"Endnotes" - January 22, 2021

A place to discuss the weekly Wall Street Journal Crossword Puzzle Contest, starting every Thursday around 4:00 p.m. Eastern time. Please do not post any answers or hints before the contest deadline which is midnight Sunday Eastern time.
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KscX
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#401

Post by KscX »

If you actually play that melody it is a little unfinished. If it ended back on DO (maybe use HARMONY instead?) that would be some musical resolution.
Tom Wilson
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#402

Post by Tom Wilson »

I got hung up on the absence of "fa," and would never have seen past the trees if not for Wiser Muggle Intervention. As such, I did not submit ... which reduces the potential winners' pool by one. Hey, I do what I can.
NuYear68
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#403

Post by NuYear68 »

Got as far as "DEGBAC", was stressing the missing "FA", and considered a last minute submission of "scales". Ended up closing the bar with Isaac instead.
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ReB
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#404

Post by ReB »

burak wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 12:12 am
burak wrote: Sun Jan 24, 2021 8:24 pm I most likely am missing something but I find the answer a bit inelegant this week. Good idea though.
Huh, of course I was missing something: The first step! I immediately noticed the letters in the clues and thought "OK I'll take the last letters of the answers to these clues" in the musical order: D, E, G, A, B, C. What did I get? MELDOY. It wasn't rocket science to figure out the actual answer but I was unhappy with the mechanism. It turns out the mechanism was actually pretty nice!
Exactly. I did look at the last letters of the long clues, but just didn't see the solfege, which is kinda a head slapper for me being as I sing Shape Note/Sacred Harp where you always line out the songs together using these syallables before singing verses. Especially because I knew the note order and (from 68A) that the key of C was central.

(Note: since the solfege syllables are a relative scale, where DO is the tonic of the relative major scale of the song, it was critical to the "elegant solution" that we know the key of the melody. That is, had the melody been in the key of G major, for instance, then DO would be G, RE would be A, and so on. I won't get into discussing here the complications of minor keys, except to note that this "elegant solution" wouldn't work if the key were C-minor instead of the presumed C-major.

Well if you really have to know, in C-minor, DO is E-flat, RE is F... and C is LA, since E-flat major is the relative major to C-minor.)
Last edited by ReB on Mon Jan 25, 2021 9:16 am, edited 6 times in total.
zacmoretz
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#405

Post by zacmoretz »

🤦🏼‍♂️
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jenirvin
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#406

Post by jenirvin »

Never made it to shore on this one. Partly a matter of time, partly I probably just never was going to see it. I was so stuck on a couple different paths and couldn't shift my thinking. My music teachers would be so disappointed. On to the next, and kudos to those who went down the right path! (Or one of the two, I guess.)
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ReB
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#407

Post by ReB »

KscX wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 8:24 am If you actually play that melody it is a little unfinished. If it ended back on DO (maybe use HARMONY instead?) that would be some musical resolution.
Actually, when I played it out, it seemed that the melody should pause at the C and then end with an F#, G. But that would have put it the melody in the wrong key. (see #404)
MatthewL
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#408

Post by MatthewL »

I'm with those who saw the do re mi thing right away, and converted that to DEGBAC, but then was stuck, until a helpful nudge to look at the "whole" puzzle. Took about 2 minutes to see it after that. It's amazing what your brain sees, and, by extension, refuses to see even though it's right in front of your face.
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ky-mike
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#409

Post by ky-mike »

What the meta needed was end letters that anagrammed to more than one possible answer (notes / stone, for example; not a very good music example, but an example nonetheless) requiring the solver to follow the intended path.

I will admit that I also took the shortcut after having written out do, re, mi... and matched C to DO, etc. and not seeing the elegance of the end letters on the long answers spelling out do, re, mi...
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Bird Lives
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#410

Post by Bird Lives »

ReB wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 8:39 am
(Note: since the solfege syllables are a relative scale, where DO is the tonic of the relative major scale of the song. . . .
Only in America (well, not quite) because we use the "moveable do," a phrase which to me always suggests transferring liquid assets offshore for purposes of tax avoidance. (And yes, I know that "liquid assets" leaves this one wide open for Dr. Tom.)
Last edited by Bird Lives on Mon Jan 25, 2021 9:26 am, edited 1 time in total.
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tim1217
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#411

Post by tim1217 »

Omnibus wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 6:33 am As elegant the RE-MI-SOL-etc. was in providing the order of the “notes” to spell out MELODY, it really wasn’t at all critical to solving the meta. Hats off to those who got that bit, but no extra points given for entries to the contest.
Agree. I never saw the long route (more elegant, really?). The number one rule for solving Mike Shenk metas is that if you are not seeing anything in the grid, carefully review the clues. Yes, the anagram was a bit unsettling because MS usually constructs the answer from top to bottom, but as Kay pointed out, if MELODY was not the right answer, it would be the PAEGENT of all PAEGENTS!
matty_p
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#412

Post by matty_p »

I was completely blind to the clues ending with letters. After a nudge pushed me to see the notes in the theme answers I even dug into the clues for the next step but only found rabbit holes.

Big thanks to boharr for the nudges. Just sorry I was too dense to put them to best use. Regardless, great puzzle and great learning experience for me!
EmilyW
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#413

Post by EmilyW »

I got it using the short cut. I had nothing at first and my non-crossword boyfriend came over to my computer to take a look. He said he could barely read the clues because the font was so light, and I told him after you answer them they show up lighter like that which is really annoying because sometimes you need the clues to solve the meta...OH, that's what I need to do!
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C=64
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#414

Post by C=64 »

CPJohnson wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 5:36 am
C=64 wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 1:33 am
MileHighSolver wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 12:46 am I always enjoy reading the explanations on Sunday nights, especially after I solved MELODY so quickly. Was it just a coincidence that there were two ways to solve the puzzle correctly? If so, hats off to Shenk on this one. I saw the single note letter clues and immediately took the bait.
From what I've seen (which isn't comprehensive and others can chime in), the constructors always take care to arrange the letters in order somehow: top to bottom, left to right, in a spiral if that fits the theme... Whenever a solver says they randomly anagrammed some letters to get the meta answer, they're missing something or doing it wrong.
Anagramming has been required a few times in the past. One example is the 4-26-19 puzzle; there are others. I'll mention a few others later if no one else has done it by the time I get back.It's 5:30 am, and I'm leaving to go get in line for my Covid vaccine.
Sure, we might be asked to anagram parts of words in the grid for step 2 when that was also the mechanism for step 1, but I'm curious about getting individual letters from around the grid and then anagramming them for no particular reason.
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Joe Ross
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#415

Post by Joe Ross »

jhseeman wrote: Sun Jan 24, 2021 11:19 pm Big fan of Home Free...great harmonies and acapella
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQt9jKDCqHo
Holy wow.

Thank you.

If you want to see women turn to jelly, watch reviewers of Home Free's videos. There are two opera singers, in particular, and a voice coach from Australia, then more I am sure.
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Joe Ross
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#416

Post by Joe Ross »

C=64 wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 9:56 am
CPJohnson wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 5:36 am
C=64 wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 1:33 am
From what I've seen (which isn't comprehensive and others can chime in), the constructors always take care to arrange the letters in order somehow: top to bottom, left to right, in a spiral if that fits the theme... Whenever a solver says they randomly anagrammed some letters to get the meta answer, they're missing something or doing it wrong.
Anagramming has been required a few times in the past. One example is the 4-26-19 puzzle; there are others. I'll mention a few others later if no one else has done it by the time I get back.It's 5:30 am, and I'm leaving to go get in line for my Covid vaccine.
Sure, we might be asked to anagram parts of words in the grid for step 2 when that was also the mechanism for step 1, but I'm curious about getting individual letters from around the grid and then anagramming them for no particular reason.
The random letters around the grid are found the same way as in the elegant mechanism. Skipped are the do, re, mi notes found in the long answers, which lead to the EFGABC notes in the clues. Those SIX notes stand out at the END (with the meta clue & puzzle title in mind) of the clues, on their own.
Endnotes solution PDF JPR.png
Last edited by Joe Ross on Mon Jan 25, 2021 10:27 am, edited 2 times in total.
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EdStrong
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#417

Post by EdStrong »

The first thing i saw was the scale pattern, particularly the re mi phonetics of Sam Raimi then also Fa in Fait then nothing else, chalking it up as a rabbit hole. FWIW, when i wrote down the scales after googling it, I wrote So, not Sol - maybe that’s why Mike created the alternative solution?Then noticed the shortcut options, the first several being within A-G - no chance that was a coincidence. The anagram was easy from there...
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escapeartist
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#418

Post by escapeartist »

NuYear68 wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 8:31 am Got as far as "DEGBAC", was stressing the missing "FA", and considered a last minute submission of "scales". Ended up closing the bar with Isaac instead.
FA was there in 36 Down, in "OF LA" - another red herring that kept me from sniffing this one out. :(
* 2022 WSJ Mug Winner - I bask in its Glory *
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ky-mike
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#419

Post by ky-mike »

Trifecta!

After my daughter won a mug a few years ago and I won one last year, my wife (not on the forum) is today's mug winner. Congrats to her!
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Powers2020
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#420

Post by Powers2020 »

ky-mike wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 10:44 am Trifecta!

After my daughter won a mug a few years ago and I won one last year, my wife (not on the forum) is today's mug winner. Congrats to her!
Congrats to her indeed! On a related note, I'd love to join your family's Powerball/Mega Millions club!
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