Not researching passport laws.
Check the passport laws for the countries you plan on visiting. Some countries including Brazil, Singapore, Ecuador, Indonesia, Romania, Israel, Paraguay and Malaysia will not allow you to visit within six months of your passport expiration date. Countries including Denmark, Cambodia, Switzerland, Fiji and Greenland will not allow people with passports within three months of expiring. We determine and advise you for your destination(s).

Not having enough blank pages.
If you travel abroad frequently, you may be running low on space for stamps in your passport. In most countries, you will need at least two blank pages to be granted entry. Once it is full, you will need to apply for a new one. There is also an option to apply for a Frequent Travelers Passport which is a bit more expensive but will save you money in the long run.

Not renewing after a name change.
Have you recently gotten married and changed your name?  It’s important not to forget to also change it on your passport. If it has been less than a year since your current passport was issued, you are eligible for a free change with a DS-5504 form. If it has been over a year, you will need to provide a renewal form along with a new photo and documents proving your new name.

Traveling with a damaged passport.
Significantly damaged passports are completely ineligible for travel, according to State Department guidelines. This includes water damage, substantial tears, missing visa pages and either damage,  and rips or markings on your bio page in the front. You may think its fine if your passport has any sign of damage,  but it’s better to be safe than sorry. Apply for a new one online or by mail.

Sydney Opera House, one of the world’s most famous music venues, has long had a problem. Everyone loves the building, but not everyone loves the way it sounds, especially in its largest venue, the Concert Hall, Some feel the acoustics in the Concert Hall lack power (actor and director John Malkovich quipped that an airplane hangar would sound better).  

A sneak-peek at the acoustic improvements

An included poll asked about students' opportunities to access and engage in music, both in and outside of school.  The reporting method of the study allows you to break down the results by ​various student groups.

Because people own dozens of mugs, we realized that if we ask clients to embrace our mug, it had better be a good one.

That's the approach we used with our latest gift project.  Attendees at the last two choral conferences agreed with us, loving them.

more news here ​

​The foundation stone for the German signal instrument factory Max B. Martin GmbH & Co. KG which opened in 1880 were hunting horns, cavalry trumpets and fanfare trumpets for two- or four-note signals. The now-famous Kaiserfanfare signal, "now here, now there," announces vehicles of the royal family.

In the early days, motor car horns and fire horns were production-priorities. These were also the years when many volunteer fire brigades called Martin Chapels were already responding to fires using onboard 8-tone Martin trumpets, 

In 1932 they developed the German signal instrument factory to manufacture for fire and police departments a horn with a "prescribed priority warning". Up to World War II, these horns were made for emergency vehicles only.

Nicole Pesce at a 2011 concert displayed virtuosity, creativity, and humor as she speculates on how master composers might have performed "Happy Birthday".  We've also included a Victor Borge performance recorded 60 years earlier..

Excerpt from Neuroscience news:

If you’re a musician, this sounds too good to be true: UChicago psychologists have been able to train some adults to develop the prized musical ability of absolute pitch, and the training’s effects last for months.

Absolute pitch, commonly known as “perfect pitch,” is the ability to identify a note by hearing it. The ability is considered remarkably rare, estimated to be less than one in 10,000 individuals. It has always been a very desired ability among musicians, especially since several famous composers, including Mozart, reportedly had it. The assumption has been that this special talent has a critical period to be established in childhood based on early musical training and that it was not possible for adults to acquire this skill.

In this 2015 study published by the journal Cognition, Howard Nusbaum, professor of psychology, and colleagues tested how much an individual’s general auditory working memory capacity can predict the success of acquiring absolute pitch. Other UChicago authors on the paper are psychology doctoral student Stephen C. Van Hedger, post-doctoral scholar Shannon L.M. Heald and College undergraduate Rachelle Koch.

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