Adolphe Sax’s 201st Birthday

• Adolphe Sax’s 201st Birthday

• If you were alive in the mid-nineteenth century and had a particularly keen ear for music, you might have noticed a void somewhere between the brass and woodwind sections. Adolphe Sax certainly did, and being both a talented musician and the enterprising man that he was, he started tinkering and endeavored to fill it. The result was the iconic, honey-toned instrument still bearing his name: the saxophone.

  The son of an instrument-maker, Sax was highly creative and had a deep understanding of brass and woodwinds. He started tinkering with instruments of his own, and upon bringing together the body of a brass and the mechanics of a woodwind created a hybrid that would revolutionize music. His eponymous saxophone had a sound all its own, a wonderfully smoky middle ground between the two.

  The Saxophones that were popularized by the likes of John Coltrane, Lisa Simpson, and Kenny G constitute only a fraction of his impressive body of work. From the whimsical looking 7-bell trombone to the large and swooping saxtuba, Sax never tired of exploring, experimenting, and creating new—and sometimes unusual—instruments. To properly highlight his inventiveness we couldn’t possibly make just one Doodle. Which is why you can find five unique Doodles today, each celebrating a different instrument created at the hands of Mr. Sax. There is one notable exception—what we affectionately call The Googlehorn. Inspired by the intricate tubing Sax employed to alter and manipulate sound, this is Doodler Lydia Nichols' attempt to fashion an instrument as unique and quirky as both Adolphe Sax and Google.

  Learn more about the family of musical inventors behind today's Doodle on Google Cultural Institute.

  

  Initial sketches with some errors in hand-placement. From left to right: Saxtuba, Alto Sax, 7-Bell Trombone, Soprano Sax, 'Googlehorn.' The background treatment was changed in the final to mimic the plates and engraving typically found on instruments of that era.

  
  

Inessa Rodina, from Russia with Love

Inessa Rodina photographed by Alessio Cristianini

Inessa Rodina is our new cover model, and she was a real surprise. When we first saw her portfolio at her model agency in Milano – Major Model Management – we could not imagine how nice and polite she would be. But after shooting a half day with her, we would not let her go

Watch the video, and the interview with Inessa Rodina Inessa comes from Russia, from the most remote place in the world (this is what they used to teach me at school) Vladivostok. She is now living and working in Milano, Italy, where we shot the pictures and video you can see here below.
Her model agency is Major Model Management http://www.majormodels.it/, and for this shoot Inessa has been wearing beautiful lingerie outfits from Christies and Naory. – Alessio
Name and agency?
Inessa Rodina, Major Model Management in Milano

Where are you from?
From Moscow, Russia
How long have you been modeling?
I have been modeling for three years already, and I really love this job. You never know what will happen, you can move, change, meet new people. Modeling is perfect for me!
How did you start?
When I was living in Vladivostok, the city where I was born, a model agency asked me to try. Very simple, this is how I started. Now I work in Italy.
Your favorite top models are…
I love a lot of models, but my favorite models are: Bianca Balti, Izabel Goulart, Sasha Luss.
Your best quality is…
I think my best quality is that I am never late, not common for a model.
And a bad aspect of your personality?
…let’s talk about it… tomorrow
Your hobbies?
I love music, yoga, sports, in the winter I love skiing, snowboarding. I really love sport, that is my hobby.
Your favorite music?
Deep house, tech house. You can dance, listen to it…
The best quality in a man?
For sure the sense of humor. If you do not have a good sense of humor, you cannot be my boyfriend. That is really important, the most important thing.
Flat shoes or high heels?
For sure, flat shoes. Only at castings I wear high heels, in my normal life… only flat shoes.
Shopping and fashion. Your favorite brands, your fashion style? How do you dress when you are not busy with castings or model work?
I follow style. In the future I would like to work as a designer. Rick Owens, Boris Bidjan, Julius are among my favorites. I study at the school of design, let’s see what happens.
What about your personal style?
I do not like skirt and heels, I prefer a more casual style, sneakers, jeans, jackets, my favorite color is black.

Opinion: Checkposts not enough to stop terrorism

Security was stepped up in the capital following a machete attack on a police checkpost in Savar yesterday morning. Photo: Palash Khan

Sharier Khan

The Wednesday attack on a police checkpost in Ashulia that left a policeman dead and another one critically injured shows that setting up road side checkposts are not enough to foil missions of terrorists blinded by ideological corruption.
The nature of attack also shows that the terrorists have become more aggressive – especially considering that the police victims were on duty and armed.
It also shows that in order to spread fear among the public, the terrorists are picking up unpredictable targets, locations and time.
First, they killed two foreigners separately in two regions – Dhaka and Rangpur, and then they bombed a Shia community gathering, and then they attacked cops in the capital. Side by side, terrorists have separately killed five writers and publishers and several religious leaders and have announced to kill ‘enemies of Islam’, who could be anyone as it is the terrorists who judge and execute people.
The recent spate of terror began from late September – just a few days after the Australian cricket team declined to visit Bangladesh on security grounds. Australia had intelligence that there would be some terrorist attacks on foreigners and other targets. Later, according to a report of The New York Times, we learnt that the USA also shared similar messages with the government in late September, just a few days before the murder of the Italian citizen in Dhaka. It seems the government did not take those seriously.
We later saw that several other countries were also informed about possible spate of terrorist activities and these countries had issued travel alerts for their citizens in Bangladesh.
Sadly, while foreign nations have such information, our intelligence seemed to be in dark. Why?
A probable answer to that question is how the government reacted to the murders of the foreign nationals, bombing on the Shia community, slaying of the freethinkers and even the police. The government wasted no time in faulting the BNP-Jamaat for the killings. When the government high ups bring up such conspiracy theories, how can our intelligence agencies work independently and professionally?
Threats of militancy are nothing new in Bangladesh. It crept into Bangladesh in the ’90s and attacked anything that stood for indigenous culture, secularism and freethinking using the name of Islam.
Following the fall of the Jama’atul Mujahedin Bangladesh (JMB) by 2008, the government had formulated its plan to uproot terrorism for good by not only strengthening the police forces, but also by fighting terrorism intellectually by mobilising religious leaders at mosques and other places. The intellectual bid fell flat by 2010 as the government could not motivate religious leaders for its cause. The government could have then asked the parliamentarians to help motivate these people. But it seems the government just gave up.
All the while the government was more interested to use the cops politically to bash its BNP-Jamaat rivals.
In the wake of the recent terrorist activities, the government beefed up the security by installing checkposts. But it did not prepare or train cops to deal with sudden terrorist attacks. Now we have seen the consequence. These checkposts are good for harassing innocent people. Terrorists can avoid checkposts if they want as they follow detailed plans.
The situation demands the government asks itself why our cops and intelligence agencies are failing to stop terrorism. They need to be more professional and competent. And that would be possible only through depoliticisation of these institutions. Fighting terrorism is a tricky battle, which must be fought both intellectually and professionally – not by hatching conspiracy theories.