May 19

Is Australian David Helfgott a geniune savant, or does he just play piano better than we'd expect him to?
Helfgott is known for his piano playing, along with his psychological burden. As a youth, he showed genius potential in his musicianship, but by the time he was awarded scholarships to international music conservatories, he was also battling mental illness. By his 30's, he was institutionalized.
Eventually, he found the coping mechanisms that allowed him to return to society. He got a job playing piano at a wine bar in Perth, and from that ignominious perch, began dazzling everyone that could hear with his music again.

It's the kind of story that the movies love to tell (and the movie based on his life, Shine, would be nominated for 8 Academy Awards.) But there are music critics who feel he's been too mythologized by the movies; that beyond his on-stage tics and behaviors, his piano playing is only slightly better than ordinary. So are crowds gathering to listen to a genius? Or just to cheer on a man who they wouldn't expect to play piano at all? Is he being appreciated or exploited?
Undeniably, his story has brought to light the challenges of dealing with mental illness and trying to find a place in the world. In 1999, he played piano on the Silverchair track, "Emotion Sickness".

May 14

I showcase a larger proportion of singers and actors than I like in this column; it's easier to find videos, easier to give you something else to look at beside my bumbling testimonials and second-hand research. The people that are really shaping our world to come - the doctors, scientists, and philosophers that our children will study about - these are the kind of people I want to recognize and imbue, in some small way, some distinction in our pop culture-saturated attention spans.
A great example is Professor Frederik Kruger, world expert in particle discharge and DC current systems. Since the early 60's, he's invented several high voltage containment systems and components that have become global standards. His laboratory in Delft, Holland is considered the centre of knowledge in direct current research. He wrote the textbook on particle discharge, literally.
That's not all Professor Krueger writes about, however. He's published several studies of a fellow local boy done good, 17th century painter Johannes Vermeer, and the painter's use of pre-photographic technology in his art. He also identified several presumed Vermeers as forgeries, particularly by the expert forger Han Van Meegeren.
Krueger became an expert on Van Meegeren himself, writing several novels and biographies about Van Meegeren's work, his frustration as a legitimate artist, and his abilities to fool the critics and the Nazis. (You can read some of Kruger's research at this Van Meegeren website.)
When he's not playing with high voltage or identifying great art forgeries, Krueger plays out with his band, the Siperkov Ensemble, who keep alive the traditional sounds of Romany (Gypsy) music.

Of course, he's written a book about Romany music, too.

But who am I kidding? If I say it's Fred Krueger's birthday, you're probably expecting something like this:


I'm sorry, Professor...

March 8

If you know the name Ralph H Baer, you probably know too much about video games. He's the inventor of the first video game console (The "Odyssey"), from which all video game systems are derived. Sure, that deserves props, especially with how hard his team fought to get credit for their work. Baer touches on those legal fights in an article about the creation of the SIMON game, which is what I'm thanking him for on his birthday.
I mean, video games are nice and all, but back in the day, SIMON was the shizz:

Now, who doesn't want to be Johnny?

March 7

Here's a birthday nod for Alan Hale, comet hunter; he identified over 200 comets in his career. A former Navy man, he worked on several projects including the Voyager probe before he earned his PhD in astronomy. The most famous discovery of his, (Comet Hale-Bopp, also independently discovered by Thomas Bopp), he discovered from his driveway. You might never know what's in front of your eyes until you know how to look...
In honor of the Professor, let's get out the glowsticks and bop along to "Hale Bopp", a Goa trance track by Der Dritte Raum:

February 26

And now for something completely different; a birthday rememberance for an unforgettable amnesiac. HM, born in 1926, suffered from epileptic attacks as a child. At the age of 27, he underwent brain surgery to combat his seizures; a side effect of the surgery was retrograde amnesia, the inability to create new long-term memories. He lived to the age of 82, but couldn't remember anything after 1953.
He spent the rest of his life as a professional test subject, the case study known in research circles as "HM". HM would become the cornerstone of modern neurological research; the study of his dysfunction obliterated old theories on how the brain works, and inspired new ideas. His life offered physiological evidence of a subconscious- that alone deserves a place in history.
In 2008, he passed away, and his brain was sliced up and preserved for further research. Upon his death, his birth name was finally revealed to the world: Henry Gustav Molaison.
Today's video is a fanvid for the Foo Fighters' "Everlong," using clips from the Christopher Nolan film "Memento," which is most people's exposure to retrograde amnesia.
(BTW, the editor used some of the R-rated plot points, so this video is NSFW and SPOILERY.)

"Memento" isn't the only movie to use retrograde amnesia as a device; I can think of a few comedies that tried to milk laughs from it. I figured it was worth sharing that such a thing as retrograde amnesia actually exists, and somebody lived with it, in front of the world. Happy Birthday, Henry, and thanks for the memories...