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MUSIC
MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS
MUSICIANS --- MYSTERY --- MYTHOLOGY

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MUSIC

[QUOTES FOLLOW LINKS]

see:

HAROLD ARLEN

BACH, BAGPIPES

(THE) BEATLES

BEETHOVEN

BIG BAND

CLASSICAL MUSIC

COMPOSERS, CONDUCTORS

ELVIS

FLUTE

JUDY GARLAND

JAZZ

MOZART

MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS, MUSICIANS (below)

OPERA

PIANO

COLE PORTER

RAP

RAP MUSIC

ROCK 'n' ROLL

FRANK SINATRA, SINGING

SOUNDS


I can't listen to that much Wagner. I start
getting the urge to conquer Poland.
--Woody Allen [Allen Stewart Konigsberg] (1935— )
American actor, screenwriter, and director.

I love Wagner, but the music I prefer is that of
a cat hung up by its tail outside a window and
trying to stick to the panes of glass with its
claws.
--Charles Baudelaire (1821—1867)
French poet and critic.

I prefer Offenbach to Bach often.
--Sir Thomas Beecham (1879—1961)
English conductor.

Beethoven can write music, thank God, but
he can do nothing else on earth.
--Ludwig van Beethoven (1770—1827)
German composer.
Letter to Ferdinand Ries [20 December 1822].

Jack Benny played Mendelssohn last night. Mendelssohn lost.
--Jack Benny [Benjamin Kubelsky] (1894—1974)
American entertainer.

Which of the powers, love or music, is able to lift man to the
sublimest heights? It is a great question, but it seems to me
that one might answer it thus: love cannot express the idea
of music, while music may give an idea of love. But why
separate them? They are the two wings of the soul.
--Louis Hector Berlioz (1803—1869)
French composer.
_Memoires_ [1870]

TV, which compared to music plays a comparatively small role in
the formation of young people's character and taste, is a consensus
monster—the Right monitors its content for sex, the Left for violence,
and many other interested sects for many other things. But the music
has hardly been touched, and what efforts have been made are both
ineffectual and misguided about the nature of the problem. The result
is nothing less than parents' loss of control over their children's moral
education at a time when no one else is seriously concerned with it.
--Allan Bloom (1930—1992)
American writer and educator.
_The Closing of the American Mind_ [1987]

There’s something about music that’s healing. There’ve been many times
that I don’t feel good at all, but once I hit the stage, something transforms.
I don’t know why, I don’t know how, but it just does. Unless you’re just
about dead, music’ll do something for you.
--Ray Charles (1930—2004)
American pianist and soul singer.
Interview in _The Los Angeles Times_ [1996].

Music rises from the human heart. When the emotions are
touched, they are expressed in sounds, and when the sounds
take definite forms, we have music. Therefore the music of a
peaceful and prosperous country is quiet and joyous, and the
government is orderly; the music of a country in turmoil shows
dissatisfaction and anger, and the government is chaotic; and
the music of a destroyed country shows sorrow and
remembrance of the past and the people are distressed.
Thus we see music and government are directly connected
with each other.
--Confucius (551—479 B.C.)
K'ung Ch'iu, Chinese philosopher.
_On Music_

Music has charms to soothe a savage breast,
To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.
--William Congreve (1670—1729)
English dramatist.
"The Mourning Bride", act I, sc. I [1697]

Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.
--Elvis Costello [Declan MacManus] (1954— )
English singer and songwriter.
Quoted in "Musician" [October 1983].

If I had to live my life again, I would have made a rule to read
some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week;
for perhaps the parts of my brain now atrophied would thus have
been kept active through use. The loss of these tastes is a loss
of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to the intellect, and
more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional
part of our nature.
--Charles Darwin (1809—1882)
English naturalist.
_Autobiography_ (ed. Francis Darwin) [1887]

-

INTERVIEWER: Do you know what your songs are about?
DYLAN: Yeah, some are about ten minutes long,
others five or six.
--Bob Dylan [Robert Allen Zimmerman] (1941— )
American singer and songwriter.
[In 1965.]

-

If yesterday's rock was the music of abandon, today's is that
of abandonment. The odd truth about contemporary teenage
music — the characteristic that most separates it from what has
gone before — is its compulsive insistence on the damage wrought
by broken homes, family dysfunction, checked-out parents, and
(especially) absent fathers.

[...]

To put this perhaps unexpected point more broadly, during the same
years in which progressive-minded and politically correct adults
have been excoriating Ozzie and Harriet as an artifact of 1950s-
style oppression, many millions of American teenagers have enshrined
a new generation of music idols whose shared generational signature
in song after song is to rage about what not having had a nuclear
family has done to them. This is quite a fascinating puzzle of the
times. The self-perceived emotional damage scrawled large across
contemporary music may not be statistically quantifiable, but it is
nonetheless among the most striking of all the unanticipated
consequences of our home-alone world.

--Mary Eberstadt, "Eminem Is Right",
_Policy Review_ [December 2004]

-

ILSA: Play it once, Sam, for old times' sake.
SAM: I don't know what you mean, Miss Ilsa.
ILSA: Play it, Sam. Play 'As Time Goes By.'
--Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, and Howard Koch (1902—1995)
"Casablanca" [1942 film]. Spoken by Ingrid Bergman and Dooley Wilson.

It is right well done that pilgrims have with them
both singers and also pipers; that when one of them
that goeth barefoot striketh his toe against a stone
and hurteth him sore, and maketh him to bleed, it is
well done that he or his fellow begin then a song or
else take out of his bosom a bagpipe for to drive
away with such mirth the hurt of his fellow; for with
such solace the travail and weariness of pilgrims is
lightly and merrily borne.
--Desiderius Erasmus (1469—1536)
Dutch humanist and theologian.
_Pilgrimages to St. Mary of Walsingham and St.
Thomas of Canterbury_ [1875 edn.] p. 21

Yet there is one thing the world with all its rottenness
cannot take from us, and that is the deep and abiding
joy and consolation perpetuate in great music. Here
the spirit may find home and relief when all else fails.
--Eric Fenby (1906—1997)
British musician, musicologist, and author.
_Delius as I Knew Him_ [1936]

Singin' in the rain, just singin' in the rain.
What a glorious feeling, I'm happy again.
--Arthur Freed (1894—1973)
American lyricist.
"Singin' in the Rain" In the musical film _Hollywood Review of 1929_ [1929].

Bach almost persuades me to be a Christian.
--Roger Fry (1866—1934)
English art critic and painter.
In Virginia Woolf, _Roger Fry_ [1940].

-

They told me later that my blood pressure when I arrived at the
clinic across the street measured zero; that it was lucky I had
decided to walk and not wait for a ride, because I would likely
have bled to death otherwise. But it was a very difficult walk.
When I looked down at my right hand I saw the bones sticking
out in all directions and the skin crumpled like paper.

It could only have been a two- or three-minute walk at the
outside, but the possibility existed that I would pass out or
just stop, and I didn't want to. Providentially an old Zionist
marching song with a good, strong beat came into my head.
Music is valuable.

--David Hillel Gelernter (1955— )
Professor of computer science at Yale injured opening a package from the "Unibomber."
_Drawing Life: Surviving the Unibomber_ [1997]

-

-

Music begins where words end.
--Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749—1832)
German poet, novelist, and playwright.


A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry,
and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order
that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the
beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul.
--Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749—1832)
German poet, novelist, and playwright.
Quoted in James M. Trotter _Music and Some Highly Musical People_ [1880].

-

I know only two tunes: one of them is "Yankee Doodle"
and the other one isn't.
--Ulysses S. Grant (1822—1885)
American Unionist general and 18th President of the United States [1869—1877].

-

Rock and roll was music to get pregnant by.
Rap is music to get dead by.
--Lewis Grizzard (1946—1994)
American author and commentator.
On the American South; [mid-1980s.]

I occasionally play works by contemporary composers and for
two reasons. First, to discourage the composer from writing
any more, and secondly, to remind myself how much I
appreciate Beethoven.
--Jascha Heifetz (1901—1987)
Russian-born American violinist.

God Save me from a bad neighbor and
a beginner on the fiddle.
--Italian proverb

-

[On hearing a violin solo:]
Difficult do you call it, Sir? I wish it were impossible.
--Samuel Johnson (1709—1784)
English poet, critic, and lexicographer.
Quoted in William Seward _Supplement to the
Anecdotes of Distinguished Persons_ [1797].


Of all noises, I think music is the least disagreeable.
--Samuel Johnson (1709—1784)
English poet, critic, and lexicographer.
Quoted in _The Tickler_ [1 February 1821].

-

[God Bless America, Easter Parade, White Christmas, Always, Blue Skies,
Alexander's Ragtime Band, Mandy, "The Continental" (Fred and Ginger),
Cheek to Cheek (Fred and Ginger again), I Love a Piano, The Girl That
I Marry, Doin' What Comes Natcherly, How Deep is the Ocean (How High
is the Sky), (You're Not Sick) You're Just In Love...] Irving Berlin doesn't
have 'a place in' American music; Irving Berlin _is_ American music.
--Jerome Kern (1885—1945)
American composer.
When asked about Irving Berlin's place in American music.

The sweetest music is the sound of
the voice of the woman we love.
--Jean de La Bruy่re (1645—1696)
French essayist and moralist.
_The Characters_ [1688] "Of Women," tr. Henri van Laun [1929]

Last Thursday, at the Harvard Square Theatre, I saw my rock 'n' roll past
flash before my eyes. And I saw something else: I saw rock and roll future
and its name is Bruce Springsteen. And on a night when I needed to feel
young, he made me feel like I was hearing music for the very first time.
--Jon Landau, "Growing Young With Rock And Roll,"
The Real Paper [22 May 1974]

A Chicago high school punished truants by making
them listen to Frank Sinatra records.
--Bill Mandel
"The Year 1992: Calling It Like It Was"
_San Francisco Sunday Examiner and Chronicle_ [20 December 1992]

There are two things John [Lennon] and I always do
when we're going to sit down and write a song. First
of all we sit down. Then we think about writing a
song.
--Paul McCartney (1942— )
English pop singer and songwriter.

Ahh, the soothing o' the Pipes... Whenever I find myself
missing its melodious sounds, I just toss the cat in the
dryer on low heat.
--Jordan Montgomery

-

Melody is the essence of music. I compare a good
melodist to a fine racer, and counterpoints to
hack post-horses.
--Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756—1791)
Austrian composer regarded as one of the greatest musical geniuses ever.
In Michael Kelly _Reminiscences_ [1826].


Music ... must never offend the ear; it must please
the hearer, in other words, it must never cease
to be music.
--Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756—1791)
Austrian composer regarded as one of the greatest musical geniuses ever.
Letter to Leopold Mozart [26 September 1781].

-

I don't like country music, but I don't mean to
denigrate those who do. And for those people
who like country music, denigrate means 'put
down.'
--Bob Newhart (1929— )
American stand-up comedian and actor.

Without music, life would be a mistake.
--Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (1844—1900)
German classical scholar, philosopher, and critic of culture.
(1889, "Die Gotzen-Dammerung", translates as "Twilight of Idols.")

-

kap informs USENET in 2002:

Three months ago I was spinning the dial on the radio and I came
across a station playing a song from the fifties. I can't say I remember
which tune it was, perhaps Ricky Nelson's 'Poor Little Fool.' The song
ended and instead of a commercial or other talk another song played,
let's say it was Connie Francis' 'Who's Sorry Now.' Afterwhich, another,
without interruption, 'Maybe' by the Chantels. After three or four songs
a brief commercial and then right back to the music. I was in heaven.

I'd finally found a station which played my "youth." I had always enjoyed
music from the forties but it is difficult, if not impossible, to find a station
nowdays which does so. Anyway, the forties were more my mother's time,
not mine. Her music was pretty good although I'm sure I never told her I
thought so. More likely I probably upturned my nose, and if not condemning
outright, certainly offered no encouragment. Of course once I gave her
music a chance I found it not altogether distasteful. I still remember some
of the tunes she played around the house.....'Little Things Mean A Lot,"
'Secretly' (I wonder what the Old Girl was up to!), Como, Cloony, Crosby,
Fitzgerald, et al. Later, she liked Elvis - no doubt a parent trying to be hip.
Disgraceful! Since she liked Elvis I had to, had to, dislike him. Matteroffact,
I hated him! He was the worst.

It must have taken me a good twenty years to really listen to Elvis and
when I finally did, well, duh, I found he wasn't bad; okay, he was the
best rock-n-roll singer ever. ......My new station played Elvis, and the
Cleftones, and Tillotsen, and Gore, and the Teddy Bears, and Do Wop....
one after the other with little talk. I wondered how such a station could
survive. I taped as much as I could just in case my treasure ceased to
exist. When we moved I found I no longer had the time to listen to radio,
apart from a few minutes in the morning when I would awake to 'He's A
Rebel,' 'Duke Of Earl,' or 'Just Ask Your Heart.'

....Saturday morning I listened as the announcer said that on Monday
1140 AM was becoming "all talk." They're going to talk about love and
sports and all the L.A.Dodger ball games will be broadcast. I suppose
somebody will listen. I'll miss 1140 AM just the way I miss everything
else that has changed. The old neighborhood isn't the same, many of
the old friends are gone, the styles have changed, the hairdo's....

Unarguably, the fifties and early sixties had their share of goofy songs,
'The Twist' giving rise to all the other 'Twisting' songs, 'The Hully-Gully,'
'The Mashed Potato' .....the car songs, 'The Leader of the Pack,' 'Beep-
Beep,' the history songs, 'Sink the Bismark,' 'North to Alaska,' nutty
songs, 'Flying Purple People Eater' .....weren't they fun! And maybe
you had one special song, perhaps, 'Today I Met The Boy I'm Gonna
Marry.'

Somewhere down the road I'll find another station that will make me
think I'm 17 again and listening to WABC in New York City, without
the commercials. Until then I'll just read and feel a bit older.

kap

-

The Orchestra very often played while the prisoners
were at work. To the accompaniment of this music,
the guards would call out prisoners whose work was
especially feeble and shoot them there and then.
--Polish miner deported to the Soviet labor camp at Maldiak,
in Norman Davies _God's Playground_ v. 2 [1981] p. 450.

Some to church repair, not for the doctrine,
but the music there.
--Alexander Pope (1688—1744)
English poet.

When you are about thirty-five years old,
something terrible always happens to music.
--Steve Race

[On Beethoven's 9th:]
Nobody will ever write anything better than this symphony.
--Sergei Rachmaninov (1873—1943)
Russian composer and pianist.

Joy, sorrow, tears, lamentation, laughter — to all these music gives voice,
but in such a way that we are transported from the world of unrest to a
world of peace, and see reality in a new way, as if we were sitting by a
mountain lake and contemplating hills and woods and clouds in the
tranquil and fathomless water.
--Albert Schweitzer (1875—1965)
Franco-German theologian, philosopher, and mission doctor.
_Albert Schweitzer: Thoughts for Our Times_ (ed. Erica Anderson) [1975]

-

The man that hath no music in himself,
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils.
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus.
Let no such man be trusted.
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_The Merchant of Venice_ [1596—1598], V, i, 83


Music oft hath such a charm
To make bad good, and good provoke to harm.
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_Measure for Measure_ [1604]

-

My favorite story involved the song "I Wanna Be Around To Pick Up the
Pieces When Somebody Breaks Your Heart." A lady in Ohio named Sadie
Zimmerstedt sent an angry letter to famous songwriter Johnny Mercer.
She was mad at Frank Sinatra for divorcing his first wife, Nancy, and
wrote a note on lined calendar paper asking Mercer to write a song
which should be entitled: "I Wanna Be Around to Pick Up the Pieces
When Somebody Breaks Your Heart." The rest is, of course, pop music
history. Mercer wrote the song and put her name on it along with his,
Tony Bennett made it famous and Sadie got a $50,000 royalty check.
Whether or not it bothered Sinatra, surely Sadie was smiling all the
way to the bank.
--Tony Stein in "The Chesapeake Clipper" Norfolk, Virginia [July 2001]

A Steinway will never sound quite the same again.
--Steinway & Sons, piano manufacturer.
Sole copy in ad honoring the memory of Vladimir Horowitz who had just died.
_New York Times_ [10 November 1989]

I do play the violin, but not well enough to hold a
steady job — just a series of one night stands.
--Isaac Stern (1920—2001)
Ukrainian-born violinist.

Music washes away from the soul the dust
of everyday living.
--Leopold Stokowski (1882—1977)
Conductor of the Cincinnati & NBC Symphony Orchestras.

In a world of peace and love, music would be the
universal language.
--Henry David Thoreau (1817—1862)
American essayist, poet, and practical philosopher.
_The Service_ [1840], Chapter 2

[Comment to his orchestra:]
Assassins!
--Arturo Toscanini (1867—1957)
Italian conductor.

Sirs, I have tested your machine. It adds a new terror
to life and makes death a long-felt want.
--Herbert Beerbohm Tree (1852—1917)
English actor-manager.
When asked for a testimonial by a gramophone company,
in Hesketh Pearson _Beerbohm-Tree_ [1956], ch. 19.

The sound of laughter has always seemed to me
the most civilized music in the universe.
--Sir Peter Alexander Ustinov [1921—2004]
British entertainer, writer, and humanitarian.

All my life I was having trouble with women. . . . Then, after I quit
having trouble with them, I could feel in my heart that somebody
would always have trouble with them, so I kept writing those blues.
--Muddy Waters (1915-1983)
American blues singer and guitarist.
In Tony Palmer _All You Need is Love_ [1976].

--

Country music titles

"Come On Down Off The Stove, Granny, You're Too Old To Ride The Range."
"You're the Reason Our Kids Are So Ugly"
"I've Been Flushed From The Bathroom Of Your Heart"
"My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend And I Sure Do Miss Him"
"She Got The Ring And I Got The Finger"
"Get Your Tongue Outta My Mouth 'Cause I'm Kissing You Goodbye"
"I Got In At 2 With A 10 And Woke Up At 10 With A 2"
"Mama Get The Hammer (There's A Fly On Papa's Head)"
"I'd Rather Have A Bottle In Front-a Me Than a Frontal Lobotomy"

--

Most Blues begin with: "Woke up this morning..."

"I got a good woman" is a bad way to begin the Blues, unless you
stick something nasty in the next line like, "I got a good woman,
with the meanest face in town."

The Blues is simple. After you get the first line right, repeat it. Then
find something that rhymes . . . sort of: "Got a good woman with the
Meanest face in town. Yes, I got a good woman with the meanest face
in town. Got teeth like Margaret Thatcher, and she weigh 500 pound."

The Blues is not about choice. You stuck in a ditch, you stuck in a ditch-
ain't no way out.

Blues is not a matter of color. It's a matter of bad luck. Tiger Woods
cannot sing the blues. Sonny Liston could. Ugly white people also
got a leg up on the blues.

Blues cars are Chevys, Fords, Cadillacs and broken-down trucks.
Blues don't travel in Volvos, BMWs or Sport Utility Vehicles. Most
Blues Transportation is a Greyhound bus or a southbound train.
Jet aircraft and state-sponsored motor pools ain't even in the
running.

Walkin' plays a major part in the blues lifestyle. So does fixin' to die.

Teenagers can't sing the Blues. They ain't fixin' to die yet.

Adults sing the Blues. In Blues, "adulthood" means being old enough
to get the Electric chair if you shoot a man in Memphis.

Blues can take place in New York City but not in Hawaii or any place
in Canada. Hard times in Minneapolis or Seattle is probably just
clinical depression. Chicago, St. Louis and Kansas City are still the
best places to have the Blues. You cannot have the blues in any
place that don't get rain.

A man with male pattern baldness ain't the blues. A woman with male
pattern baldness is. Breaking your leg 'cause you were skiing is not the
blues. Breaking your leg 'cause a alligator chomped on it is.

You can't have no Blues in a office or a shopping mall. The lighting is
wrong. Go outside to the parking lot or sit by the dumpster.

Good places for the Blues:

a. highway
b. jailhouse
c. empty bed
d. bottom of a whiskey glass.

Bad places for the Blues:
a. Nordstrom's
b. gallery openings
c. Ivy League institutions
d. golf courses.

No one will believe it's the Blues if you wear a suit, 'less you happen to
be a old ethnic person, and you slept in it.

Do you have the right to sing the Blues?

Yes, if:
a. you older than dirt
b. you blind
c. you shot a man in Memphis
d. you can't be satisfied.

No, if:
a. you have all your teeth
b. you were once blind but now can see
c. the man in Memphis lived
d. you have a 401K or trust fund.

If you ask for water and your darlin' give you gasoline, it's the Blues.

Other acceptable Blues beverages are:
a. cheap wine
b. whiskey or bourbon
c. muddy water
d. nasty black coffee.

The following are NOT Blues beverages:
a. Perrier
b. Chardonnay
c. Snapple
d. Slim Fast
e. Diet Coke.

If death occurs in a cheap motel or a shotgun shack, it's a Blues death.
Stabbed in the back by a jealous lover is another Blues way to die. So
are the electric chair, substance abuse and dying lonely on a broken-down
cot.

You can't have a Blues death if you die during a tennis match or while
getting liposuction.

Some Blues names for women:
a. Sadie
b. Big Mama
c. Bessie
d. Fat River Dumpling
e. Caldonia.

Some Blues names for men:
a. Joe
b. Willie
c. Little Willie
d. Big Willie
e. Leroy Persons.

Ladies with names like Michelle, Amber, Jennifer, Tiffany, Brooke, Brittany,
and Heather can't sing the Blues no matter how many men they shoot in
Memphis.

Make your own Blues name Starter Kit:

a. name of physical infirmity (Blind, Cripple, Lame, etc.)
b. first name (see above) plus name of fruit (Lemon, Melon, Kiwi, etc.)
c. last name of President (Jefferson, Johnson, Fillmore, etc.)
e.g.: Blind Melon Jefferson, Jakeleg Lemon Johnson or Cripple Kiwi Fillmore,
etc. (Well, maybe not "Kiwi.")

Oh, by the way. I don't care how tragic your life. If you own a computer,
you cannot sing the blues.

--anon.

--

_Waltz_, in Music, the name of a riotous and indecent German dance.
-- Definition in an art dictionary [1825], cited in OED s.v. waltz.

---

There's a fairly long passage in the last movement of
Beethoven's 9th Symphony in which the basses have
nothing to do.

One evening at a concert at Carnegie Hall the three
bassists looped strings around their scores so as not
to lose their place and walked out. They went next
door to the Carnegie Tavern and had a few drinks.

Alas, it was the last of the ninth, the score was tied,
and the bassists were loaded!

---

A lady in Ohio named Sadie Zimmerstedt sent an angry letter
to famous songwriter Johnny Mercer. She was mad at Frank
Sinatra for divorcing his first wife, Nancy, and wrote a note
on lined calendar paper asking Mercer to write a song which
should be entitled: "I Wanna Be Around to Pick Up the Pieces
When Somebody Breaks Your Heart." The rest is, of course,
pop music history. Mercer wrote the song and put her name
on it along with his, Tony Bennett made it famous and Sadie
got a $50,000 royalty check.

----

From National Public Radio's poll:

The 100 most important American musical works of the 20th century:
("Important" was specially defined.)

* ADAGIO FOR STRINGS, SAMUEL BARBER (1938)
* AIN'T THAT A SHAME, words/music ANTOINE "FATS" DOMINO/DAVE
BARTHOLOMEW; as performed by FATS DOMINO (1955)
* ALEXANDER'S RAGTIME BAND, words/music IRVING BERLIN (1911)
* ALL OR NOTHING AT ALL, words/music JACK LAWRENCE/ARTHUR ALTMAN; as
performed by FRANK SINATRA with HARRY JAMES & HIS ORCHESTRA (1939)
* APPALACHIAN SPRING, AARON COPLAND (1944)
* AS TIME GOES BY, words/music HERMAN HUPFELD (1931)
* BACK IN THE SADDLE AGAIN, words/music RAY WHITLEY/GENE AUTRY; as
performed by GENE AUTRY (1939)
* BLOWIN' IN THE WIND, words/music BOB DYLAN; as performed by BOB
DYLAN (1962)
* BLUE MOON OF KENTUCKY, words/music BILL MONROE (1946); as
performed by BILL MONROE AND HIS BLUE GRASS BOYS (1954)
* BLUE SUEDE SHOES, CARL PERKINS; as performed by CARL PERKINS
(1955)
* BODY AND SOUL, words EDWARD HEYMAN/ROBERT SOUR/FRANK EYTON, music
JOHNNY GREEN (1930); as performed by COLEMAN HAWKINS & HIS
ORCHESTRA (1939)
* BORN TO RUN (LP), BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN (1975)
* A CHORUS LINE (musical), words EDWARD KLEBAN/music MARVIN HAMLISCH
(1975)
* COAL MINER'S DAUGHTER, words/music LORETTA LYNN; as performed by
LORETTA LYNN (1970)
* CRAZY, words/music WILLIE NELSON; as performed by PATSY CLINE
(1961)
* DJANGO, JOHN LEWIS; as performed by THE MODERN JAZZ QUARTET (1954)
* DREAM A LITTLE DREAM OF ME, words GUS KAHN/music WILBUR SCHWANDT
and FABIAN ANDRE (1931)
* DRUMMING, STEVE REICH (1971)
* FIDDLER ON THE ROOF (musical), words SHELDON HARNICK/music JERRY
BOCK (1964)
* FINE AND MELLOW, words/music BILLIE HOLIDAY (1940); as performed
by BILLIE HOLIDAY with MAL WALDRON ALL-STARS on "The Sound of
Jazz" (CBS-TV) (1957)
* FIRE AND RAIN, words/music JAMES TAYLOR; as performed by JAMES
TAYLOR (1970)
* FOGGY MOUNTAIN BREAKDOWN, EARL SCRUGGS; as performed by LESTER
FLATT and EARL SCRUGGS and the FOGGY MOUNTAIN BOYS (1949)
* 4:33, JOHN CAGE (1952)
* GIVE MY REGARDS TO BROADWAY, words/music GEORGE M. COHAN (1904)
* GONE WITH THE WIND (film score), MAX STEINER (1939)
* GOOD VIBRATIONS, words MIKE LOVE/BRIAN WILSON, music BRIAN WILSON;
as performed by THE BEACH BOYS (1966)
* GRACELAND (LP), PAUL SIMON (1986)
* GRAND CANYON SUITE, FERDE GROFE (1931)
* GREAT BALLS OF FIRE, words/music OTIS BLACKWELL/JACK HAMMER; as
performed by JERRY LEE LEWIS (1957)
* THE GREAT PRETENDER, words/music BUCK RAM; as performed by THE
PLATTERS (1955)
* GUYS AND DOLLS (musical), words/music FRANK LOESSER (1950)
* HELLHOUND ON MY TRAIL, words/music ROBERT JOHNSON; as performed by
ROBERT JOHNSON (1937)
* HELLO DOLLY, words/music JERRY HERMAN; as performed by LOUIS
ARMSTRONG (1963)
* HIS EYE IS ON THE SPARROW, words/music C.D. MARTIN/C.H. GABRIEL;
as performed by MAHALIA JACKSON (1958)
* HOOCHIE COOCHIE MAN, words/music WILLIE DIXON; as performed by
MUDDY WATERS (1954)
* HOUND DOG/DON'T BE CRUEL, words/music JERRY LEIBER/MIKE STOLLER;
OTIS BLACKWELL/ELVIS PRESLEY; as performed by ELVIS PRESLEY (1956)
* I GOT RHYTHM, words IRA GERSHWIN/music GEORGE GERSHWIN (1930)
* I WALK THE LINE, words/music JOHNNY CASH; as performed by JOHNNY
CASH (1956)
* I WANNA BE SEDATED, words/music RAMONES; as performed by RAMONES
(1978)
* I'M SO LONESOME I COULD CRY, words/music HANK WILLIAMS; as
performed by HANK WILLIAMS (1949)
* IN THE MOOD, words ANDY RAZAF/music JOE GARLAND (1938), as
performed by GLENN MILLER & HIS ORCHESTRA (1939)
* (GOODNIGHT) IRENE, words/music HUDDIE LEDBETTER (LEAD BELLY)/JOHN
LOMAX (1936)
* KIND OF BLUE (LP), MILES DAVIS (1959)
* KING PORTER STOMP, JELLY ROLL MORTON (1923)
* KO KO, CHARLIE PARKER; as performed by CHARLIE PARKER (1945)
* LA BAMBA, words/music WILLIAM CLAUSON; as performed by RITCHIE
VALENS (1958)
* LET'S STAY TOGETHER, words/music AL GREEN/WILLIE MITCHELL/AL
JACKSON; as performed by AL GREEN (1971)
* LIGHT MY FIRE, words/music JOHN DENSMORE/ROBERT KRIEGER/RAYMOND
MANZAREK/JIM MORRISON; as performed by THE DOORS (1967)
* LIKE A ROLLING STONE, words/music BOB DYLAN; as performed by BOB
DYLAN (1965)
* A LOVE SUPREME (LP), JOHN COLTRANE (1964)
* MACK THE KNIFE, words MARC BLITZSTEIN (after BERTOLT BRECHT)/music
KURT WEILL (1928/1956)
* MAYBELLENE, words/music CHUCK BERRY; as performed by CHUCK BERRY &
HIS COMBO (1955)
* MOOD INDIGO, words/music EDWARD KENNEDY "DUKE" ELLINGTON/ALBANY
"BARNEY" BIGARD/IRVING MILLS ; as performed by DUKE ELLINGTON AND
HIS ORCHESTRA (1930)
* MY FAIR LADY (musical), words ALAN JAY LERNER/music FREDERICK
LOEWE (1956)
* MY FUNNY VALENTINE, words LORENZ HART/music RICHARD RODGERS (1937)
* MY GIRL, words/music WILLIAM ROBINSON/RONALD WHITE; as performed
by THE TEMPTATIONS (1964)
* NIGHT AND DAY, words/music COLE PORTER (1932)
* A NIGHT IN TUNISIA, JOHN BIRKS "DIZZY" GILLESPIE/FRANK PAPARELLI
(1944); as recorded by DIZZY GILLESPIE AND HIS ORCHESTRA (1946)
* OKLAHOMA! (musical), words OSCAR HAMMERSTEIN/music RICHARD RODGERS
(1943)
* ONCE IN A LIFETIME, words/music DAVID BYRNE/BRIAN ENO/TALKING
HEADS; as performed by TALKING HEADS (1980)
* ONE O'CLOCK JUMP, WILLIAM "COUNT" BASIE; as performed by THE COUNT
BASIE ORCHESTRA (1937)
* OYE COMO VA, words/music TITO PUENTE (1963); as performed by
SANTANA (1970)
* PAPA'S GOT A BRAND NEW BAG, words/music JAMES BROWN; as performed
by JAMES BROWN (1965)
* PEGGY SUE, words/music JERRY ALLISON/BUDDY HOLLY/NORMAN PETTY; as
recorded by BUDDY HOLLY (1957)
* PORGY AND BESS (opera), words IRA GERSHWIN/DUBOSE HEYWARD/music
GEORGE GERSHWIN (1935)
* PSYCHO (film score), BERNARD HERRMANN (1960)
* PURPLE HAZE, words/music JIMI HENDRIX; as performed by THE JIMI
HENDRIX EXPERIENCE (1967)
* RAPPER'S DELIGHT, words/music BERNARD EDWARDS/NILE RODGERS; as
performed by SUGARHILL GANG (1979)
* RESPECT, words/music OTIS REDDING (1965); as performed by ARETHA
FRANKLIN (1967)
* RHAPSODY IN BLUE, GEORGE GERSHWIN (1924); orchestrated by FERDE
GROFE (1924/1926/1942)
* (WE'RE GONNA) ROCK AROUND THE CLOCK, words/music MAX
FREEDMAN/JAMES MYERS a.k.a. JIMMY DE KNIGHT (1953); first recorded
by BILL HALEY & HIS COMETS (1954)
* 'ROUND MIDNIGHT, words BERNARD HANIGHEN; music THELONIOUS
MONK/COOTIE WILLIAMS (1944)
* (GET YOUR KICKS ON) ROUTE 66, words/music BOBBY TROUP; as
performed by THE KING COLE TRIO (1946)
* THE ST. LOUIS BLUES, words/music W.C. HANDY (1914); as performed
by BESSIE SMITH (1925)
* SHOW BOAT (musical), words OSCAR HAMMERSTEIN/music JEROME KERN
(1927)
* SING, SING, SING, words/music LOUIS PRIMA (1936), as arranged by
JIMMY MUNDY and performed by BENNY GOODMAN & HIS ORCHESTRA at
Carnegie Hall (1938)
* SINGIN' IN THE RAIN (film musical), words/music ARTHUR FREED/NACIO
HERB BROWN (1952)
* (SITTIN' ON) THE DOCK OF THE BAY, words/music OTIS REDDING/STEVE
CROPPER; as performed by OTIS REDDING (1967)
* SMELLS LIKE TEEN SPIRIT, words KURT COBAIN/music NIRVANA; as
performed by NIRVANA (1991)
* STAND BY YOUR MAN, words/music TAMMY WYNETTE/BILLY SHERRILL; as
performed by TAMMY WYNETTE (1968)
* STAR DUST, words MITCHELL PARISH/music HOAGY CARMICHAEL (1927)
* SYMPHONY OF PSALMS, IGOR STRAVINSKY (1930/1948)
* TAKE FIVE, PAUL DESMOND; as performed by THE DAVE BRUBECK QUARTET
(1959)
* TAKE MY HAND, PRECIOUS LORD, words/music THOMAS A. DORSEY (1932)
* TAKE THE "A" TRAIN, BILLY STRAYHORN; as performed by DUKE
ELLINGTON AND HIS ORCHESTRA (1941)
* TALKING BOOK (LP), STEVIE WONDER (1972)
* TAPESTRY (LP), CAROLE KING (1971)
* THEME FROM "SHAFT", words/music ISAAC HAYES; as performed by ISAAC
HAYES (1971)
* THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND, words/music WOODY GUTHRIE (1940)
* TOM DOOLEY, Traditional; as arranged by DAVE GUARD and performed
by KINGSTON TRIO (1958)
* THE VELVET UNDERGROUND & NICO (LP), THE VELVET UNDERGROUND (1967)
* WARNER BROS. CARTOON MUSIC, CARL STALLING (1936 to 1958)
* WE SHALL OVERCOME, words/music ZILPHIA HORTON, FRANK HAMILTON, GUY
CARAWAN, PETE SEEGER (1960); believed to have originated from C.
ALBERT TINDLEY'S Baptist hymn I'LL OVERCOME SOME DAY (1901)
* WEST END BLUES, words CLARENCE WILLIAMS, music JOE OLIVER; as
performed by LOUIS ARMSTRONG AND HIS HOT FIVE (1928)
* WEST SIDE STORY (musical), words STEPHEN SONDHEIM/music LEONARD
BERNSTEIN (1957)
* WHAT'D I SAY, words/music RAY CHARLES; as performed by RAY CHARLES
(1959)
* WHAT'S GOING ON, words/music AL CLEVELAND, MARVIN GAYE, and
RENALDO BENSON (1970); as performed by MARVIN GAYE (1971)
* WHITE CHRISTMAS, words/music IRVING BERLIN (1942); as performed by
BING CROSBY (1942)
* WILDWOOD FLOWER, words/music MAUDE IRVING/J.P. WEBSTER; as
arranged by A.P CARTER and performed by CARTER FAMILY (1928)
* WIZARD OF OZ (film musical), words E.Y. "YIP" HARBURG/music HAROLD
ARLEN (1939)

----

TRIVIA: The cover of the first issue of "Rolling Stone"
magazine featured John Lennon.

-----

busker [BUS-kur], noun:
A person who entertains (as by playing music) in public places.

cadence (noun)
The beat or measure of something that follows
a set rhythm, for example, a dance or a march

dulcet (adj.) ['d๊l-set]
Pleasingly sweet to the ear, soothingly musical,
most closely associated with sounds, such as
those of the dulcimer, a word based on the same
root.

leitmotif [LYT-moh-teef], noun:
1. In music drama, a marked melodic phrase or short passage
which always accompanies the reappearance of a certain person,
situation, abstract idea, or allusion in the course of the play; a
sort of musical label.
2. A dominant and recurring theme.

mandolin (noun)
A stringed instrument of the lute family with a pear-
shaped body and four or more pairs of strings, usually
played with a plectrum.

mariachi (noun) Hispanic
1. Traditional Mexican folk music as played by a small
group of musicians
2. A Mexican street band that plays traditional folk
music

mellifluous (adj.) [m๊-'li-flu-w๊s]
Pleasant to hear.

opus (noun)
One of series of musical works: a musical work, especially one of a
numbered series by the same composer arranged to show the order in
which they were written or cataloged.

sotto voce [SAH-toh-VOH-chee], adverb or adjective:
1. Spoken low or in an undertone, as not to be overheard.
2. (Music) In very soft tones. Used chiefly as a direction.

staccato
as adverb: As rapid short detached notes (used as a musical direction)
as adjective: Played as rapid short detached notes.



Click picture to ZOOM
MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS

.
.

see "MUSIC" (above) for related links


Like two skeletons copulating on
a corrugated tin roof.
(About the harpsichord.)
--Sir Thomas Beecham (1879—1961)
English conductor.
In Harold Atkins & Archie Newman
_Beecham Stories_ [1978].

'Tis wonderful how soon a piano gets into a
log hut on the frontier. You would think they
found it under a pine stump.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803—1882)
American philosopher and poet.
"Civilization" _Society and Solitude_ [1870]

The piano is the easiest instrument to play
in the beginning, and the hardest to master
in the end.
--Vladimir Horowitz (1904—1989)
Russian pianist.
In David Dubal _Evenings with Horowitz_ [1992].

-----

clarion [KLAIR-ee-uhn], noun:
1. A kind of trumpet having a clear and shrill note.
2. The sound of this instrument or a sound similar to it.
3. Sounding like the clarion; loud and clear.




MUSICIANS

.
.

see "MUSIC" (above) for related links


^

Greek orator and satirist Lucian described an
ill-fated debut: 'Harmonides, a young flute
player and scholar of Timotheus, at his first
public performance began his solo with so
violent a blast that he breathed his last
breath into his flute, and died upon the
spot.'
--in Charles Burney
_A General History of Music_

^

The good thing about them is that you can look
at them with the sound turned down.
(Of the Spice Girls.)
--George Harrison (1943—2001)
English rock singer and pop guitarist
and a member of The Beatles.
In "Independent" [28 August 1997].

Something touched me deep inside
The day the music died.
(On the death of Buddy Holly.)
--Don McLean (1945— )
American songwriter and singer.
"American Pie" [1972 song]

If anyone has conducted a Beethoven performance,
and then doesn't have to go to an osteopath, then
there's something wrong.
--Simon Rattle (1955— )
English conductor.
In "Guardian" [31 May 1990].

Wagner has lovely moments but awful
quarters of an hour.
--Gioacchino Rossini (1792—1868)
Italian composer.
Said to Emile Naumann [April 1867],
in E Naumann _Italienische Tondichter_ [1883].

-

Please do not shoot the pianist.
He is doing his best.
(Printed notice in a dancing saloon.)
--anon., in Oscar Wilde
_Impressions of America_ "Leadville" [c.1882-1883]

-

In 1986, Bjork smashed several windows at a disco in Reykjavik, Iceland.
She later offered an explanation: "It was full of boring people."

[On the 200th anniversary of the city's founding, Bjork and her Sugarcubes
bandmates broke into a government radio station and played some "realistic"
music. Their protest earned them a stint in the city's jail. "My rule," she once
remarked, "has always been not to have a clue about what I was doing."]

-

The review below appeared in the "Desert Aria" (newspaper) in 1983 by Lisa Coffey —

ZUCKERMAN DAZZLES LAS VEGANS

Wednesday, January 18, Pinchas Zuckerman conducted and perjformed [sic] with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra in an all Beetthoven [sic] concert at Ham Hall. Those Las Vegans lucky enough to attend were treated to an evening of performance of a caliber shamefully rare in a city of a half million people.

The first half of the program, consisting of the Overture to The Creatures of Prometheus and the Symphony No. 4 in B-flat, Op. 60, was somewhat disappointing in that Zuckerman conducted the orchestra with his back to the audience. While one cannot fault him entirely for assuming the traditional posture of the vast majority of great maestros, it must be said that the choice of his stance in combination with his having also elected to wear the tradtional "tails" all but obscured whatever clarity of physique one might have hoped to savor, even from the best seats.

Even so, true genius shines forth. The broad expense [sic] of his shoulders, the abundant wavy dark hair, the well proportioned legs planted oh-so-firmly on the podium were sufficient food for the culture-starved crowd to feast upon throughout even the longest of movements. Perhaps it might even be said that the program order reflected a certain deftness of planning, for it certainly left the audience at intermission clambering [sic] to return to their seats in anticipation of the climactic second half which promised the chance to observe Mr. Zuckerman from the front for the duration of a while violin concerto. [sic]

What followed was pure magic, as Zuckerman proved that the combination of virtuosity, artistry and a great body can make even the Concerto in D for Violin and Orchestra, Op. 61 seem too short. He inspired his audience where a performer of lesser attributes might have left them bored to death. But who among them could for an instant let her eyes stray from the Maestro as he cradled his violin so gently, yet firmly, with the touch of well proportioned hands made strong and supple by years of torturous practice? Whose eyes could have been other than riveted to the spectacle of the grace and power of the bow arm, the fire in his dark eyes, the tension in his taut thighs as he made reday [sic] to launch into some passionate passage with the energy of an athlete. [sic] Who could but succumb to the tenderness of his smile as he lost himself in the ecstacy of each undulating sweet melodic phrase that surged and swelled from the instrument at his command? It is only a wonder that the audience managed to suppress both thunderous applause and shrieks of pleasure until the end. We can only hope that it not be an eternity before he again graces our stage with the captivating magic of his talents.

Mr. Zuckerman is a native of Israel, Middle East. He has recorded quite a number of musical pieces onto records which are considered quite good by those who listen to them. He is married to a woman of questionable musical ability and character.

-----

busk (verb) ['b๊sk]
To play music or entertain on the street for money.




MYSTERY

.
.

see "DECEPTION" for related links


The most beautiful and deepest experience a man can have is the sense of
the mysterious. It is the underlying principle of religion as well as all serious
endeavor in art and science. He who never had this experience seems to me,
if not dead, then at least blind. To sense that behind anything that can be
experienced there is a something that our mind cannot grasp and whose
beauty and sublimity reaches us only indirectly and as a feeble reflection,
this is religiousness. In this sense I am religious. To me it suffices to
wonder at these secrets and to attempt humbly to grasp with my mind
a mere image of the lofty structure of all that there is.
--Albert Einstein (1879—1955)
German-American physicist.
"My Credo" Speech to the German League of Human Rights, Berlin (Fall, 1932].

The more unintelligent a man is, the less
mysterious existence seems to him.
--Arthur Schopenhauer (1788—1860)
German philosopher.

Ah, sweet mystery of life
At last I found thee.
--Rida Johnson Young (1869—1926)
American songwriter.
"Ah! Sweet Mystery of Life" [1910 song]

-----

enigma (noun) [๊-'nig-ma]
A very difficult riddle; an unsolvable mystery.

inscrutable (adjective) [in-'skrut-๊-b๊l]
Unfathomable, incomprehensible, inexplicable,
mysterious. Noun: inscrutability.




MYTH/MYTHOLOGY

.
.

see "SUPERNATURAL" for related links


Mythology, n. The body of a primitive people's beliefs
concerning its origin, early history, heroes, deities, and
so forth, as distinguished from the true accounts which
it invents later.
--Ambrose Bierce (1842—1914)
American newspaperman, wit, and satirist.
_The Devil's Dictionary_ [1911]

About 850 B.C., Odysseus, the hero from Homer's "The Odyssey," faced
a perilous nautical journey between Scylla, a terrifying sea
monster, and Charybdis, a massive whirlpool. As Homer's story was
passed down through the generations, it became immortalized in the
metaphor, "Between Scylla and Charybdis," which was used to describe
the careful path one must take to emerge from two troubling fronts.
--"Between Scylla and Charybdis"
John J. Castellani, in "The Wall Street Journal" [23 August 2005]

Later mythmakers invested the Middle Ages with a bogus
aura of romance. The Pied Piper of Hamelin is an example.
He was a real man, but there was nothing enchanting about
him. Quite the opposite; he was horrible, a psychopath and
pederast who, on June 20, 1484, spirited away 130 children
in the Saxon village of Hemmel and used them in unspeakable
ways. Accounts of the aftermath vary. According to some,
his victims were never seen again; others told of dismembered
little bodies found scattered in the forest underbrush or
festooning the branches of trees.
--William Manchester (1922—2004)
American historian.
_A World Lit Only by Fire_, p. 66 [1992]

-----

Cerberus (noun)
In Greek and Roman mythology, the three-headed
dog that guards the entrance to Hades.

chimera (noun)
1: A mythical fire-breathing female monster with a lion's
head, a goat's body, and a snake's tail.
Similar: monster, Gorgon
2: a fantastic, often horrible, idea or image produced by the
mind.
Synonyms: specter, apparition, phantasm, phantom
Similar: monster, bugbear, bogeyman, hallucination, nightmare,
bugaboo

Cyclops (noun)
In Greek mythology any of several giants having
only one eye, in the middle of the forehead.
Related: ogre

euhemerism (noun)
The theory that mythology has its origins in history,
the gods being deified heroes of the past.

Mnemosyne (noun)
In Greek mythology, the goddess personifying
memory, and mother of the Muses.


end page




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