VisLang: Brainstorm/Matrix

This is the initial list of things I came up with. I worked on this list while also jotting down ideas on note cards. From here I made a list of Icon Index and Symbols that I could use to represent Mr. Peplowski. 

The Icon/Index/Symbol list: 

ICON: 100 "Years", 100 clarinets

INDEX: Benny Goodman's grave with music notes, upside down clarinets, recreation of a benny goodman poster, Old microphone/radio/radio dial, 100 "years" making up a clarinet

SYMBOL: baby playing a clarinet, cd on a record player, bee with movement lines, branch with a berry or leaf, playing a branch with berry or leaf

I also included a "Random" Category for things that don't quite fit the bill of any one icon/index/symbol category. For example, the words "TELL YOUR FRIENDS" and then having a picture of an old circle-dial phone and a cell phone to comment on the past/present aspect of Mr. Peplowski's music. 

Below are the matrix-to-date photos. I wrote some of the note cards with pink pen which was hard to photograph. I apologize for the quality. 

VIsLang: Rhetorical find and share: Archive magazine

NA: Project 1: 10 frames and single shots

These first two are a close up, and the actual 2 sets of 10 frames. I decided on Choose Design, Carve Plate, Cut Paper to Size, Pick a Color, Ink the Plate, Line Paper up on the Plate, Press, Peel the Paper off, Let it Dry, Hang it. 1st and 3rd Person.

These are 1st person "Choose Color." In photo, drawing, and collage.

The rest of these are 3rd person, drawing, collage, and photo.

VisLang: Jazz Visual Research

These are photos I got off the net of Ken Peplowski, Benny Goodman, and general images of clarinets and a couple of album covers. I think the "This is Benny Goodman" cover may end up being one of my biggest inspirations for this project.









These images are horrible quality because they were taken with my phone, but I took them while we were at the Jazz Museum down in the Jazz District. 18th And Vine baby!

VisLang: Jazz Research

Appearing with his quartet in a swinging, centennial celebration of Benny Goodman, we are happy to present Ken Peplowski, who has recorded nearly 20 CDs with Concord Records. Among others, Ken has worked with Mel Torme, Charlie Byrd, Peggy Lee, George Shearing, Hank Jones, Rosemary Clooney, James Moody, Cedar Walton, Houston Person, Steve Allen, Woody Allen, and Madonna, “Although not necessarily in that order,” says Ken. “When you grow up in Cleveland, Ohio, playing in a Polish polka band, you learn to think fast on your feet!” says Peplowski, who played his first pro engagement when he was still in elementary school. He recalls, “From my first time performing in public, I knew I wanted to play music for a living.”

That’s just what he has been doing, and nobody swings harder than Ken Peplowski! “Since the advent of Benny Goodman, there have been too few clarinetists to fill the void that Goodman left. Ken Peplowski is most certainly one of those few. The man is magic.” - Mel Torme

Ken Peplowski’s

Benny Goodman Centennial Celebration

Fri. Dec. 18, 2009 - 8 p.m.

is in the right place.”

- Herbie Hancock

"These quotes only hint at Ken Peplowski's virtuosity - not only is he an outstanding clarinetist and saxophone player, but he's also a charismatic entertainer who has been delighting audiences for over 30 years with his warmth, wit, and musicianship.

"When you grow up in Cleveland, Ohio, playing in a Polish polka band, you learn to think fast on your feet", says Peplowski, who played his first pro engagement when he was still in elementary school. "From my first time performing in public, I knew I wanted to play music for a living."

Also: I wrote Mr. Peplowski an email and was lucky enough to get a response:

Hello Mr. Peplowski,
I am a student at the Kansas City Art Institute. We have recently been assigned a project to promote this seasons shows at the Folly Theater. Our class was divided up amongst the artists preforming this year. I was lucky enough to have been assigned your poster. That being said, if you could possibly spare a moment of your time, I would like to ask you a few questions.

1- After having read several articles about you, I understand that you have been compared quite often to Benny Goodman. Was he an inspiration for you while you were forming your career as a musician? Who else would you classify as an inspiration?
KP: he was an early inspiration, along with Duke Ellington, Sonny Stitt, and The Beatles.
2- What, if anything, would you like to see on a poster representing you and your show?
KP: Actually, something expressing the joy of this music rather than a depiction of a Benny Goodman tribute-as-history-lesson; I try to do his music in my own fashion when asked to do these tributes, with my own solos and my own take on his music/influence.
3- Would you consider your music to compare more with the classics of the jazz world or do you think of it as a more progressive and current style?
KP: I consider myself, above anything else, as an interpreter of song, so I bristle at putting any time frame to it, like "swing" or "modern" - it's as modern and relevant as anyone wants to make it!!!! I think the problem with jazz is many people treat it like a historical recreation rather than an ongoing, exciting, valid art form!
I hope this helps...Ken

NA: Project 1: The big decision

My activity/hobby is Print Making.

My action is Making a Linotype.

Typo3: Stephen Fry Video Response

This video made me wonder if Gutenburg were still alive today, would he approve of all the ways typography and printing have evolved? Yes, his press made something priorly hand-made faster and easier to access, but there was also still a very keen sense of a personal touch in each page he printed. Hand crafted press, hand carved type, hand-made paper. Today, the pressing process is almost completely impersonal. It's almost depressing. I hit a key on a computer and hit another and I can print 4 billion copies of the same thing without even hardly being in the same room as the whole process.

Couple of facts that I found interesting from the video:

It would have taken the slaughter of 140 calves in order to get the amount of vellum needed for only ONE copy of the bible.

The mold used to quickly reproduce the letter E in the video was amazing but I didn't quite understand how that worked, if you're hand pouring something, how do you make the letters all the same height. I guess you possibly have to do some filing?

He possibly drew inspiration from a grape/wine press.

The man that made the press in the video based some of his design off of an illustration by Albrecht Durer.

One of the Brothers Grimm had written in the front of one of Gutenberg's bibles when he was working as a librarian.