Holiday greetings from Specialized

[Bluetree]

I'm glad Specialized keps bringing that back. I never get tired of it!

Just in case you didn't know, Flip Baber made all the music from bike parts...

I was recently approached by award winning advertising agency, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners to do a composition for their client, Specialized. Specialized is a bike manufacturer and they needed some Christmas music, but with a twist: They wanted me to create the music from only bike sounds. They didn’t even know if it was possible, so they left the song choice up to me to see what I could come up with. Since Jingle Bells is a little overdone this time of year, I thought Tchaikovsky’s “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy” would be a great alternative. At first I didn’t think it could be done, but as I recorded sounds from my road bike and mountain bike it started to take shape. Here’s the instrumentation and score:

Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite, Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy

Glockenspiel & Clarinet melody = spokes.
Cello & Violin pizzicatos = plucked derailleur cables.
Triangle = disc brake hit.
Percussion = shifting, coasting, finger over turning spokes, chain pulls, braking, clipping into pedals, back-spinning, air out of tires.

Link

Specialized says Happy Christmas with bike music
Carlton Reid Dec 2 2006, 9:45pm

And that's music played on bike parts, not music about a bike. The US bike company commissioned experimental musician – and cyclist – Flip Baber to produce a short orchestral piece to accompany an animated rear cog. The stunning result is sure to be a viral hit for Specialized. And, yes, the road and mountain bike used for the twanging, banging and plucking were from the big squiggly S.
Flip Baber - aka Johnny Random - was commissioned to write the Christmas card piece in November. He was approached via Goodby Silverstein & Partners, Specialized's ad agency since 1999.

Baber told BikeBiz.com: "I used a mountain bike and road bike and they were Specialized bikes. I am a mountain biker and Rich Silverstein is a cyclist as well.

"I recorded all the takes at different points during one day since there was construction going on near my studio. The next day I edited the sounds and took the best takes and then everything was interpreted and composed within about 4-5 hours, including the mixdown.

"I came up with some really far out sounds in my bike recordings, but couldn't use them on this project because they were either too dissonant or weren't easily recognizable as 'bike' sounds."

The 'happy holidays' card and music has just gone live on the Specialized website. The piece is a glockenspiel-free rendition of Tchaikovsky's 'Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy' from 'The Nutcracker Suite.'