Talk:Constance Demby

Permission from Constance Demby
Permission to use www.constancedemby.com contents.

Other
We could sure us some pictures and an explaination of the Space Base and Whale Sail. . . if you have the info handy.

http://www.constancedemby.com/instruments.html The Sonic Steel Instruments, original designs created by Constance Demby, were recently recorded by Lucas SkyWalker Studios for use in their filmscores. As well, Discovery Channel filmed the Space Bass at Gaudi's famous "Parc Geull" in Barcelona, for use in the special entitled, "The Power of Music."

The Space Bass is a 10 ft sheet of mirror finish stainless steel with 5 octaves of tuned steel and brass rods bolted to a bar. The rods can be double bowed, struck percussively or the metal sheet can be rubbed to create still another effect. Several tones can be created by bowing a single rod, creating a multi-tiered overtone series. The Space Bass emits deep, primordial, archetypal resonances that invariably put audiences into altered states.

The Whale Sail, is a vertical 8 ft sheet strung with steel and brass wires that are bowed in a free- form fretless style, emitting sounds reminiscent of whales and dolphins.

A vibratory sound healing called SONIC IMMERSION using the Space Bass can be seen at http://www.constancedemby.com/sonicimmersion.html This consists of a journey through the energy centers, the chakras, with the penetrating tones of the Space Bass. Each chakra is treated to a clearing with the tonal vibrations, and corresponding colors and light infusions. Many have had powerful healings and transformative experiences with this process.

From the artist: "I had one-woman shows of my artwork and sculpture in Greenwich Village, NYC, in the 60s and 70s, as my creative pursuits have always extended beyond music to include painting, sculpture, and multi-media. So these steel instruments are the result of my combined love of sculpture and music.. At the time, I was about to torch a big piece of sheet metal to start a sculpture, but the roar of the sheet made my torch stop in mid-air, and thus was borne the first version of the Sonic Steel Instruments, a primitive thunder sheet. Many experiments followed, such as the discovery of the insides of a toy piano, a small horizontal bar with rods attached, which eventually became a key design element in the Space Bass.

These instruments were not something that I planned, preconceived, or consciously designed beforehand, Rather it was a time of being willing to remain for long periods in the "don't know" state while the instruments designed themselve. This state of uncertainty is one that teachers such as Deepok Chopra recommend to their students as a preferred state, like a kind of innocence or openness to divine accident. As the instruments came into being, I became their mother-guardian, watching these curious metal creatures give birth to themselves. There were others I was co-creating with at the time as well, who added their design elements to the mix, such as Bob Rutman, who eventually created his own versions, and presently performs in Germany with his Steel Cello Ensemble. Jack Hilmer added a suspension system type of stand so that the sheet of metal is free to vibrate and sway, increasing the resonance.

The rods can be double bowed, usually in intervals of octaves, fourths or fifths, struck percussively, plus the metal sheet can be rubbed with a hard rubber ball to create still another effect. One can choose different positions on the rods to bow, to produce either the low tones, the higher tones, or the overtone series. What's fun about playing the Space Bass is that it has a mind of it's own, and you can never count on just exactly which part of the overtone series it 's going to give you. A sound scientist in California once took a guess and determined that the sound waves on the lowest bowed notes are approximately thirty feet long.

As to describing the sound, words simply cannot. But we'll try a few --- Primordial......... Penetrating........ Archetypal.......... Deep and high......... The center of the earth........The far reaches of time and space....... Bone-rattling resonance........ An OM machine........ Tibetan Monks...... Tibetan Horns...... Whales in space......... A gateway to other dimensions........ A chakra tuner-upper........ An atom-re-arranger....... A healer....... More than just a scrap of metal........

Autobiography
no wonder this article is shit, it was written by herself —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.152.56.94 (talk • contribs) 18:13, 4 April 2008


 * Please, remove this awful article, this is Wikipedia not "advertise-yourself-pedia" —Preceding unsigned comment added by Vasti (talk • contribs) 15:51, 11 May 2008


 * This article was not written by Constance Demby but rather by User:Equinoxe. There is as yet no evidence that User:Equinoxe is Constance Demby and even if it is, there is no prohibition against writing an article on yourself. There is a prohibition against advertising yourself. I understand there may be some concerns with POV, but the artist is a notable musician. You are free to edit articles at Wikipedia if you wish to make improvements: WP:SOFIXIT. -Thibbs (talk) 18:59, 21 January 2009 (UTC)


 * The current article is heavily rewritten by User:Constancemary who has admitted to being Constance Demby, which is a complete WP:COI. No wonder she constantly re-inserts unsourced peacock such as "hailed as the 21st century’s Mozart / Bach / Beethoven" in 2008 as in 2009 62.147.37.184 (talk) 09:56, 18 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Article now fixed so I removed the WP:COI tag I previously added (re: Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_32). Let's hope Demby's 2007–2009 COI chapter is now closed too. 62.147.38.135 (talk) 16:42, 31 May 2009 (UTC)


 * It would be very nice if all could be pleasant and Assume Good Faith. COI does not mean that a subject cannot edit their own article.  Happy editing to all.   Keegan talk 01:12, 11 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Have to disagree: ever since Demby started censoring and rewriting her own bio in 2007, she has been warned many times on her talk page, yet never discussed and kept at it. I think she has forfeited rights to "Assume Good Faith" long ago. &mdash; Ekans talk @ 18:54, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

It's several years later and I went and removed or reworded some things and removed the autobiography tag. Still needs more references. Morganfitzp (talk) 15:38, 8 October 2016 (UTC)

Alleged Grammy nomination
After looking into this long unsourced claim that Novus Magnificat was "Grammy nominated", and filing a request about it at the Reference desk/Entertainment (permalink), it appears that it's not just unsourced but unfounded. I'm going to work this sourced sentence into the article:


 * Though it wasn't nominated at the Grammy Awards, the album sold over 200,000 copies worldwide [...]

Its note being:

Should there be another side to this story, the burden of proof is now even more in Demby's camp: as already suggested on Demby's talk page, I think that a scan of a reputable publication listing Grammy noms with her album among them (plus full references) would now be needed to update this claim in the article. &mdash; Ekans talk @ 21:11, 8 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I saw your post on the Entertainment Reference Desk and it's obvious you put a lot of hard work into researching this. Good work, Ekans.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:14, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Notice from Constance Demby about date of birth

 * Pardon the shoddy sourcing. Several webpages cited her birthdate as being in 1939, and the most reliable one was a music article published in Italian. Unbeknownst to me said Italian author is of ill repute on Wikipedia, yet his was the most reliable source out there. As an editor, I'm not in the habit of demanding to see people's birth certificates for proof of age (or anything else), but if Ms. Demby can send Wikipedia a note contesting a birthdate, then she could just as easily send a note with proof of what that birthdate actually is. Morganfitzp (talk) 19:21, 1 December 2016 (UTC)