J.S. Bach - Crab Canon on a Möbius Strip

[bigmanpigman]

:rebblack:

[hellomate639]

"Just let me play more piece before bed, mom!"

*trollface*

[hyowonriver]

Gödel, Escher, Bach...

[davidgarciacardenas]

Great!!!!!!!!!

[iaranah]

jungkwonchin brought me here

[emirkara]

Bach the great!!!

[Abracadabra208]

I had to listen to this for my Bach class in college. Too bad the rulers of the Germanic provinces didn't realize just how insanely genius Bach was, or they would have bowed to HIM.

[YamatoYagyu]

Absolutely brilliant!!!!

[kometierra666]

wow!!! fucking maths!!!

[AdamBMorris]

Playing the 5th bar from the end backwards (0:52) sounds horrible.

[salomonaquino7]

@AdamBMorris it doesnt soud horrible, itws just a different form of progression :D

[shgidi]

fucking mindblowing

[WGTSA]

where is the limit of human genius mind....

[Xx032]

WHAT SORCERY IS THIS?!?!

[princesslenorastone]

... dude. sick.

[ECKARDTfamilie]

thank you very much

[Gerar2891]

yeah yeah there is a point that you just will not get more impress cause you acept that Bach was and is, a superior been, perfect, brilliant, the most smartest man (allien or god) that ever put a feet on earth and you realize that he is just Bach, this man deserv a Religion!!

[TheVengefulTortoise]

Verily, thou hast blown my mind. Epic! :D

[MrDerogative]

Mind=blown

[darthtrinna]

14 people hear Justin Bieber

[BladedFret]

14 people are musically incompetent............

[hjbrothers]

Now THAT'S what I call a Moebius strip! Beautifully done, Jos!

[bersilu]

simply awesome :o

[peterluth]

Deeply impressive. I am wordless. 

[tintiringa]

I became breathless listening to this. My heart pounding :O

[spyrogalaktiko]

SUBLIME

[spyrogalaktiko]

AWESOME AND BEATIFUL.

[cyndie26]

Try reversing the song the last time that plays! The flute sounds like a clarinet, and the harpsichord sounds like an oboe!

[devize92]

coool :)

[Fishity6]

Just as good forwards, backwards, and upside down!

[JWKeebs]

This is brilliant

[ballcapmusicbox]

:O

[cafity]

Just one word:

Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius Genius

[Vesivian]

Genius!

[88Cortex]

An 'old', but Golden book it is!

[andrewyaoauatauabaea]

I used to think Bach was a genius.

Now I know he's a genius.

[ArtezVideo]

AMAZING!

[punk2564]

very nice

[cookingwithrob]

This is significantly better than Rebecca Black's Friday

[Xx032]

@cookingwithrob bitch please

[EmperorCQX]

@cookingwithrob Haha, whatz up with Reccaba Black, i thought it was a whole another category? One is Art and the other is entertainment?

[TheDebasteitor]

@cookingwithrob shit dude! J. S. Bach is THE SHIT, that's right yo, in fucking capitals cuz he was not only a fucking baroque musician, he was THE baroque style, you don't believe me? well his father was Johann Ambrosius Bach, you can't think in anything more badass than Johann Ambrosius except Johann Sebastian, nevetheless JS Bach created not only the Brandenburg Concertos but also the partitas, the musical offering and the art of fugue, that the mother fucking state-of-the-art yo!

[MrDanann]

@TheDebasteitor Best comment I've ever read about Bach. Motherfucking genius!

[hellomate639]

@cookingwithrob

That's like saying Einstein is smarter than one of Sarah Palin's brain cells.

[SERUNONURES]

@hellomate639 or breast cells for that matter

[EdiEllerymissing]

Bach simplemente no tenía límites... ESTO ES IMPRESIONANTE!

[becomepostal]

Excellent.

[rimwirrum]

Anyone interested in this should read the book "Goedel, Escher, Bach: The Eternal Golden Braid" by Douglas Hofstadter.

[ravenslaves]

I used to say that Bach is where music and math, merged into one, and somehow, created something better than the parts. This video just confirms it. Thank you for the moment of sanity. :)

[chosop25]

Thank you so much for the visual. It makes so much sense, especially I'm studying Mobius strip in topology now.

[bhinderbinder]

I don't think Bach was actually from this planet.

[ihamoitc2005]

This is rather pedestrian. What use is polyphony if it comes at the cost of rythmic sophistication. This piece does not do Bach's genius justice.

[analhemorrhage]

@ihamoitc2005

Blow it out your ass.

[ihamoitc2005]

@analhemorrhage=future tea-bagger

[13Naru13]

@ihamoitc2005 Pedestrian now, perhaps, but for its time a nice line of notes. This isn't supposed to be a sample of his genius, but in its simplicity show it all the same. It's just a bit of Bach for fun. Enjoy it for what it is. I did! :-D

[gr0mithtimon]

@ihamoitc2005

Use? What you talking about?

[ihamoitc2005]

Sorry, I'm not here to teach you English.

[jrssjdca]

@ihamoitc2005 The purpose of this selection was to thwart Frederick's "trickery".

[AllenTheAllen]

I think I hear "ppp aaulll is d dd eaad ' when it's played backwards!

[Borussiasempervictor]

Der liebe Vaterslandsboden gibt mir wieder Freud' und Leid, aber da ist unser

magister magistrorum, JSB, per eternitam maximus.

[Zarhejo]

Speechless.

[KRaMsong3760]

Amazing! Fun! Interresting. 3700 THUMBS UP!

[Hailstormand]

Bach might be laughing merrily at us, marveling at something he could have created over a cup of tea. Or a pint of beer. How in the world he could have come up with something so deceptively simple, yet so profoundly complex? In a single line? Brahms was right to remark on the other enigmatic piece (Chaconne, Partita No.2) that the experience in creating it alone would "have driven me out of my mind". This drove me speechless!

[pianino4ever]

Yup... My brain just exploded...

[miroljub1001]

incredible... bach surprises me all the time...

[BigBiff88]

i am going to die now

[giorgiopicker]

people like Bach were the living " computers " of their time, using their mind in a highly specialized way with practical real time enjoyable results :Just imagining the "education" or training involved into translating it all into a correct live performance is a trip in itself... As the story about the canon goes Bach would improvise on the theme up to four voices harmonization and backward too....

the moebius strip is the perfect nest for this...

tnx

[giorgiopicker]

@giorgiopicker

btw the whole Musical Offer ,where this one comes from is available in a tiny pocket book and by now in midi notation for free on the web check by "bach" / "midi" and have fun

(well guess most folks out there know that already)

[SixPositive]

Esto es excelente! Brillant!

[therookiecynic]

Many melodies, taken from the same key and time signature, will often have harmonious passages, pleasing counterpoints, and synthetic texture. This is an excellent example of that. Plus, the whole mobius strip graphic is sweet.

[nonnopirro52]

Jos Leys BRAVO

[seahyimin]

what you get on a mobius strip, if im not wrong, is the same as when the melodies are played in opposite direction. however, it is a very clever idea play this on a mobius strip

[Margotbear]

beautiful. thankyou for posting this.

[reedracher2710]

There are 10 stupid people now 

[liquidsteel49]

@reedracher2710 they were always stupid, but now they are identified.

[jiverdug]

Genius!

[artois54]

Thanks for posting! A perfect realization!

[JuglarEuskaldun]

Am I the one thinking on Escher? Great job making/uploading the video, johnny bach was the musucian for excellency and this lil masterpiece confrims it.

[charlielloydboyd]

read the book Godel Escher Bach... it will change your life

[GEternalBraid]

@charlielloydboyd signed

[MonicaKn17]

@charlielloydboyd it sure changed the way i think!

[Imaigner1]

@charlielloydboyd New favorite person on the internet. I totally agree. I saw a video of this and someone commented "What is the point of this" and I almost vomited.

[donaldnewmanmedone]

@charlielloydboyd Actually just started reading GEB and that's what brought to all this Bach. I picked up GEB because it was referred to so often in another tome you might enjoy, "The Most Human Human". Respect from Michigan' usa. Power to the Peaceful.

[Umby64]

9 people just declared their stupidity

[AhamBrahman]

Holy GOD!. Bach is such an epic genius, I feel unbelievably amazing just for having the privilege of being in the same race as a being this fucking godly. Also, read Godel Escher Bach if you haven't, cuz it seriously blows the mind.

[kettiboop]

excellent visualization. the only pity is the absence of feelings given by the midi version.

[lequeze]

great animation!!

[shariotoflove]

if anyone doesnt know what a counterpoint is, they will from this

[Markronimus]

Um, hate to break this to you but a crab canon isn't like a mobius strip. It's not even an ambrigram. It's a piece that works forwards or backwards but usually sounds different played each way. Like a bunch of letters that, read forward, spell one word and, backwards, another. This is one of my least favorite bach canons.

[contekkst]

@Markronimus when the canon is written *with* both parts then it does have mirror symmetry (particularly if played by the same instrument, otherwise switch instruments is part of the symmetry!) I agree the mobius strip is a bit misleading. Here we have a double cover of a mobius strip, since the paper is double sided and not transparent. (Kids who are encouraged to make mobius bands out of paper should instead be encouraged to use a transparency!)

[asix999]

incredible, wow. now i'm really scared xD

[sergiogeorge1]

@asix999 im too, haha

[rumpranger65]

AWESOME!

[jchevlen]

Wow...and people still don't worship Bach?

[ijoemil]

non-commutativity with Bach

[rapanalyst]

the 8 people who disliked this are rockers.

[thepoet82]

@rapanalyst

No way, we love Bach as well!

Must be those damn Justin Bieber fans! :p

[WadeTWilson]

@thepoet82 lol

[XXXkLeCiIj69XXX]

@rapanalyst bah, i'm a metalhead and i love it.

Bach spirit must not die!!!

[Tubull]

I would really recommend Douglas Hofstadter's book, Gödel Escher Bach, for further analysis/thoughts about this phenomena.

[annie1931]

fascinating!

[RoboticusMusic]

alot of bachs music is like a continuous build of pressure with no end in sight. like a cannon. I dont know if thats why they are called cannons... food for thought.

[batlin]

@RoboticusMusic It's a "canon" not a cannon. According to the Wikipedia article: 'The Old French canon, which meant "learned", was taken from the Greek kanon for "rule" or "law", which eventually came to mean "an accepted rule" in English. This term was first used to refer to the rule that describes how the voices relate to each other.'

[scottdaris]

@RoboticusMusic : That is one of the funniest "kid logic" things I've ever heard! Whether you were being serious or not, who cares! Excellentism delivered.

[madafaka35]

i dont understand this, can anyone tell me what so special about this music is?

[VolkColopatrion]

@madafaka35 you must be kidding. look at it. it's played backwards on itself and follows counterpoint

[Wyhejin]

@madafaka35 youre an idiot

[jotadeguijarro]

no words

[franchescco]

Se verla al reveS <-

[usertyfoon]

amazing!!!

[jrdennis95]

Bach.

Is.

Genius.

[franchescco]

Satan oscillate my metallic sonataS<

[paradoxicus]

Clases y conceptos son dudosamente reales.Son formas de hablar,casi juegos del lenguaje.Esta idea que seria sometida a razonamiento por Godel,Russell,Eliade y Wittgenstein,dos siglos antes fue enunciada por JSB,en una musica que prescinde del tiempo y acaso del espacio.

[amatorynumber]

nice video... the moebius strip was kind of an obvious and yet clever idea!!! bravo!

actually, these crab canons are not so difficult to compose, but most likely mine (or most other people's) wouldn't be as interesting as this one... clever old Bach :-)

[aristizabal900925]

explica muy bien el funcionamiento de los canones

jajaja musical sudoku!!!! so cool!!!

[amildias]

Olhem-me só para este "gajo"...!!! Fantástico! Grandesíssimo...!

Vejam e escutem o canon até ao fim...

[desertricker]

holy sh- this is awesome! fav'd!

[alucardz100]

Bach era un genio

[JXB54321]

wow. this is just pure greatness. Well done.

Thank you!!!!!

[binhoservice]

fantasticoooo

[isabelgonzalez1]

¡Qué bonitoo!

[mirloniger]

¡¡ De lo mejor que he visto en mucho tiempo !!

THANKS, THANKS, THANKS.

BRAVO, BRAVO,BRAVO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[googlekopfkind]

ha i did my own crab canon thats fun :D

[Davccelion]

La leche en bicicleta..

No words!

[katita5111]

MARAVILHOSO!!!!

[mighinmar]

It's cool, but when the score is bent to make the Möbius strip, the piece is exactly the same as before !!

[Aqualung1989]

lol musical sudoku that's a great way to say it. and yeah, bach is just amazing... how many people can do something like this? blah and people listen to cheap pop or rap nowadays... oh well

[kickinapouch]

@Aqualung1989 people? computers will be able to do this shit in a few years

[delmago1]

@Aqualung1989 not many, Nobuo Uematsu being very good of course

[RangerThompson]

@Aqualung1989 Just like food, good music like this is quality like meat and potatoes. Rap and Pop are not nutritious or fulfilling, but sometimes they are fun to enjoy as a guilty pleasure, like desert.

[fonikx]

@Aqualung1989 you should try and show more respect. Awesome song and curious fact about the mobius strip

[Aqualung1989]

@Aqualung1989 for the people that think I'm dismissing pop and rap, I'm not. I'm not a rap fan and I don't like 95% of pop, but I do know there are guys (not in the mainstream) that are good at what they do even if their style isn't really made for me. So please don't get me wrong.

[jsymons1985]

i don't know what the point of the mobius strip is

[ntipouan]

Its a surface with one side ! ! !

[rambydave]

This is like something that only autistic megasavants do. Amazing.

[herseyb]

I think Bach was just a genius. Not broken in a way that made him better at some things.

[rustydog1236]

Wonderful! thanks for posting!

[soramy01]

Es Brillante esta cancion

me encanto

[EdgarYoT]

Ya no hay genios de la música... o me diréis que cualquier músico actual es capaz de idear una cosa así, increíble...

[b0ttomzone]

i can imagine bach sitting there, taking a break from his cantatas or masses or whatever, and just kind of like coming up with these little canonic variations, like a musical sudoku or something.

[0bambi0deer0]

hahahaha nicee

[idaspe]

Hahahaham "musical sudoku", great image!!! :o)

[danielkirk1]

Musical sudoku... Holy shit, bach's life coulden't be explained any better :)

[LauraDeBunbury]

well, i think that it would be better if the whole stave was turned, i mean, to hace two staves and two put them together, then to create the strip, but who know, probabily i'm wrong =P

[tonirealflorit]

Perfect!!!

Incredibly woundrous! :-))

Thank you for your great work!

[BLACKDOTSx]

I love Bach <3

Such a genius.

[mizzpeekaboo]

i would love to hear glenn gould play this!!!

[musamor75]

Well Sir, I take my hat off to you. You have ingeniously delved into the mind of the Master himself, using a visual illustration of his labyrinthian thought mode. The Mobius Strip illustrates 3D in perpetual motion. "Takesone to know one". Carry on

[halentien]

Astounding !!! A precious document on youtube...Many many thanks to you for your WONDERFUL work !!!...I love it SO SO MUCH !!! Hello from Toulouse/France.

[kv310]

*"He uses two different rythms for the first and second segments (cheating!)"

This is called Compensation. Every time you want to do some contrapunctus to a melody, you need to compensate it rhythmically.

On the other hand, if you think you could improve this canon, you should show us how to make it better, then we all would learn from you.

Please, demonstrate how this is canon is shit. You need to use the same theme and the same canon-style.2

[danielkirk1]

I tried to compose my own crab canon, and this is very correct. The rhythm is one of the key reasons why this canon works. Let's laugh at this fool for thinking otherwise :)

[SuperHcooper]

they way the get the mobius strip thing to work is that they don't just turn the whole thing into the strip: they cut it in half first, paste it back to back, then turn it into a strip. and BEFORE they paste it back to back, they invert one of the parts. very tricky. so a second iteration along the strip would work. but I find this disingenous because it falsely suggests it's a table canon.  in fact it's a crab canon.

[paolitas7]

i love it amazing Bach

[camilocuesta]

awesome

[orsontan95]

genius

[talhyam]

that's grate :D

[SOPM2007]

That's ingenious! I've never heard a track that sounds serious played forward as well as played backwards - withal the two melodic sequences combined.

[666hermannski]

thats Bach^^

[seltsamurai]

i liek music

[MakingtheList]

Master Johann Sebastian Bach...

Absolutely fantastic.

[MattAosta]

Yeah! Bach Rocks!

[ihamoitc2005]

Quite the chatterbox, aren't you?