Steve's Harmonic Notes

Function Syntax Design Conundrum

I love using the arguments block, but it doesn't handle this use case well.

Breathing Out While Waiting

I didn't think the D major scale in Barber would be a big deal.

Combining My Blogs

I started a blog about my French horn learning path and musicianship on hornjourney.com back in May 2023. Later, after retiring from MathWorks in March 2024, I started a second blog, on matrixvalues.com, about MATLAB and image processing in MATLAB. I've now decided to simplify my

Horn

Octave Notation Change in The Horn Call

The Horn Call has switched to a better notation for distinguishing pitches in different octaves.

MATLAB

Pixel Grid Update

As it turns out, there are several ways to draw thousands of line segments with just one "line" object.

MATLAB

Image Zoom and Pan Utilities

In today's world of display devices with a wide range of resolutions, this notion of a virtual pixel has evolved to help interface and website designers achieve reasonably consistent results on different devices.

MATLAB

Cris Luengo on Image Processing Library Design Issues

Cris Luengo discusses how the "everything is a class" design philosophy affects the complexity of the resulting client interfaces.

Horn

Thinking Again About the Word "Amateur"

"Amateur" in French always gives the connotation of someone who deeply appreciates and is knowledgeable about something.

MATLAB

Step Through Your Code

Although I was certainly happy to have found the bug before the feature shipped, I was disappointed to have found it fairly late in the development process.

MATLAB

FFT Zero-Padding Strategies - Computing Transform Length

For 1-D applications with very long vectors, the time required to compute the transform size could be significant.

MATLAB

FFT Zero-Padding Strategies - Small Prime Factors

"The standard FFTW distribution works most efficiently for arrays whose size can be factored into small primes (2, 3, 5, and 7), and otherwise it uses a slower general\-purpose routine."

Horn

Thinking About the Word "Amateur"

You can't avoid English words that have ambiguous meaning; they are everywhere.

MATLAB

FFT Zero-Padding Strategies - Introduction

FFT-based convolution can be performed faster by using a different zero-padding strategy than what is commonly used.

MATLAB

Initialize a MATLAB Toolbox

As I learned during my MathWorks career, a set of recommended practices is much more likely to take hold if it can be automated.

MATLAB

Welcome!

Matrix Values is about MATLAB, image processing, and other related topics that may catch my interest.

Horn

Retirement + 4 Days

The last month or so was rather intense.

Horn

Practice Room Playing Position and Recording

I stood in the center of the room and contemplated this setup.

Horn

Today's practice plan

As Randy Gardner says, "plan your work and work your plan."

Horn

Horn camp

By the end of the week, my musical batteries were fully charged, and I had enough practice and performance ideas to last a whole year (at least).

Horn

Fingering chart

I wondered how much horn math could be presented on a single chart.

Horn

Juicy mistakes

Each mistake is a chance for pausing and reflecting on what just happened, and learning from it.

Horn

Patrick Stewart on learning a script

I don't read biographies that often, but I am enjoying my birthday present from last month, the book Making It So, by Patrick Stewart, known to many as Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the starship Enterprise. I've seen him very many times in TV shows, movies, and

Horn

Troubleshooting the high notes

When the note dropped out again, in the same place, I put my horn down and stared at the music stand.

Horn

More thoughts about the octave notation system in The Horn Call

My favorite musical practice app, TonalEnergy, uses scientific pitch notation.

Horn

Using forScore recording cues for practice

I have found it helpful and efficient to use forScore's audio capabilities to practice my concert parts along with an orchestral recording.