2017 EMT: Alex's Stuff (Fine Arts, some OSci/Religion)
Posted: Mon Mar 20, 2017 5:17 pm
Hey all, here's my stuff.
I did:
- Math: All
- Computer Science: search algorithms, Turing/P=NP/Fortran, string/concatenation/dictionaries, classification/trees/KNN
- Painting: David, Raphael, allegory, Watteau, Velasquez, Revolutionary War, Garden of Earthly Delights, PRB, Magritte, Jesus/Van Eyck/Memling, Jerome/John/Catherine, Judith/Caravaggio/Medusa, self-portraits/Night Watch/bride, chiaroscuro/tenebrism/sfumato, Dali/Beata Beatrix/View of Delft
- Other visual: Praxiteles, City beautiful, Stieglitz, mosaics, The Greek Slave/Berlin Holocaust memorial/Tilted Arc, Bronze Horseman/Busting Bronco/Donatello, Cartier-Bresson/New York/Maier, Ai Weiwei/bird's nest/porcelain
- Music: All but Hermit songs/ Barber/ Knoxville: Summer 1915
- Other auditory: All
- Religion: healing miracles, Icons, purgatory, kosher, Abraham, beard, born again/predestination/sola scriptura, fasting/baptism/Jesus prayer, mark/synoptic/Q, glossolalia/snake handing/holy rollers, prophets/Miriam/Maimonedes
- Other: Hamilton
This was compiled after the Skype mirror when we were at 11 of 15 packets, I'll edit this before the in-person mirror.
This is my first major writing project, but I've been around quizbowl just long enough to "feel ways about stuff." So, a few things about question philosophy before I/we get into specific discussion:
Religion
People have said that there should be more Orthodox Christianity in quizbowl. I grew up cradle Greek Orthodox and am happy to oblige. In the same vein, I really wanted to diverge from "name this holiday" for Judaism.
Math/Computer Science
Similarly, people have said that there should be more stats in quizbowl. I transferred from a grad program in stats to one in in predictive analytics and am happy to oblige. I had one math tossup (LLN) and one comp sci bonus (classification/trees/KNN) that I thought would try and approach that area, especially since it's exploding in importance right now.
Music
Hooray for the chance to use my BMus. Thanks for all the feedback that's already come through on the forums and during rounds; there's already a few questions that I know I'm going to tweak, but I'll discuss specific answer lines in the next post. I feel strongly about a couple of things when it comes to music in quizbowl, namely "reading out a series of six notes to describe a theme is extremely unhelpful" and "knowing the key of a piece usually has little to no practical significance." The longest series of notes that you get is "B-B-high F#" for the Polovtsian Dances for _Russia_ and “do-ti-do-mi” for _Brahms_. I also specified "low" or "high" when the notes spanned a fourth or a fifth, since it's sort of ambiguous. (I'd be interested in music players' opinion on using solfege in this situation--in this case the alternative was "D C# D F#" which seemed super clunky. I only used solfege that one time.) Speaking of which, if you read music but sort of struggle with writing music clues, I'd really recommend A Dictionary of Musical Themes (probably available at your local academic library) for getting your hands around a piece.
With the questions on _Haydn string quartets_ and _Chopin études_ in particular, I felt sort of obligated by the difficulty level (which I had misjudged in general) to just describe and then title-drop nicknamed works. It's really quite difficult to write about Haydn at all because he was so prolific! At least with Chopin I literally sat down with a book of the études, a few of which I had played, and wrote from those. If anyone has suggestions I'm completely open to them.
I tried to make quick notes of my sources for many of my questions, so if you're curious about something please do ask.
I did:
- Math: All
- Computer Science: search algorithms, Turing/P=NP/Fortran, string/concatenation/dictionaries, classification/trees/KNN
- Painting: David, Raphael, allegory, Watteau, Velasquez, Revolutionary War, Garden of Earthly Delights, PRB, Magritte, Jesus/Van Eyck/Memling, Jerome/John/Catherine, Judith/Caravaggio/Medusa, self-portraits/Night Watch/bride, chiaroscuro/tenebrism/sfumato, Dali/Beata Beatrix/View of Delft
- Other visual: Praxiteles, City beautiful, Stieglitz, mosaics, The Greek Slave/Berlin Holocaust memorial/Tilted Arc, Bronze Horseman/Busting Bronco/Donatello, Cartier-Bresson/New York/Maier, Ai Weiwei/bird's nest/porcelain
- Music: All but Hermit songs/ Barber/ Knoxville: Summer 1915
- Other auditory: All
- Religion: healing miracles, Icons, purgatory, kosher, Abraham, beard, born again/predestination/sola scriptura, fasting/baptism/Jesus prayer, mark/synoptic/Q, glossolalia/snake handing/holy rollers, prophets/Miriam/Maimonedes
- Other: Hamilton
This was compiled after the Skype mirror when we were at 11 of 15 packets, I'll edit this before the in-person mirror.
This is my first major writing project, but I've been around quizbowl just long enough to "feel ways about stuff." So, a few things about question philosophy before I/we get into specific discussion:
Religion
People have said that there should be more Orthodox Christianity in quizbowl. I grew up cradle Greek Orthodox and am happy to oblige. In the same vein, I really wanted to diverge from "name this holiday" for Judaism.
Math/Computer Science
Similarly, people have said that there should be more stats in quizbowl. I transferred from a grad program in stats to one in in predictive analytics and am happy to oblige. I had one math tossup (LLN) and one comp sci bonus (classification/trees/KNN) that I thought would try and approach that area, especially since it's exploding in importance right now.
Music
Hooray for the chance to use my BMus. Thanks for all the feedback that's already come through on the forums and during rounds; there's already a few questions that I know I'm going to tweak, but I'll discuss specific answer lines in the next post. I feel strongly about a couple of things when it comes to music in quizbowl, namely "reading out a series of six notes to describe a theme is extremely unhelpful" and "knowing the key of a piece usually has little to no practical significance." The longest series of notes that you get is "B-B-high F#" for the Polovtsian Dances for _Russia_ and “do-ti-do-mi” for _Brahms_. I also specified "low" or "high" when the notes spanned a fourth or a fifth, since it's sort of ambiguous. (I'd be interested in music players' opinion on using solfege in this situation--in this case the alternative was "D C# D F#" which seemed super clunky. I only used solfege that one time.) Speaking of which, if you read music but sort of struggle with writing music clues, I'd really recommend A Dictionary of Musical Themes (probably available at your local academic library) for getting your hands around a piece.
With the questions on _Haydn string quartets_ and _Chopin études_ in particular, I felt sort of obligated by the difficulty level (which I had misjudged in general) to just describe and then title-drop nicknamed works. It's really quite difficult to write about Haydn at all because he was so prolific! At least with Chopin I literally sat down with a book of the études, a few of which I had played, and wrote from those. If anyone has suggestions I'm completely open to them.
I tried to make quick notes of my sources for many of my questions, so if you're curious about something please do ask.