Tone

Suzanne Ciani's most famous piece of music lasts approximately one second, and is heard about 280 million times every day. In 1988, she created what may be the world's best-known audio signature: the miniature chordal flourish that introduces every AT&T call. Known within the company as the sparkle tone, the brief chime was the first concerted foray into sonic branding in "phonespace."Now, driven by the competition, the wires are clogged with audio logos and announcements. If a line is busy in the Bell Atlantic calling area, a voice will intrude for a moment to offer the company's new call-back service.

My older brother and I used to be the same size. Then he got married and put on a lot of weight.He has given up trying to lose it, and he gave all his suits to me. I'm happy to have them because he always bought the best.The problem is that we both work in the same company, and his secretary has been teasing me about wearing hand-me-downs. I'm a good sport, but I don't want my business contacts to notice the same thing.How can I update them, so they look as though they belong to me?The easiest way to change the look of a suit is with a shirt and tie. Experiment with combinations, keeping in mind colors your brother does not wear.

Dressing the table can turn any meal into an occasion. But the merriest holidays, those of the bountiful autumn and glittering winter seasons, inspire extraordinary adornment.Whether made of cloth, leather, metal, woven straw or other materials, a backdrop changes the personality of dinnerware. Tablecloths, place mats, runners or combinations of these elements can go a long way to set the holiday mood.Even the simplest, most minimal treatment can be enhanced with a balance of color and a mix of materials -- dinnerware and flatware, candle holders, flowers, serving pieces and baubles.

Havre de Grace. -- In 1982, when Irna and I were newspaper publishers here, the publisher of the competing weekly down the road in Aberdeen died, and we bought his paper. It was the right move from a business standpoint, but it brought us face to face with one very uncomfortable editorial fact.Newspaper readers are resolute in their belief that their newspapers should be local. And while ''local'' is an imprecise adjective, we soon learned that in Aberdeen, it didn't mean a newspaper with its home office in Havre de Grace.

Theater has its origins in religious ritual, and pop musicians are often revered as saints in this country, as was reinforced by the death of Jerry Garcia last week. So a play about the rise and fall of a rock star would appear to be a natural. And "The Zalmar Boys," the latest script by Bowman Ensemble artistic director Matthew Ramsay, certainly has a natural, recognizable flow.Although the Zalmar Boys is a fictitious band, the rungs it climbs in its ascent are almost iconically familiar from real life, or fact-based stage shows such as "Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story," or Rob Reiner's film parody "This Is Spinal Tap."

"The Crow," the death-haunted, mega-violent, pulpy, vigorous final film of Brandon Lee, may not qualify as much of a monument to a lost life -- what film could? -- but it's a hell of a movie.It's one of those strange numbers that can only be classified as being of a piece, meaning that however you feel about the value of what it sets out to do, you must admit that it does it brilliantly.And here's what it sets out to do: to compress into one seamless threnody the sensibilities of film noir, urban gothic and slam-bang comic-book energy while sounding chords of nihilism and cynicism and very loud rock 'n' roll.

Just because major cosmetics companies finally are offering foundations, concealers and color cosmetics, they still may not solve every makeup problem women of color have confronted for years.There is still the tricky business of proper application.Here, cosmetics experts offer their suggestions for achieving the most natural looking face:* Test foundation in natural light. A lot of people don't know how to judge undertones. Go outside in the natural light and look at the areas of your skin that aren't exposed to sunlight, like the underside of your forearms.

Thirty years ago, if someone asked who would be among the world's most celebrated conductors by the '90s, the Swiss conductor Peter Maag would have been on my list. His early recordings -- particularly of Schumann and Mendelssohn -- were among the finest I had ever heard. They were sensitive and affecting (without being affected), and they bespoke remarkable cultivation.Well, no one was asking my opinion, and while Maag has enjoyed a successful career, the stardom that I thought surely would be his has eluded him.But he was a remarkable conductor then and -- as his concert last night in Meyerhoff Hall with the Baltimore Symphony indicated -- Maag, now 72, is perhaps even more remarkable now. His performance of Mendlessohn's Symphony No. 4 ("Italian")

It looks like any other office building from the outside. But step inside and you quickly learn that Maryland's new telephone relay center is really a window on the world: the world of the deaf and hearing-impaired.The $4 million, 25,000-square-foot facility is set up to handle calls between the hearing and the non-hearing or hearing-disabled, which is a feat considering that these people are unable to communicate by telephone now without special equipment.Maryland's relay center, which officially opens today, is one of the most technologically advanced in the United States.

Natural redheads have always been something of a rarity, but lately more and more women are seeing red.But is it the right hair color for you? While there are no hard and fast rules -- and anyone thinking of making the change should first consult a professional -- here are some guidelines:* Does your hair pick up red highlights naturally in the sun? If so, experts say it's the best indication that you can make a successful transition to red.* Blonds: First consider a light red tone instead of plunging into the deeper shades.

Media coverage of the presidential race has not always been glowing for Barack Obama, but it has clearly been negative for John McCain, according to a survey of newspapers, Internet and TV news outlets since the end of the national political conventions. Slightly less than one-third of the stories about Obama were negative, while more than one-third were positive and about the same number were neutral or mixed. More than half of the stories about McCain cast him in a negative light, while fewer than two in 10 were positive, according to Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism.

Switch on the small, gray metal box and listen: A sharp, pulsating, high-pitched tone burrows into the ear like a power drill, prompting an agitated, please-shut-that- blasted-thing-off grimace. That's what you hear if you're between the ages of 13 and 25. If you're not, you might not sense a thing. Howard Stapleton can't hear the sound he conjured up three years ago. His daughter, Isobel, 15 at the time, had come home in tears from a store in their town in South Wales, after having been harassed by other teens.

LAST WEEK'S ISSUE: -- In his first week in office, County Executive John R. Leopold quickly sought to set the tone for his administration. He vowed to cut the budget, crack down on critical-area violators and require firefighter recruits to repay the cost of their training if they don't stay with the department. He also said he intends to curb panhandling and pursue an elected county school board. Is he setting the right tone? Right tone set, but school investing key While I do not agree with everything that Leopold is doing, I do believe he is setting the right tone.

Kitchen tip bonappetit.com Looking for ideas on how to throw that summer party? The Web site of Bon Appetit magazine offers a planner that puts together a menu (complete with recipes) to fit the size and tone of your event. Registration is required. Kate Shatzkin

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- Slumped down in his chair after a hard day of work, he starts off slowly, measuring every word in a hushed tone. Then, the words start to spew from Melvin Mora's mouth, gaining decibels with each sentence. His face contorts, shifting from smile to scowl at a moment's notice, and his mood appears to fluctuate as often as his tone. Mora, an All-Star third baseman and the longest tenured member of the club, may not be the face of the Orioles' franchise because Miguel Tejada is more celebrated and Brian Roberts is probably more revered by fans.

CRAWFORD, Texas -- For six days, President Bush has stayed in nearly complete isolation on his ranch here - just mountain-biking and brush-clearing, the White House insisted daily, and seeing only one visitor, his mother-in-law, Jenna Welch. He never ventured into this little town of 600, not even to the cheeseburger joint that he often uses as a political tool to show that he is in touch with his neighbors. But today, after a brief stop at an Army hospital in San Antonio to visit wounded soldiers, Bush is scheduled to return to the White House earlier than usual from his break and start a campaign to set the tone for 2006 and, perhaps, the remainder of his presidency.

The Cello Player, by Michael Kruger, translated from the German by Andrew Shields. Harcourt. 200 pages. $23. This is a devilishly clever novel about politics, art and varieties of failure. First it makes you think you're in an absurdist comedy, then in a satire of modern business and aesthetics. Just when you're thinking you've got the tone (disgust aiming for cynical detachment) and the theme (the difficulty of pursuing art in a climate of venal ambition and shallow ideals), it dives into a black regress to Stalinist Russia, takes a stylistic respite in sensitive evocations of landscape and ends where it began, in a Hungarian cemetery with an unstable tone of tragicomedy.

The first in an occasional series about the fitness habits of Marylanders. It's a bird. It's a plane. No, it's Rod Daniels taking a curve on his bicycle at breakneck pace. Breathing in fresh air, pumping blood into his system, discovering a new vista: It's all part of WBAL news anchor Rod Daniels' daily workout routine. "I'm bicycle crazy," says Daniels, 51, who has a stable of ultra-light, high-tech bikes, including a couple always available for friends along for the ride. His most prized bike is a Trek with a carbon-fiber frame, on which he can average 18 to 20 miles per hour after a season's worth of riding.

The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, which started the new year last weekend with a pops program, eased back into the classical groove on Thursday night with venerable, pleasantly roasted chestnuts by Dvorak and Strauss. An unexpected ingredient was added. Dvorak's Cello Concerto, one of the noblest utterances of its kind, was to have been played by a touted Russian soloist, but a hand ailment prevented his appearance very late in the game. The orchestra turned to one of its own for rescue, principal cellist Ilya Finkelshteyn, who is in his first BSO season.

IHAD ALMOST had it. Midway into our seven-day, seven-person, multiple-family vacation, my 6-year-old niece, Ashley, found my last nerve and stepped on it. Last year, I had teased her about her high-pitched voice: "Ashley, you sound like you took a big gulp of helium." But the year of maturity didn't lower her pitch. And on the fourth day of our vacation, an ungranted request led to an even shriller sound -- the ubiquitous, universal, no-family-is-complete-without-it WHINE. Adorable, with her crystal baby-blues and her sunny blond hair, Ashley began pleading her case to her mom for something -- who knows what.