talbotlucas.org: a word to the wise is sufficient

This is a very nifty offering from the BBC, and one that you might wish to take advantage of. The downloads page is here and the mp3 files will only be available for a brief period of time. There's quite a bit of traffic on the site, so if you don't have a fast connection, you might want to wait 'til a later hour. (The files are not small; e.g., No. 7 is a 37.2 megabyte file; No. 6 was just over 44 MB.) For those using Safari and iTunes, once the file is downloaded it automatically finds its way to the iTunes library. Each file includes brief introductory comments and closing comments, but you're otherwise getting the whole musical performance, uninterrupted.

I missed downloading symphonies 1 through 5, but I grabbed No. 6 last night and very much enjoyed it. No. 7 is now available, and 8 and 9 will be available in the coming days. Even if you're not a huge Beethoven fan, this is a great opportunity to snag some quality recordings and to expand your musical knowledge. (At least that's how I feel; my knowledge of music isn't as broad or deep as I'd like it to be.)

There are other features of the BBC's project that I haven't yet explored, and don't know if I will because I can't justify dawdling when the Bar Exam Countdown is at 28. The homepage for the project is here, for those of you with a little more time (or better time management).

I'd also encourage those of you who are excited about the new Podcasting feature in iTunes to hold off for a few days. The service seems swamped (at least for those feeds that interested me, like several from KCRW, a local NPR afffiliate) and my iPod isn't happy with the supposed update to its software. Then again, my iPod wasn't happy with the shuffle update, either, but that worked itself out after a few tries.