Title: “Press Play” by Pete Muller, Mack Meller, and Andrew White
Prompt: The meta for this puzzle is a famous song.
Answer: “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”
puzzle 32 mins; meta 2.5 hours with a last-minute save! (Matt)
70 minutes to go on the September Muller, and I haven’t got it yet so I’m doing the old blog-and-see-what happens trick. I solved it earlier today and looked have a couple of promising leads so I’ll give myself a 49% chance of solving. 236 right so far so that’s a fair number…but the first solver to get it needed 31 minutes and it took Jangler over an hour so yikes…
Highly unusual grid size (53×11) and interior design (seven 3×5 chunks of black squares). Those bear a striking resemblance to a piano keyboard, and even the spacing checks out: 7 black keys alternative with 10 white keys, which form what I think is called a scale? My knowledge of musical theory is unimpressive so let me know how badly I’ve mangled the terminology in comments.
The grid contains seven NOTE rebus squares:
1-A= OF (NOTE) + 3-D= (NOT E)VEN A LITTLE
80-A= OPEN-(NOTE) + 13-D = TAKES (NOTE)
106-A= ON THAT (NOTE) + 107-D = (NOTE)PADS
67-A= NO-TELL + 19-D = DULY (NOTE)D
118-A= POUND (NOTE)S + 120-D = (NO TE)ARS
48-A= T(NOTE)S + 23-D= DO (NOT E)AT
146-A= END(NOTE)S + 24-D= SUSTAINED (NOTE)S
OK so we’ve got seven NOTEs in the grid, and seven black keys forming the grid, which is 85% not a coincidence. Somehow we’re probably matching each of those seven notes with a NOTE. Maybe? The internet tells me that these seven black keys are: C-D-F-G-A-C-D, but I’m guessing we’re only going to be playing the white keys, since all 7 of the NOTE rebus squares are on white keys in the grid. 7/7, so probably not a coincidence.
Those notes are C-G-A-BB-CC. I crept down to the study where the piano is (everyone’s asleep but me) and got ready to play these seven notes, which I figured would be instantly recognizable to me. So bad at piano that I had to put a little piece of paper on each of these five keys so I didn’t forget what was what. Played the seven notes, full of meta thrill-of-the-chase excitement and…hmm, didn’t sound familiar. Played it again and…again, nada. Hmm. Went back upstairs and entered that note sequence into Google and…zippo. Hmm, this seemed like the perfect finish to this meta and all of its steps logically led up this final answer. Where did I go wrong? This has to be very close. 35 minutes left to figure it out…
OK, I got it! Submitted with 20 minutes to spare. This is a highly memorable and beautiful meta. Instant classic!
You take the seven notes in grid order, from top-to-bottom. They are C-C-B-G-A-B-C. When I went back down and played them on the piano I recognized the tune right away — “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” — and submitted.
This is an instant classic. Lovely and intricate, but not more than it had to be, with its many secrets revealed slowly as I chipped away at the idea. Bravissimo to our three meta-maestri!
Can’t praise this meta enough. Here’s a pic of my second visit down to the piano (yes, I had to write the notes on little pieces of paper plus a number indicating the order in which they were to be played). 10:59 so I need to submit but I’ll clean this post up over the next half-hour. Or maybe not — the typos do convey the thrill of the chase…!
5.00 stars. This is why we write metas!
and TECHNICOLOR in the down clues, maybe not as a solving hint, but probably as a “yes you got it”
IF THE SHOE FITS… ;)
yes, I missed that connection
After playing the notes from left to right and not recognizing a tune, I tried playing the notes from top to bottom. Nothing rang a bell… so I tried playing them from bottom to top, and out jumped “I Want To Hold Your Hand.” I thought it might have been considered a valid alternative correct answer, but noop. Ah well…
The instructions for this puzzle on the Muller Monthly Music Meta “strongly encourage solvers to use either the PDF or the online applet.”
Maybe the applet works well enough if you’re solving on a desktop or laptop computer, but on an iPad it’s garbage. You can’t tell where you are and you can’t see the clues readily. I should have known better than to use it, because it’s a lousy interface for a 21 x 21 grid. Why would 53 X whatever be any better?
The instructions should have said “Use the PDF.” Or “Look at the PDF.” (If you can’t see the whole grid at once, it’s easy to miss the approximation of a piano keyboard.)
Better yet, just make only the PDF available.
Solving the grid was unpleasant because of the technical issues. I had some trouble with the filll, but nothing out of the ordinary.
Seeing that there were seven NOTE rebuses, I googled “seven notes” and the top hit suggested that the answer might be “Do Re Mi” from “The Sound of Music.” So that’s what I submitted, with little confidence that it was correct.
I don’t know how anyone who has no experience playing music is supposed to have been able to figure this one out.
I really wish I had gotten the correct answer, because “Over the Rainbow” would have been a much better earworm to have.
There’s slightly more to it than that – reading top to bottom, not all rows have a note rebus. This roughly matches the rhythm of the song!
It took longer to fill the grid (due to its size and the rebuses) than it did to solve the meta (along the way, I realized the top represented piano keys and the NOTEs were actual notes). Wasn’t a fan of all the 3-letter fill but the payoff was quite rewarding. A fantastic and unique construction!
Thanks Matt!
241 correct this month.
Glad so many folks liked it, and that the juice was worth the squeeze of the extra-large grid.
More in the write-up Tuesday…
Thanks for a very fun puzzle, Pete – I loved it! The mechanism reminded me of the mega-meta from a few years ago that depended on hyphenated words that began with musical note letters (I think the solution was “Layla”). That might have helped my solve.
I had the right idea but went left to right and I never got past “Star Wars, nothing but Star Wars.”
I was flailing until I printed the whole grid out and saw the piano keyboard. On the screen, I could only see a part of the grid at a time so the piano keyboard didn’t pop out.
Fun fact: Ignoring the duration of the notes, while composing the Broadway musical “Wicked,” Stephen Schwartz deliberately put in a segment of the score that duplicates these notes from Over the Rainbow.