Classical Music, Poetry and stuff

[robertlouis]

As a number of us have effectively hijacked a thread over on the Review Section to talk about classical music and one on this section became clogged up with poetry, perhaps it's time for the dilettante faction to confine themselves to a specific place.

Right, for starters: Beethoven, influenced by tgirls or not?

[Birgitta]

Hi, can anyone perhaps recommand me some early music with the recorder, i love the recorder....i am listening to french baroque now 1700-1740, blavet, hottetere, couperin

[Stavros]

Not Beethoven, but Schubert. There was a spirited exchange in the journal Nineteenth Century Music about Schubert's alleged homosexuality. Maynard Soloman, the biographer who has tended to 'modernise' our views of composers like Beethoven and Mozart by getting away from the wigs and hose, suggested that Schubert had sexual relations with transvestite prostitutes in Vienna -the codeword was 'the peacocks of Benvenuto Cellini' -a reference to a segment of the Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini in which the author describes an evening he organised where the women were men, and which so entranced the men who attended, and enraged the local whores they laid siege to the building.

Anyway, these are the references:
Maynard Soloman, 'Franz Schubert and The Peacocks of Benvenuto Cellini', Nineteenth Century Music Vol XII, no 3 (1989) 193-206.

Rita Steblin, 'The Peacock's Tale: Schubert's Sexuality Reconsidered', Nineteenth Century Music Vol XVII, no 1(1993) 5-33.

Maynard Solomon, 'Schubert: Some Consequences of Nostalgia', Nineteenth Century Music Vol XVII, no 1(1993) 34-56.

Susan McClary, 'Music and Sexuality: On the Steblin/Solomon Debate, Nineteenth Century Music Vol XVII, no 1(1993) 83-88.

Transvestism or cross-dressing in opera has been common for centuries -it may have begun with the Castrato in early opera, it certainly existed in the operas of Mozart, and particularly Richard Strauss where male characters are sung by women -in Strauss's case it may have been his obsession with the female voice (his wife was a singer). For some reason it rarely encourages 'gender confusion', his skill being so adept it seems natural to see two women -one dressed as a man- rolling around on a bed at the opening of Der Rosenkavalier...

[robertlouis]

Hi, can anyone perhaps recommand me some early music with the recorder, i love the recorder....i am listening to french baroque now 1700-1740, blavet, hottetere, couperin

Try getting up at 4am to practise, Brigitta. That should be early enough. :dancing:

[Stavros]

Hi, can anyone perhaps recommand me some early music with the recorder, i love the recorder....i am listening to french baroque now 1700-1740, blavet, hottetere, couperin

The Dutch have been producing exceptional early music artists for years -here is Franz Bruggen, playing a recorder with his legs crossed!

YouTube - ‪Telemann - fantasie nr. 3 (Brüggen)‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQatlvFvGdM&feature=related)

[Prospero]

Recorders - Birgitta. You might find this interesting.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/tomserviceblog/2008/jul/02/howdolmetschbreathednewlif

[iamdrgonzo]

My favorite wordsmith:


Edgar Allan Poe

The Raven

First published in 1845

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more.'

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
`'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -
This it is, and nothing more,'

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
`Sir,' said I, `or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you' - here I opened wide the door; -
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, `Lenore!'
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, `Lenore!'
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
`Surely,' said I, `surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore -
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; -
'Tis the wind and nothing more!'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
`Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, `art sure no craven.
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the nightly shore -
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door -
Bird or beast above the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as `Nevermore.'

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only,
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered - not a feather then he fluttered -
Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'
Then the bird said, `Nevermore.'

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
`Doubtless,' said I, `what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never-nevermore."'

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore -
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking `Nevermore.'

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
`Wretch,' I cried, `thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he has sent thee
Respite - respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! -
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted -
On this home by horror haunted - tell me truly, I implore -
Is there - is there balm in Gilead? - tell me - tell me, I implore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore -
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -
`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!

[Prospero]

Wonderful poem - thanks for reminding us it it Dr Gonzo

[iamdrgonzo]

Wonderful poem - thanks for reminding us it it Dr Gonzo

It was the rap, rap, rapping, the tapping, I could no longer ignore, upon my chamber door, so I pondered I would post as way of a toast, The Raven for Lenore once and evermore.

[Birgitta]

Recorders - Birgitta. You might find this interesting.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/tomserviceblog/2008/jul/02/howdolmetschbreathednewlif

Thaaaaanks sweety!

The raven is cool, have you heard the black cat spoken by diamanda galas, its greeeeeaaaat

[Birgitta]

Try getting up at 4am to practise, Brigitta. That should be early enough. :dancing:


Hihihi, poor neighbours :)

I am taking recorder lessons, i love the fluteeeeee!

[Birgitta]

Hi, can anyone perhaps recommand me some early music with the recorder, i love the recorder....i am listening to french baroque now 1700-1740, blavet, hottetere, couperin

The Dutch have been producing exceptional early music artists for years -here is Franz Bruggen, playing a recorder with his legs crossed!

YouTube - ‪Telemann - fantasie nr. 3 (Brüggen)‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQatlvFvGdM&feature=related)


Thhhanks yes he is great!

[maaarc]

This has always been one of my favorites:

The Emperor of Ice-Cream

Call the roller of big cigars,
The muscular one, and bid him whip
In kitchen cups concupiscent curds.
Let the wenches dawdle in such dress
As they are used to wear, and let the boys
Bring flowers in last month's newspapers.
Let be be finale of seem.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.

Take from the dresser of deal,
Lacking the three glass knobs, that sheet
On which she embroidered fantails once
And spread it so as to cover her face.
If her horny feet protrude, they come
To show how cold she is, and dumb.
Let the lamp affix its beam.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.

-- Wallace Stevens

[Prospero]

My favourite Wallace Stevens is The Blue Guitar. Have you read that? it's very long and there is a marvellous edition with illustrations by David Hockney.

This is another good one which is much shorter.

Anecdote of the Jar

Wallace Stevens

I placed a jar in Tennessee,
And round it was, upon a hill.
It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.

The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in air.

It took dominion every where.
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.

[hippifried]

Right, for starters: Beethoven, influenced by tgirls or not?

I think he was more by his own woes. You can hear the frustration of going deaf in the first movement of the Pathetique:
YouTube - ‪Horowitz plays Beethoven Pathetique Sonata - first movement‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weEYNgeHyDA)

[Jericho]

Kind of appropriate around here......

Love In The Asylum - Dylan Thomas

A stranger has come
To share my room in the house not right in the head,
A girl mad as birds

Bolting the night of the door with her arm her plume.
Strait in the mazed bed
She deludes the heaven-proof house with entering clouds

Yet she deludes with walking the nightmarish room,
At large as the dead,
Or rides the imagined oceans of the male wards.

She has come possessed
Who admits the delusive light through the bouncing wall,
Possessed by the skies

She sleeps in the narrow trough yet she walks the dust
Yet raves at her will
On the madhouse boards worn thin by my walking tears.

And taken by light in her arms at long and dear last
I may without fail
Suffer the first vision that set fire to the stars.

[Yvonne183]

It was the rap, rap, rapping, the tapping, I could no longer ignore, upon my chamber door, so I pondered I would post as way of a toast, The Raven for Lenore once and evermore.


Poe is buried near where I live,, original goth, cool

My poetry

Roses are reddish
Violets are blueish
If it wasn't for Jesus
We'd all be Jewish.


I like this one, I forget who wrote it.

Yesterday upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today,
Oh how I wish he'd go away.

I also like classical music,, the Beatles are my favorite

[gsman1968]

this is working for me today:

[maaarc]

My favourite Wallace Stevens is The Blue Guitar. Have you read that? it's very long and there is a marvellous edition with illustrations by David Hockney.

This is another good one which is much shorter.

Anecdote of the Jar

Wallace Stevens

I placed a jar in Tennessee,
And round it was, upon a hill.
It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.

The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in air.

It took dominion every where.
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.

Wallace is my favorite and The Man with the Blue Guitar" is one of his best


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isFZYAac3u8&feature=related

[maaarc]

Pavarotti - Nessun Dorma

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VATmgtmR5o4

[south ov da border]

My fave Emcee

YouTube - ‪Aceyalone - Jabberwocky‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-YWRJBxif0)

...

[theone1982]

You mentioned in another thread that a lot of fans of metal also enjoy Wagner. I've also found this to be true. There's just that full-scale bombast blasting you in the face with Wagner, like on The Flying Dutchman, and obviously Flight of the Valkyries, that has the same spirit as metal.

[runningdownthatdream]

You mentioned in another thread that a lot of fans of metal also enjoy Wagner. I've also found this to be true. There's just that full-scale bombast blasting you in the face with Wagner, like on The Flying Dutchman, and obviously Flight of the Valkyries, that has the same spirit as metal.

Wagner's music is melodic but primal with violent undertones - at least that's my impression. He was very much into old pagan culture (Germanic in his case) something else that metal tends to have in common with him.

[Prospero]

I think runningdownthatdream has hit the nail on the head re Wagner and heavy metal. It's the grandiose and heroic underscore - and paganism.

But I defy any fan of Black Sabbath or megadeath or any such outfit to sit through The Ring Cycle.

[theone1982]

I think runningdownthatdream has hit the nail on the head re Wagner and heavy metal. It's the grandiose and heroic underscore - and paganism.

But I defy any fan of Black Sabbath or megadeath or any such outfit to sit through The Ring Cycle.

Maybe Black Sabbath or Megadeth performing The Ring Cycle.:)

[Prospero]

"Maybe Black Sabbath or Megadeth performing The Ring Cycle."


Now that would be something else! And after that Napalm Death do Madam Butterfly. The possibilities are... erm.... well

[theone1982]

"Maybe Black Sabbath or Megadeth performing The Ring Cycle."


Now that would be something else! And after that Napalm Death do Madam Butterfly. The possibilities are... erm.... well

Napalm Death doing Madam Butterfly would be a trip!

[nonnonnon]

what do you think? YouTube - ‪Lady Gaga Art - Painted using Penis (Censored Version)‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vRI7IIGHYA)

[iamdrgonzo]

what do you think?

Fat over lean with penis in between the guy is obviously a mastur-bator.

[Prospero]

Maaarc - who is that reading the Wallace Stevens?

[Stavros]

This week Philip Roth was awarded the Man International Booker prize, but one of the judges, Carmen Calil, resigned in frustration or anger for a writer she has no time for.

I have no time for Roth either, I recall the enthusiasm for Portnoy's Complaint in the 70s but wonder if it was just people who hadn't read widely thinking it was cool that a man would write 'sympathetically' about masturbation. I also tend to prefer writers who experiment with language, form and meaning and Roth just doesnt challenge me, but perhaps that is why he and simple writers like Ian McEwan are popular. I don't know if it matters if one is not American, or knows New York well, it just doesn't excite me.

By contrast, I can't forget the shock and excitement of reading The Naked Lunch, and Last Exit to Brooklyn, as I was in my late teens and new to that sort of thing.

Finally, I can't get into Thomas Pynchon either -not sure how other BMs feel about these writers.

[Prospero]

Stavros - if you base your judgment of Roth on Portnoy I'm not surprised you have no time for him. It was a book designed to shock and is badly dated.. I suggest you might want to try "American Pastoral" which offers - for me - an eloquent refutation of both Carmen Calil's objections and yours. I don't think "American Pastoral" is simple except on the surface in that it adheres to conventional narrative form.

And yes - those two books you single out were certainly "shocking _ - Burroughs in stepping entirely out of the narrative stream with a fantasia on sexual violence and drugs and Selby in examining a very dark underside previously scarcely looked at in contemporary American writing (City of Night - John Rechy perhaps being an exception).

Yep Pynchon is difficult. Never managed to get through any of his books, (But not that I dislike post modernism in writing. Plenty og just great French writers who are even more daringly experiemental than him.

[iamdrgonzo]

I have not read any of Roth or Selby although American Pastoral and Last Exit to Brooklyn seem very interesting. The The Queen Is Dead chapter from Selby's Last Exit to Brooklyn where Georgette, a transvestite hooker, is thrown out of the family home by her brother and tries to attract the attention of a hoodlum named Vinnie at a benzedrin-driven party (Wikipedia) really gets my attention.

I have read and can highly recommend Jack Kerouac's Dharma Bums and On the Road.
Hunter S. Thompson's The Rum Diary, Hell's Angels and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

When I read these books and I held them in my hands, it seemed as if an electric current was flowing within the pages where the authors and I connected and stayed connected throughout.

I'm also very fond of Vonnegut.

[Stavros]

Last Exit to Brooklyn marks the moment when the censorship of books in the UK all but collapsed. A private prosecution in 1967 declared it to be officially obscene, but in 1968 the publishers won on appeal and with it books that had either been banned or heavily censored were published. George Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London had its 'naughy words', previously blanked out, restored, even though they were words like 'bugger' which is a measure of how attitudes to language have changed. In Exit, Georgette re-appears in the Strike episode where the union organiser, Harry has an affair with a friend of hers called Alberta whom he meets at a gay/ts bar called Mary's -the judge in the first trial claimed that the pernicious effect of the book might be to persuade men whose marriages were not working that they might find happiness in being homosexual, in spite of the fact that Harry gets a beating at the end of the chapter.

The Lord Chancellor, one of the UK's senior Law Lords, used to scrutinise plays before they were given a licence for performance in the UK. In 1965 John Osborne wrote a play called A Patriot for Me about a gay army officer in Vienna during the empire, which included a drag ball and which Osborne knew would be banned. The Royal Court theatre in Chelsea could only put it on by re-classifying itself as a private club -Osborne exposed the stupidity of the 'blue line' rule, but its not much of a play although I don't like Osborne so don't take my word for it.

The changes that took place in the 1960s are seen by most people as an adjustment to reality, along with the repeal of the legislation that had made homosexuality illegal, the new laws on divorce, and the legalisation of abortion -but tend to be seen by conservatives as the sins of the 'permissive sixties' which have led to a decline in national morals.

Incidentally, I am trying to recall any sex in On the Road or Kerouac's other books but I can't remember any -I knew someone years ago who had met JK and thought he was an obnoxious shit with bad breath, I also read somewhere he was a repressed homosexual -??? and so on.

[iamdrgonzo]

the judge in the first trial claimed that the pernicious effect of the book might be to persuade men whose marriages were not working that they might find happiness in being homosexual,


Who do these "men" seeking happiness think they are?!

There shall be no happiness unless it has been validated by the state as an accepted form of expression otherwise you shall be classified a deviant by the moral busybodies (thank you CS Lewis).



Incidentally, I am trying to recall any sex in On the Road or Kerouac's other books but I can't remember any -I knew someone years ago who had met JK and thought he was an obnoxious shit with bad breath, I also read somewhere he was a repressed homosexual -??? and so on.



Mexican brothels with young prostitutes, overt homosexual behaviour ring a bell?

Aren't we all obnoxious shits with a bit of halitosis from time to time.

[Prospero]

Speak for yourself re Halitosis Dr Gonzo - so keep ya distance!

[Stavros]

Mexican brothels with young prostitutes, overt homosexual behaviour ring a bell?

Sorry DrGonzo it doesnt but I realise now it must be 30 years since I read it, its in a box on the stairs I think...

[Mariselle]

Anyone else here go into absolute waves of emotional spasms when listening to Sibelius?

[Helvis2012]

My favorite wordsmith:


Edgar Allan Poe

The Raven

First published in 1845

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more.'

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
`'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -
This it is, and nothing more,'

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
`Sir,' said I, `or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you' - here I opened wide the door; -
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, `Lenore!'
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, `Lenore!'
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
`Surely,' said I, `surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore -
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; -
'Tis the wind and nothing more!'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
`Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, `art sure no craven.
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the nightly shore -
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door -
Bird or beast above the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as `Nevermore.'

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only,
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered - not a feather then he fluttered -
Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'
Then the bird said, `Nevermore.'

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
`Doubtless,' said I, `what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never-nevermore."'

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore -
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking `Nevermore.'

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
`Wretch,' I cried, `thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he has sent thee
Respite - respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! -
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted -
On this home by horror haunted - tell me truly, I implore -
Is there - is there balm in Gilead? - tell me - tell me, I implore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore -
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -
`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!

Poe was a drunken, poor, degenerate racist, obsessed with the decay of America due to the influx of immigrants and idea of free blacks. Those are the main ideas he masks in his Gothic fiction: the decay of a society dominated by whites. His work is OK but pretty ugly if you look into in the deeper meanings.
In reality, he was a angry fellow. A poor white who saw himself as some kind of an aristocrat regardless of his poverty and addictions....but I suppose that's the kind of mind of that it takes to cobble together elaborate tales to promote hate.

[Stavros]

Anyone else here go into absolute waves of emotional spasms when listening to Sibelius?

In a word, yes! Especially Symphony No 2, and Finlandia, one of the most arousing pieces of orchestral showing off I can think of.

[iamdrgonzo]

Poe was a drunken, poor, degenerate racist, obsessed with the decay of America due to the influx of immigrants and idea of free blacks. Those are the main ideas he masks in his Gothic fiction: the decay of a society dominated by whites. His work is OK but pretty ugly if you look into in the deeper meanings.
In reality, he was a angry fellow. A poor white who saw himself as some kind of an aristocrat regardless of his poverty and addictions....but I suppose that's the kind of mind of that it takes to cobble together elaborate tales to promote hate.

Indeed he was a poor angry sot but I fail to see how his work promoted hate.

Immigration to the US in Poe's time was practially non-existent.

Poe had opportunity in life a wealthy foster father, he studied abroad in Scotland and London he served in the US military attaining the rank of Sergeant Major and attained an appointment to West Point which he duly cast aside in pursuit of his "career" in publishing.


Please explain how it is possible to cobble together elaborate tales (an oxymoron if I've ever read one)?

Additionally please explain how Poe used his work to promote hate?

[iamdrgonzo]

Poe: A Dream Within A Dream

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

This poem was published in 1849 the year of his death.

[Jericho]

Poe was a drunken, poor, degenerate racist, obsessed with the decay of America due to the influx of immigrants and idea of free blacks. Those are the main ideas he masks in his Gothic fiction: the decay of a society dominated by whites. His work is OK but pretty ugly if you look into in the deeper meanings.
In reality, he was a angry fellow. A poor white who saw himself as some kind of an aristocrat regardless of his poverty and addictions....but I suppose that's the kind of mind of that it takes to cobble together elaborate tales to promote hate.

But does that lessen his works?

[Prospero]

Indeed I wish I were able to "cobble together" such poetry and literature.

Mind you we had our own poet occasionally accused of some racism who slung together a few decent plays including Hamlet an Macbeth.

[nicebrn]

But does that lessen his works?
Yeah, exactly. No artist is perfectly politically correct by our modern standards.

HP Lovecraft was pathologically fixated on miscegenation, desperately feared being overrun by the "lower orders" and likely had serious issues with his sexuality as well. None of that diminishes his work...though in a way it does make it more interesting. But without Lovecraft, there would have been no Richard Matheson, Stephen King or Thomas Ligotti.

[Stavros]

I have admired Poe for years, he was a pioneer of the short story and has few equals in the genre. In a way he was a modernist before modernism, creating a literature of displacement and anxiety, of threat and despair wrapped up in the surroundings of enormous houses crammed with furniture, antiques curios and odd people unable to connect to the outside world. Perhaps that is why he was so popular among Baudelaire, Mallarme and other modernists and symbolists. Poe himself was born in New England and when his acting parents died he was displaced to slave-state Virginia and then England and then Virginia again, perhaps he never felt truly at home anywhere and was always searching for the balance, the peace of mind he never achieved. He described democracy as 'mobocracy' and saw universal suffrage as a con whereby the rich and powerful got the poor and powerless to maintain them in office year after year. But as far as I know he never endorsed slavery.

[trish]

THE FALL

Parallel rills
Of rain
Ripple through the sheet of water slipping down
My pane
And shimmy downward toward the rotten sill
To cascade over the drop and spill
Loudly into the chill
And shimmering pools
That leak into the pores and crevices
Of the hollow ground.

Were these heavenly inhabitants thrilled
To trade their potential
For the wild kinetic plummet
To their splashing success?
Or would they have preferred
To fall onto the soft green grass,
Miles away from my peering eyes,
Absorbed unobserved by the thirsty dirt?

__yours truly

[iamdrgonzo]

Very nice Trish

[Birgitta]

Poe was a drunken, poor, degenerate racist, obsessed with the decay of America due to the influx of immigrants and idea of free blacks. Those are the main ideas he masks in his Gothic fiction: the decay of a society dominated by whites. His work is OK but pretty ugly if you look into in the deeper meanings.
In reality, he was a angry fellow. A poor white who saw himself as some kind of an aristocrat regardless of his poverty and addictions....but I suppose that's the kind of mind of that it takes to cobble together elaborate tales to promote hate.

Poe was a rascist?

[nicebrn]

Poe was a rascist?
It was the 19th Century.

There weren't many who weren't racist--or at least white supremacist, which is almost the same thing--by modern standards.

[Stavros]

There is a discussion of this and other myths on Poe here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/matthew-pearl/top-five-myths-about-edga_b_334742.html
There were racists in the 19th century -and the 20th and still today, at least provide some evidence if you have it, on Poe.

[nicebrn]

There is a discussion of this and other myths on Poe here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/matthew-pearl/top-five-myths-about-edga_b_334742.html
There were racists in the 19th century -and the 20th and still today, at least provide some evidence if you have it, on Poe.
I saw that link on HuffPo last night and blew it off. You should have dug a little deeper. Yes, his stories are filled with a few racist stereotypes. I'll explain that away as being a product of the time.

It's also unclear whether Poe inherited that slave or whether he was acting as the agent for his aunt in the sale, so I'll set that aside as an example. I'll also set aside the question of whether the mere possession of slaves presupposes racism, and highlight the fact that he did write (or so thoroughly re-edit the work as to effectively make it his own) a non-satirical, non-ironic, well-known defense of the institution of slavery (http://www.eapoe.org/pstudies/ps1970/p1974201.htm). He also went far out of his way to support and defend those who also championed the rightness of the institution (which was most commonly justified on the basis of white supremacy). So yes, I think my original claim stands.

[Stavros]

well-known defense of the institution of slavery (http://www.eapoe.org/pstudies/ps1970/p1974201.htm)

Many thanks for this reference. This certaintly gives a different, more accurate, and more negative perspective on Poe as a man, I think like many others I am not familiar with the journalism even if it is not always 'signed'' although Edmund Wilson suggests the French symoblists knew his essays as well as his stories. I suspect that we are in a situation not unlike that encountered with Wagner -do you throw out the music-dramas because of Wagner's anti-Jewish rants and writings? One can sense in Poe's writings a deep resentment of the rich and the privileged, forcing us, as it were, to 'look up' with Poe from his disadvantaged position -yet though he owned no property he lived in households which owned slaves. And clearly it was not enough for him; it underlines the unhappiness of the man, it doesn't mean he did not write powerful stories either, but doesn't let him off politically.

[nicebrn]

well-known defense of the institution of slavery (http://www.eapoe.org/pstudies/ps1970/p1974201.htm)

Many thanks for this reference. This certaintly gives a different, more accurate, and more negative perspective on Poe as a man, I think like many others I am not familiar with the journalism even if it is not always 'signed'' although Edmund Wilson suggests the French symoblists knew his essays as well as his stories. I suspect that we are in a situation not unlike that encountered with Wagner -do you throw out the music-dramas because of Wagner's anti-Jewish rants and writings? One can sense in Poe's writings a deep resentment of the rich and the privileged, forcing us, as it were, to 'look up' with Poe from his disadvantaged position -yet though he owned no property he lived in households which owned slaves. And clearly it was not enough for him; it underlines the unhappiness of the man, it doesn't mean he did not write powerful stories either, but doesn't let him off politically.
Sure.

That link is a pretty good starting point for doing your investigation, so I didn't dig too deeper than the first few primary sources. The Paulding-Drayton review and the speech endorsing Nathaniel Tucker are quite damning on their own.

I'm not really in that lit-crit school of trashing the work of artists who might have had a few insensitive and ridiculous beliefs. Not unless they're still living, anyway, in which case I try very hard not to give them any money.

Unless they hold particularly hateful and ignorant views, I tend to give historical figures a pass and evaluate only their body of work itself. Poe is dead, and the dead cannot hurt the living...so I'll go right on enjoying his excellent proto-detective fiction. (Other than "The Raven" and "Ulalume," I'm not too acquainted with his poetry.)

....American superhero and horror/fantasy comics are my primary source of art appreciation these days anyway. I'm really into that "Comics as Modern Myth" thesis. ;) In fact, I've been thinking of posting an examination of Grant Morrison's work to this thread....

[robertlouis]

Anyone else here go into absolute waves of emotional spasms when listening to Sibelius?

In a word, yes! Especially Symphony No 2, and Finlandia, one of the most arousing pieces of orchestral showing off I can think of.

Add to that the final movement of the Fifth Symphony with its remarkable series of trumpet blasts for the finale and for me the whole of the Seventh, especially in the Ashkenazy version. For a man who claimed, in his famous exchange with Mahler, that the symphony was nothing if not rational and minimalist, he certainly has the ability to bring tears to the eyes and a lump to the throat.

[robertlouis]

It was the 19th Century.

There weren't many who weren't racist--or at least white supremacist, which is almost the same thing--by modern standards.

Just as Lincoln was. He was morally and philosophically opposed to slavery both at the institutional and individual levels, but thought that the long-term solution for America's black population was repatriation to Africa and that the white man was much the superior of his black counterpart.

But his views were both conventional and highly representative of the time, and it doesn't prevent me as a Brit for having him as one of my heroes.

[Stavros]

Last night I watched the film New York, I Love You The film was inspired by the film Paris, Je t'aime - both films are comprised of shorts which are shot in different parts of the city by different directors, on the the theme of love. The French film, released in 2006 was originally to be made up of 20 shorts, one each for the 20 arrondissement that comprise metro Paris within the Boulevard Peripherique -two directors pulled out so in fact there are only 18, but each one is distinct and has its own flavour, and at the end some loose ends are tied. Love in the French film is the conventional boy-meets-girl-falls-in-love; it can be parental love; love of place; fantasy-love; and so on: it benefits from the photogenic qualities of Paris, the quality of the writing acting and directing: New York, I Love You, fails on all these levels.

To begin with, it isn't always clear where the film is being shot, other than than Manhattan is New York -with one exception the last segment of ten is shot in Brighton Beach. There are obligatory New York Jews, Italian-Americans, and one segment is shot in Chinatown. There is an English musician trying to develop a career; a sardonic hooker; a businessman whose role-play with his wife is a mimic of the Bob Hoskins scene in Paris, and so on. A couple of Indians, in front of and behind the camera, but no Black people, other than one cab driver who is from Haiti, and Carlos Acosta who is Cuban and lives in London (as far as I know).

I thought this was a missed opportunity to emulate Paris; I don't know what other city could stand in, although I suppose places like San Francisco and LA -cities with distinct sectors and multiple identities- could do it. Anyway here are the imdb links:

Paris, Je T'Aime (2006) - IMDb@@AMEPARAM@@http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMTc1MDgwNDE4MF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMTQzMzc0MQ@@._ V1._SX93_SY140_.jpg@@AMEPARAM@@BMTc1MDgwNDE4MF5BMl 5BanBnXkFtZTcwMTQzMzc0MQ@@@@AMEPARAM@@SX93@@AMEPAR AM@@SY140 (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0401711/) (Paris)
New York, I Love You (2009) - IMDb@@AMEPARAM@@http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMTI3NDYxOTM4OF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwOTEwNTI4Mg@@._ V1._SX94_SY140_.jpg@@AMEPARAM@@BMTI3NDYxOTM4OF5BMl 5BanBnXkFtZTcwOTEwNTI4Mg@@@@AMEPARAM@@SX94@@AMEPAR AM@@SY140 (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0808399/) (New York)

[trish]

Add to that the final movement of the Fifth Symphony with its remarkable series of trumpet blasts for the finale and for me the whole of the Seventh, especially in the Ashkenazy version. For a man who claimed, in his famous exchange with Mahler, that the symphony was nothing if not rational and minimalist, he certainly has the ability to bring tears to the eyes and a lump to the throat.You should check out "Dark Waters" by the modern composer Ingram Marshall.

[robertlouis]

You should check out "Dark Waters" by the modern composer Ingram Marshall.

Thank you Trish. I'll certainly check that out.

[Stavros]

Ingram Marshall -not a name I had previously heard of, I am ashamed to say; however I checked it out on YouTube and it indicates the options that composers have been able to explore outside the dreary, lifeless legacy of Schoenberg and Stravinsky- there is so much music out there from which to draw inspiration. It also has some kind of congruence with what Klaus Schulze has been working with, vide Irrlicht:

YouTube - ‪Klaus Schulze. Irrlicht, I, Satz; Ebene‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oppZBF40is)

[Stavros]

I don't know if there are any David Mamet fans here; I have disliked his work since I first encountered it through Glengarry Glen Ross, and the film House of Games, I don't like his use of language, that brittle soul-less repetition that you get in the empty books by Hemingway and Cormac McCarthy -anyway I always assumed he was a macho right-wing Republican like the film-maker David Lynch so I was surprised to see this review by Christopher Hitchens of some kind of confessional book in which Mamet declares his allegiance to the 'no-nonsense' politically incorrect strata of society who consider all forms of government an assault on freedom. As Hitchens points out Mamet can't even get simple facts right (Beaverbrook was Presbyterian not Jewish), and rants with all the spooky perfection of a convert -but from what, to what? Its an acid review, and I don't usually think of Hitchens as anything other than a self-important windbag, but its worth reading anyway. It is from today's New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/19/books/review/book-review-the-secret-knowledge-by-david-mamet.html?_r=1&hpw

David Mamet’s Right-Wing Conversion

By CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

THE SECRET KNOWLEDGE


On the Dismantling of American Culture


By David Mamet
241 pp. Sentinel. $27.95.




This is an extraordinarily irritating book, written by one of those people who smugly believe that, having lost their faith, they must ipso facto have found their reason. In order to be persuaded by it, you would have to be open to propositions like this:
“Part of the left’s savage animus against Sarah Palin is attributable to her status not as a woman, neither as a Conservative, but as a Worker.”
Or this:
“America is a Christian country. Its Constitution is the distillation of the wisdom and experience of Christian men, in a tradition whose codification is the Bible.”
Some of David Mamet (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/m/david_mamet/index.html?inline=nyt-per)’s unqualified declarations are made even more tersely. On one page affirmative action is described as being “as injust as chattel slavery”; on another as being comparable to the Japanese internment and the Dred Scott decision. We learn that 1973 was the year the United States “won” the Vietnam War, and that Karl Marx — who on the evidence was somewhat more industrious than Sarah Palin — “never worked a day in his life.” Slackness or confusion might explain his reference to the *Scottish-Canadian newspaper magnate Lord Beaverbrook as a Jewish courtier in the tradition of Disraeli and Kissinger, but it is more than ignorant to say of Bertrand Russell — author of one of the first reports from Moscow to analyze and excoriate Lenin — that he was a fellow-traveling dupe and tourist of the Jane Fonda style.
Propagandistic writing of this kind can be even more boring than it is irritating. For example, Mamet writes in “The Secret Knowledge” that “the Israelis would like to live in peace within their borders; the Arabs would like to kill them all.” Whatever one’s opinion of that conflict may be, this (twice-made) claim of his abolishes any need to analyze or even discuss it. It has a long way to go before it can even be called simplistic. By now, perhaps, you will not be surprised to know that Mamet regards global warming (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/science/topics/globalwarming/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier) as a false alarm, and demands to be told “by what magical process” bumper stickers can “save whales, and free Tibet.” This again is not uncharacteristic of his pointlessly aggressive style: who on earth maintains that they can? If I were as prone to sloganizing as Mamet, I’d keep clear of bumper-sticker comparisons altogether.
On the epigraph page, and again on the closing one, Mamet purports to explain the title of his book. He cites the anthropologist Anna Simons on rites of initiation, to the effect that the big secret is very often that there is no big secret. In his own voice, he states: “There is no secret knowledge. The federal government is merely the zoning board writ large.” Again, it is hard to know with whom he is contending. Believers in arcane or esoteric or occult power are distributed all across the spectrum and would, I think, include Glenn Beck. Mr. Beck is among those thanked in Mamet’s acknowledgments for helping free him from “the bemused and sad paternalism” of the liberal airwaves. Would that this were the only sign of the deep confusion that is all that alleviates Mamet’s commitment to the one-dimensional or the flat-out partisan.
I am writing this review in the same week as I am conducting a rather exhausting exchange with Noam Chomsky in the pages of a small magazine. I have no difficulty in understanding why it is that former liberals and radicals become exasperated with the pieties of the left. I have taught at Berkeley and the New School, and I know what Mamet is on about when he evokes the dull atmosphere of campus correctness. Once or twice, as when he attacks feminists for their silence on Bill Clinton’s sleazy sex life, or points out how sinister it is that we use the word “czar” as a positive term for a political problem-solver, he is unquestionably right, or at least making a solid case. But then he writes: “The BP gulf oil leak . . . was bad. The leak of thousands of classified military documents by Julian Assange on WikiLeaks was good. Why?” This is merely lame, fails to compare like with like, appears unintentionally to be unsure why the gulf leak was “bad” and attempts an irony where none exists.
Irony is one of the elements of tragedy, a subject with which Mamet is much occupied. He has read — perhaps before Glenn Beck’s promotion of it on the air — Friedrich von Hayek’s classic defense of the market, “The Road to Serfdom.” (I would guess he has not read Hayek’s essay “Why I Am Not a Conservative.” (http://www.fahayek.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=46)) Briefly, Hayek identified what he called “the Tragic View” of the free market: the necessity of making difficult choices between competing goods. Classical economics had already defined this as “opportunity cost,” which is just as accurate but less tear-jerking. We have long known it under other maxims — “to govern is to choose” — or even under folkloric proverbs about having cakes and consuming them. But to Mamet, Hayek is the brilliant corrective to the evil of Franklin Roosevelt, who “dismantled the free market, and, so, the economy,” and shares this dismal record with Nazis, Stalinists and other “Socialists.” More recent collapses and crimes in the private capital sector, and the Bush-Obama rescue that followed, strike him as large steps in the same direction.
Mamet began the book more promisingly, by undertaking to review political disagreements between conservatives and liberals in the light of his own craft: “This opposition appealed to me as a dramatist. For a good drama aspires to be and a tragedy must be a depiction of a human interaction in which both antagonists are, arguably, in the right.”
That was certainly Hegel’s definition of what constituted a tragedy. From a playwright, however, one might also have expected some discussion of what the Attic tragedians thought: namely, that tragedy arises from the fatal flaw in some noble person or enterprise. This would have allowed Mamet to make excursions into the fields of irony and unintended consequences, which is precisely where many of the best critiques of utopianism have originated. Unfortunately, though, he shows himself tone-deaf to irony and unable to render a fair picture of what his opponents (and, sometimes, his preferred authorities, like Hayek) really believe. Quoting Deepak Chopra, of all people, as saying, “Our thinking and our behavior are always in anticipation of a response. It [sic] is therefore fear-based,” he seizes the chance to ask, “Is it too much to suggest that this quote contains the most basic prescription of liberalism, ‘Stop Thinking’?” On that evidence, yes, it would be a bit much.
Eschewing irony, Mamet prefers his precepts to be literal and traditional. In case by any chance we haven’t read it before, he twice offers Rabbi Hillel’s definition of the golden rule and the essence of Torah: “What is hateful to thee, do not do to thy neighbor.” As with Hayek’s imperative of choice, the apparent obviousness of this does not entirely redeem it from contradiction. To Colonel Qaddafi and Charles Manson and Bernard Madoff, I want things to happen that would be hateful to me. Of what use is a principle that is only as good as the person uttering it? About as much use as the (unnamed) “doyenne” of the American left who, according to Mamet, recommends always finding out what MoveOn.org thinks and does, and then thinking and doing it. That, I suspect, was a straw antagonist — with no chance at all of being, “arguably, in the right” — and this is a straw book, which looks for tragedy in all the wrong places.


Christopher Hitchens is a columnist for Vanity Fair. His memoir, “Hitch-22,” is now available in paperback.

[trish]

I generally enjoy Christopher Hitchens' writing, whether I agree with him or not. I do agree with his (and apparently your) assessment of David Mamet. I find Mamet's theater cold and unbelievable. (My first encounter was Oleanna, which I found to be stilted, preachy, robotic and shallow in spite of the intellectual pryrotechnics.) His plays are intended as sermons and display as much intellectual integrity as one. I haven't been following Mamet's career and was unaware of his new book and his "conversion." Thanks for posting the Hitchens review.

P.S. We (Stavros and I) disagree on Cormac McCarthy. As far as Hemingway goes, I like the short, simple prose. Brief flashes of light. An illuminated face. An undeveloped idea. Then darkness. But like Mamet, Hemingway sometimes constructs his characters to illustrate a moral. Rather than being true to themselves and reality, his characters are reduced to symbols in an allegory.

[Paige]

I 'm really, really glad somebody started this -there's not a law saying TGirls have to be incurably dumb (=interested only in pop stuff), or if there is, i haven't been told. A lot of hot-as-hell GGirls are much more interested in Mozart & F.S. Fitzgerald than in Lady GaGa, etc. etc. No reason TGs can't be too. One note-try to get all the Mozart piano concertos by Mitsuko Uchida-expensive, but it's like buying medicine, only better. Paige. PS-Stavros-that is a super post, i hate politics, but i'll look Mamet up.

[samlord]

I agree with Paige completely. This thread is such a breath of fresh air in the forum. So bravo fortissimo to the intrepid souls who decided to hijack it and create a small oasis of cuture and sociability in the wild and wacky world of Hungangels.

Now . . . anyone care to discuss the lyric qualities of Algernon Charles Swinburne's Hymn to Proserpine? Anyone . . .? Anyone remember Swinburne (hint - he was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature every year from 1903 to 1907).

[Stavros]

P.S. We (Stavros and I) disagree on Cormac McCarthy. As far as Hemingway goes, I like the short, simple prose. Brief flashes of light. An illuminated face. An undeveloped idea. Then darkness.
Its obviously a matter of taste, and it doesn't always mean that intricate prose is superior -Conrad, Woolf, Joyce and Proust to me are at the summit of modern writing, Nabokov is a worthless fraud. I think it took me 4 hours to read The Road, and it was a waste of four hours of my life. I then watched the film after a cup of tea, so I guess I wasted half a day of my waking life. Its more like typing than writing. Modernism intrigues me with its paradoxes, subtleties, anxieties -its just more enjoyable to read.

One note-try to get all the Mozart piano concertos by Mitsuko Uchida-expensive
Paige, I adore Uchida, I have her Schubert set but the HMV shop in London had a special offer on Barenboim's complete set of Mozart a few years ago -no contest! and I am not disappointed...

Anyone remember Swinburne..
Swinburne is the forgotten romantic of English poetry, as with AE Housman his poetry went out of fashion in the 20thc under the onslaught of modernism and after, Auden and the 'Life Studies' type movement pioneered by Lowell. Its a bit odd because Yeats is a late romantic -I think it was Edmund Wilson or someone who called Yeats the last 19thc poet, but on the whole a better poety than AS. Swinburne's poetry has musicality, lush phrasing, and though dense can be rewarding if you stick with it. He himself like Rilke was a sickly, neurotic individual needing constant care and attention. Maybe that style will come back into fashion, but I doubt it in present times.

[robertlouis]

[/I]
Its obviously a matter of taste, and it doesn't always mean that intricate prose is superior -Conrad, Woolf, Joyce and Proust to me are at the summit of modern writing, Nabokov is a worthless fraud.



It saddens me that of the four authors you named, Stavros, Conrad is the least read these days. I remember being enthralled as a youngster by his maritime novels and only realised on returning to them in adulthood that it was the quality of the prose and his talent for characterisation that had pulled me in in the first place. Most people know that Heart of Darkness was the template for Coppola's masterful Apocalypse Now, but I wonder how many have read it. The opening chapter, in which he describes the civilisation of London as the thinnest and most fragile of veneers sets the tone for one of the 20th century's finest novels. Add in Nostromo - his masterpiece imho - The Secret Agent, Lord Jim, Typhoon.....

A lost genius.

[robertlouis]

I 'm really, really glad somebody started this -there's not a law saying TGirls have to be incurably dumb (=interested only in pop stuff), or if there is, i haven't been told. A lot of hot-as-hell GGirls are much more interested in Mozart & F.S. Fitzgerald than in Lady GaGa, etc. etc. No reason TGs can't be too. One note-try to get all the Mozart piano concertos by Mitsuko Uchida-expensive, but it's like buying medicine, only better. Paige. PS-Stavros-that is a super post, i hate politics, but i'll look Mamet up.

As the OP, thank you, Paige. Well, it's nice to get away from the metal freaks for a while! :)

If you're into piano concertos, I picked up the full set of Beethoven concertos in a 2 cd set from Amazon uk for £6 (about $10) last month, with Alfred Brendel in his prime, excellent quality 1983 recording, on Decca. Strongly recommended.

[robertlouis]

Ingram Marshall -not a name I had previously heard of, I am ashamed to say; however I checked it out on YouTube and it indicates the options that composers have been able to explore outside the dreary, lifeless legacy of Schoenberg and Stravinsky- there is so much music out there from which to draw inspiration. It also has some kind of congruence with what Klaus Schulze has been working with, vide Irrlicht:

YouTube - ‪Klaus Schulze. Irrlicht, I, Satz; Ebene‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oppZBF40is)

On Trish's recommendation I did a search for the Marshall and downloaded it from Amazon. Excellent. Challenging, but very lyrical in its own highly idiosyncratic way.

In my other musical strand I've been on a serious Paul Simon kick this month, so the Marshall made for an intriguing counterpoint!

[Stavros]

Add in Nostromo - his masterpiece imho - The Secret Agent

It takes time to read and understand Conrad, as is also the case with other modernists, like Faulkner for example, and if you believe people 'don't have time' these days and expect everything to take place within 3 minutes its never going to happen. On the other hand I notice how many histories and biographies are rarely less than 500-600 pages long, so some people must be spending a lot of time reading.

I was not impressed by Apocalypse Now, and repeated viewings confirm it is a mess of a film; it doesn't have much to do with Heart of Darkness, which is surely one of the most misunderstood pieces of 20thc fiction -either Coppola doesn't understand it or realised he couldn't film a story that is a narrative within a narrative that simultaneously takes place in London and Africa...

Nostromo is without doubt one of the finest creations in English literature, I used to read it every summer when I went on holiday, and decided I only really understood it after the fourth reading -to which someone I know responded if it took that long then what was the point of reading it? Under Western Eyes may be his most under-rated book, it has been criticised for giving voice to Conrad's issues with the Russians, but for a book published in 1911 is remarkably perceptive on the mind-set of 'revolutionaries' and particularly the expats, in this book cuddled together in Geneva. Victory is also a book I have read several times, I also saw Richard Rodney-Bennet's opera years ago although I didn't enjoy it; and most of these books have been filmed, but never successfully, although Hitchcock's version of The Secret Agent (called Sabotage, he made another flm called The Secret Agent but its not Conrad); is not bad. I also read The Shadow-Line in tandem with the BBC2 drama, but Blick who wrote it has only taken the kernel of that story, most of which takes place on board a ship in the Gulf of Siam.

[Prospero]

I fully agree with the judgement of Mamet's ignorance and of his poor quality as a playwright in recent years. However I personally found Glengarry Glen Ross to be a wonderfully powerful piece of theatre and then cinema brining forther a performance of near brilliance from Jack Lemmon. The rot set in fully with Oleanna.


Conrad is a quite astonishing writers made more remarkable by swift mastery of English and then dramatic achievement in it - rivalled and perhaps surpassed by Nabokov. Apocalypse Now was a ragged film with some brilliant moments. But as a cinematic approach to Conrad it was a failure. I suspect Lord jim filmed many years earlier with peter O'Toole was a better piece but i saw it so long ago I've forgotten it (and read the book many years later).

[Prospero]

Ingram Marshall I have heard but one piece by - a very interesting work called, Fog Tropes utilising found sound (ships sirens in the fog). A wonderfully atmospheric piece It was including in an album some years back that also awoke me to Quiet City by Copland - a piece unlike most of his output.

[Prospero]

This is fun

http://flavorwire.com/188138/the-30-harshest-author-on-author-insults-in-history


11. Vladimir Nabokov on Ernest Hemingway (1972)

“As to Hemingway, I read him for the first time in the early ‘forties, something about bells, balls and bulls, and loathed it.”

[robertlouis]

The BBC made a heroic attempt at serialising Nostromo back in the 90s. A noble effort, undermined by the leading actor's lack of charisma. Just checked and it doesn't seem to be available on DVD.

[Stavros]

The problem with modernism in literature with its subtle changes of time, place, and mood is that to film the book the purely literary quality is thrown overboard and the narrative thread is taken out -it is precisely the shifts in time that make Nostomo so mesmerising, and yes, difficult, but rewarding. Thus, the expensive BBC film replaced complexity with a linear narrative, Nostromo was not tall enough did not have a moustache and couldn't act, in fact it was a catastrophe although the geography seemed the only accurate thing in it. Lord Jim too, which I have on dvd, dispenses with most of the first half of the book to become a redemptive adventure story. I always thought if one director was a natural for Conrad, it would be Nicolas Roeg, whose editing skills are phenomenal. David Lean planned Nostromo with a screenplay by Robert Bolt, but my guess is that the heart of the story would have been replaced by fabulous long shots of the coast and the mountains...

[Paige]

I wonder what people think about John Fowles these days-if you want some lovely, subtle writing, set mostly in the French country-side, read "Ebony Tower." He also did "The French Lieutenant's Woman," which is Meryl Streep's best movie, for me, anyway. Just for the record-if anybody thinks one of the requirements for being a sexy GGirl or TGirl is dumbness-I work in the Summer at a pretty well known Music camp. There are many, many staggeringly beautiful HS, college-age, post-college age ladies here-much more beautiful than the "pro" beauties- who play Bach, act in Shakespeare, and read Camus in French.

[Prospero]

Paige...Asheville NC - what a great city that is. I love it and know it somewhat. A great old fashioned soda fountain on the main street I recall and a great gallery nearby where i bought an art watch a few years ago. Some of my best friends live nearby in Tryon.

I for sure never thought dumbness was a qualification. Just the opposite. The brighter the better for me.
And on the subject of john Fowles The Magus (which he re-wrote later in life) is for me one of his interesting. Daniel Martin, on the other hand, is a work of phallocentric fantasy and self regard. Also his first published work The Collector is fine - with a remarkable film performance by Samantha Eggar.

[Stavros]

I don't like John Fowles, I find him arrogant in tone, and borderline misogynist (vide The Collector); similar to Salman Rushdie. The Magus is an example of clever storytelling, but is let down at the end by a latin epigraph which is meaningless if you don't know latin, but typical of Fowles superior view of himself -I didn't know he re-wrote it so I don't know if he changed the ending, it was also a poor film with Anthony Quinn some years ago. I loathed both the book and the film of The French Lieutenant's Woman, but the location, Lyme Regis in Dorset is worth visiting, but not in the height of summer when it gets too crowded.

Meryl Streep plays Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady which comes out next January I think, Richard E Grant plays Michael Heseltine (with blonde hair?) Jim Broadbent Denis. Streep has made some great films, and some dire ones too (eg Mamma Mia), but is one of the best actresses to come out of American films in the last 40 years.

[trish]

I loved Fowles' The Magus, and then tried a bunch of other novels by him and never made it all the way through any of them.

[iamdrgonzo]

This is fun
http://flavorwire.com/188138/the-30-harshest-author-on-author-insults-in-history


Very nice.


17. Martin Amis on Miguel Cervantes
“Reading Don Quixote can be compared to an indefinite visit from your most impossible senior relative, with all his pranks, dirty habits, unstoppable reminiscences, and terrible cronies. When the experience is over, and the old boy checks out at last (on page 846 — the prose wedged tight, with no breaks for dialogue), you will shed tears all right; not tears of relief or regret but tears of pride. You made it, despite all that ‘Don Quixote’ could do.”

[Jericho]

Meryl Streep plays Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady which comes out next January I think, Richard E Grant plays Michael Heseltine (with blonde hair?) Jim Broadbent Denis.

I hope it shows him doing her rough, fucking her up the arse...
MARGARET...THIS...IS...WHAT..yOU'RE...DOING...TO.. .THE...COUNTRY!

Probably some revisionist bullshit, painting her as our saviour...CUNT!

[Stavros]

Originally Posted by Prospero http://1.2.3.12/bmi/www.hungangels.com/vboard/images/ca_serenity/buttons/viewpost.gif (http://www.hungangels.com/vboard/showthread.php?p=954833#post954833)This is fun
http://flavorwire.com/188138/the-30-...lts-in-history (http://flavorwire.com/188138/the-30-harshest-author-on-author-insults-in-history)

13. Gore Vidal on Truman Capote
“He’s a full-fledged housewife from Kansas with all the prejudices.”


Excellent link Prospero! Vidal on Capote: the word 'bitch' comes to mind...but also how unreasonable some comments are -Jane Austen wrote with an uncommon fluency; I doubt Lawrence understood much of Joyce;but his remarks about Melville are astonishing -the execution of Billy Budd is to my mind one of the finest examples of writing in English; Melville, along with Emerson and Thoreau is part of the Holy Trinity of American letters.


Meanwhile, rather than acid remarks, Edmund Wilson in Classics & Commercials, a Literary Chronicle of the Forties, offers something rare: 'A Dissenting Opinion on Franz Kafka', pointing out how poorly organised his papers were but dismissing him for being dishonest and lacking in purpose. In The Bit Between My Teeth, A Literary Chronicle of 1950-1965', Wilson lays into Tolkien with a dimissive piece 'Oh, those awful orcs', believing the Lord of the Rings to be repetitive, lacking characters with depth, and to be more suitable for 9 year olds than adults.

[Stavros]

Jericho most of these films about politicians, queens and other leaders are usually bland especially if they are still alive -they dont want to end up in court. The BBC is about to broadcast a three-party 'biopgraphy' of Muhammad, by Rageh Omar who has been to 'the region' and along with the 'facts' about the 'Messenger' there will be the usual 'Here I am in Mecca', 'Here I am in Medina', 'Here I am in Jerusalem' and probably the biting question to some Imam 'What does Islam mean to us today'? And so on. I daresay this will generate more comment when it is broadcast.

[Prospero]

I have no doubt whatsoever that Rageh Omar's film will be a very well executed and utterly respectful film which will be scrupulous in not offending any Muslim sensibilities. The BBC cannot afford to ruffle any feathers in the region or the wider Muslim world. No question whatsoever could be asked in this context of the veracity of the archangel Gibreel's revelations or the nature of the Qur'an. There will surely be no interrogation of the perversion of islam implicit in the entire Wahabist vision - which holds the fountainhead of the faith in its grip and exports its poison globally.

[Prospero]

Bump.....

[Paige]

Stavros-It's strange that you mention Mitsuko doing Schubert's sonatas-i've been hoping to get the set for about a year. i have a 2-cd set by Pete Klein, which is good, but really want to hear Mitsuko. Schubert is my great love, along with Mozart. Also looking for a complete set of Beethoven sonatas, if i can afford it. I had six years of piano, didn't do much good, but i love the piano repertoire.

[Stavros]

Some of Uchida's Schubert recordings have divided the critics more than any other performer I can think of in recent times. When she released her disc with the Sonata in D D850 and the Sonata in A D784 Gramophone magazine published two reviews, one in favour, one against. Her tempi in D784 are extreme, at one point in the mystical andante, one of the most astonishing things Schubert wrote, it sounds like Messiaen rather than Schubert, but it works for me. I also have the complete set by Wilhelm Kempff and once spent a week playing each sonata by each performer back to back -they are both outstanding musicians, but for me Uchida digs deeper into the sub-surface of Schubert's musical world to bring forth treasures I dont hear in Kempff. Another contrast would be to listen to Andras Schiff, whose ability to transform dynamic and exciting music into something bland and lifeless is truly depressing; Murray Perahia is another pianist who kills music every time he plays it. There are a few complete Beethoven sets around, my guess is they all have something to offer -with the obvious exceptions (Parahia and Schiff specifically, Maurizio Pollini is another pianist whose musicianship does nothing for me), and with the Summer sales on there are bargains to be had; Brendel would be a possible target, or Asheknazy. Unfortunately in the UK for real shopping the main HMV store on Oxford St in London remains the best in the UK, otherwise one has to search on Amazon for bargains. I stopped playing the piano when I was I think 9 or 10, big mistake!

[Prospero]

Highly recommended in London - Kevin Spacey as Richard III at the Old Vic. He totally commands the stage making a darkness palpable. Directed by Sam Mendes.

[Paige]

Stavros & Prospero-You guys in London make me jealous- I am up in the Blue Ridge Mountains here-one of the most complex & beautiful nature preserves in the world, but you are much more likely to get a good discussion on dealing with bears than on Schubert/Shakespeare & so forth. The plus side is, there are some excellent Music centers and drama festivals in the summer-heard Frederika von Stade singing Mahler during a June rain-shower two years ago-sort of like hearing music in your sleep. Still, I'd love to wander around London for a few days. If there's room for one more American.

[Stavros]

Paige -I don't live in London, where there is plenty of room for intelligent, sensitive Americans...and I have no doubt Prospero will be willing to show you around the capital...whereas the Blue Ridge Mountains and Frederica von Stade sound more appealing to me that Oxford Street on a Saturday afternoon, but I had no idea there were bears in North Carolina...I thought they migrated to Canada to get away from the Carolinas Golf Courses...

[Stavros]

Highly recommended in London - Kevin Spacey as Richard III

I guess its a step forward from Keyser Soze...

[Prospero]

Highly recommended in London - Kevin Spacey as Richard III

I guess its a step forward from Keyser Soze...

Actually The usual Suspects was a pretty good film, I thought.

i LOVE the local landscape but had no idea there were bears there either. Did you see my eariier post about your hometown Ashville which I know slightly. (Good friends live not far away in Tryon).

[robertlouis]

Highly recommended in London - Kevin Spacey as Richard III at the Old Vic. He totally commands the stage making a darkness palpable. Directed by Sam Mendes.

Hoping to see it this Thursday.

[robertlouis]

Actually, I guess this is the right thread to mention the latest in your imaginative and always interesting series of avatars, Prospero.

The eyeball-slicing scene from Un Chien Andalou still has the ability to shock and disturb 80 years on, despite the modern audience's constant exposure to endless gore.

God only knows how the film's first audiences reacted!

[Prospero]

Well I hope you can get tickets Robert Louis.... I got mine months back and even joined friends of the old vic in order to be sure of seats. It's pretty much sold out for the entire run but you might get returns.

[Stavros]

I have had an intense loathing of Salvador Dali for years, the essay on him Orwell wrote is all that needs to be said, the films are rubbish. Bunuel was quite an amusing sort of film-maker, but sort of like an anarchist version of Woody Allen....

[Prospero]

You're right Stavros - Dali was a fake but actually technically a better painter than most of the other surrealists. For me the best surrealist is the infinitely subtler Max Ernst. Bunuel's later films were fun. But this scene is still mightily disturbing.

[robertlouis]

Well I hope you can get tickets Robert Louis.... I got mine months back and even joined friends of the old vic in order to be sure of seats. It's pretty much sold out for the entire run but you might get returns.

Inside influences, dear boy..... :dancing:

[robertlouis]

You're right Stavros - Dali was a fake but actually technically a better painter than most of the other surrealists. For me the best surrealist is the infinitely subtler Max Ernst. Bunuel's later films were fun. But this scene is still mightily disturbing.

One of the first paintings that ever had a real impact on me was Dali's Christ of St John of the Cross in Glasgow Art Galleries, which I saw first as a young child. The unique perspective of the crucifixion from above is till a very arresting image.

Amazing that the dour presbyterian baillies of Glasgow had the imagination and courage to purchase it on behalf of the city.

[Prospero]

It is a fine painting.... and though I agree with Stavros by and large regarding the lack of honesty in much of Dali's dealings, loathe is a strong word to apply to this playful shaman.

[trish]

I think a lot of Dali's earlier work has merit. His later fame and greed corrupted his art. The Sacrament of the Last Supper is in the Smithsonian and the original is a wonder to see. I've a print of The Landscape of Port Lligat hanging in my bedroom.

[Prospero]

It is sometimes hard to see the power of some vary familiar works of art because they are so familiar - i.e. the melting clocks. They're now a cliche. But that landscape is nice Trish.

[Prospero]

But I still prefer Max Ernst

[Prospero]

The key thing about the surrealist movement was their potential to cause disquiet - and for the most part familiarity has made that impossible.

[trish]

But I still prefer Max ErnstThey truly are astounding paintings. Is it true he used sponges for those instead of brushes?

The key thing about the surrealist movement was their potential to cause disquiet - and for the most part familiarity has made that impossible. Sad, if true. Not only does familiarity evaporate the disquiet of older surrealist tropes, it makes newer ones more difficult to invent. Either we spiral into the grotesque or new surrealistic creations become impossible. Still, the Ernsts seem to remain fresh. Why? Underexposure? Or are they just that good?

(Here's Dorthea Tanning's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. One of my faves)

[Stavros]

The core of Orwell's criticism is that Dali was a fine draughtsman and stylist, but that the content of his work reveals a nihilist with anti-social attitudes, but that is obviously way beyond the values Orwell espoused. I find that art that needs to 'shock' to make its point has already lost it. Mutilated bodies, juxtapositions of innocent elements made to look perverse -its no different from Lady GaGa and her meat dress or the masks, and so on. The shock value of many renaissance works emerges when you realise that the content of a work of lush colours and beautiful forms is a dreadful act of violence, it is the act that is shocking that registers, enhanced by the form.

Anyway I like John Richardson's essay Dali's Gala in Sacred Monsters, Sacred Masters; he points out that before marrying Gala he had only been in love once before, and that was with the poet Lorca. Apparently, when Lorca was told Dali was going marry a woman, he said: It's impossible, he can only get an erection when someone sticks a finger up his ass...
Richardson goes on to explain that he enjoyed Gala's affairs with young men while for himself, Hating to be touched, he became a compulsive onanist...

[iamdrgonzo]

A little Pablo:


Guernica:

404919



Massacare in Korea:

404920



Les Demoiselles d'Avignon:

404921

[runningdownthatdream]

I like this site and have spent hours browsing, hopefully it has some value for those who can't get to see the actual works;

http://www.abcgallery.com/

[European21]

Some from Dalí
http://www.umelcisrdce.wz.cz/Salvador_Dali/Salvador_Dali/Obrazky/temp.jpg
http://nd03.jxs.cz/960/711/279147974e_56616789_o2.jpg
http://dali.uffs.net/galerie/pictures/1936_1937_lighted_giraffes_01.jpg

[Paige]

Prospero-Yes there are bears here. If you stay on the main highways, you see a pleasant, mostly pastoral scene,with cattle farms, corn fields, wheat fields... but if you trek up into the mountains around here, you can be in untouched wilderness soon. I love it-you see something magical every day, like a quarter-mile patch of wild rhododendron in bloom. I go through Tryon often-let me know if you are going to be back this way. Brevard Music Center just started-they have Mahler 3rd in a couple of weeks.

[robertlouis]

Prospero-Yes there are bears here. If you stay on the main highways, you see a pleasant, mostly pastoral scene,with cattle farms, corn fields, wheat fields... but if you trek up into the mountains around here, you can be in untouched wilderness soon. I love it-you see something magical every day, like a quarter-mile patch of wild rhododendron in bloom. I go through Tryon often-let me know if you are going to be back this way. Brevard Music Center just started-they have Mahler 3rd in a couple of weeks.

Hi Paige, sounds beautiful. Do they have other musical festivals round your way? I'm a singer-songwriter and I'd love to do some gigs on the east coast. Got offers around New England, NY state, DC etc, but a few further south would make the trip economically viable. Any thoughts would be gratefully appreciated.

And I'll still be happy to discuss Mahler and Sibelius with you if/when I get there!

[Jackal]

The key thing about the surrealist movement was their potential to cause disquiet - and for the most part familiarity has made that impossible.

Who is this?


Reminds me of Magritte


http://emilypothast.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/rene-magritte-philosophy-in-the-boudoir-1947-m.jpg?w=600&h=766

[robertlouis]

Who is this?


Reminds me of Magritte


http://emilypothast.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/rene-magritte-philosophy-in-the-boudoir-1947-m.jpg?w=600&h=766

Almost certainly Lady Gaga LOL.

[Jackal]

Almost certainly Lady Gaga LOL.

Lady Gaga is to Rene Magritte as Ed Wood is to Orson Welles.

[robertlouis]

Lady Gaga is to Rene Magritte as Ed Wood is to Orson Welles.

Agreed but I couldn't resist.

Ah Ed Wood, Plan Nine from Outer Space.

They don't make 'em like that any more.

Thank God.

[iamdrgonzo]

Gaston Vinas:

405476

405478

405477

[iamdrgonzo]

More Gaston:

http://26.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ll94ezpIsG1qbcporo1_500.gif


http://artscroll.ru/Images/2008/g/Gaston%20Vinas/000053.jpg

[iamdrgonzo]

"You've got to be taught
To hate and fear,
You've got to be taught
From year to year,
It's got to be drummed
In your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught. You've got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff'rent shade,
You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught before it's too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You've got to be carefully taught!"

-- South Pacific, Rogers & Hammerstien

[joeninety]

Check me out Evie i'm flying as high as a bird:dancing::geek::salad:hide-1:

[StlyeMeCunty]

HMMMMMM WELLL! I am a BIG ASS ARTSY FARTSY TYPE! I know I'll be posting a lot here!
Here is a clip of the amazing Linda Eder's rendition to a popular song from "Man of LaMancha.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWP7l0OTXJI

[maaarc]

always enjoyed Charles Baudelaire

Les Phares

Rubens, fleuve d'oubli, jardin de la paresse,
Oreiller de chair fraîche où l'on ne peut aimer,
Mais où la vie afflue et s'agite sans cesse,
Comme l'air dans le ciel et la mer dans la mer;

Léonard de Vinci, miroir profond et sombre,
Où des anges charmants, avec un doux souris
Tout chargé de mystère, apparaissent à l'ombre
Des glaciers et des pins qui ferment leur pays;

Rembrandt, triste hôpital tout rempli de murmures,
Et d'un grand crucifix décoré seulement,
Où la prière en pleurs s'exhale des ordures,
Et d'un rayon d'hiver traversé brusquement;

Michel-Ange, lieu vague où l'on voit des Hercules
Se mêler à des Christs, et se lever tout droits
Des fantômes puissants qui dans les crépuscules
Déchirent leur suaire en étirant leurs doigts;

Colères de boxeur, impudences de faune,
Toi qui sus ramasser la beauté des goujats,
Grand coeur gonflé d'orgueil, homme débile et jaune,
Puget, mélancolique empereur des forçats;

Watteau, ce carnaval où bien des coeurs illustres,
Comme des papillons, errent en flamboyant,
Décors frais et légers éclairés par des lustres
Qui versent la folie à ce bal tournoyant;

Goya, cauchemar plein de choses inconnues,
De foetus qu'on fait cuire au milieu des sabbats,
De vieilles au miroir et d'enfants toutes nues,
Pour tenter les démons ajustant bien leurs bas;

Delacroix, lac de sang hanté des mauvais anges,
Ombragé par un bois de sapins toujours vert,
Où, sous un ciel chagrin, des fanfares étranges
Passent, comme un soupir étouffé de Weber;

Ces malédictions, ces blasphèmes, ces plaintes,
Ces extases, ces cris, ces pleurs, ces Te Deum,
Sont un écho redit par mille labyrinthes;
C'est pour les coeurs mortels un divin opium!

C'est un cri répété par mille sentinelles,
Un ordre renvoyé par mille porte-voix;
C'est un phare allumé sur mille citadelles,
Un appel de chasseurs perdus dans les grands bois!

Car c'est vraiment, Seigneur, le meilleur témoignage
Que nous puissions donner de notre dignité
Que cet ardent sanglot qui roule d'âge en âge
Et vient mourir au bord de votre éternité!

— Charles Baudelaire

The Beacons

Rubens, river of oblivion, garden of indolence,
Pillow of cool flesh where one cannot love,
But where life moves and whirls incessantly
Like the air in the sky and the tide in the sea;

Leonardo, dark, unfathomable mirror,
In which charming angels, with sweet smiles
Full of mystery, appear in the shadow
Of the glaciers and pines that enclose their country;

Rembrandt, gloomy hospital filled with murmuring,
Ornamented only with a large crucifix,
Lit for a moment by a wintry sun,
Where from rot and ordure rise tearful prayers;

Angelo, shadowy place where Hercules' are seen
Mingling with Christs, and rising straight up,
Powerful phantoms, which in the twilights
Rend their winding-sheets with outstretched fingers;

Boxer's wrath, shamelessness of Fauns, you whose genius
Showed to us the beauty in a villain,
Great heart filled with pride, sickly, yellow man,
Puget, melancholy emperor of galley slaves;

Watteau, carnival where the loves of many famous hearts
Flutter capriciously like butterflies with gaudy wings;
Cool, airy settings where the candelabras' light
Touches with madness the couples whirling in the dance

Goya, nightmare full of unknown things,
Of fetuses roasted in the midst of witches' sabbaths,
Of old women at the mirror and of nude children,
Tightening their hose to tempt the demons;

Delacroix, lake of blood haunted by bad angels,
Shaded by a wood of fir-trees, ever green,
Where, under a gloomy sky, strange fanfares
Pass, like a stifled sigh from Weber;

These curses, these blasphemies, these lamentations,
These Te Deums, these ecstasies, these cries, these tears,
Are an echo repeated by a thousand labyrinths;
They are for mortal hearts a divine opium.

They are a cry passed on by a thousand sentinels,
An order re-echoed through a thousand megaphones;
They are a beacon lighted on a thousand citadels,
A call from hunters lost deep in the woods!

For truly, Lord, the clearest proofs
That we can give of our nobility,
Are these impassioned sobs that through the ages roll,
And die away upon the shore of your Eternity.

— William Aggeler, The Flowers of Evil (Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1954)

[Paige]

Robertlouis-Around here it's mostly Bluegrass, which is sort of the native music. But Asheville, NC is a huge music scene, check it out on the internet-you should find the right links. And of course, the mountains are all around there too.

[Birgitta]

YouTube - ‪V. Vivaldi: Dopo un' orrida procella / Simone Kermes‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evHprVxDYLo&feature=youtube_gdata_player)

She is so great !!7 watch this !

[Stavros]

Its a killer of an aria, but Kermes brings it off and with no aspirations! I hadn't heard of her before so thanks for the link. The YouTube link identifies the Italian players but not the venue, my initial thought was the Kleine Saal in the Musikverein in Vienna but I am not sure -is it Venice? It doesnt look like La Fenice...

[runningdownthatdream]

YouTube - ‪V. Vivaldi: Dopo un' orrida procella / Simone Kermes‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evHprVxDYLo&feature=youtube_gdata_player)

She is so great !!7 watch this !

That was fucking awesome! Thanks....

After checking out some more of her videos on her site http://www.simone-kermes.de/sites/video.html I think she's the Freddie Mercury of opera

[Birgitta]

That was fucking awesome! Thanks....

After checking out some more of her videos on her site http://www.simone-kermes.de/sites/video.html I think she's the Freddie Mercury of opera


Yeesss!!!! (although i dont like freddy mercury much lol !)
she is such a pleasure to watch ! BaroCk!!! :}

I just bought her new cd "colori d'amore" (scarlatti amongst others)

Why is it that its easier for me to identify with old music and baroque then modern music ? Well maybe thats what any trained listener would say probably..(which im only becoming), you can really learn to love classical music, my parents never listened to it, but once your hooked, you never go back, im truely addicted, lol
Xxx

[runningdownthatdream]

Yeesss!!!! (although i dont like freddy mercury much lol !)
she is such a pleasure to watch ! BaroCk!!! :}

I just bought her new cd "colori d'amore" (scarlatti amongst others)

Why is it that its easier for me to identify with old music and baroque then modern music ? Well maybe thats what any trained listener would say probably..(which im only becoming), you can really learn to love classical music, my parents never listened to it, but once your hooked, you never go back, im truely addicted, lol
Xxx

I expected the Stavros to say what you said about Freddie Mercury!

Old things are fascinating for me because they require me to think outside of today's context (if that makes sense). Sometimes when the past meets the present it is really fascinating. The song below was apparently written in medieval times and I really like it:

YouTube - ‪Agnes Buen GarnÃ¥s / Jan Garbarek - Margjit og Targjei Risvollo‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qx9j7s8NMMQ&feature=fvsr)

[Stavros]

Hmmmm...Freddie Mercury...let's not go there people...

Hard to say why the Baroque appeals to some more than other periods in music -people who detest Wagner tend to loathe his philosophical topics wrapped in a huge and tonally rich orchestral tapestry. The Baroque is about control: similar to the concentrated use of language in Racine that nevertheless expresses a wide variety of thoughts and feelings: baroque sounds predictable (Handel is the criminal here, his Water Music consists of the same piece of music played like 500 times with no development, horrific), but the skill of the composers was in using a concentrated style of writing to express the range of thoughts and feelings, often demanding great dexterity by singers and beauty of singing and tone -bel canto. Baroque opera tends to be based on classical themes with all-too-human characters so the commonplace and the divine are merged in sound. And so on, but with a different palate to Wotan and Siegmund, for example. Decoration, artisty, musicality -different periods of music all have their appeal, to me anyway. Finally if you don't know it I hope you enjoy this clever play on musical style from Rameau's Platee:

YouTube - ‪Rameau Platée La Folie‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1EE6CSIo6A&feature=related)

[StlyeMeCunty]

I am a HUGE Lopatkina fan. This historic piece that she dances gives Pavlova a run for her money!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6829uWfH-g

[Birgitta]

Baroque predictable, i think i disagree, its very disciplined yes, but predictable, no ?
A painter like Honthorst, or carravagio, are they predictable, i would rather think they follow a discipline...and bach, well, i still am amazed about the complexity of his compositions, its more exciting and less predictable then most music today isnt it ? Even while baroque is the foundation of modern music, there is a lot of improvisation in baroque, at the time there were even a lot of arguements that the musicians improvised too much, so that the listener could no longer distinquish the melody from the improvisation...

I do prefer the pure feeling of the music over that of classical music, because classical music feels more personal to me then universal...

Thanks for the link, great !!7

[Birgitta]

YouTube - ‪El Pajarillo-Trad. colombiano-venezolano-J.Savall-Hesperion XXI-Tembembe Ensamble Continuo‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VM9fpDxKjE&feature=youtube_gdata_player)

Highly recommanded ! Meow !

[Stavros]

Baroque predictable, i think i disagree, its very disciplined yes, but predictable, no ?

I didn't mean to sound pejorative -I was suggesting that in the baroque there were a set of rules that composers followed, a 'discipline if you will', the skill was working within these rules and continuing to create something new and fresh, I was only being negative in reference to Handel whose music I cant listen to without feeling imprisoned. I think there is a theory somewhere about people who believe classical music began with Bach and ended with Beethoven -I once met a German who took this view. He was opposed to romantic music and its consequences because it was driven by emotion and this allowed composers to stretch out music, radically change its tone and form and enable them to create chaos -but as Kenneth Clark once argued, there is always something of the classical in romantic art and vice versa. There is as much emotion in Bach and Mozart as there is in Wagner, only its expressed with more decorum...I think we are in the happy days when you can choose your medium to suit your mood, but in the end its a matter of personal taste.

I am a HUGE Lopatkina fan
So am I, she is a wonderful dancer, but I am not old enough to have seen Pavlova dance and compare the two, honest...

[StlyeMeCunty]

Baroque predictable, i think i disagree, its very disciplined yes, but predictable, no ?

I didn't mean to sound pejorative -I was suggesting that in the baroque there were a set of rules that composers followed, a 'discipline if you will', the skill was working within these rules and continuing to create something new and fresh, I was only being negative in reference to Handel whose music I cant listen to without feeling imprisoned. I think there is a theory somewhere about people who believe classical music began with Bach and ended with Beethoven -I once met a German who took this view. He was opposed to romantic music and its consequences because it was driven by emotion and this allowed composers to stretch out music, radically change its tone and form and enable them to create chaos -but as Kenneth Clark once argued, there is always something of the classical in romantic art and vice versa. There is as much emotion in Bach and Mozart as there is in Wagner, only its expressed with more decorum...I think we are in the happy days when you can choose your medium to suit your mood, but in the end its a matter of personal taste.

I am a HUGE Lopatkina fan
So am I, she is a wonderful dancer, but I am not old enough to have seen Pavlova dance and compare the two, honest...

I would be surprised if anyone here was old enough to see here dance LOL! You can see a clip of her dancing the same piece as it was originated on youtube. Here it is!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YW01o9x0Alc

[Prospero]

And I was sure your wit and wisdom must come from someone at least in their nineties, Stavros

[Prospero]

I believe that the structure of Baroque music appeals to an audience nurtured on the rigidity of rock 'n' roll music. The generation who grew up before the rock era seemed, by and large, to prefer later romantic composers, but the post sixties generation when moving on from rock have in many cases chosen to listen to the Baroque.

[Stavros]

I believe that the structure of Baroque music appeals to an audience nurtured on the rigidity of rock 'n' roll music

I think you should be more precise about which R&R you refer to, is it for example, Led Zeppelin and Guns 'n Roses, or Pink Floyd -? I can understand the drift of your argument but I don't know enough about r&r to comment.

The argument that intrigues me is the one derived in part from Plato's critique of poetry and Lenin's notorious remarks about Beethoven's Apassionata sonata which he loved, but which produced an emotional reaction in him which dissipated his energy and thus detracted from the need for revolutionaries to be forever vigilant in their prosecution of the class struggle...when he was a boy there was a score of the Ring on the family piano, I think he turned against Wagner in his mature years...

...in other words, music and poetry for some are, in their entirety, a threat to the pursuit of reason precisely because they inspire irrational thoughts and feelings in people; and for some this is the difference between 'acceptable' tonally secure music and 'dangerous' atonal music even when it merely strays from tonic resolution-Stalin's fury at Shostakovich's Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District -'chaos instead of music' and Socialist Realism's Hymns to the Boy who Fell in Love with a Tractor are another consequence...

I once spent the best part of a day listening to Don Cherry -the guy who lived upstairs objected, claiming it was 'soophisticated noise'...

The Baroque explores within a set framework, when it succeeds it is outstanding, when it fails it is boring -like most art I guess.

[Prospero]

Well not the Floyd of led Zeppelin... more the twelve bar blues and rigid verse chorus structure of earlier rock and roll. it is the innate order - a form of musical conservatism. That would probably have made it appealing to Stalin - if it was freed from its otherwise rebellious quality. Dissonance, disorder etc are open doors in music and suggest other possibilities don't they. The anarchic scratch of jazz on the shiny surfaces of the idealised state or corporation. And yes when baroque is good it is utterly wonderful, but whe nit fails there is little more dull.

[Birgitta]

It feels to me that early music / baroque the emotions are more universal and less egoistical (i dont want to make this spund negative in any way), im not sure how to explain it...i do love classical music too though...but baroque is music i listen to daily and no matter what mood i am in, i enjoy it...
this is not the case with classical music for me...
Atonal music can be great...yet sometimes it sounds to me that it was composed just to be different then what went before and not because it wants to communicate with the listener, but its all so very personal, also the way the music is performed can make such a huge difference ! Anyway i looooove it, music really makes me happy !
And Prospero, its true baroque reminds me of rock, punk rock even lol, ...maybe im a tough kitten after all :)

Love
Birgitta

[Birgitta]

YouTube - ‪Cecilia Bartoli Agitata da due venti Vivaldi‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rISjBGOtHhs&feature=youtube_gdata_player)

[OmarZ]

As I awoke this morning
When all sweet things are born
A robin perched on my windowsill
To greet the coming dawn
He sang his song so sweetly
And paused for a moment's lull
I gently raised the window
And crushed his fucking skull

[Birgitta]

As I awoke this morning
When all sweet things are born
A robin perched on my windowsill
To greet the coming dawn
He sang his song so sweetly
And paused for a moment's lull
I gently raised the window
And crushed his fucking skull

Lol !

[Stavros]

Atonal music can be great...yet sometimes it sounds to me that it was composed just to be different then what went before and not because it wants to communicate with the listener
This is almost exactly what happened when Schoenberg composed his Three Piano Pieces op 11 in 1909 and the two songs op 14, to formally depart from tonality in composition. Dissonance as a form of atonality is present in all music in the sense that the intervals between notes do not form a natural tonal form unless the composer makes sure they do -JS Bach blurs the boundaries of tonality in one of the Brandenburg Concerti, Mozart's 'Dissonance' String Quartet K465 uses it to deepen the satisfaction of tonality, and famously Wagner broke the rules in the opening chord of Tristan und Isolde, which Berlioz listened to a hundred times in complete bewilderment. The problem is that Schoenberg felt it had to be formalised if music was to move forwards, but like the breakdown of form in painting, abstraction left a lot of the audience behind.

Behind this are theories of modernism in music -where modernism expresses the spirit of the industrial age -the loss of direct links to nature, the alienation of modern work and the impersonal city, anxiety, loss of control, the collision of diverse cultures in one urban setting, a crisis in religious feeling -all of the ingredients that some people feel Atonal music expresses the problems of modern life. It can be intensely beautiful and dramatic, even if, as with Berg's Wozzeck and Lulu that composer never fully abandoned tonality (much to his teacher Schoenberg's disgust). One triumph wold be The Passion of St John by Sofia Gubaidulina, a phenomenal work that has to be heard live to be experienced at its best -but requires huge forces and is therefore expensive to put on (I saw it at the Proms with Valery Gergiev a few years ago, simply staggering).
On the other hand, I have been bored almost to an early grave by Harrison Birtwistle who to my ears has been writing the same thing over and over again for the last 50 years. I have made an honest effort to listen to his music, but its a cruel and unusual form of punishment, and therefore an abuse of my human rights.

After listening to that stuff, its no surprise that Bartoli, Savall and other baroque specialists have such a wide audience.

How do you feel about Minimalism? Reich, Adams, Glass?

[Birgitta]

Atonal music can be great...yet sometimes it sounds to me that it was composed just to be different then what went before and not because it wants to communicate with the listener
This is almost exactly what happened when Schoenberg composed his Three Piano Pieces op 11 in 1909 and the two songs op 14, to formally depart from tonality in composition. Dissonance as a form of atonality is present in all music in the sense that the intervals between notes do not form a natural tonal form unless the composer makes sure they do -JS Bach blurs the boundaries of tonality in one of the Brandenburg Concerti, Mozart's 'Dissonance' String Quartet K465 uses it to deepen the satisfaction of tonality, and famou
sly Wagner broke the rules in the opening chord of Tristan und Isolde, which Berlioz listened to a hundred times in complete bewilderment. The problem is that Schoenberg felt it had to be formalised if music was to move forwards, but like the breakdown of form in painting, abstraction left a lot of the audience behind.

Behind this are theories of modernism in music -where modernism expresses the spirit of the industrial age -the loss of direct links to nature, the alienation of modern work and the impersonal city, anxiety, loss of control, the collision of diverse cultures in one urban setting, a crisis in religious feeling -all of the ingredients that some people feel Atonal music expresses the problems of modern life. It can be intensely beautiful and dramatic, even if, as with Berg's Wozzeck and Lulu that composer never fully abandoned tonality (much to his teacher Schoenberg's disgust). One triumph wold be The Passion of St John by Sofia Gubaidulina, a phenomenal work that has to be heard live to be experienced at its best -but requires huge forces and is therefore expensive to put on (I saw it at the Proms with Valery Gergiev a few years ago, simply staggering).
On the other hand, I have been bored almost to an early grave by Harrison Birtwistle who to my ears has been writing the same thing over and over again for the last 50 years. I have made an honest effort to listen to his music, but its a cruel and unusual form of punishment, and therefore an abuse of my human rights.

After listening to that stuff, its no surprise that Bartoli, Savall and other baroque specialists have such a wide audience.

How do you feel about Minimalism? Reich, Adams, Glass?

Hiii !
Im not so experienced, i know Phillip Glass, saw him perform once, lovely, though the music bores me quickly, a lot of it sounds the same to me, i have a cd of simeon ten holt (if i write it correctly,( im pretty bad with names and music theory), its called canto ostinatos i believe lol, which is a work i love, very hypnotic.

I think you hit the nail right on the head when you described atonal music, its exactly the reason i dont listen to it, i live in the city, its always crowded and busy here, un personal, individualistic, i long for nature, balance, love, serenity, perhaps when i lived far out in the woods i will be listening my xenakis cds more often, they dissapearedinto my drawer, even pop music is too intrusive for me lately ! :)

[Birgitta]

YouTube - ‪Canto Ostinato - Simeon ten Holt (High Quality)‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPHo7r5CuZc&feature=youtube_gdata_player)

[Stavros]

Sorry Birgitta, canto ostinato sounds like the repetitive emptiness of Michael Nyman in The Piano...if you want something with more depth and imagination, the Koln Concerts Keith Jarret recorded in the 1970s are worth listening to (there are three segments on youtube), you need to immerse yourself in all three, love it or hate it. Jarret is one of the few musicians who can cross boundaries without controversy although I think that people who either play an instrument or have experienced live music from an early age appreciate the best in most genres, and he is one of the rare people who can play more or less anything...

YouTube - ‪Keith Jarrett Köln Concert - Part 1 1 / 3‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wivo94ylmhE)

[robertlouis]

The 2011 season of the BBC proms starts next Friday, with the usual varied and eclectic programme. Let's hope that the BBC's sponsorship doesn't become another casualty of this philistine government's barbarian accounting policies.

In the early stages I'm attracted by Prom 7 which features the Schubert String Quintet, a desert island piece for me, Prom 9 for Sibelius 7th which I've never heard performed live, and Prom 14 which features Mahler's final melancholic masterpiece, the 9th.

The kickoff concert should be good too with Janacek's glorious Glagolitic Mass.

I was an avid promgoer when I lived in London. These days the mix of Radio 3 and BBC4 suits me perfectly.

But I loathe the smug home counties fest of the Last Night more than any other musical event on the planet.

Anyone else?

[trish]

Philip Glass is of course a modern tonal composer. It seems his generation of composers has re-embraced tonality and have abandoned serial and other atonal techniques. Actually I think it's ashamed. I love both tonal and atonal musics. Anton Webern's music is brief and exacting__exquisite mathematics for the ear (Die Funf Lieder, for example). Not at all programmatic of the anxieties of modern life. Alban Berg's stirring compositions probe the deep wells of the human soul. Some of the aleatoric music of John Cage (for example Five Stone Wind) though atonal, can be pensive and restful. The atonal period was full of experiment and innovation and it produced some of the world's most provocative and alluring music.

[Prospero]

I do live in London and still seldom get to the proms. The whole chase for tickets is a hassle.. which is stupid of course. But the last night? You'd have to pay me a lot of money to go. As RL says its "smug home counties" and worse... a chance for fools to show off their jingoism and listen to usually rather hackneyed music.

[Stavros]

My first Prom was Messiaen's Transfiguration in 1970, and I have been to some awesome ones over the years but like RLS no longer live in London. Last time I went I had to stay in a hotel for two days, I think the whole expedition cost me around £250. The best way these days is to buy a weekend ticket if the August bank holiday includes more than one concert you want to go to -it also means you join the priority queue and can usually get one of the seats on the sides of the arena which are also quite good acoustically. The problem is that sometimes -always?- the nerds ruin a performance -Sibelius 7 will undoubtedly be ruined by some dickhead bellowing BRAVO! a micro-second after the final note has been played -would you do that after listening to it on disc at home? I wonder what these people think they are achieving when they do this, after a profound piece of music I want silence.

[Stavros]

Some of the aleatoric music of John Cage (for example Five Stone Wind) though atonal, can be pensive and restful.

To be controversial for once (!) I think John Cage should be re-classified as a sound engineer, not a composer. All music is sound, but not all sound is music, not that he knew much about it. If he is a composer, he is a fraud; if he is a sound engineer he plays around with musical instruments, electronics, sounds, silent intervals (sometimes lasting 4' 33") and contributed nothing to modern music. Allow me to sum up John Cage in his own words:
I have nothing to say
and I am saying it

So there! Webern, on the other hand, I can listen to. Such a tragic death.

[robertlouis]

My first Prom was Messiaen's Transfiguration in 1970, and I have been to some awesome ones over the years but like RLS no longer live in London. Last time I went I had to stay in a hotel for two days, I think the whole expedition cost me around £250. The best way these days is to buy a weekend ticket if the August bank holiday includes more than one concert you want to go to -it also means you join the priority queue and can usually get one of the seats on the sides of the arena which are also quite good acoustically. The problem is that sometimes -always?- the nerds ruin a performance -Sibelius 7 will undoubtedly be ruined by some dickhead bellowing BRAVO! a micro-second after the final note has been played -would you do that after listening to it on disc at home? I wonder what these people think they are achieving when they do this, after a profound piece of music I want silence.

My first prom was Elgar in the 80s. It was a treat, the 1st symphony with its gloriously sonorous and stately theme, the under-appreciated violin concerto, and the Enigma Variations. What I remember most of all was the organ coming in at the triumphal end and making the whole of the Albert Hall shake.

Sibelius 7th is another desert island constant for me, but it has to be Ashkenazy's recording on Decca. Somehow he imbues it with a depth of emotion that none of the others can match.

And as for stupid audience response, I remember one idiot cheering after the first of thor's five mighty hammer blows in the finale of Sibelius 5th - almost spoiled what had been up till then a very fine rendition by an Estonian orchestra at the Royal in Northampton, a perhaps surprisingly good venue for pre and post west end runs of drama as well as classical concerts. I'm also an annual subscriber for the summer series of concerts at the Corn Exchange in Bedford and dip into the Cambridge Festival too, particularly strong on chamber works, as well as playing at the folk festival myself!

You don't have to go to London to enjoy some wonderful music.

[Prospero]

I was once at a concert of music by Xenakis and as it finished - before the applause - a single vice rang out with the word "Rubbish."

[robertlouis]

I was once at a concert of music by Xenakis and as tit finished - before the applause - a single vice rang out with the word "Rubbish."

I was once at a performance of Verdi's Requiem at the Kelvin Hall in Glasgow, where, right from the start, the large lady in front of me began to give vent to the loudest and smelliest farts imaginable. I did feel like asking her companion to take her out before she started shitting.

Anyway, I haven't been able to listen to the piece since without feeling queasy.

BTW, anyone else agree with me that it has to the campest requiem mass of them all?

[Prospero]

RL wrote: " I did feel like asking her companion to take her out before she started shitting."

You have a bit of English in your clearly. The "Feel like" rather than actually doing anything. What kinda Scot are you!

I don't like Verdi's religious music. (I like Rigoletto simply because i had a music master who sang the whole opera to us over a few weeks at school.) Brahms Requiem on the other hand is sheer thrilling bliss.

[Stavros]

Sibelius, Xenakis -hilarious examples, in their own way.

I recall a concert of contemporary sound/music at the QEH featuring I think, Cornelius Cardew's Scratch Music No 2 -I think- I can't be sure it was this piece, but in one of them, he created 'music' by dropping a sandwich [wrapped in cling film I guess] onto the floor. Judged by its melodious consequence , it was cheese and onion...

[Stavros]

Anyway, I haven't been able to listen to the piece since without feeling queasy.
BTW, anyone else agree with me that it has to the campest requiem mass of them all?

This is tragic, Verdi's Requiem is equal to Bach's Mass in B Minor, Beethoven's Mass in D, Mozart's Mass in C, Szymanowski's Stabat Mater, and the Brahms -Verdi camp??? I think that needs an explanation...

[robertlouis]

Anyway, I haven't been able to listen to the piece since without feeling queasy.
BTW, anyone else agree with me that it has to the campest requiem mass of them all?

This is tragic, Verdi's Requiem is equal to Bach's Mass in B Minor, Beethoven's Mass in D, Mozart's Mass in C, Szymanowski's Stabat Mater, and the Brahms -Verdi camp??? I think that needs an explanation...

I'm not devaluing it in any way, I simply mean that for me at least it contains all the ingredients to make it a camp classic. I can shut my eyes and imagine Judy Garland doing the solos.

I'd agree with the peers that you named, of which the Brahms for me is special. Choosing to take Lutheran rather than Latin texts was a bold and very personal move.

I'd add the Faure for its humanism and the relatively little known Berlioz.

[Prospero]

Ah the late great Cornelius Cardew - the musical equivalent of some of the winners of the Turner prize. Like the fellow given the award for turning on and off the gallery lights.

Interesting Stavros... I've ears and soul for Bach's B Minor Mass (for me the single greatest piece of music in the world) and the Great Mass in C and Szymanowski and Penderecki's choral work and Brahms.

[robertlouis]

I grew up with oratorio as my late parents were founder members of what was to become one of the leading amateur choirs in Scotland, so I've been familiar with the great works in the canon since I was about seven. The Tallis Spem in Alium sung in the round with the audience in the middle in Glasgow Cathedral with only a few candles for illumination has haunted me all my life.

[Stavros]

There must be a point in Spem in Alium that is close to organised chaos and rampant dissonance: the genius of Tallis -who died a hundred years before Werckmeister codified the harmonic 'temperaments' (and over 500 years before Bela Tarr's amazing film Werckmeister Harmonies) -was to create a quasi-mathematical masterpiece pre-figuring most of what Werckmeister was trying to organise as theory. The result is literally beyond words, I don't know what words I could use to do justice to it.
Favourite recordings please.

[robertlouis]

RL wrote: " I did feel like asking her companion to take her out before she started shitting."

You have a bit of English in your clearly. The "Feel like" rather than actually doing anything. What kinda Scot are you!

I don't like Verdi's religious music. (I like Rigoletto simply because i had a music master who sang the whole opera to us over a few weeks at school.) Brahms Requiem on the other hand is sheer thrilling bliss.

If there's any English in me it must predate 1720, and previous to that year the family name was Swedish, so I doubt it.

Hell of an insult, Prospero. You should know better.

[trish]

Some of the aleatoric music of John Cage (for example Five Stone Wind) though atonal, can be pensive and restful.

To be controversial for once (!) I think John Cage should be re-classified as a sound engineer, not a composer. All music is sound, but not all sound is music, not that he knew much about it. If he is a composer, he is a fraud; if he is a sound engineer he plays around with musical instruments, electronics, sounds, silent intervals (sometimes lasting 4' 33") and contributed nothing to modern music. Allow me to sum up John Cage in his own words:
I have nothing to say
and I am saying it

So there! Webern, on the other hand, I can listen to. Such a tragic death.Well, to each his own taste__though I do think you succeeded in being controversial.

I agree that not all sound is music. But I also agree with Proust, "The voyage of discovery is not seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes." If you hear it has music, it has become music. A composer is simply one who creates "blue prints" that function to guide musicians in musical performance. I think most musicologists count Cage as a composer. One may think his compositions suck, but that's another matter.

So what about the claim, "If he was a composer, then he was a fraud?" Given that musicologists are right and Cage was a composer, this claim would have us conclude he was also a fraud. But were Cage a fraud, then he would have intended to deceive. I see no reason to be so uncharitable. I would simply say, there's a lot of Cage compositions that fail and there are a lot that are successful.

YouTube - ‪Suite for Toy Piano - John Cage‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ep5fNEeoh74)

[Prospero]

If there's any English in me it must predate 1720, and previous to that year the family name was Swedish, so I doubt it.

Hell of an insult, Prospero. You should know better.

I apologise -

[robertlouis]

I apologise -

Apology accepted. You are a true English gentleman.

[Stavros]

But were Cage a fraud, then he would have intended to deceive
Trish I accept your criticism that my use of the word 'fraud' is inaccurate in the literal sense of the word -but I am not going to apologise for that; it has pejorative clout. Cage took music away from music -from its comfortable niche, I concede that- and into the world of sound, experimentation with the hardware -prepared pianos and all that. I don't object to it, I think its valid, I am a man of diverse tastes -but the result? 'Seeing' music with new eyes when encountering Cage? I get no pleasure from listening to it, and only a temporary fascination with what sounds can be generated when you stick a coke bottle in a Steinway and smash it with a silver hammer while playing Fur Elise...
But what happens when you get to the stage 'piece' for ballet which Cage 'prepared' [surely not composed?] with Merce Cunningham but where there is, in the literal sense of the word, no music, just the two of them on stage talking about their sexual history: sound, not music.

A composer is simply one who creates "blue prints" that function to guide musicians in musical performance
I can't agree with this: it is true that a lot of composers don't provide metronome markings or full technical specs, but a lot of players and conductors ignore the ones composers do provide, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but the notes are there -for a reason. A waltz is not a tango, and I am sure some of us have heard old recordings of Bach where a Gigue sounded more like a marche funebre. And yes, in a way every performance is an experiment, but its not Jazz where a musician can take a tune like My Favourite Things and improvise on it.

Cage was creative, and his contribution lay in exposing the essential chaos that exists in the heart of music; but other than showing us what it sounds like, and failing to do much else, he remains an historical curiosity, the Heath Robinson of sound.

[Stavros]

I saw this extract from a book review in the New York Times, a description of a sexual act that amazed me as I coudn't understand it...

he captained her onto the pillowy pier of her Posturepedic

the link is here
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/08/books/reasonable-doubt-by-peter-manso-book-review.html?hpw

[Prospero]

In the design business I am told that those who come up with stupid and pretentious ideas are labelled as "design wankers." I think this is a journalist example of the same - a candidate for pseuds corner. You sort of get the meaning but ....

[Birgitta]

But were Cage a fraud, then he would have intended to deceive
Trish I accept your criticism that my use of the word 'fraud' is inaccurate in the literal sense of the word -but I am not going to apologise for that; it has pejorative clout. Cage took music away from music -from its comfortable niche, I concede that- and into the world of sound, experimentation with the hardware -prepared pianos and all that. I don't object to it, I think its valid, I am a man of diverse tastes -but the result? 'Seeing' music with new eyes when encountering Cage? I get no pleasure from listening to it, and only a temporary fascination with what sounds can be generated when you stick a coke bottle in a Steinway and smash it with a silver hammer while playing Fur Elise...
But what happens when you get to the stage 'piece' for ballet which Cage 'prepared' [surely not composed?] with Merce Cunningham but where there is, in the literal sense of the word, no music, just the two of them on stage talking about their sexual history: sound, not music.

A composer is simply one who creates "blue prints" that function to guide musicians in musical performance
I can't agree with this: it is true that a lot of composers don't provide metronome markings or full technical specs, but a lot of players and conductors ignore the ones composers do provide, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but the notes are there -for a reason. A waltz is not a tango, and I am sure some of us have heard old recordings of Bach where a Gigue sounded more like a marche funebre. And yes, in a way every performance is an experiment, but its not Jazz where a musician can take a tune like My Favourite Things and improvise on it.

Cage was creative, and his contribution lay in exposing the essential chaos that exists in the heart of music; but other than showing us what it sounds like, and failing to do much else, he remains an historical curiosity, the Heath Robinson of sound.

Ive enjoyed listening to cage, the discussion here seems to be the definition of music and composition...i for instance love the didgeridoo, and music for didgeridoo are indeed compositions, the rules and meanings are different, even the purpose, but i still call it music

[Birgitta]

Sorry Birgitta, canto ostinato sounds like the repetitive emptiness of Michael Nyman in The Piano...if you want something with more depth and imagination, the Koln Concerts Keith Jarret recorded in the 1970s are worth listening to (there are three segments on youtube), you need to immerse yourself in all three, love it or hate it. Jarret is one of the few musicians who can cross boundaries without controversy although I think that people who either play an instrument or have experienced live music from an early age appreciate the best in most genres, and he is one of the rare people who can play more or less anything...

YouTube - ‪Keith Jarrett Köln Concert - Part 1 1 / 3‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wivo94ylmhE) Yyyyyy

Did you listen to it as a whole and played it (for 8 hours long ? ) A few of my best friends plays the piano from childhood on and really appreciate the piece......think u just exposed yourself lol...its a difficult peace to play....prr

But lol u also called baroque 'predictable' while its music written for musicians and singers with such virtuosity ...so i guess its not suprising that you call this repetitive emptyness...

Bla bla ! Thats what i hear, start to try to play these pieces....baroque 'predictable' lol !

[Stavros]

Birgitta I have already said I love Baroque music, what I meant when I said it was predictable is that when it is not at its best it follows a predictable formula -composers who wrote for money often had to produce something quickly and re-cycled existing ideas -I did not dismiss the Baroque tout court.

Canto ostinato for a few minutes was as much as I could take, life is too short for me to spend eight hours listening to something that does nothing for me. I was kept waiting in an office for an hour yesterday during which all I had to read was the local paper, and I was mightily pissed off -eight hours of music I don't like sounds like an abuse of my human rights.

We usually agree on music generally, if not the details, lets leave it like that.

[Prospero]

Music hath charms to cool the savage breast... so let it be a balm between you. "If music be the food of love, play on...."

[robertlouis]

Music hath charms to cool the savage breast... so let it be a balm between you. "If music be the food of love, play on...."


Just a friendly stoking of the flames....

In Cage's case "If music be the food of love, prepare for a long night on the toilet......"

[Prospero]

Unless you listen to 4' 33"

[robertlouis]

Unless you listen to 4' 33"


Sorry, I was confusing him with Stockhausen. :twisted::twisted::twisted:

[Prospero]

Didn't he do a version of "Such Sweet Thunder" - Duke Ellington's great Shakespearian jazz suite, scored for jackhammer and moog?

[robertlouis]

Didn't he do a version of "Such Sweet Thunder" - Duke Ellington's great Shakespearian jazz suite, scored for jackhammer and moog?


No-one, but no-one, should ever tamper with the Duke's compositions.

He's in the glorious quartet of American composers of the 20th century with Gershwin, Copland, and Ives

[Prospero]

agreed

[robertlouis]

agreed


With Oscar Petersen, Miles Davis and Art Tatum leading the second rank.

[Prospero]

Hmmmm... I'd put Dylan in there somewhere too. though heis a words man not a tunes one and cole porter, jerome kern, johnny mercer irving berlin

[Prospero]

Apparently Churchill was once introduced to the Philosopher Isaiah Berlin and spent a good deal of time talking to him about his great skills as songwriting. true.

[robertlouis]

Hmmmm... I'd put Dylan in there somewhere too. though heis a words man not a tunes one and cole porter, jerome kern, johnny mercer irving berlin

I'd agree with all of those and raise you Bernstein, Bernard Herrmann, Richard Rodgers and Irving Berlin.

[Prospero]

Rogers yes and Bernstein yes and hermann.... so ho about Benny Goodman and stephen foster

[Prospero]

Stevie Wonder and Brian Wilson

[robertlouis]

Rogers yes and Bernstein yes and hermann.... so ho about Benny Goodman and stephen foster

I'd agree with those as well, although Foster died during the Civil War.

At least we're relatively safe on this thread from being deluged by claims on behalf of death-metal writers!

[Stavros]

Apparently Churchill was once introduced to the Philosopher Isaiah Berlin and spent a good deal of time talking to him about his great skills as songwriting. true

Irving Berlin was in London with his musical This is the Army in 1943 -when Isaiah Berlin was in the Washington Embassy. Irving had contributed to one of Clementine's charities which is why she said WSC should thank him if he met Irving at the Churchill Club in the New Year around February -WSC insisted Berlin be invited to lunch and kept asking him questions about Roosevelt and the War. Berlin was puzzled but flattered that the Prime Minister would ask him political questions, WSC confused by Berlin's American accent (I was given Isaiah Berlin's Letters 1928-1946 last Christmas, its on p478-479 and some other accounts).

Apart from some Jazz classics most American music leaves me cold, except for Aaron Copland whose music makes me feel physically sick -Rodeo came on Radio 3 a week or so ago and I nearly broke a leg in the mad dash across the room to turn the radio off. There are two composers whose work I find so horrible I would sent it to Room 101 -Copland, and William Walton.

I have an album of Barber and Korngold's violin concertos and the Korngold violin suite for Much Ado About Nothing (Gil Shaham and Andre Previn) -two of my favourite violin concertos (I suppose Korngold is classified as an American); and some of Scott Joplin's piano music bears repeated listening. My brother-in-law thinks his opera Treemonisha is worth listening to even if it isnt in the first rank of operas.

[robertlouis]

Can't agree on Copland - Appalachian Spring remains one of the most evocative pieces and is a perfect fit with the ballet it was written for.

But Scott Joplin - yes, absolutely. The stately pace of his earlier pieces belie the frantic nature of far too much of the ragtime music that followed in his wake.

Now, would it be a stretch to far to suggest Robert Johnson for inclusion in the pantheon?

[Stavros]

Now, would it be a stretch to far to suggest Robert Johnson for inclusion in the pantheon?

Not at all. I guess its toss up which of Blind Lemon Jefferson, Leadbelly and Robert Johnson came to establish 'folk blues' as a crucial element in modern popular music -Johnson has the added dimension of a strange, tragic life generating myths and legends, I never saw the film in the link below. If anything the reverence for Johnson, which did not exist when I bought King of the Delta Blues Singers in the mid-60s has mushroomed into a small industry -see the link attached. I would rather just have the recordings, and speculate on my own. For the record, the crossroads is everywhere...
http://www.robertjohnsonfilm.com/robertjohnsonfilm.com/Welcome.html

[robertlouis]

Now, would it be a stretch to far to suggest Robert Johnson for inclusion in the pantheon?

Not at all. I guess its toss up which of Blind Lemon Jefferson, Leadbelly and Robert Johnson came to establish 'folk blues' as a crucial element in modern popular music -Johnson has the added dimension of a strange, tragic life generating myths and legends, I never saw the film in the link below. If anything the reverence for Johnson, which did not exist when I bought King of the Delta Blues Singers in the mid-60s has mushroomed into a small industry -see the link attached. I would rather just have the recordings, and speculate on my own. For the record, the crossroads is everywhere...
http://www.robertjohnsonfilm.com/robertjohnsonfilm.com/Welcome.html

I wrote a song, which is on my last album, which only as I finished it did it become clear to me that it was about Johnson. Make of that what you will.

As for the legend about selling his soul to the devil at the midnight crossroads so that he could become the best blues guitarist of them all, my personal theory is that he disappeared for a while and practised a lot!

[runningdownthatdream]

Now, would it be a stretch to far to suggest Robert Johnson for inclusion in the pantheon?

Not at all. I guess its toss up which of Blind Lemon Jefferson, Leadbelly and Robert Johnson came to establish 'folk blues' as a crucial element in modern popular music -Johnson has the added dimension of a strange, tragic life generating myths and legends, I never saw the film in the link below. If anything the reverence for Johnson, which did not exist when I bought King of the Delta Blues Singers in the mid-60s has mushroomed into a small industry -see the link attached. I would rather just have the recordings, and speculate on my own. For the record, the crossroads is everywhere...
http://www.robertjohnsonfilm.com/robertjohnsonfilm.com/Welcome.html
First, those names you mention were just contributors. Many many others whose names we'll never know influenced the style before and after. Second, it isn't possible to critique blues and folk prior to the recording boom of the 40s because the music wasn't done for mass audiences. It came from people and for people that music critics in today's world much less the European world can scarcely comprehend. Something else of interest, if you are resourceful enough you will find that 'white' and 'black' music in rural America at the turn of the century have many similarities. Try listening to Mississippi John Hurt and Mother Maybelle Carter......one black and one white. A man and a woman. Their guitar work is very similar although they are from different places at a time when it would have been difficult for each to have heard the music of the other - how to explain the similarities?

The famous blues musicians got famous because of white hippies from the UK who proclaimed this musician or that musician to be a musical god. Prior to that these were just people who sang about their lives so I think it is important to separate out the Robert Crays from the guys like:
YouTube - ‪'Let Your Light Shine On Me' BLIND WILLIE JOHNSON (1929) Gospel Blues Guitar Legend‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-PrIS318V0&feature=related) or

YouTube - ‪Charley Patton - Spoonful Blues (Delta Blues 1929)‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyIquE0izAg&feature=related)

Another thing: don't look for technical know-how on the guitar or the harp....it's all about the emotion!

[Prospero]

[QUOTE=Stavros;965354]Apparently Churchill was once introduced to the Philosopher Isaiah Berlin and spent a good deal of time talking to him about his great skills as songwriting. true

Irving Berlin was in London with his musical This is the Army in 1943 -when Isaiah Berlin was in the Washington Embassy. Irving had contributed to one of Clementine's charities which is why she said WSC should thank him if he met Irving at the Churchill Club in the New Year around February -WSC insisted Berlin be invited to lunch and kept asking him questions about Roosevelt and the War. Berlin was puzzled but flattered that the Prime Minister would ask him political questions, WSC confused by Berlin's American accent (I was given Isaiah Berlin's Letters 1928-1946 last Christmas, its on p478-479 and some other accounts).
Whoops - I stand well corrected. interesting how i "misremembered' that story.

[Prospero]

This is my favourite Copland. Have you head this Stavros. I rally don't see HOW this could make anyone sick (It is short so stay with it)

YouTube - ‪Copland's Quiet City‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9r1l_9YurHA)

[Stavros]

I can't cope with Copland, I have an as yet undefined theory that there are certain combinations of notes, some harmonies that my brain rejects: something about the tone of a Copland piece, particularly the parts he writes for the strings-its like root canal treatment without anaesthetic. For some reason I recall the Ornette Coleman section in AB Spellman's Four Lives in the Bebop Business -I dont have the book so this is from memory -someone who said to OC during a break in his set that if he didn't stop playing he would blow his brains out, and I don't think it was a race thing. Claims the way OC played tenor sax (as he did in the early part of his career) made this guy feel that bad...I am not going to take a gun to a Copland concert, but I can't explain it, mreley say that to me its poison; as is, incidentally, rhubarb.

[Stavros]

The famous blues musicians got famous because of white hippies from the UK who proclaimed this musician or that musician to be a musical god

Sir (or Madam) you are well informed!
In addition to Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Peter Green and Jimmy Page, there was a radio DJ called John Peel who did more than anyone to introduce people like me to Johnson with his show The Perfumed Garden on a pirate radio station called Radio London c 1965.

You are of course right about the cultural thread, which is not as clear as historians would like it to be. Sometimes we say things because they fit a model. I did an evening class in Jazz History in the 60s where I lived in 'Greater London' where the 'historian' -in his day job he was a professional photographer- went through the origins of Jazz from African slaves and the 'Field holler' of southern plantations -I believe a lot of work was done on this by people like Alan Lomax. It's a rich heritage, and Johnson stands out because of the quality of his songs, the mystique surrounding his life, and so on -the people I mentioned were, of course, important to me: but also, in the 60s, the ones whose recordings were available in Dobell's on the Charing X Road -time marches on, we know more than we did in those days -link below, and look out for Blind Boy Grunt...
Doug Dobell - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_Dobell)

[FawlenAngelle]

What a surprise and a fabulous thread--here's a genius I am partial to:
Django Reinhardt!:Bowdown:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6jwvS0mHwo&feature=related

(Banned in Germany by Adolf Hitler.)

[runningdownthatdream]

What a surprise and a fabulous thread--here's a genius I am partial to:
Django Reinhardt!:Bowdown:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6jwvS0mHwo&feature=related

(Banned in Germany by Adolf Hitler.)

Genius and Gypsy!

[runningdownthatdream]

The famous blues musicians got famous because of white hippies from the UK who proclaimed this musician or that musician to be a musical god

Sir (or Madam) you are well informed!
In addition to Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Peter Green and Jimmy Page, there was a radio DJ called John Peel who did more than anyone to introduce people like me to Johnson with his show The Perfumed Garden on a pirate radio station called Radio London c 1965.

You are of course right about the cultural thread, which is not as clear as historians would like it to be. Sometimes we say things because they fit a model. I did an evening class in Jazz History in the 60s where I lived in 'Greater London' where the 'historian' -in his day job he was a professional photographer- went through the origins of Jazz from African slaves and the 'Field holler' of southern plantations -I believe a lot of work was done on this by people like Alan Lomax. It's a rich heritage, and Johnson stands out because of the quality of his songs, the mystique surrounding his life, and so on -the people I mentioned were, of course, important to me: but also, in the 60s, the ones whose recordings were available in Dobell's on the Charing X Road -time marches on, we know more than we did in those days -link below, and look out for Blind Boy Grunt...
Doug Dobell - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_Dobell)

Awesome! Had never heard of the Blind Boy Grunt character before. I guess we do need to thank Alan Lomax and your own Dobell for appreciating the blues and helping bring it the rest of the world.

The more I research, the more I see that the cultural lines were indeed blurred among the poor in those times. For instance Charlie Patton I mentioned before MAY have been either white or mixed and how about Jimmie Rodgers:

YouTube - ‪JIMMIE RODGERS 'Long Tall Mama Blues' (1932) Blues Guitar Legend‬‏ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYOB8tDGi5g&feature=related)

People mostly think of cowboy music as 'white' music and while it was indeed influenced by all the northern and western europeans who ended up in the American West, let's not forget that the great majority of cow 'boy's were black!

We are all far more connected than we know...................btw I'm a Sir!

[Stavros]

As the music industry changes so do the cultural threads: 'back in the day' a good record shop didn't just have a stack of obscure recordings, they also had the staff whose enthusiasm for the shop meant if you weren't sure what that record was where Coltrane played with Miles -and there was no internet, no google -the guy behind the counter or someone in the shop knew. Dobell's wasnt a shop, it was a library -and a studio -we have lost that. As for music, its like language: all human languages share meanings, even if the precise grammar of expression is different -the tonality of Oriental music might be different from European: but our ears adjust and we can enjoy most things, taste aside. Slavery and capitalism seem to be huge influences on western popular music....

[robertlouis]

As the music industry changes so do the cultural threads: 'back in the day' a good record shop didn't just have a stack of obscure recordings, they also had the staff whose enthusiasm for the shop meant if you weren't sure what that record was where Coltrane played with Miles -and there was no internet, no google -the guy behind the counter or someone in the shop knew. Dobell's wasnt a shop, it was a library -and a studio -we have lost that. As for music, its like language: all human languages share meanings, even if the precise grammar of expression is different -the tonality of Oriental music might be different from European: but our ears adjust and we can enjoy most things, taste aside. Slavery and capitalism seem to be huge influences on western popular music....

Here in the UK if you're lucky enough to have one of the surviving Fopp shops locally you'll still get that service from interested and knowledgeable geeks. There aren't many, but their staff in my experience have the same knowledge and enthusiasm for their product that used to mark out Oddbins from all the other High St wine chains until they became another commodity for vulture capitalists.

I grew up with Bruce's record shops in Glasgow and Edinburgh, they were wonderful places too.

[Stavros]

Interesting, some years ago I had to spend some time in Aberdeen and was told by locals there that all the independent book shops had closed, leaving a chain called Ottokar's, I think. I was also dismayed at the limited cd's and dvd's on sale in the HMV there. I can't recall being impressed by the situation in Edinburgh, but its a larger city and I didn't have as much time to explore as I wanted to, even though it stopped raining on my two days off. The main HMV shop on Oxford St in London seems to be the only shop with a comprehensive collection. I think some Fopp shops were re-branded as Head.

[robertlouis]

Interesting, some years ago I had to spend some time in Aberdeen and was told by locals there that all the independent book shops had closed, leaving a chain called Ottokar's, I think. I was also dismayed at the limited cd's and dvd's on sale in the HMV there. I can't recall being impressed by the situation in Edinburgh, but its a larger city and I didn't have as much time to explore as I wanted to, even though it stopped raining on my two days off. The main HMV shop on Oxford St in London seems to be the only shop with a comprehensive collection. I think some Fopp shops were re-branded as Head.

In Edinburgh, there's a very good and pleasantly eccentric record/bookshop at the bottom of Leith Walk, but I can't remember it's name, and another good independent in Stockbridge, but they're both away from the city centre and harder to find. The HMV shop on the north side of Oxford St certainly has a terrific range of classical music, and always used to be good for folk, alternative acoustic and americana, my popular musics of choice, but I haven't been there for years. I think Fopp started in Scotland, so there's still a good one in Byres Road in Glasgow, and another in Edinburgh, but these days my plastic incurs most of its damage at the Cambridge shop in Bridge St.

[Stavros]

Change of subject, and as a guitarist RobertLouis -have you any of the Schubert song cycles with guitar? Of the two that I have, Die Schone Mullerin with Peter Schreier and Konrad Ragossnig is outstanding, the haunting song Die Liebe Farbe in particular works well with guitar; for some reason Winterrreise is recorded with two guitars, the Folkwang Gitarren Duo -Scott Weir, the tenor does a good job but doesnt have the dramatic range of sensitivity to pull the cycle off, but its an interesting comparison with the single guitar, as well as coventional piano. Can't find samples on youTube but you might have the recordings anyway. The Ragossnig used to be in HMV on Oxford St, I bought the Winterreise on amazon.

Some recommendations for recordings of classical guitar would be welcome, for family reasons.

[robertlouis]

Change of subject, and as a guitarist RobertLouis -have you any of the Schubert song cycles with guitar? Of the two that I have, Die Schone Mullerin with Peter Schreier and Konrad Ragossnig is outstanding, the haunting song Die Liebe Farbe in particular works well with guitar; for some reason Winterrreise is recorded with two guitars, the Folkwang Gitarren Duo -Scott Weir, the tenor does a good job but doesnt have the dramatic range of sensitivity to pull the cycle off, but its an interesting comparison with the single guitar, as well as coventional piano. Can't find samples on youTube but you might have the recordings anyway. The Ragossnig used to be in HMV on Oxford St, I bought the Winterreise on amazon.

Some recommendations for recordings of classical guitar would be welcome, for family reasons.

I wish I could help, Stavros, but my contact with the classical guitar world has always been at arm's length and as a listener rather than a player. I'm entirely self-taught as a guitarist and have never had a lesson (and it shows, lol). Aside from mainstream Spanish and Latin pieces by the likes of Villa Lobos my collection is shamefully thin, I'm afraid. I learned from listening to the likes of James Taylor, Bert Jansch, Ralph McTell, Dick Gaughan and Richard Thompson.

[Prospero]

A few fragments of info.... Blind Boy Grunt, referred to in an oldr osting here was a fiction. it was pseudonym Bob Dylan once used. No such person.

Totally agree about the lack of knowledge of people in most chain bookstores and music stores these days. They might as well be selling potatoes. There is, funnily enough, one guy who works in the basement of HMV's main store on Oxford Street who really does know and care about music. Don't know his name - older guy with long hair often in a ponytail in the folk, blues, world, country, easy listening desk.

Dobells is long gone but another of the old jazz shops (Rays) is now housed inside Foyles and the guys there know their stuff. There is also still an excellent classical music store on Great Marborough Street where they're enthusiasts and well informed.

On classical interepretations for guitar you might like to investigate a duo Agustín Maruri & Michael Kevin Jones (Maruri is a guitarist, Jones a cellist)

http://www.agustinmaruri.com/home%20pages/cd_catalogue.htm

[Prospero]

‪Jones Maruri Duo 3‬‏ - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JnRcLBMgXs)

[Stavros]

I had vague memories of Bert Jansch from the 60s and his album SirJohnAlot etc -I bought a 3 disc-set last year and was so bored by it I gave it to a relative, some things are for connosseurs. I did see John Williams at Ronnie Scott's on a double bill, I think, with Blossom Dearie; and John McLaughlin with the Tony Williams Lifetime at the now defunct Country Club in Belsize Park, but I think some of his work is cerebral and I never had any empathy with the Indian mysticism trip....maybe I should go back and try McLaughlin again.

Thanks for the link Prospero; Henry Stave is the shop on Great Marlborough St I have no idea how they survive, but having said that earlier this year when I couldn't find a dvd set HMV never sold, until I decided to buy it, I went straight to Henry Stave and bought it -I guess their stock moves even more slowly. There were a couple of shops called Asman's I think, one was in the City where I used to work when I left school, they were outstanding. I have been to Ray's once when I was looking for a dvd of John Handy Live at the Monterey Jazz Festival 1965 (the one with Spanish Lady) -I used to have it on vinyl before getting rid of all that, and actually wanted to buy it as a present for a Jazz enthusiast -it doesn't seem to be available, although some extracts are on YouTube
‪Spanish Lady - John Handy Live at the Monterey‬‏ - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQ-wiLECmuA)

[Prospero]

Stavros - I still have that john Handy album on Vinyl - and have burned a cd of it. PM your email address and i can e-mail you the MP3 tracks if you want.

Re: John McLaughlin. He was back at Ronnie Scotts this week - and John Williams is there next month in a duet situation (I am going to see him). Cant recall who he is appearing with.

[Erika1487]

Does any one else a Wagner fan?


I love Wagner's dark melancholy.

Vienna Philharmonic, Wilhelm Furtwangler
Studio Recording, March 2, 1954

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCE_aYJNfQo&feature=related

[trish]

Just heard 18 year old cellist Ivan Karizna play the Quadrille from Shchedrin's "Not Love Alone." Stupendous!! You can hear it on the July 14th broadcast of Performance Today about 22 minutes into the first hour.

http://performancetoday.publicradio.org/?month=7&day=14&year=2011

[Stavros]

The death of Lucian Freud does not end a chapter in art, end an era or anything like that. Freud was obviously a man of his time, but was never part of a movement -in his time there was Pop Art, Abstract Expressionism, Conceptual and Kinetic Art (as the two used to be known), and the more recent BritArt, Stuckists and so on. Freud was notoriously a loner, a shy man who loathed travelling and stayed in London most of his life.

Freud was clearly fascinated by paint, by colour and form and the rigours of working within a confined space, for some reason considered 'conventional' in comparison with the experimental work of artists working with different materials. In addition, the greater part of his work consists of portraits. The bold brush strokes, the depth in his paintings, the way flesh folds and creases in his subjects, the mood, the position -every aspect of portraiture was there, yet while completely unlike Velasquez or Titian, Rembrandt or Ingres, four of the most phenomenal portrait painters, Freud nevertheless captured his subject. It is not surprising that Chardin was a great influence, the painter of still lives whose ability to make the border of a tablecloth look exquisite is an ability beyond the reach even of Gilbert and George, whose selfish, juvenile rubbish can sometimes be drawn with much care (why bother is what I usually think when seeing their stuff).

Freud was not unique, there are plenty of portrait painters around; but he was a painter of great depth, and one whose work has given me a lot of thought and pleasure, which I cannot say about most of his contemporaries (with the exception of Bridget Riley).

As we have not discussed art much in this thread, other BM's opinions are welcome.

[Miss Aeryn]

As long as no-one says Cage's '4:12' (or whatever the hell it is) is a art masterpiece, I'll remain very gruntled ;)

Agustín Maruri and Michael Kevin Jones duo is hot hot hot :)

[Prospero]

As long as no-one says Cage's '4:12' (or whatever the hell it is) is a art masterpiece, I'll remain very gruntled ;)

Agustín Maruri and Michael Kevin Jones duo is hot hot hot :)

No one would claim the Cage is a masterpiece lol - just a stroke of originality i think

Yes the duo are wonderful. I have sat in a room with them - and heard them play to me a couple of others. Sheer bliss.

I have to agree with Stavros's summation of Freud. An uncomfortable brilliance though - enveloping us in the power of the real. There is no romanticising vision there. And thank god for his power over the ephermeral triviality of the stuckists, the brit art movements etc.

[Miss Aeryn]

Yes the duo are wonderful. I have sat in a room with them - and heard them play to me a couple of others. Sheer bliss.


Oh now I'm jealous!

[Prospero]

:Bowdown:Well when you come to London you can bathe in the reflected glory - but sitting alone in a room with me.

[Prospero]

By the way the cage piece is 4.22 - and while it is hardly brilliant in itself (how could it be) its a conceptual masterstroke in my opinion - the idea being to make us listen intently to what we never normally hear. The ambience of a room etc. It's a sort of framing of time. Rather in the same way Marcel Duchamp took familiar objects like a urinal and decontextualised them.

[trish]

Of course Cage's 4'22" is sheer perfection. Proof: If you change just one note, the whole thing is ruined. :)

[Stavros]

Presumably that's the cover version, as John Cage's piece is 4' 33"

Talking of music, A Clockwork Orange -the Musical is in preparation. At first I thought this was a joke, but apparently Burgess, who was also a composer, provided a score, similar, it is said, to West Side Story...I have never been able to get into Burgess's other books, and heard some of his music on Radio 3 years ago, and was similarly unimpressed. Story is here:
http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/07/22/a-clockwork-orange-the-musical-yes-its-happening/

[Prospero]

Thanks Stavros. He's the go to guy for this kind of accuracy.

[Prospero]

Re Burgess. Try "Earthly Powers". Wonderful piece of fiction. "The Long Day Wanes" isn't half bed either.

[robertlouis]

Presumably that's the cover version, as John Cage's piece is 4' 33"

Talking of music, A Clockwork Orange -the Musical is in preparation. At first I thought this was a joke, but apparently Burgess, who was also a composer, provided a score, similar, it is said, to West Side Story...I have never been able to get into Burgess's other books, and heard some of his music on Radio 3 years ago, and was similarly unimpressed. Story is here:
http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/07/22/a-clockwork-orange-the-musical-yes-its-happening/

No Stavros, that was the radio version. Radio 1 wouldn't have it on their playlist unless it was under 4' 33".

And as for the mind-boggling conceit of a musical version of A Clockwork Orange, it couldn't possibly be worse than anything by Andrew fecking Lloyd fecking Webber.

[Prospero]

YOU mean Fecking Andrew Fecking Lloyd Fecking Fecking Webber?

Wasn't a clockwork orange (the film) almost a musical anyway? Music was so crucial in it?

[Miss Aeryn]

Oh gawds, I've stepped on a trigger plate.

CAGE!?!! SERIOUSLY!?!! ARGHHHhhhhhhhhhhh!!!

*cue sounds of running footsteps, a door closing and screaming of 'Lalalalalah' fading to black...*

[Miss Aeryn]

:Bowdown:Well when you come to London you can bathe in the reflected glory - but sitting alone in a room with me.

With a offer like that how could a girl refuse?

:party:

[Prospero]

I have a sneaking feeling that, just perhaps, you do find this offer resistible Miss Aeryn. But c'mon now - you know it would improve antipodean relations no end. I'll make you a nice cup of tea.

‪The Pogues - Goodnight Irene‬‏ - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4modJeSNLk&feature=related)

[Miss Aeryn]

but what kind of tea?

:P

[Stavros]

but what kind of tea?

Miss Aeryn, read or see The Tempest and then join the dots: Prospero..Tea...

[Stavros]

RobertLouis -it was Burgess himself who had the idea of scoring A Clockwork Orange for the stage. I doubt Lord Lloyd-Webber could make anything musically valid from it -for what its worth I went to the 3rd performance of Evita! in London whenever that was -Harold Prince, who staged West Side Story with Jerome Robbins, produced a great show. Shame about the music.

[Prospero]

No-one has ever doubted that the Lloyd Webber stagings are a grand spectacle. Surely not enough. Did Guys and Dolls, Kiss Me Kate or My Fair Lady need grand stagings? They'd stand-up to a concert performance. And as you say Stavros - shame about the music. he sually manages one "memorable' song a how - memorable in that you can remember the tunes (and he seems to remember them too - and use melodies by other composers)

[Stavros]

I am ambivalent on musicals -I was fortunate to have parents who were sufficiently interested in culture to get me to the theatre, ballet and opera by the time I was 11 years old. I was also taken to see Oliver! when I was I think 11 or 12 an age when I think its easy to impress -but it was a great show with some great songs, and still is -I was appalled on the one occasion I saw the BBC tv auditions with that semi-incoherent idiot on a throne gushing You could be Nancy!
I was also taken to see the film of South Pacific in the days when there was a live band before the film started -the film was controversial because of the mixed-race relationship that develops, but the songs are excellent, and I watched the film on tv last year I think it was, with a lot of pleasure. On the other hand, My Fair Lady, Mary Poppins, Sound of Music, do nothing for me. The King and I is a mixed bag, I was dragged to see it because my mother liked Yul Bryner; but Happy Talk is a wonderful song. I am unable to connect with Sondheim even though I appreciate his role in keeping the musical alive as a genre. Finally, and I dont want to sound like a London taxi driver, but aren't there just too many musicals on in the West End?

[Miss Aeryn]

but what kind of tea?

Miss Aeryn, read or see The Tempest and then join the dots: Prospero..Tea...

good to see that went straight over my head like a F-111 on afterburn sigh.

I see said the blind man :geek:

[robertlouis]

I am ambivalent on musicals -I was fortunate to have parents who were sufficiently interested in culture to get me to the theatre, ballet and opera by the time I was 11 years old. I was also taken to see Oliver! when I was I think 11 or 12 an age when I think its easy to impress -but it was a great show with some great songs, and still is -I was appalled on the one occasion I saw the BBC tv auditions with that semi-incoherent idiot on a throne gushing You could be Nancy!
I was also taken to see the film of South Pacific in the days when there was a live band before the film started -the film was controversial because of the mixed-race relationship that develops, but the songs are excellent, and I watched the film on tv last year I think it was, with a lot of pleasure. On the other hand, My Fair Lady, Mary Poppins, Sound of Music, do nothing for me. The King and I is a mixed bag, I was dragged to see it because my mother liked Yul Bryner; but Happy Talk is a wonderful song. I am unable to connect with Sondheim even though I appreciate his role in keeping the musical alive as a genre. Finally, and I dont want to sound like a London taxi driver, but aren't there just too many musicals on in the West End?

I'm ambivalent too, Stavros, although I have a hankering for those with a strong story, and if it's dark and controversial like Carousel, all the better. In addition to my early introduction to oratorio by two very musical parents, I also met a lot of Rogers and Hammerstein/Hart, Lerner and Loewe etc musicals through their involvement in amateur theatricals. Because of that, Oklahoma still has a special thrill for me, as does West Side Story - Sondheim's first book to Bernstein's music, I think.

My goddaughter has done quite a few west-end productions in the chorus, usually the more esoteric ones, like the frankly amazing adaptation of Wedekind's Spring Awakening, Rent etc. I'd rather risk one of those than see yet another revival, anything by Andrew Feckin' Lloyd Feckin' Webber makes me nauseous, and the various concoctions built around pop songs like Mama Mia, Queen etc make me want to kill someone, they are so awful in every possible way.

So yes, far too many musicals in the West End, but Kate is taking me to see her in Parade at the Southwark Playhouse in two weeks, and I'm sure to enjoy it.

[Miss Aeryn]

My goddaughter has done quite a few west-end productions in the chorus, usually the more esoteric ones, like the frankly amazing adaptation of Wedekind's Spring Awakening, Rent etc. I'd rather risk one of those than see yet another revival, anything by Andrew Feckin' Lloyd Feckin' Webber makes me nauseous, and the various concoctions built around pop songs like Mama Mia, Queen etc make me want to kill someone, they are so awful in every possible way.

LOL well awful they might be but at least they are keeping the theatre alive, wouldn't you agree? They may well be the equivalent of fast food, but the good thing is that a fair number of people are introduced to the theatre world via fast food and once they get tired of the cardboard munching they move on to something more hearty and nutritious for the soul :)

Well that's the theory anyhow lmao!!

x

[robertlouis]

LOL well awful they might be but at least they are keeping the theatre alive, wouldn't you agree? They may well be the equivalent of fast food, but the good thing is that a fair number of people are introduced to the theatre world via fast food and once they get tired of the cardboard munching they move on to something more hearty and nutritious for the soul :)

Well that's the theory anyhow lmao!!

x

Reluctantly, I have to agree, Aeryn, at least as far as keeping theatres open is concerned. As I've said, I'm very selective about musicals that I'd be prepared to see, but I tend to be a lot more daring when it comes to straight theatre (which isn't as opposed to gay theatre, of course). The reviews in the quality press are fairly reliable guides too.

What's the theatre scene like where you are? The State Theatre in Sydney is one of the most stunning theatres I've ever seen.

[Stavros]

I have to agree: once a decline sets in I think it would be hard to stop, although I don't believe there is any evidence that, for example, long running shows like The Lion King and Mamma Mia subsidise revivals of Pinter and Beckett. Also, I think that as an introduction to the theatre for children and young people, musicals are ideal -in today's climate when the attention span is so limited, the stop-start structure of a musical is ideal: however I would prefer musicals on original themes, rather than being a loose collection of songs by the same band/person: Evita was at least original, even if it had little to do with the real Eva Peron. I was taken to the theate and ballet when I was 10, and the opera when I was 11, which also included Gilbert & Sullivan: great for an 11 year old but by the time I was 16 I thought G&S passe.

Live music, and if possible, participation through singing, dancing or playing an instrument is priceless: I sang in the church choir and it was thrilling, exciting and one of my most treasured memories. I aso think that a personal experience of music enables people to distinguish between good musicianship and the rest, regardless of the genre. I don't care if its Wagner, Gilbert & Sullivan, Kylie Minogue or I Am H-A-P-P-Y -the alternative is silence, a very dull life indeed.

[robertlouis]

Is anybody else here enjoying the proms season on Radio 3, BBC4 and occasionally BBC2?

The Brahms Concert on Friday night featuring the 3rd symphony and the 1st piano concerto with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and Bernard Haitink conducting was simply sublime. The symphony in particular was the finest rendition I have yet heard.

[Stavros]

In the late 1970s I used to work with a Havegal Brian enthusiast; if you have ever met one you will realise that even being obsessed with Delius cannot compare to the Brianistas who are convinced he is the most neglected genius of British music. He had every symphony on tape that had ever been broadcast. These days I suspect only the Proms could do the Gothic (or ' das Siegeslied') but while it was brave -or foolish- to, perform it, it was a sad waste of resources. I can't remember which Brian symphonies I liked, it might have been the 6th, but overall his work is not something I would actively pursue.

I haven't been able to listen to as many Proms as I would like. Although I liked Prokofiev's concerto for turntables and orchestra, it would have been so much better without the turntables, a worthless gimmick that failed in whatever it was supposed to achieve. I feel ambivalent about Haitink. To me he has an astonishing ability to transform beautiful and dynamic music into something bland and lifeless, yet the best Mahler 4 I heard was at the Concertgebouw with the same man conducting.

I bought Yuja Wang's cd of Rachmaninov's piano concerto no 2 and the Paganinni rhapsody a while ago, and its one of the best recordings of those perennial favourites I have ever heard; she has real sparkle in her playing, although I don't know how one pianist can sound so different from another. Her Bartok last Tuesday was brilliant -in fact, so far this and the National Youth Orchestra Proms were the ones I have enjoyed most.

[robertlouis]

Saw a musical called Parade at the Southwark Playhouse last night with my goddaughter, who knew several of the cast from her own background in musical theatre. Played in traverse, so very close to the action, and in the vaults, with the trains from London Bridge rumbling overhead.

I have to be persuaded to go to musicals - I hate the contrived pop group lyrics like Queen and Rod Stewart with a passion, am bored by endless revivals of supposed classics from the canon, and "spectacles" like the Lion King or Phantom (indeed anything by the dreaded ALW leave me stone cold.

But this was very, very different. It was a revival of a 1998 musical, book and score by Jason Robert Brown, based on a true story, which concerns the lynching, in Georgia 1914, of a New York Jew falsely accused of the rape and murder of a young girl. Dark, terrific score and coruscating lyrics superbly delivered by a young and very committed cast.

If you're in London, I urge you to see it. Not in the West End, so not west end prices - our seats cost £16 each. And an excellent pre-show dinner for £12 each directly overlooking the Thames on a sunny evening. Perfect.

[buckjohnson]

I play it cool
and dig all jive
Thats the reason
I stay alive
My motto is as
I live and learn
is dig and be dug
In return.

[Prospero]

The beat poets are reborn courtesy of Buck Johnson. Do you wear a black beret, smoke Gitanes and listen to Juliette Greco?

[buckjohnson]

Black beret, yes. I like cool and funky hats.

[Stavros]

The artist Richard Hamilton has died at the age of 89; he is remembered as a central force in the so-called 'Pop Art' movement of the 1960s, which in his case was the creation of multi-surface images which used paint, collage and photography simultaneously. I used to see his work as a regular visitor to the old Tate Gallery in London, and was never once impressed, neither by the indidivual works, nor by his style. I am not a renaissance reject, I do like contemporary art -Bridget Riley is one of my favourite artists of all time and if I had the money I would commission a work from her. Hamilton never did it for me. In fact, I see his work as a precursor to the self-advertisements of Tracy Emin and Gilbert/George, that one-way route to indifference.

I await the opinions of BM's with eager anticipation....

[robertlouis]

The artist Richard Hamilton has died at the age of 89; he is remembered as a central force in the so-called 'Pop Art' movement of the 1960s, which in his case was the creation of multi-surface images which used paint, collage and photography simultaneously. I used to see his work as a regular visitor to the old Tate Gallery in London, and was never once impressed, neither by the indidivual works, nor by his style. I am not a renaissance reject, I do like contemporary art -Bridget Riley is one of my favourite artists of all time and if I had the money I would commission a work from her. Hamilton never did it for me. In fact, I see his work as a precursor to the self-advertisements of Tracy Emin and Gilbert/George, that one-way route to indifference.

I await the opinions of BM's with eager anticipation....

I suspect your tongue is so firmly in your cheek, Stavros, that if you were to hold your breath as well you'd only last about three minutes.

FWIW I agree with your assessment of Hamilton. One of those strange contradictions who managed to be influential without at the same time creating any worthwhile art of his own.

[Prospero]

Got to disagree... and this is the best example of a powerful and influentail body of work.

[Stavros]

I am not denying Hamilton's influence, but it does nothing for me; and I have seen it enough times. If anything, it pre-figures post-modernism's decentering of the subject and in doing says: everything is of equal value, which is why nothing is important. It also integrates branded products into a frame of reference that cannot decide if it is public or private, further promoting the chaos of post-modernism. Avant-garde indeed!

[runningdownthatdream]

Got to disagree... and this is the best example of a powerful and influentail body of work.

Maybe i'm a Philistine but that looks like pretentious, bourgeois garbage.......work done by someone with too much time on their hands........time no doubt spent trying to come up with something 'radical'.

[robertlouis]

Changing tack briefly, has anyone else been watching Mark Cousins' new series on More4 Saturday evenings, about the Story of Cinema?

Once you get over his curious and I'm afraid highly mannered slow northern Irish commentary, I must say I'm finding the whole thing quite mesmerising in the positive sense of that word. It's beautifully written, with marvellous and rarely seen clips (he's coming up to episode 4 and we're still in the 20s) and I find I'm learning a great deal too, especially about masters from all across the world during the silent era.

15 weeks of 75 minute episodes, each with a link to a film that exemplifies the period and style of the previous Saturday's programme on the following Monday on Film 4. We've already had Griffith's glorious silent masterpiece of the French Revolution, Orphans of the Storm, Carl Dreyer's Ordet, and next Monday we'll get Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin.

Thank you Channel 4.

[Prospero]

The Cousins series is brilliant as is his book on the history of cinema which came out a few years back. But by - I nearly switched it off during the first episode because of his weird sophorific delivery. Get past that - or get used to it - and its terrific.

Re Emin et all - I tend to think that they're paler and paler spins on Duchamp rather than in the lineage of Warhol, Hamilton, Lichtenstein etc.

[Prospero]

And if anyone is in London and likes dance go see Grupo Corpo, Brazilian contemporary company at Sadlers Wells this week. The beet ciontemporary dance I've seen since I saw them at last year's Edinburgh Festival. A glass of wine beforehand enabled me to push the intellect aside and revel in the sheer physicality and mesmerising spectacle f wonderful human forms offered in the two pieces they're performing.

Also saw a terrific new film not yet released here - Habemus Papem (We Have A Pope) - an Italian film all about a crisis in the Vatican when a newly elected pope decides he cannot do the job. Very funny, original and ultimately quite moving.

[Stavros]

Story of Cinema sounds interesting, does it cover Japan and India or is it mostly Europe and America? I can't get much on tv now so I assume it will make it to C4 sometime in the future. Potemkin is so over-rated; Ivan the Terrible is Eisenstein's masterpiece. Vertov's The Man with a Movie Camera must be one of the best silent films ever made -? Did anyone see the restored version of Abel Gance's Napoleon?

If I think about it, I don't like clutter in paintings, not detail, but unnecessary stuff thrown in to fill the canvas: there is a famous Poussin in the Wallace Collection, A Dance to the Music of Time which would look better if the top third was cut off and thrown away; also in the Wallace Collection there are two paintings by Rembdrandt or his pupils which show a father and son and a mother and daughter where there is gorgeous detailing of their clothes and enough small items to give symbolic meaning to the paintings (parents giving their children moral lessons) but no unncessary frills; and there was the Genius of Rome exhibition at the Royal Academy in the 90s where hideous Caracci paintings festooned with sickening cherubs were shown alongside the dramas of Caravaggio whose plain sometimes menacing/haunting backgrounds made so much more sense. Hence my dislike of Hamilton, but Prospero's point about Emin is well made; except maybe Duchamp and Miro are at least amusing at times, Emin is so depressing.

[Stavros]

Another question on films, or more accurately film festivals: there seems to be a rich crop of interesting films at Toronto this year; it makes me wonder if Toronto is emerging to match Sundance and the TriBEca as the most interesting festivals in the calendar -I haven't been to the London Film Festival for years, but it always seemed to me to be a cull from others rather than a showcase for new material; and Cannes is more a market than a festival -?? Any ideas on this?

[Prospero]

Stavros - It's on More4 - odd programming decision suggesting C4 don't exect much of an audince. (They are too full of reality TV these days). Yes it ill be covering india, china etc... has already featured the best japanese silent movie (in Cousins' estimation). he is passionate about world cinema - not just the west.

So if you don't like clutter you don't care for Breughel?

Gance - yes. I was there he was alive and was telephoned in France so he could hear the applause for the restored print. A shame they won't be showing that.

And I concur with your judgement on Eisenstein. Potemkin is darn good for all that, though.

I would not edit any of the dance to the music of time - painting or book sequence. Both are masterpieces IMHO

[Prospero]

Venice film festival is a biggie.