DL Open Thread Sunday Magazine: August 9, 2026

Ventriloquism For–Dummies.  A guy in Maine makes it possible:

In the backroom of a small, cluttered workshop in Portland, Maine, a figure lies facedown on a table. Its head has been cut open, exposing a delicate anatomy of brass rods, hinges and levers.

It is motionless, as though sleeping. But soon it will turn its head, blink, crack a wry smile and part its lips to speak. Each movement will be directed by an intricate network of hand-soldered mechanisms concealed inside its small, hollow body.

The figure is a recent creation of Austin Phillips, one of the last full-time professional makers of ventriloquist dummies in America.

A craftsman working in a tradition that stretches back to Victorian music halls and vaudeville theaters, Phillips, 33, creates custom figures for performers and collectors while preserving a disappearing art.

“To some people, these are just puppets,” Phillips said in a recent interview at his shop. “To me, there’s so much to them. It’s sculpture, casting, painting, sewing, mechanics, history, research, performance design — all at once. They are like kinetic art objects.”

This is a wonderful multi-media piece.  Enjoy!

Conductors–What Do They Do, Exactly?  How can I resist a piece with the phrase ‘tuxedoed air guitar’ in it?:

I would bet that practically everyone who’s seen a conductor leading an orchestra has had the fleeting thought Come on, anyone could do that. They’re just waving their arms! Aren’t they? And if not, then what exactly are they doing? Plenty of people—plenty of musicians, even—mistrust the abracadabra mysticism that so frequently surrounds practitioners of this elusive and slightly dubious art.

At the other end of the spectrum is the equally inaccurate notion that the conductor is an infallible being with almost supernatural powers. People who hold this view tend to assume that the orchestra would be utterly helpless without the sage guidance of the baton-wielder; they forget that any good ensemble is made up of dozens of experienced, intelligent musicians, each of whom is capable of autonomous musical thought. Listeners inclined in this direction will sometimes marvel that the conductor seems, somehow, to know every note of everyone’s part. If they attend a rehearsal, they might swoon over even a simple request from the maestro—for example, to play a passage more lyrically—as if it were a commandment from on high.

Conducting, as a distinct profession, only emerged in the mid-19th century, an inevitable result of converging musical and technological developments. The Industrial Revolution left its imprint on music as on so much else, enabling the invention of newfangled instruments: the tuba, the saxophone, the celesta. Instruments that had been around for centuries got upgrades; the addition of piston valves to trumpets and French horns, for example, made them louder and more precise. In turn, these technical improvements made possible the roaring, oceanic modern orchestra, an ensemble capable of producing the rich, polished sound that we might call “cinematic” today.

Many composers made gleeful use of the new coloristic possibilities available to them. Now they had brass sections whose burnished, gleaming tone could rattle the listener’s ribs, and string sections so large and lush that they could lull their audience into a narcotic stupor. Orchestras got bigger and bigger, ultimately evolving into the musical counterpart of the mighty steamboats and freight trains of the Industrial Age. And like those boats and trains, these ensembles were unwieldy enough that they needed conductors to steer them.

The solitary, magus-like figure of the conductor was also an ideal emblem of the Romantic age, a period that valorized the lone artist endowed with mystical gifts.

Another piece worth reading in its entirety.  I kinda like this explanation:

I’m not always convinced by these sometimes-cloying assertions of free and easy collaboration. Even if most conductors have softened their affect, the fundamental power dynamic has not shifted. “I think we’re still dictators but we smile more,” the conductor Stéphane Denève said, with refreshing candor, in a 2011 interview.

When you see the phrase ‘tuxedoed air guitar’, do you think of anybody but Leonard Bernstein?

Building The Sustainable Home:  A Pictorial Of What Is Both Possible And Increasingly Necessary.  Featuring a couple of possibilities for affordable housing.  Like this:

Photograph: Ty Cole/Taschen

Increasing urban density is critical to sustainability. Poplar Grove, a house built in an alleyway in Washington DC, is an experiment in infill development, the practice of adding new buildings to vacant lots or under-developed land. Designed by BLDUS, it is composed of a modular panelized system made from engineered bamboo called BamCore, which reduces temperature transfer from outside to inside by 90%. Insulation made from sheep’s wool also helps regulate the temperature.

Paul Simon’s ‘Graceland’ just had its 40th anniversary.  This song is an appropriate send-off: