39 posts tagged “music”
I'm headed to work, where we're playing the Beatles, the Beatles, the Beatles, and very little else.
I'm probably the only woman in the Western Hemisphere who can't stand the Beatles.
Here's something to fill my brain with for the evening:
Too often, it seems as though I'm too busy being a music student to appreciate, well, music. I'm going to be trying to post a video here every morning, just for kicks and to remind me to slow down and listen to the music. Enjoy!
1) Renee Fleming has a new CD out. It's a gooily Italian conglomeration of Puccini and his ilk--some far better known than others, all good. It's retailing in the $15-ish area in stores, and $10 in at least one online place (Barnes & Noble, last I looked).
2) Pie in the Sky series 2 will be arriving in stores on January 26, 2010. Still a ways off, but it's nice to know that the British series, which features a gourmet-cooking-would-be-retired detective, will continue to be released here.
I regret to say (and regret even more to say in truth) that while I am diva through-and-through, my budget is not. Therefore, while building my music library I have picked up scores where I can: for free (you have an extra Boheme score and want to give it to moi? Excellent!); dirt cheap (Four Althouse collections for 50 cents each? SWEET.); cheaper-than-retail ($15 for a Cosi score? Better than the $30 it'll cost new). Occasionally, though, by the nature of these scores (used), there will be something about a score that Simply Will Not Do.
Take my Cosi fan tutte score, for example. I purchased it at Half Price Books several months ago and promptly stuck it on my shelf. When I was told I'd need it this semester, I pulled it off the shelf and brought it to school, where I produced it from my bag...and nearly lost my breakfast right there.
This score rivaled Letters from New York in terms of stale cigarette smoke smell. My scores are somewhat obsessively arranged (first by type of music, then by composer), and the score had gone to the bottom of a stack. Therefore, I'd no idea of the smoke smell until that morning.
What was a diva to do?
I got a couple of copies of the local fishwrap and put a sheet between every dozen pages or so. I then wrapped several sheets around the outside and took a four-day weekend from looking at (or SMELLING) it.
I brought it forth this morning, and while it is not yet smoke-free, it is much, MUCH better: the smoke smell is virtually imperceptable. I think the score might spend next weekend in newspaper, too, just to be on the safe side, but I judge this experiment a success.
One final note: newspaper is somewhat acidic. I don't particularly care about this score, per se: I just didn't want to have to purchase a new one. I would not use this on a keepsake score or antique book, as the newspaper acid would encourage the deterioration of the paper of such an item.
I have wanted a MP3 player for YEARS. It's just always been one of those things I've put off and put off and put off; usually, such a purchase would NOT be in the budget, and on the rare occasions that it was, something else came in ahead of it.
I was told last week that I'd need a voice recorder to record my voice lessons. My financial aid check also came in on Friday. I looked at some voice recorders, and one of decent quality would run $30-$45. This was the point at which my brain said, "Okay, for another $30 you could get an MP3 player that will record the lessons, play all your music and let you listen to the local classical music station. DO IT."
So I did.
See this? Meet the Sansa Fuze.
It's mine, mine, MINE!
(Bad picture; mine is a much darker red. Whatever.)
It is currently loading my not-insubstantial music library. I am a most happy diva. Tomorrow I shall revel in any music I choose to revel in en route to school, when driving home from school, and yes, while doing any kind of typing or filing at work.
Yay for the occasional bit of retail therapy!
ETA: Just finished putting all my music onto this player. I still have some space--not a huge amount, but some. A review? Well, the user manual that came with it sucked wastewater, but there is a much better one available online, as a quick bit of Google-fu will tell you. The playlist option requires you to sync the player with your computer, which is initially time-consuming but worth it in the end--if you want every bit of music from your computer on the player. It also tries to load all pictures from your computer. I put a hasty foot down on that one, as I'd prefer not to fill up the player with every picture I've ever felt compelled to store on my computer. Still, I can see how this could be a useful tool for some folks; I might even use it for a few photos.
There is a slot on the side of this player where you can, if you should choose, insert a memory card. This memory card is available for about $20 and will expand the memory from 4 GB to 12GB...a bargain if ever I heard of one. Yes, it'll play video, too.
Now for bed, so that I can get up and try this out!
Customer #1 I judged to be a fun customer for the first seventy-three seconds, as he wanted to purchase several opera DVDs. My opinion changed once he start to explain that it was his dream to have an affair with an opera singer because "you know, there's so much POWER." If any of my coworkers ever mentions to him my interest in opera, they will sleep with the fishes.
Customer #1: Creepy.
Customer #2 was a little old lady who was initially an utter witch but who settled down with some firm-but-nice customer service and then bought $200 worth of product, thus helping us set a near-record hour of sales.
Customer #2: Tolerable, yet necessary.
Customer #3 was this tiny Japanese lady of perhaps 35 or 40. She couldn't speak English very well, but she bowed and managed to get across that she wanted some recording of a classical violinist. Could I recommend anyone? "Well, certainly. How about Isaac Stern, or Itzhak Perlman (remind me to tell y'all about the time my uncle met Perlman), or maybe Jascha Heifetz?" As I said the names, I handed her CDs of the artists in question. Initially, I had thought that I only had one of Heifetz, in which he's playing Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto in D (Opus 35):
(Yes, I do realize that this is shortened for the film, but I liked that I could watch his face while he played. Yes, the whole thing is available on Youtube. Go watch or listen to it, if you so desire.)
Her son plays the double bass, and she wanted some specifically double-bass recordings for him to listen to. This is slightly more difficult, as the double bass hasn't been romanticized or popularized the way that the violin or cello have, but I manage to find her a list of double-bassists whose recordings I can order. I kept leaving her and returning with more information and CDs, and every time I came back/handed her another CD to listen to/what have you she bowed. Yes, as in from the waist. By the end of the half-hour or so I spent helping her, I bowed and asked her to come back.
ANYWAY. While digging around for a double-bass recording of any sort, I found two more Heifetz CDs and brought them over, as she seemed to like his playing better than that of the others.
Customer #3 bouncing slightly while squee-ing "HEIFETZ!!!!" with the sort of smile one generally sees on the face of a person who's just auditioned successfully into Juilliard?
Priceless.
I got an email today which told me that the church in which I grew up will close this fall.
This church was in a particularly nasty neighborhood. It was an old Catholic church of a style seen on the East Coast and in Europe. Honestly, if you were to walk into this church you would think you were in Italy somewhere. The paintings all over the ceiling, the organ, the stunning stained glass...all of it ad majorem Dei gloriam, and so very, very beautiful.
It was in this church that I first heard the chant and polyphony that have come to mean so much to me. The Latin Mass had a most peculiar time slot--two in the afternoon--and yet, since it was what I was used to, that seemed like the perfect time to have Mass.
The convent next door was a homeless shelter for a decade or so. As such, it was a disaster: it was poorly supervised and averaged over three hundred emergency calls per year for fires, overdoses, fights, etc. The church eventually regained control of the convent and turned into a building-of-all-use for the church and associated school. I remember holding receptions in what was once the nun's chapel: the choir seats/stalls were still in there.
The people of that parish worked so hard to keep it open, to keep a church in that neighborhood. They had so little to give--nearly all the congregation were within a generation of immigrating from Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Latin America. Many couldn't speak English. They gave that church so much: never was a church more immaculately kept; when one of the priests decided to organize the parish to clean up the neighborhood, the outpouring of volunteers for housepainting, cleaning of lots and throwing out of drug dealers (yes, the priest in question actually went door to door to tell the drug dealers to leave the neighborhood or clean up their act) was nothing short of amazing. The church school gave the parish kids a strong educational foundation that would serve them well all their lives.
Yale's school of nursing has wanted the land on which the church stands for expansion and parking for many years now. I don't know if the land will be sold to Yale. I suspect it will. I cry to think that that beautiful church will become an empty lot or a parking structure.
Perhaps I'm focusing overmuch on the building and less on the impact it has as a church. Forvgive me. In that church and listening to that chant, that polyphony, I was closer than I have ever been to the divine. The priests who said Mass there will always be in my memory: Father Zocco, the little Sicilian priest who dreamed for years of saying the Latin Mass once more and who, when given the opportunity, could not have been happier--he gave sermons laced with cooking and gardening metaphors, as he loved both; Father Newman, pastor of the church for so many years, who could often be found tinkering with the church boiler or cheerfully messing around under the hood of his Model T before Mass; Father Richardson, a pastor who learned the Latin Mass in order to minister better to his congregation; Father L'arche, who gave me my First Communion; Father Fitzpatrick, that champion of the Tridentine Rite, who died so very young last year. I never knew any of them terribly well, you understand, but they all formed me a little.
I remember one day creeping quietly up the stairs to the choir loft after Mass. I wanted so badly to see where that music was created. I stayed there silently for quite some time, just reveling in the fact that I was in the presence of Something so much bigger than I. When I eventually came back downstairs, half the congregation was frantic as I had simply disappeared...well, I was about seven or eight, and I did mention what sort of neighborhood the church is in.
I know deep down that the polyphony, the chant, the reverence, the love will always exist. I carry them with me. The demolition of a church cannot destroy those things.
And yet the tears stream down my face when I think that that church will soon not be there.
I have no immediate family members who have served in conflict. My father was ineligible to be drafted for Vietnam because of certain physical issues. I know I have an uncle (mother's brother) who was in the army, but I believe he served prior to the Vietnam conflict. (Note to self: ask about this sometime.) My father has no siblings; his father served very briefly in WWII before being discharged due to a non-conflict injury, while my mother's father, due to polio, never served.
Various men on my father's side of the family served in a variety of wars--WWII, Korea, Vietnam. I never met most of them. I usually only "met" them at a family funeral of some sort, which was, to say the least, less than conducive to forming relationships. I remember several military funerals. They are unparalleled in their beauty and reverence.
Truth be told, I know only one person at all well who has served in the armed forces. That saddens me. I don't know how to begin to say "thank you" to these men and women who were willing to lay down their lives so that I can live the way I do.
Might I offer a suggestion? Tomorrow, go take a veteran out to dinner. Thank him (I use "him" because there is still a male majority, not to dissuade anyone from spending time with a woman who served). And make a note on your calendar to do that again next month. Or in two months. Whatever.
Because they're there all year: not just late in May, that first week of July, and that second week of November.
Hand the barista in a coffeeshop near a parade route or ceremony $20 and tell her you're buying coffee for the next five veterans who come in.
Pick up the check for that four-top of old men who are wearing uniforms, or Legion caps, or what have you.
Or tell your waitress to tell them that dessert's on a grateful citizen.
Go to your local cemetary and clean the grass off of a few markers. Leave a few flowers. Bow your head, and think, feel, pray for a few minutes.
Talk to a veteran of the Second World War about his experiences, if he wishes. Remember that talk. Someday in the not-too-distant future, there will not be even one veteran left who served in that conflict, and you'll be able to tell your children/nieces/nephews/young friends/grandkids that you remember a time when you could take someone who served then out for coffee and pie.
Give a veteran a hug, if it seems right. Hand him a kleenex afterwards. I once helped a gentleman in the music department of The Bookstore. His son was spending Christmas in Afghanistan. I helped him pick out a gift for his son to "give" to his son's girlfriend. As I rang him through, he mentioned how amazing he found it that he can email back and forth with his son; when he was in Vietnam, he said, it often took weeks for letters to get back and forth. After the transaction, I held my hand out to him, thanked him, and wished him a good Christmas. This huge biker type--over six feet, 275 easy, all leather, chains and long hair--had tears in his eyes when he ignored my hand and gave me a big bear hug.
The welcome back that many Vietnam veterans got was nearly as bad--and worse in some ways--than some of their experiences over there. Remember that, whatever you might think of that war.
Consider attending a military funeral or two in the next year in order to show support. That goes treble if a particular bunch of scumbags--whose name I will not give publicity to on this blog--feels compelled to show up and scream insults at the families of dead soldiers. Don't engage them, mind. Just block the family's view. Don't let this already horrifying experience--ie, burying a loved one who died suddenly--become more of a nightmare than it already is.
There's something you can do to show gratitude, even if it's just buying a cup of coffee for a person who was willing to die for you.
And listen to this, because John Williams put it much better than I ever could.
Dear Unknown Diva,
I don't know why or how I ended up with your music. Did you once teach singing? Did you sing or live hear in cowtown? What made you give up your music? Why, instead of gifting it or selling it to a fellow diva, did you donate it to the library book sale?
(The only reasons I've come up with are exceptionally morbid ones.)
Why didn't you write your name in your music? Why?
Whatever the reason, though, thank you.
Thanks to your generosity, I walked away from today's book sale with seven song books for "soprano" or "medium high" voice. These are good songbooks, too, and all ones that I'll use often. Oh yes, they're a bit battered, and one is rather elderly. I don't care. I love used music; it has history--even if that history is unknown to me.
If I were to buy these songbooks new and with the accompaniment CDs you so kindly left in them, I'd pay a hundred bucks or a touch over. I spent three dollars and fifty cents.
So, whoever you are, thank you, thank you, thank you, and may peace be with you!
the UbiCaritas Diva
Watch the following. Music majors--those of you who've had the agony joy of analyzing/writing a fugue--put down all beverages previous to watching this. I refuse to be responsible for ruined keyboards or monitors.
I heard this on WRR (local classical music station) whilst driving home from work tonight, and could barely drive because I was laughing so hard.
Listen carefully.
