Project for Libro Vitae

Multiplication Tables in Verse — Awesome App!
It was a truly fascinating and challenging experience to work on this excellent project. My job involved translating the original Russian text into English and then recording the vocals. Translating prose is one thing, but the translation of poetry and lyrics is one of the hardest tasks for any translator; you must not only translate faithfully, but also ensure that everything scans and rhymes properly. Although it was a tough assignment, it was at the same time very rewarding, so much so that the hard work simply evaporated because I was having so much fun doing it. The proof of whether I had done my job well as a translator of Andrey Usachev’s wonderful poems came when we were recording my vocals to the marvellous and infectious music created by Vorontsov Denis. I am happy to say that the half spoken, half sung style that I used worked rather well. At least, that’s my opinion!

I hope my work competes favourably with the original Russian, but ultimately, of course, it is the listener and user who will be the judge. At any rate, I commend this release to anyone who teaches, or is learning multiplication tables. The art of creating engaging and first class teaching materials is to make them interesting and eliminate boredom, which is the enemy of scholarship. This project has certainly achieved that. It’s educational of course, but a really entertaining and effective way to learn how to multiply through wonderful animation, music and rhymes. For learning the basics of multiplication, you can count on it!

You can see screenshots and download the iPad app here

More details at Libro Vitae