The Fredösphere

Seeing Revenge of the Sith, I was struck by how Wagnerian the six-movie series is, in its extreme juxtapositioning of the really cool and the really sucky.  The dialog, like Darth Vader, is more machine than man.  I was also surprised that to the end, George Lucas pulled his punch, refusing to divulge the big secret, but those of us in the know could detect the occasional subtle innuendo:  "good relations with the Wookies I have."  Please Yoda; we don't want to know.

Here's a FAQ that answers the question everyone is asking.

Yes, Terry, life is unfair.  And Terry has more:  a quote from my favorite essay from my favorite book.  Someday I'll write one of my dreadfully incontinent serious posts on The Protestant Mystics.  Today (a Friday before a three-day weekend) is not that day.

Colby Cosh deserves a box of Turkish delight for finding this confection:

"I'm not buying a Gameboy until they bring out Mere Christianity." I wish I could've somehow worked that into a conversation, but I couldn't. This is a point-and-click style adventure game tied to the upcoming movie (trailer here), but since there's no mouse on the Gameboy this means "walk slowly across the screen and click".

I played a little girl in a dress (Lucy, presumably) wandering in a mysterious snowy landscape, with an "A" button for jump and a "B" button for kick. I was approached by a faun, one Mr. Tumnus, who rapidly broke down and blurted out his story about a White Witch whose spell had been cast upon the once green and pleasant land. I tried to kick him repeatedly in the groin: B B B B B B.  The game tediously refused to acknowledge this attempt.

Note to the producers of TLTWATW:  I already "beloved" the Narnia books.  Your telling me that the books are "beloved" makes me want to stop beloving them.  That's not what you wanted, was it -- to decrease the net total of belove in the world?  Maybe this is an example of piling on, advertising overhype, unintended consequences, all that.  Something to think about, anyway.

Get to know Imant Raminsh:  a Latvian-born Canadian composer, Raminsh's music is greatly admired among choral musicians.  You want to call his idiom conservative?  Sticks and stones may break his bones, but:

He is unconcerned that his music is viewed as harmonically and rhythmically conservative: 'I have a limited time to compose... and I'm more comfortable saying the things I have to say in a language I already know. I don't have to be original for the sake of being original. That's my very sincere approach.'

And let's be honest, people, the prevalence of amateurs among choral musicians puts a lid on the technical difficulty of choral works, unless their creators don't much care if they get performed.  Some other day I'll rant at length on that subject; today I will simply observe its truth as a practical matter.  In fact, many church choirs would find Raminsh's music too hard, too weird, too icky.  Don't get me started.

Want to know more about Imant Raminsh?  I found links to some amazon.com sound excerpts, more sound files at Hear the Choirs Sing (don't miss the tantalizingly brief bit of Quia Respexit), a list of works, a recording review or two, and another bio.

Fun stuff:  Charles T. Downey describes bizarre, da Vinci-code-esque speculation that the paintings of the Sistine Chapel contain a coded message:  implausible, slightly embarrassing, and more than slightly seductive.  And yes, you're right, it is interesting that Ned Rorem is turning Our Town into an opera.  I confess I don't get the love people have for that play.  What's with the ending?  Those dead guys:  they're awfully smug for a bunch of people who do nothing but sit around on chairs all day, don't you think?

Meanwhile, Gregory Hall may be a newbie at the Sequenza21 composers' blog, but he asks a sophisticated question:

It seems to me that good solid thought-out contrapuntal writing is taking a back seat to the practice of the "prosodic line"; that is, a melodic line that flows more "naturally" or imitates speech patterns. When you have a counterpoint of two or more of these complex lines, they often seem to be thrown together with little regard for the counterpoint between them.[...]

QUESTION for the reader: where are the great contrapuntalists of the present day? More specifically, those working not only somewhere between the prosodic line and the simple line, but those working between atonality/aleatoric practices and the "New Tonality" which, more often than not, is the "old tonality". Most specifically, composers who are writing aurally logical music (music that actually considers the overtone series, circle of fifths, etc.) which perhaps involves a good deal of scalar dissonance (modal tone clusters) and tertian writing, both of which have a good deal of tonal logic but are not at all traditional tonality. Graham Fitkin and Louis Andriessen come to mind, but I want to get even more specific, more "Bach-like"...

Well, this gives me a theme for a nice little research project.  Thanks, Gregory; now I know a little better what I don't know.  Those who want to find out more about species counterpoint may find this Schenker website a useful starting point.

My experiments in counterpoint are modulated by a casual comment from a a composition teacher.  He spoke of the importance of melodic line in contrapuntal writing, noting that even Bach occasionally (very occasionally) dives into harmonic incoherence for a beat or two for the sake of good voice leading.  I suppose he was repeating a meme that composers have passed around for years.  It makes sense to me.

Prelude to the Afternoon of a Fern.  "Hey Jude" in the key of F-flat.  Alex Ross has written the funniest thing you'll read all day.  Dang!

Soundbites looks at the state of music education and cannot find much cause for optimism.  He makes a variety of observations, but I was especially struck by his mention of home schoolers.  We are homeschooling our kids, and the culture of our church and community is such that I expect we will reach the state soon whereby none of our close friends will be sending their kids to public schools.  The trend toward homeschooling is reaching the famous tipping point, and I wonder how many people will be surprised by it when it happens.  (In case you needed a reason to home school your kids, see Roger Simon from yesterday.)

We are fascinated by the trend toward classical education.  (And yes, I now duly note the irony of "trendy classicism.")  What does classical education mean?

Ideally, classical education includes learning Latin and Greek, but that's not really the heart of it.  That's a good thing, since only with a lot of luck will our children learn the modern languages we would like them to learn; ancient languages are toward the bottom of the list.

Those who promote classical education emphasize placing all subjects in historical context.  Even math and science can be taught while referring to the time and place each discovery was made.  The historical context is a critical, but not quite the central, component of classical education.

I think this passage by Camille Paglia from Arion Magazine gets at the heart of the thing:

The grand sequence of the classical tradition, which extends in various strands through the Middle Ages and Renaissance to the scientific Enlightenment and modern era, is actually a master paradigm for how to structure an authentically multicultural curriculum on a global scale. All students abroad as well as in the US need to learn the general contours of the world’s major artistic and cultural traditions. These long channels of lineage can best be understood as streams—mighty rivers that are fed by tributaries and that are a confluence of mixed and varied material. The great rivers of cultural tradition are nearly always powered by religion, even when they slow down and spread out in the secular delta of modern life.

Thus my premise in understanding art and culture is always continuity. From Egyptian and Greek sculpture to Hollywood movies and rock music, I believe in creative influence over time. I categorically reject the view of culture as disconnected fragments or as the breakage of meaning—an insular fiction fostered by depressive intellectuals who lack the long view and whose ability to weigh or negotiate historical evidence is questionable. The modernist delusion of fragmentation can be traced to T. S. Eliot’s “The Waste Land,” published in 1922 in the aftermath of the disaster of World War I. Its use in the chic postmodernism of the closing decades of the twentieth century descended from European writers and intellectuals in crisis after World War II. Lamentably, this outdated and provincial point of view has been given canonical status by those who evidently cannot see the patterns in culture and who have imposed their own limitations on hapless students.

I know what is on your mind right now:  you are thinking about underpants!  I see civilization as a grand project which every generation is called to maintain and expand.  Parents have an obligation to involve their children in this project.  I don't understand the passivity of some parents in the face of advertising and fashion; instead of allowing Captain Underpants to train their children in disrespect, they should remember Hannah Arendt's warning:

Every generation, western civilization is invaded by barbarians.  We call them "children."

(By the way, for an alternate take on le capitaine des pantalons de le sous, see Guys Read, an excellent site by Jon Scieszka.)

Assuming a call to love and nurture your culture will save us from all kinds of mistakes, especially the twin evils of worshiping or demonizing the New.  It's sad that a magazine like The New Criterion can be casually mislabeled as anti-modern. (See this editorial review at the amazon.com page for Paul Johnson's Art:  A New History, for example.  In fact, TNC criticized Johnson for his wholesale rejection of the 20th century.)  It seems to me they can rise above various fads when critiquing the New because they are rooted in a classicist's view of the whole 3000-year-old stream.  Yet anyone who reads the magazine knows they don't reject modern art.

I hope this helps answer the question Stefan Beck asked at the end of this post.

They had me at:

Of all the threats to America's standing in the world, is there any more profound than Scandinavian rock? Never mind the deficit or the state of math and science education. The Nordic countries are full of people with better looks, English and nightlife than you, and they're moving aggressively in music's markets of cool. Soon it will be impossible to put together an indie-movie soundtrack without them.

Take the Raveonettes, the Danish duo last seen encouraging '60s pop to hop on the back of garage-rock's motorcycle and go do something sleazy under the pier. Ringleader Sune Rose Wagner has a more unwholesome obsession with Buddy Holly, surf guitar, '50s sci-fi, and the opus of Phil Spector than anyone from Copenhagen ought to. His 6-foot-tall, part-Asian co-conspirator, Sharin Foo, looks and sounds like Persian-cat-stroking mastermind Ernst Stavro Blofeld's ultimate revenge on James Bond.

Another great lede:

When they give a final requiem for traditional masculinity, they could do worse than to hire Il Divo. The toothsome singers of the "popera" quartet, whose eponymous album debuted at No. 4 on the U.S. Billboard album chart(and is No. 8 this week), specialize in music that is earnest but unthreatening. The cover of their hit album shows them with roses in the lapels of their dark Italian suits, and inside, their photographs have an androgynous purity, with bright eyes wide open, pools to swim but not drown in.

Bob Shingleton of The Overgrown Path informs us that Lorin Maazel's unloved new opera 1984 will be webcast Wednesday, May 25.  He's got more information here.  Of the many reviews out there, Jessica Duchen's is short and to the point.

Speaking of unloved, the wifeösphere and I tried to watch Roman Polanski's The Pianist this weekend, but the required effort proved too great.  This movie is supposed to be excellent -- what were we missing?  Does it suddenly shed its leaden clichés and get interesting one moment beyond point at which we stopped watching?  It was educational, however:  we learned that Nazis are very, very, very, very bad people.

This was a Movielens recommendation -- I do hope this is not an augury of future wrongheadedness.  I'm a huge fan of collaborative filtering, thanks to my unfailingly good experience with the now-defunct moviecritic.com.

I haven't seen the new Star Wars, and I don't have to.  I knew three years ago what direction the plot would take.  Permit me to quote an email I sent some friends right after episode II came out, on the subject of the decadence of the Jedi:

WHAT WAS THE JEDI COUNCIL THINKING when they tasked Anakin with "guarding" a gorgeous young woman who has nothing better to do than parade up and down terraces in backless gowns, have picnics in meadows, and pop pieces of peeled fruit into her mouth?  If they want to maintain a celibate culture, they need to give their young people lots of work to fill up their time.  Preferably, work involving exhausting physical labor.  Ditch digging would be fine for the purpose.

And speaking of celibacy:  Let's look at the situation as it now stands.  We have an organization in decline, trying to maintain a rule of strict abstinence.  We know that eventually it will all but fall apart.  The adult members, mostly male from what we've seen, each keep a young "apprentice" in tow.  I think we have enough information to make a prediction about the plot of episode III....

Yes, face it:  if the Catholic church could be rocked by such a scandal, if the freakin' Jesuits of all groups could see their subculture radically redefined, how could the Jedi presume to be above such a disaster?  Why else is Yoda living in a swamp in episode V?  Could it be that, being a registered sex offender, no other neighborhood would have him?  Now we can guess what really drives Anakin over to the dark side.  No wonder Obi-Wan lacks the moral authority to resist him in the light saber duel in episode IV.  One more reason, as if you need it, to conclude the Empire is better than the Republic.

And finally, they're not beneath using choral music to frighten people.

My current composition project is a trio for men's voices.  It may be the last of a line of experiments in geeky canonical writing.  Counterpoint is at it's most facile when you give it room to breathe; let the time interval be two measures (or better, four) and let the pitch interval be alternating fifths and fourths.  Then, as Handel did, make sure each part has plenty of big rests scattered around -- make the score look gap-toothed.  There!  The counterpoint never becomes too thorny, and the focus hops back and forth between parts, so the listener never gets bored.

Unless he's a geek like me, that is.  I've been writing canons with a time interval of one measure (or sometimes just one beat) and, just to be perverse, pitch intervals of a third or, as in today's example, a second.  Is this a good idea?  Am I just showing off?  Let's just say that I'm growing in my appreciation of just how limited the possibilities are.

The text in this example is from Psalm 40:  "and set my feet upon a rock."  The first line is my first version.  As in all dense vocal counterpoint, the words tend to step on one another.  (That's the reason I have never found renaissance polyphony perfectly satisfying.)  In the first line I displaced one note (on the word "my") from the beginning of its measure to break things up a bit, but those "feet" are still stepping on other words in the text.

In the second line, I've changed the first two notes from four and six beats to five beats each, just so no word begins simultaneously with any other.  Hey, look what happened.  If you lay out the words in order as they will be sung by all three voices, you get the sentence repeating itself with words progressively added at the end, then removed from the beginning:  "and - and set - and set my feet - set my feet - my feet."  The geeky mathematician in me finds that very satisfying.  The musician in me wants to take a wait-and-see attitude, but why should we listen to him?

Thus endeth the lesson.  As promised, I included no torturous nested counterpoint examples, but I've got a bad feeling I lost most of you by the third paragraph anyway.  Sigh.

Everybody's reviewing the premiere of the opera Margaret Garner, presented by the Michigan Opera Theatre.  The libretto is by Toni Morrison (from her novel Beloved) and the music is by Richard Danielpour.

The NYT thinks the theme (slavery) has the grand scale that an opera needs to succeed.
The Detroit News gushes with local pride.
The Detroit Free Press likes its scenes of domestic tenderness and compares the music to a film score.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution calls it blue state words set to red state music.
The Flint Journal likes the performers but says the score lacked brilliance.

Most all agree that a few of the slow scenes could be improved with some trimming.  Danielpour's conservative idiom prompts the greatest divergence of opinion, but they agree he succeeded in giving mezzo soprano Denyce Graves opportunities to show off her instrument nicely.

I just found out about Sine Nomine, an early music octet up there in East Lansing.  (For those unfamiliar with Michigan geography, not to mention politics, East Lansing is Michigan State University territory.)  Sine Nomine's web site is not quite ready for prime time, and the page listing their future performances requires some high-tech fiddling for it to display properly, so I'll excerpt the relevant paragraph here:

Sine Nomine, the East Lansing-based semi-professional early music octet under the direction of J. Nixon McMillan, presents a concert of “Music from the Elizabethan Era and Beyond”.  Works will include anthems by Batten, anonymous Gregorian chant, a motet by Marenzio, madrigals by Bennet and Morley, spoken poetry by Queen Elizabeth I, and more recent choral works by renowned East Lansing composer James Niblock.  Saturday, May 21, 2005, at 4 pm at All Saints Episcopal Church, 800 Abbott Road, East Lansing (517-351-7160); Sunday May 22, 2005 at 5 pm at Trinity Episcopal Church, 101 East Mansion Street, Marshall (616-781-7881).  Free, donations appreciated.

James Niblock is a retired MSU professor.  Here's Niblock's webpage.  Guys, about that website design?  I'd be happy to spiff it up for you.  For an extra $10K, I think I could arrange a celebrity guest appearance by Umie the Umlaut, the artsöshpere's most endearing trash-talking logo.

I watched A Series of Unfortunate Events with the wifeösphere over the weekend.  She dared to judge it even funnier than the book, and I'm inclined to agree.  I strongly commend to you the bonus material on the DVD.  Watching Jim Carrey as Count Olaf in his various disguises is dazzling, exhilarating, and more than a little bit frightening.  You discover his performance as seen in the final cut of the film just scratches the tip of the iceberg, as a friend was wont to say.

I can't exactly recommend the commentary track with director Brad Silberling joined by author Daniel Handler in his Lemony Snicket persona. It starts out quite amusing; "Snicket" is repeatedly shocked to discover the movie -- which he supposedly knows nothing about -- is as grim as its source material. Then it slowly dawns on you that Handler is going to maintain this Snicket schtick relentlessly throughout the entire movie. I had to turn it off after 40 minutes.  On the other hand, you will not want to miss the bonus scene -- completely out of context of the story -- where Count Olaf responds graciously to applause that seems to go on forever -- said applause being produced by his own two hands.

Congratulations to Scott Spiegelberg, whose blog Musical Perceptions turns one year old today.  You will recall Scott is the scion of Satan, the brother of Beelzebub, the heir of the Erl King, the apple of Apollyon's eye.  See his recent post on research into high-definition MIDI.

Alex Ross has a lot to say about American operas, including those by Lorin Maazel and  William Bolcom.  Barber's Antony and Cleopatra gets a mention.  I really like A&C, and wish that the bozo who lost the Ann Arbor library's recording of it would find and return it.  You may recall I extend my approval (whatever it may be worth) to operas only reluctantly.  The story about A&C is that it never recovered from the botched production of its premiere.  I should add it to the list of operas I'd like to see.

My friend Alan urges me to check out MPR's report on the Cleophone.  I'm going to resist the overpowering urge to put an umlaut on the first "o."

What looks like a dulcimer and sounds like electronically altered Balinese gamelan? The answer is the Cleophone. The instrument's Minneapolis inventor created it mainly for the sheer pleasure of sonic exploration.

I feel I must warn you, this article contains Weird Band Name Content that some readers may find disturbing:

During the day Krecji works for a Twin Cities PR firm. At night he sometimes plays in a loud rock band known as the Reverend Strychn Trio. What he likes about the Cleophone is its potential to reach audiences beyond the dingy bar scene.

A fellow (or is that former?) Ann Arbor blogger runs Form and Function.  From it we learn of a documentary about Detroit called Ruin of a City.  Sadly, I never heard a word about it when it came through these parts lately.  Am I allowed to say it again?  Well, Fred, that's asking a lot ... but okay, one more time, we'll allow it.  Thanks:  ALAS BABYLON.

The wifeösphere informs me that "Umie the Umlaut is cute."  From the context, it is clear she means, "Umie is cute and you are not."  I guess this is episode #4137 of "Mad Genius Begets Magnificent Creation; Creation Then Turns On The Creator."  How's that Oedipus complex coming along there, Umie?

Umie says, "I'd prefer you spell it Ödipus."

The middle brow is the rung of a ladder that provides access to the high brow to those unable to jump straight from low to high.  Discuss.

Meet choral composer Cary John Franklin.  Hear Dale Warland & co. perform bits of Franklin's With a Poet's Eye.

My architecture rant of yesterday attracted some nice attention from Ionarts of course, and A.C. Douglas.  Both blogs resisted denouncing me, which is appreciated.  The venerable City Comforts also took notice.  Thanks to all.

This architecture cow's udder does not appear empty, so let's keep milking, shall we?  Let's return to the collection of snap shots I took during a recent road trip to Coldwater, Michigan, the seat of the county I grew up in.  It possesses many fine old homes.  Previously I focused on the Italianates, my first love.  Today I bring you Queen Anne, the most familiar of the Victorian styles.  I admit I resent the way Her Majesty uses her position to overpower the more interesting Italians, Goths and Greeks.  I also take exception to some of the wild color schemes that have captured the attention of preservationists:  do rusty brown, teal, mustard and mauve really all belong together on one house?

Nevertheless, Queen Anne is worthy of our praise.  Coldwater has many fine examples.  (Click any thumbnail image to see a larger version.)  The first home is on Chicago St., the main drag.  This is one with a color schemes that troubles me, but the square tower is fine.

The second, third and fourth houses each stand at a corner of the same intersection, just one block south of Chicago St.  Particularly the second impresses one with the size and complexity of the restoration effort.  What a magnificent job.  The fourth's corner tower is seems not a completely successful part of the design.

The final house stands just a few doors down from the previous three.  It's front is unusually plain for a Queen Anne, and not entirely typical in its detailing; the fancy bays with second-storey balconies are reserved for the side.  Standing in the street and seeing these four neighbors (plus an adjacent Italianate that is a bit odd but has interesting detailing in brick) one is transported to an older, more tasteful time.  A time free of terrorism, pollution, and moral squalor.  A time free of blogs.  A time with a really crappy infant mortality rate -- well, I seem to have got off track somehow.  I'm sure the era that produced these beautiful houses must have been superior in every way, but the idea of bolstering my argument with, you know, facts seems very boring all of the sudden.

In any event, enjoy the images, and if you find yourself near Coldwater some day, definitely stop by and take a quick tour.

Lynn's got the good links today:  KISS bars of soap, and the monstrous, seductive architectural fancies of Étienne-Louis Boullée.

I really like what Charles T. Downey and the gang are doing at Ionarts, and I've been looking for an excuse to link to them for a while.  I still feel guilty that I didn't see this kind attention soon enough to respond to it in a timely way -- sheesh, he practically begged me to get into a mutual linkathon with him, and I blew it.  More recently, he mentioned me in a post about dragging the young'uns to classical concerts.

Sadly, now I come to denounce the object of Downey's most recent post:  Notre-Dame-du-Haut, a freakazoid chapel designed by Le Corbusier.  (And, before I continue, let me note Downey does not exactly say he admires this building, although the existence of the post implies the building has a certain claim on our attention.)

Is there any word that describes this building better than "revolting"?  The curves are an early expression of the kind of arbitrary forms that Gehry has built his career on, but what really repels is the array of randomly sized and positioned windows (which you can see here and here).  What does this wall resemble except a pockmarked face?  Folks, we have deep, hard-wired instincts to backpedal furiously when we encounter this pattern -- so why did Le Corbusier put it on his chapel?  Am I the only one who sees this?  Tell me I'm not crazy.

One is supposed to mellow as one ages, and really, I've mostly learned not to go ballistic like this anymore -- but this building gets my goat cheese like none other on the planet.

It's okay, Fred.  Here, sit down, take a deep breath, and calm yourself with one of these.

While listening to classical radio the other day, they announced Haydn's Symphony #572, "The Indistinguishable" or some such, and I meditated once again on that man's dreadful legacy.  What miserable luck that Mozart, Music's Supreme Genius, should live his formative years in Haydn's shadow.  Then, just as he was starting to find his own voice and get good, Mozart had to pull one final stunt by dying on us.

The same sense of melancholy pervades the crackup (if that's the right word) of Dale Warland's choir.  Having linked to the Ensemble of the North previously, I am now urged to give The Singers some equal time, which I am glad to do.  (Don't overlook their sound files.)  The two choirs formed after Warland's group "split."  I have no evidence the two groups view each other with hostility, but any kind of parting of the ways must be awkward.  The news gives you the same sick stab in your gut you felt when you first heard that Bible Girl and Mr. Sin were married to each other.  It's as frustrating as euphemism inflation, or searches for ghostly voices in white noise recordings that recall the continually embarrassing Face On Mars business, which is almost as embarrassing as when bloggers impose dubious themes on groups of links as a means of tying a post together.

And did I mention that Seraphic Fire has the name than which none cooler can be conceived?

My friend Alan sent me a link to a Josquin setting of Ave Maria sung by the Vocal Arts Ensemble of Cincinnati.  Alan warns it supplants the Monteverdi Sicut Cervus as the most beautiful piece of Renaissance music.  He's wrong, but it cheered me up a bit anyway.

They are the premiere a capella group of the world of higher mathematics (all five of them):  The Klein Four.

Hat tip to John Derbyshire.

Sometimes you read something that confirms your most deeply-held and cherished prejudices so completely that you're almost afraid to believe it.

Amazon recommended I read The Egyptologist.  My predisposition to finish any book I start propelled me all the way through it, but it was a near run thing.  The middle got a bit dull, and I expected more of a surprise at the end than was delivered.  By the end, the running jokes were stale, but they were quite funny when they were introduced.  (Amazon's reviewers call it a "non-mystery mystery," which seems about right to me.)  The main character, writing in his journal in the 1920s, always wants the reader to know what's playing on his Victrola.  I suspect it's meant to be a parody of a blogger's ipod log.

The wifeösphere is convalescing and the offspring are visiting Camp Grandparents, so I'm enjoying an idyllic weekend of leisure and perfect weather.  I compose until the creative bladder runs dry, then I read until the creative juices are restored.  Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age is sparkly with wit; its author is famous for Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, and The Baroque Cycle, but even the light of this lesser gem is blinding.  That Stephenson's oeuvre routinely flatters my prejudices increases the burden of reading it not one whit; homeschooling elitists and anti-anti-hypocrites get pats on the head in The Diamond Age.

Here's a sample.  Our neo-Victorian hero finds his past misdeeds have caught up with him and he's receiving informal, but intimidating, interrogation over lunch:

Hackworth took a bit of his sandwich, correctly anticipating that the meat would be gristly and that he would have plenty of time to think about his situation while his molars subdued it.  He did have plenty of time, as it tuned out; but as frequently happen to him in these situations, he could not bring his mind to bear on the subject at hand.  All he could think about was the taste of the sauce.  If the manifest of ingredients on the bottle had been legible, it would have read something like this:

Water, blackstrap molasses, imported habanero peppers, salt, garlic, ginger, tomato puree, axle grease, real hickory smoke, snuff, butts of clove cigarettes, Guinness Stout fermentation dregs, uranium mill tailings, muffler cores, monosodium glutamate, nitrates, nitrites, nitrotes and nitrutes, nutrites, natrotes, powdered pork nose hairs, dynamite, activated charcoal, match-heads, used pipe cleaners, tar, nicotine, single-malt whiskey, smoked beef lymph nodes, autumn leaves, red fuming nitric acid, bituminous coal, fallout, printer's ink, laundry starch, drain cleaner, blue chrysotile asbestos, carregeenan, BHA, BHT, and natural flavorings.

You're making my mouth water!  Meanwhile, the wifeösphere and I wanted to watch the final DVDs from the third season of Alias, but the local purveyors' supplies were depleted for the weekend.  On an impulse, I earlier had picked up a copy of Shattered Glass from the library, so we watched that.  It was compelling.  This is the story of Stephen Glass, the wunderkind of The New Republic, many of whose articles were found to be complete fabrications.  Why was there no buzz for this movie when it came out?  You people are supposed to tell me about this stuff.  Hayden Christensen is really quite good as the needy, semi-autistic, yet personable Glass, wearing what looks like Elmer's glue in his hair.  See it if you haven't already.  "Are you mad at me?"  Yes, Stephen, we are very, very mad at you.

I visited my parents' house last weekend and picked up my mom's accordion.  Years ago, I started dreaming of learning the instrument and developing a bold, cutting-edge approach to the instrument.  Unfortunately, I tried it briefly and found it bewildering, so I dropped it.  Sadly, the exciting, cutting-edge work has been done by others.

This time, the experience was quite different.  The left hand is organized by the circle of fifths, so simple tonic - subdominant - dominant harmonies are a snap.  (And why would anyone need more than those three chords?)  The right hand, with its rotated and miniaturized keyboard, was not the problem I expected.  I think what made the difference this time was my decision to improvise melodies on the instrument.  Really, the thing is quite easy.

I'd love to pursue this instrument further, and I think mastering it might just bring healing to my wounded inner child, but first things first:  I paid good money for a banjo two years ago, and I'm determined it will be the next instrument I play.  Clawhammer style: no inauthentic modern innovations for me!  Except for the ones I invent myself!

A friend is at the age where his hair is getting a bit thin on top.  The other day I was able to spot a "616" tattooed on his scalp.  It didn't bother me at the time, but after reading this, I'm starting to worry.

Frank La Rocca let me know about a new chamber choir called the Ensemble of the North.  They've recorded his choral work O Magnum Mysterium (don't miss the sound file).  A felicitous confluence of performers, text, and composition.  How come Minneapolis gets all the good music?  A pact with the devil, I'll bet.  Check their scalps.

Forrest Covington's Anagoge CD came in the mail yesterday.  I'd describe its mood as dreamy and a bit spooky.  His staccato base lines and judicious use of a vibraphone are key elements making that happen.  Anyway, that's my first impression; I'd like to spend more time with the piece.  Forrest has more information at his blog.  Nice work, Fo-Co!*

Why did it take me so long to notice a music blog called In the Wings?

We're saved!  We're saved!  Ring the bells, shout it from the housetops:  classical music is saved!

*Many of you now know "Fo-Co" is Forrest's nickname from Nam.  Later, when he and I were doing black-opsy type work in Afghanistan, he was called other things, like "Freelancer" and "Mountaineer," but I'm really not supposed to tell you that.

I just found out about Present Music.  It is one of these small ensembles that seek emancipation from all stylistic categories.  They play new works from all types of composers, from John Adams to Amy X Neuburg, who "works somewhere within a triangle formed by pop music, classical music and performance art. Her 'Songs about Life & Death & Love & Insects' has been called a 'one-woman techno-circus.'"  Good luck, guys.  What you're trying to do probably ain't easy.

Darn, darn, darn.  I had a couple of other paragraphs of good, sassy stuff that I'm not going to post.  The comic affect was achieved at the expense of some people that, after sober reflection, I realize I don't particularly want to belittle.  This -- what is it called?  -- this virtue thing is sooooo boring.

One benefit to saying nothing:  I was going suggest classical music radio station announcers to add a little punch, a little bite, to their work.  I want to hear a bit more Wolfman Jack mixed into their Peter Allen impersonations when they read mini-bios of Johann Josef Fux.  However, if I wrote that, A.C. Douglas might think I was in some way suggesting classical music needs to pander to the ignorant masses to attract more listeners.  No, no, no!  I would never suggest that!  (ACD, please don't hurt me.)

I noticed a couple of possible long-lost cousins just missed out making the Slate 60 of top philanthropists:

Donald E. and Violet Himebaugh finished 61st, just keeping them off the Slate 60. The Himebaughs bequeathed $16.3 million to the Community Foundation for the Fox Valley Region in Appleton, Wis. Donald Himebaugh had worked as an accountant and office manager for a grocery wholesaler in Appleton, and his wife was a Spanish teacher at a local high school. Apparently the Himebaughs amassed their fortune through careful saving and investment.

At 16 million, their generosity exceeds mine in quantity, but perhaps not in quality:  the Fredösphere Foundation funds a network of reeducation camps for synaesthetes.

Call it adagiöblogging!  It's happening right now at Aworks, and Lynn is reacting.  Oddly enough, George W. Bush and John Calvin are involved.  Some say that, while hearing the piece, "[t]he despairing person senses that someone at last is able to precisely identify and locate their pain"; others just call it one of the "songs that makes you want to kill yourself."

Lawrence Dillon asks at Sequenza21 about musical memory and how it works.  (Short answer:  no one really knows.)  It reminds me of Forrest Covington (or "Fo-Co" as he is known by those of us who were with him in Nam) wondering how singers stay in tune.  I've always assumed composers occupy a continuum of thinkers and doers:  the thinkers get ideas by imagining music in their heads, while the doers get them by improvising on an instrument.  Based on comments he has made, I'll bet Forrest is more of a doer, the type who thinks with his fingers.  (I, on the other hand, am forced to the opposite end, since piano playing deadens my creativity.)  Could this relate to Forrest's surprise at singers' ability to keep pitches in their heads?  Naturally, this assumes they do keep the pitch in their heads, but we know that all too often, they do not.  Forrest, am I on to something here?  The world awaits your answer!

Every once in a while, you read an article that makes you say "unbelievable!" and then, a nanosecond latter, "of course!"  This is one of those articles.  And let me just state for the record:  I am not a fan of Star Trek.  The situation makes this aborted idea seem even more disturbing, if that were possible.

Richard Danielpour's new opera Margaret Garner takes the stage in Detroit this weekend.  The Detroit News has the story.  The director is keeping the racial tensions of the work tightly wound:

To emphasize the "us" and "them" nature of that antebellum society, Danielpour has created wholly separate 36-voice choruses, one black and one white. As their music is different, the two choirs have pursued all of their rehearsals apart from each other -- literally segregated. This for a racially mixed MOT Chorus that two weeks ago was singing "Tosca" together and next month will recombine for Donizetti's "The Daughter of the Regiment."

It has been a weird, disturbing several weeks, singers from both groups say.

Meanwhile ... here's a new approach to getting volunteers together to make music: the Isthmus Vocal Ensemble packs its rehearsals into a 3-week burst, gives a performance, then dissolves itself until the next year.  I've seen debates over this approach vs. the more typical one night a week approach.  My guess is that the 3-week schedule attracts more serious musicians, assuming any can make the commitment at all.  The other schedule seems more amenable to the "Monday night bowling" mentality, aka the "let's just have fun" mentality, which is no fun.