on to have an excellent career as a playwright had another called "Paris Exiles," and a woman named Carole Pratle had one called Sphinx. And, yes, Ted Joans, the famous beat poet was hanging around too. Jim had even helped advise AND occasionally work for Odile Hellier, the owner of that very same Village Voice bookstore where we met. (Applefield, by the way, who spent most of his life in Paris until he returned to the U.S. a couple of years ago, ran for Congress last summer, lost, and died suddenly the next day.)
One of the astounding things about Jim was just how many people he did indeed know. And the range of the kind of person they were. From the famous to the unknown, it didn't matter who you were or what you did. He just liked people. But more important, even his act of knowing people was not something only for him: He loved to introduce people to each other, to make connections, to start relationships. One of his ventures was a global address book, comprising many of the people he met. And his famous Sunday dinners in Paris were always an occasion for Jim to introduce people to each other, and I mean in a really, outgoing, almost formal way: "Brad this is so and so; so and so, this is Brad." That sense that we were all there to meet and share was one of the first signals you would receive upon entering the dinner.
On one of our early meetings at his home in the 1980s, I went because I learned he had some kind of recording studio at home and I wanted to record a couple of songs and a piece of prose writing I had done. I secretly hoped he would love it and use it in his then popular "Cassette Gazette," a cassette tape collection of all kinds of writing and music and everything else you could put on tape. He showed no interest in the written piece, but he did sincerely and with some surprise in his voice, compliment my recording of the Raggle Taggle Gypsies song. At the time I was no longer playing music in public and had no ambitions to do so. So I was a bit pissed off he liked the song but not the writing!
That recording, by the way, was done by his longtime friend, Jack Henry Moore, who I knew nothing of at the time, but who I would eventually learn was also very much at the center of the underground of the 1960s. Jim wrote a Jack Henry Moore obituary for The Guardian when he died in 2014.
That, I believe in fact, was my first visit to Jim's atelier at 83, rue de la Tombe Issoire, where one of his illustrious neighbours and friends was Samuel Beckett, by the way. Yes, Jim was friends with countless literary people, including Henry Miller, another one-time Paris expat, and he had a long running friendship with the book publisher, John Calder, with whom he founded the first Edinburgh international book festival. And to my delight and surprise, he had also corresponded with Colin Wilson, one of the original Angry Young Men of British literature, whom I would later meet, interview and befriend. I was delighted to be able eventually to give to Jim a copy of the interview book that I did with Colin Wilson. How strange the world is! (I recall now that I had also run into Jim at the Frankfurt Book Fair the one time I went there, which he attended regularly, and he introduced me to Calder.)
From a coffee and brownie meeting while reading his book, and him calling me up as a librarian at the IHT, soon he would be complimenting me on "writing half of the IHT newspaper," or however he put it, while referring to all my regular Formula One writings and multiple-page special reports in that paper. He had treated me with the same respect as a support staff member of the IHT as when I became a regular journalist for the paper. Over the years we would meet in various circumstances, maybe at an organized play attendance followed by a dinner with a small group of people whom he had encouraged to see his friends' play – or at a Sunday dinner at his atelier.
In another interesting Jim Haynes phenomenon, through the decades the number and kinds of people who I knew and who I learned also knew Jim Haynes grew and grew. They would, again, be from different countries around the world, and my relationship to them would vary completely, never being entirely to do with journalism or the arts, so vastly large was his relationship "footprint" around the world.
Jim Haynes and Varda Ducovny, with host Grace Teshima behind.
Photo © Seamas McSwiney
One of our more recent meetings happened four or five years ago at a book launch of a friend of his, Varda Ducovny, in a home art space in Paris, in Montmartre. I had met Varda at one of the above mentioned dinners. At the end of the evening, he left a few minutes before I did, and as I descended the stairs of the building, I found Jim, sitting oddly on the bottom stair, with a couple of his friends either side. He had fallen and hurt himself; in fact, he had fallen before the start of the evening, and despite being in pain throughout, he stayed for the full launch and cocktail ceremony. By then in his early 80s, such a fall felt ominous. And as it turned out, it really was the beginning of a series of incidents that would remove from him his strong good health and easy mobility.
One of our last meetings I now see in a short recorded interview that I did with him for some research that Ornella was doing, was in January 2018. Three years ago. While he was 100 percent there mentally – and morally, ie, in his usual good spirits – I seriously worried about how many months he might last. That he lasted three more years is testament to his incredible inner strength, which I put down to that Jim Haynes optimistic, happy, loving and thankful philosophy of life.
Ornella found a key to that philosophy in the book he had given her that day three years ago, a copy of his book, "Everything Is!" She posted these words from the book on her Facebook page, and I agree with their profundity, so I finish this post with them too: "Some people say that when they are happy they sing and dance. But I say: when I sing and dance, I am happy!"
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Categories: Books, Bookshops, Festivals, Literary Magazines, Literary Salon, Literature, Memoir, Obituaries, Philosophy, Remembrance, Theater, Theaters, Travel, Writing • Tags: Jim Haynes, Ornella Bonventre, Paris expats, Thanks for Coming! (book), Traverse Theatre • Permalink
Holiday Week Musical Round-Up – and a Billy White Acre Video
I did not intend to, but it turned out I took more than a week's break from the blog – and actually from most musical adventures. But it was the period covering Christmas to New Year's and so that makes sense, at least once in a while.
That did not mean I was without music. I carried my guitar with me just about everywhere I went, and played in people's houses, in down moments, in moments of post-Christmas and New Year's blues etc. The only things that really stand out for me in this whole blur as I enter the new year were a dinner at the home of Antoine, one of the members of the Euks rock band. The Euks is made up of four musicians, of whom one is my son Paul. So we went over and had dinner at Antoine's place and the two members of the Euks played music and sang songs, and so did I. In fact, for two or three hours it seemed, we passed the guitar back and forth and exchanged music. It was great. The one thing I like about doing that kind of thing as opposed to performing on a stage is that I can read lyrics and chords and do all sorts of songs that I have not memorized for performance, and no one cares about the reading.
The rest of the week is something of a blur – or something of a secret, even perhaps from myself! – and it was on the first day of the year that I received a link from an old friend of mine showing off a new video he had just put online playing his wild and original guitar music. This was Billy White Acre, and I am putting the video below as any guitar loving music lover has to see and hear this cool video.
Billy and I met in the late 70s at an open mic – or a bar where he was already hired to play and sing – and eventually ended up living in the same rooming house, or co-op house, in Toronto in the Annex area. Billy was just starting out with his music, and I was just coming to the conclusion that I would quit mine…. For one thing, just looking at how Billy already played the guitar at that point after only a couple of years made me ill. He had picked up the guitar at 18 and was something of a maestro with his own sound by 20. He also had a great singing voice, as he had been a choirboy in a school in England – where he was sent on a choirboy scholarship, if I remember correctly – and he was writing some cool music and introducing me to the music of people like Egberto Gismonti!
Later, I went off to live in France, but Billy and I remained in contact over the years, and I visited him in 1997 on a trip to Los Angeles, where he has lived for a couple of decades or so and where he made some albums and music for films and television. His 1997 album, "Billy's Not Bitter," actually won a prize in the LA Music Awards as the best album on an independent label, if I remember accurately. Earlier, he had won in 1994 the singer songwriter of the year award at Billboard Magazine, when Frank Zappa was one of the judges, if I remember that one correctly (it would have been just before Zappa died). I love the Billy's Not Bitter album, by the way, which he sent to me at the time. A fabulous mixture of every feeling from the Beatles to Hendrix to the grunge of the time – and his inimitable guitar playing and singing and haunting lyrics.
This new video is fabulous, and I see that Billy has lost nothing of his innovative guitar playing technique. Oh, and before I sign off on Billy – an inspiration for the new year – I must mention that his daughter Asia Whiteacre, is also a rising talent.
Also, check out the other video of Billy, "The Apple," in which he sings a song from the Billy's Not Bitter album and he plays a tiny guitar. Very coool….. Billy was also the subject of a front page story in Guitar Player magazine in 1994 as well, for his innovative guitar playing. "Bill White Acre's solo acoustic playing invites comparisons to Hedges–highly percussive pieces based around moving chord shapes, open tunings, and careful counterpoint," said the writer.
Oh dear, I almost forgot another high point of the Christmas and New Year's week, and one that has a musical connection. I had for years been intending to go to one of Jim Haynes's New Year's dinners, and this year I finally did. I could write a book about Jim Haynes – who knew and helped the early career of David Bowie, by the way – but as it turnst out, Jim has himself written a book about his life, called "Thanks For Coming," and published by… T.S. Eliot's old company, Faber & Faber. So look him up!!! Suffice it to say that the evening was fabulous. I left to go to another party, and then a bar.
Happy New Year's to all readers of this blog and thank you for your lecture over the last nearly one year that I have run it. I plan to continue the musical adventure around the world this year.
Categories: Jam Session, Memoir, Music, Music Video, open mic, Recording • Tags: Billy White Acre, Jim Haynes, The Euks • Permalink
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Radmin's portrait in Radiant Dawn.
Radmin (Japanese: ラドミム Radmim) is a Begnion commander who served in the Imperial Occupation Army in Daein. He was tasked by his commander, General Jarod with executing civilians in Shifu Swamp to lure Micaiah and the Daein Liberation Army into a trap.
Radmin is the boss of Part 1 Chapter 8 and acts as the commander of the Occupying Army units in this chapter.
Radmin believes that Micaiah's reputation as a military commander is massively overstated and the result of propaganda to inspire the people of Daein, and believed that she would be lured into Shifu Swamp just to protect her reptuation from the results of letting the executions succeed.
— Radmin, as the boss of Part 1 Chapter 8 in Radiant Dawn.
— Radmin, when fighting Muarim or Vika in Part 1 Chapter 8 in Radiant Dawn.
— Radmin, when fighting Volug or Nailah in Part 1 Chapter 8 in Radiant Dawn.
— Radmin, when fighting Rafiel in Part 1 Chapter 8 in Radiant Dawn.
Radmin: Silver-Haired Maiden, or whoever you really are! I knew you'd come! I knew how your reputation would suffer if you abandoned these prisoners here. You had no choice but to come.
Micaiah: How many innocent, defenseless people have you ordered killed...just to lure me here?
Radmin: Look who's passing judgment! Maiden of Miracles, Savior of Daein... You've spun quite a pack of lies to inspire your conquered people. But that ends here, wench! Let's show them how insignificant you really are!
Radmin is unusual in that his battle model and his map model are not consistent with each other: on the map, he has a yellow cap, but in battle he has the usual red cap of enemy Thunder Sages.
Japanese ラドミム Romanized as RADMIM in his internal file name.
Radmin as a Thunder Sage in Radiant Dawn.


Char No. 4 of Brooklyn, New York is a whiskey bar and restaurant inspired by a passion for bourbon. BourbonBlog.com covered Char No. 4 in the video episode linked here and below. We were so impressed with their incredible selection features over 150 American all listed below, including rare finds like Maker's Mark Black and Blanton's Japanese Exports. Their menu is of American fare with a Southern influence.
Love this place. Great place to drink and eat. Bartenders are super knowledgeable and equally helpful.


text:
A Test of Wills
Inspector Ian Rutledge #1
Barry Best First Novel 1997
by Charles Todd
"Todd has written a first novel that speaks out, urgently and compassionately, for a long-dead generation….A meticulously wrought puzzle."
"An intricately plotted mystery. With this remarkable debut, Charles Todd breaks new ground in the historical crime novel."
—Peter Lovesey, author of The Circle
"You're going to love Todd."
—Stephen King, Entertainment Weekly
The first novel to feature war-damaged Scotland Yard inspector… (more)
The first novel to feature war-damaged Scotland Yard inspector Ian Rutledge, A Test of Wills is the book that brought author Charles Todd into the spotlight. This Edgar® and Anthony Award-nominated, New York Times Notable mystery brilliantly evokes post-World War I Great Britain and introduces readers to one of crime fiction's most compelling series protagonists. Here the shell-shocked Rutledge struggles to retain his fragile grip on sanity while investigating the death of a popular army colonel, murdered, it appears, by a decorated war hero with ties to the Royal Family. A phenomenal writer, a twisting puzzle, a character-rich re-creation of an extraordinary time and place…it all adds up to one exceptional read that will delight fans of Elizabeth George, Martha Grimes, Jacqueline Winspear, Ruth Rendell, and other masters of the British procedural.
Fiction Mystery & Detective Historical American and Canadian literature
Publisher: William Morrow (October 13, 2009)
Awards: Barry Best First Novel 1997 winner
eBook Store > Inspector Ian Rutledge
Mystery & Detective >
English literature >
American and Canadian literature


that benefits from nuanced minerality.
A soft, Burgundian-style Pinot with expressive raspberry and black cherry notes resulting from thick skinned fruit that benefits from nuanced minerality. Smooth and velvety tannins mingle with subtle coffee and caramel tones resulting from four months on medium toast French oak.
Cold soak lasted two days. Fermentation started at 60°F and increased to 75°F for five days, ending at 80°F to achieve desired dryness. Carefully structured pump over regime for one hour, three times a day. 100% malolactic complete.


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Wednesday, November 14 • Provocative Perspectives - What About Food?
The midterm election is coming up and it's a really big one. With it come lots of questions: What makes a good judicial candidate? Where am I voting? Can I vote early? Who will be on my ballot? Etc.
If you've got any election question—big or small!—send it on over to the folks at Jefferson County's KFTC Democracy Team! The team of people who interviewed and researched the candidates for the KFTC voter guide can fill you in on everything you need to know to cast an informed vote on November 6. Don't go to the polls with questions unanswered! The Democracy Team can help.
We are thrilled to announce Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor as the 12th Annual Anne Braden Memorial lecturer. The author of two books, "From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation" and "How We Get Free: Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective," Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor has been awarded the Lannan Foundation's Cultural Freedom Award for an Especially Notable Book and the 2018 Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Nonfiction. From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation surveys the historical and contemporary ravages of racism and persistence of structural inequality, while connecting anti-police brutality protests with a larger anti-capitalist movement. Race matters. Class matters.
As always, the lecture is free and open to the public. This event is located in UofL's Strickler Hall Auditorium.
Please join us for our second annual Social Justice Symposium on Friday, Nov. 2, where scholars and community partners will discuss how to translate social justice research into practice. Keynote speaker Dr. Alvaro Huerta holds a joint faculty appointment in Urban & Region Planning (URP) and Ethnic & Women's Studies (EWS) at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, and specializes in community & economic development, LatinX studies, and immigration. Dr. Huerta will deliver the Symposium's keynote, titled (Im)migration in Context: History, Resistance, and Hope.
The Symposium will feature concurrent sessions focused on social justice topic areas, including bridging community and academy, building community partnerships, effective communication and circulation of research, working with transdisciplinary teams, and using research to inform policy and practice. The Symposium will also feature a poster session, highlighting student research and providing an opportunity to learn about the social justice research occurring at the University of Louisville and within the community. The Symposium provides a wonderful opportunity to network with social justice researchers, students, faculty, and community partners, learn about current Consortium projects, and engage in conversations about promoting social justice in our research, practice, and policy.
multiple clergy and faith leaders, over 20 elected officials and candidates from the area, and people from across the state.
The Poor People's Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival is building a broad and deep national moral movement – rooted in the leadership of poor people and reflecting the great moral teachings – to unite our country from the bottom up. Coalitions have formed in over 40 states and Washington, D.C., to challenge extremism at the local, state, and federal level and to demand a moral agenda for the common good. It seeks to sustain and deepen the work of challenging the interlocking evils of systemic racism, poverty, the war economy, ecological devastation and the nation's distorted moral narrative.
CREATURE is a 50-minute adaptation of Frankenstein that uses live music, puppetry & projection to tell a story filled with human connection, wretchedness & wonder. This imaginative retelling of Creature's origin story features a 7-foot-tall Creature, live rock & roll accompaniment, tabletop puppetry, shadow play & projected imagery.
Timed to coincide with the 200th anniversary of the novel's publication, our adaptation seeks to restore the intelligence, grace & violence with which the novel's author Mary Shelley originally imbued it. Follow Creature from its birth to its travels through the wilderness where it faces choices that will define it as human or monster.
PRESENTED BY: The Mary Shelley Electric Co .
AGE RECOMMENDATION: Adults & brave children ages 8 & up.
Supported in part by The Jim Henson Foundation and The Kentucky Arts Council .
Please join us on November 3rd for our 14th Neighborhood Tree Planting event as we plant trees in Louisville's historic Portland neighborhood! We are in need of 200 volunteers! Come out for a great day of community building while playing in the dirt to make our community greener!
Looking for a solid resource to inform your ballot choices?
Kentuckians For The Commonwealth's voter guide website, KentuckyElection.org, has been updated for the November 6 election, and it has been rebuilt from the ground up with many new features. Now visitors to the site will be able to enter their voting address and see their entire ballot from Congress all the way down to school board. For the races our members have surveyed you can read the responses we received from candidates. This year we collected over 200 survey responses, the most we've ever had in the 13 years that we've been surveying candidates. In addition to our survey responses, visitors will be able to see candidate websites, social media pages, endorsements, and other issue positions where available.
He was elected as the 8th District Metro Councilman in November 2016 and took office on January 2, 2017. He represents the neighborhoods of Belknap, Bonnycastle, Bowman (Seneca Vista), Cherokee Seneca (Alta Vista), Cherokee Triangle, Deer Park, Gardiner Lane (Upper Highlands), Hawthorne, Hayfield Dundee (Upper Highlands), Highlands Douglass, (Original) Highlands and Tyler Park; and parts of Cherokee Gardens, Germantown and Irish Hill. He also represents the home rule cities of Kingsley, Seneca Gardens, Strathmoor Manor and Strathmoor Village. He currently serves as a member of the Committees on Parks and Sustainability (Vice Chair) and Public Works, Facilities, Transportation & Accessibility. His record, including boards, committees and sponsored legislation, can be viewed here.
Brandon is an attorney, consultant and civic volunteer. He is a trustee of the Norton Foundation, and he is a past director on the boards of Louisville Public Media, Brightside and the Kentucky College of Art and Design at Spalding University. Brandon also co-chaired the capital campaign at Louisville Public Media.
Join us for an evening of live music including a special performance by Ben Sollee and Cynthia Fletcher, hors d'oeuvres and cocktails as we present the inaugural Lee Thomas Champion for Change Award. You are invited to participate in this celebration of Peace Ed's 35 years of victories over violence with all the people who make peace possible throughout our city.
Each day, Peace Ed's trainers partner with youth and the adults who serve them in schools and community sites across our community to foster skills that de-escalate conflict and prevent violence. Thanks to our work, thousands of people in Louisville are able to reject violence and choose peaceful ways of solving their problems. From the streets, to the hallways, to boardrooms, Peace Ed alums are Champions for Change who continue to put their skills into practice in meaningful ways. Join us as we celebrate them all!
$7 per child • Call 502-458-1328 to register or for any questions.
Join us as we celebrate peace with a special Armistice Day program, complete with music, poetry, and dancing! Performances include John Gage, Misha Feigin, and more!
Join the Jefferson County Chapter of Kentuckians for the Commonwealth at their monthly meeting!
If you are looking for a growing base of fun-filled committed community leaders to share your talents with, look no further! The Jefferson County Chapter hosts over two thousand members from all over Louisville, Oldham County and across the bridge in southern Indiana. Our chapter hosts both the young and experienced from many different walks of life. While actively supporting all of KFTC's statewide campaigns, members in our chapter also have worked on local campaigns around air quality, economic justice, and more.
First Unitarian Church is wheelchair accessible, and this meeting will be potluck style so bring a dish to share if you're able! If you have any further questions about the space, or if there is something else we can do to make these meetings accessible for you, please don't hesitate to get in touch.
Transportation is provided. The space is not wheelchair accessible. If you need a ride, LSURJ members will be offering them, so don't be shy. Just message the LSURJ page. We want to see you at this event!
Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) is a national network of groups and individuals organizing white people for racial justice. Through community organizing, mobilizing, and education, SURJ moves white people to act as part of a multi-racial majority for justice with passion and accountability. We work to connect people across the country while supporting and collaborating with local and national racial justice organizing efforts. SURJ provides a space to build relationships, skills, and political analysis to act for change. More information can be found here.
While it is an independent entity, Louisville SURJ draws inspiration from the national SURJ effort. More information can be found here.
On April 4th we started our new conversation series "Provocative Perspectives" in partnership with The Community Foundation Of Louisville. Each event features a guest Provocateur opening dynamic group discussions about pressing issues impacting the future of our city.
Our next Provocative Perspectives topic will be: "What About Food?". Our guest provocateur will discuss her perspectives on opportunities for making food more accessible throughout our city.
Come network, learn from and celebrate neighborhood development and community building success stories from across Louisville and beyond.
If you are interested in building healthy, sustainable, safe, and attractive neighborhoods in Metro Louisville, this is the event for you!
Animals must migrate, hibernate, or stay active to survive the cold months ahead. Play the On Your Own Challenge to help them make the right decisions. The E-C-O stands for Every Child Outside, and that's exactly where kids can be found during ECO Kids Discovery Days!
• Hands-on Discovery Stations,led by Volunteer Naturalists, from 1 – 4 P.M.
• On Your Own Challenge, a self-guided adventure, available from 9 A.M. – 5 P.M.
Celebrating the 4th year since the River Road Mosque's community clean-up effort!
Join us at Temple Shalom for an evening of interfaith dialogue and understanding as members of Louisville's interfaith communities offer prayers from their respective faith traditions, followed by a vegetarian dinner in the spirit of Thanksgiving.
Presented by Interfaith Paths to Peace in partnership with Crescent Hill Baptist Church, Louisville Islamic Center of Compassion and Temple Shalom.
A portion of the proceeds will benefit Dare to Care Food Bank.
Scholarship tickets are available. Please email interfaithpaths@gmail.com for information.
Free parking is available at Temple Shalom.
The goal of EKI is to uplift Kentucky's people and natural spaces. By embracing environmentalism, outdoor recreation, diversity & inclusion, storytelling, and collaboration, EKI seeks to create programs, events, media, and action campaigns that are rooted in social artistry and intersectionality, thus preserving the environmental and cultural resources of the commonwealth's 120 counties.
Gerry James is the founder of The Explore Kentucky Initiative. He also serves on the steering committee for the Kentucky Rural Urban Exchange. Since 2011, Gerry has helped to further the field of adventure tourism and community and cultural exploration across Kentucky. His work has found him embedded in many rural Kentucky communities for initiatives that include outdoor recreational events, branding initiatives, and conservation projects. Gerry is an avid paddler and also a storyteller who uses photography, cinematography, and journalism to tell stories about the landscapes and people he encounters in his travels across the state.
Please join us for this informative program. Our programs are always free and open to the public.
Follow this link to our Facebook event!
to transition to 100% renewable energy!
At the request of organizers of the "Rise for Climate Jobs and Justice" rally on September 8, Metro Council President David James has introduced a "Resolution for 100% Clean Energy for Metro Louisville." On November 29th and December 13th , it is scheduled to be heard by the Parks and Sustainability Committee: Chair Cindi Fowler (D-14), Brandon Coan (D-8), James Peden (R-23), Glen Stuckel (R-17) and Vicki Welch (D-13). Want to advocate for its passage?
· Read the resolution , and these talking points .
· Write, email , call (574-1100) or visit a Parks and Sustainability Committee member to share why their support for the resolution matters to you.
· Submit a letter to the Courier Journal editor ( cjletter@courier-journal.com ).
· Attend one or both committee meetings to show your support. Signs will be provided.
· Attend any or all regular Metro Council meetings to support those speaking for the resolution. There will be at least one speaker at each meeting until a vote is taken. Signs provided. The time period for the public to address the council occurs at the beginning of each meeting, so no need to stay for the whole meeting.
· Attend the meeting whenever the resolution will be considered by the full council. We will notify everyone of when that is (assuming adequate advance notice is received).
· Speak for three minutes in support of the resolution at any regular Metro Council meeting. If you'd like to do this, there is a process, so please contact Sam Avery first.
All Council meetings are held on the 3rd floor of 601 W. Jefferson St. (enter from 6 th St.). Get more info on Metro Council meetings here .


Duties: Handle and advocate disputes with electric companies, cooperatives, municipalities, and other pole-owning utilities and with railroad management companies and railways. Support and participate in mediations and state and federal court and commission proceedings. Negotiate joint use, pole attachment, and conduit occupancy agreements and amendments with electric utilities. Negotiate licensing agreements for telecommunications service provider (CLEC) and cable television system operator (CATV) attachments to Frontier?s poles. Apply and review FCC and other complex pole-rent formulas. Negotiate and challenge railroad crossing and longitudinal licenses and agreements. Provide subject-matter expertise, training, and support on joint use, pole licensing, and railroad right-of-way issues. Assist regulatory, legal, and other internal clients on joint use, pole licensing, and railroad right-of-way issues.


New research is being presented at ADA 2014, the 74th Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association, from June 13-17 in San Francisco.
Can Hepatitis B Vaccination Prevent Diabetes?
Is It Depression or Diabetes Distress?
Is Celiac Screening for Kids With Type 1 Diabetes Adequate?
ACC/AHA Lipid Guidelines: A Step up in Diabetes Care, or Not?
Insulin Analogs: Is Benefit Worth Cost in Type 2 Diabetes?


text:
Nuclear weapons factory operators plead guilty to breaking safety law following fire
Categories: Aldermaston	Legal	Safety
The company which operates the factories where the UK's nuclear weapons are manufactured has pleaded guilty to breaking safety law following a fire in which a member of staff was injured.
AWE plc, which operates the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE), pleaded guilty at Reading Crown Court on 16 May to failing to ensure the safety of its employees in breach of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. Two further charges under safety laws were dropped by the prosecution.
The charges followed a fire which broke out in an explosives handling facility at the AWE Aldermaston site in Berkshire on the evening of 3 August 2010. The incident left a member of AWE staff with burns to his face and arm and required the evacuation of a number of local residents and closure of roads around the site as safety precautions.
Bernard Thoroughgood QC, prosecuting on behalf of the Health and Safety Executive, described the incident as a "serious fire" which burnt for five hours, and told the court that 68 firefighters from four brigades attended the incident at its peak.
Mr Thoroughgood told the court that firefighters were not initially told that the burning building contained explosives and that they had difficulties in fighting the fire because of low water pressure caused by a poorly maintained fire hydrant on the site. First aiders were initially unable to get to a casualty from the fire because of a locked gate and had to pass a burns kit over the fence to him.
The cause of the fire had not been established with certainty, but was thought to have been caused by a static discharge during an explosives manufacturing process when nitrocellulose was added to the solvent methyl ethyl ketone. Mr Thoroughgood told the court that the risks from the process were "perfectly forseeable" and that concerns about the process had been raised within AWE as long ago as 1996 but were never addressed.
In response James Maxwell-Scott QC, defending AWE, said that although the safety breaches had added to the risks from the fire, AWE senior managers were not responsible for the cause of the fire and AWE took safety very seriously.
An internal investigation into the fire by Peter McIntyre, a member of AWE's Nuclear Safety Committee, identified a number of safety failures which contributed to the incident. Mr McIntyre's report concluded that the production operation that led to the fire "was not carried out in accordance with appropriate process instructions" and had not been authorised to take place on the day of the fire. Failure to comply with operating instructions, explosives safety orders, and planned work schedules "further weakened the barriers to an event involving explosives".
Mr McIntyre's report revealed that the work area where the fire took place contained high explosives in excess of the limit specified in the Explosives Safety Order for the building, even though these were not required for the operation being conducted. Because of "a perceived feeling of pressure" some members of staff involved in the incident intended to work a shift of up to 16 hours on the night of the fire.
The case has been adjourned for sentencing, which will take place on 28 May at Reading Crown Court.