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Masterpieces of Music: Franz Schubert, Part 1
Continuing this series of posts after a hiatus. I've been tied up with doing a lot of program notes for a chamber music festival, which is why I haven't been putting up quite so many posts. But on to Schubert!
I've been doing a massive re-evaluation of Schubert the last couple of months and listening to more of his songs sung by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau has just accelerated the process. I'm afraid that in the past I have not given Schubert his full due. His working life was a mere eighteen years but in that time he composed a thousand pieces of music--well, actually 998 opus numbers (or Deutsch numbers after the compiler) many of which include several pieces. During his lifetime Schubert was much-appreciated by the Viennese, but largely in the context of domestic music-making where his songs and piano pieces were often heard in a salon setting. The most familiar of his public music were his choral settings such as this one for male choir:
But for a good example of the kind of effect that Schubert achieved with his piano music have a listen to the Moment Musical #6.
If you listen closely, or even better, have a look at the score, you can hear/see that what Schubert is up to is using those harmonies that previously gave music its greatest dynamic impetus instead to move music to another plane. The effect is to linger, to pause, to live in the moment--the very opposite of the way Beethoven might have used these harmonies, to drive the music on, to depict a kind of heroic effort. The harmonies I mean are the flat submediant and the Neapolitan. Both of these harmonies are remote from the tonic and previously were used to prepare a strong movement to the dominant which then, of course, goes to the tonic. But Schubert is using them as places to rest, places of stability, but remote from the tonic. The analogy is to another world, the private world of meditation, of subjectivity. The key of the piece is A flat major so the flat submediant is F flat. This is where the second phrase starts, with no preparation. Suddenly introducing a remote harmony and staying on it is a major harmonic innovation of the Romantic period and it was Franz Schubert who first used these harmonic devices in this way.
Posted by Bryan Townsend at 10:04 AM No comments:
Labels: Franz Schubert
Why You Should Not Transcribe Beethoven
Because it's wrong! Heh. Ok, why is it wrong? Beethoven himself did it, transcribing a piano sonata for string quartet. He only did that once but did it skillfully enough that the result is, if not earth-shaking, at least listenable. But it is very rarely played. Part of Beethoven's art, unlike that of, say, Bach, whose music is eminently transcribable, is to write most exactly and precisely for the particular instrument or instruments he chose. With great caution pianists sometimes use a lower octave than written in a piano sonata for a note or two because the piano builders were, partly at Beethoven's instigation, adding notes to the bass bit by bit at the time. They might argue, those bold pianists, that Beethoven himself, playing the piece six months later on his new piano with that extra bass note might have used it!
You see how it is? Do not tamper with Beethoven if you know what's good for you. I once proposed to a very fine violinist I was working with that we play an arrangement of the slow movement from the Tempest piano sonata made by Mauro Giuliani, a guitarist who was working in Vienna at the time Beethoven was alive. It would have actual historical cachet! The answer: "No." I have tried a few times to transcribe a movement or two. Haydn I can get to work, even a little Chopin. I almost got a slow movement from one of Beethoven's piano sonatas intended for amateurs to work for guitar duet. I even tried re-writing a movement or two for guitar as a composition exercise. But I would not inflict one of my Beethoven transcriptions on an innocent audience.
So, are you convinced yet that it is just wrong to transcribe Beethoven? Here, have a listen to this:
Ah, the sublime delicacy of it! Now here is the real thing:
Now I know the conductor has zombie eyes and they have Jesse Ventura playing drums and there are only three women in the orchestra so it must violate some diversity regulation, but this is Beethoven. That other thing on guitar is just...
...wrong...
Posted by Bryan Townsend at 6:12 PM 2 comments:
Labels: Beethoven, transcription
Valentina Lisitsa: "I don't do crossover"
Valentina Lisitsa, whom I have written about here, is about to make a major breakthrough in her career. She is reported to be the most-watched pianist on YouTube (how does one confirm these claims?) and has just signed to a major label, Decca. On June 19th she will play a solo recital at Royal Albert Hall in London. Here is Norman Lebrecht's post on these events. Norman has another post up in which he mentions an interview that Valentina did on Sky News in which "she delivered a short, sharp putdown to the pseudo-classical industry." He doesn't seem to have a link to that actual interview. The first comment to Norman's post says, "Belittling the genre and alienating fans of classical crossover music is an incredibly stupid thing to do." I'm a little hampered here, by the lack of a link but in Norman's post title he claims she said "I don't do crossover." Is that belittling?
Ah. Well.
I think it is time for one of my barn-storming, damn-the-torpedoes-full-speed-ahead posts. I haven't put anyone down in just ages.
In my previous post on Valentina I said that what she presented was "alert, intelligent, purposeful musicianship." I think if you are that kind of musician, not doing crossover is pretty much inevitable. I put up a fairly lengthy post here talking about crossover. If you go read that post, I won't have to repeat myself.
Crossover seems to have no musical significance. It is a mere marketing tool, but your increased sales are paid for in aesthetic value. For a classical musician in order to get those people to buy your recordings or tickets who wouldn't normally, you have to pretend to be someone more popular. Crossover for a very popular artist like Sting is different as instead of piggy-backing his name onto John Dowland's he is instead using his fame to make Dowland more known. Crossover for a classical artist can be rather more aesthetically fatal. In my post on Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau I said, "a great artist like Fischer-Dieskau cannot sing trivial music." Why is that? If he, or if Valentina Lisitsa plays a 'crossover' piece it is either because they are pandering to the audience, in which case our respect for them as artists diminishes, or it is because they think it is a worthwhile piece of music, in which case our respect for them as artists also diminishes. It's a lose-lose proposition. Mind you, it is probably a case of losing a few listeners but perhaps gaining a lot more. Maybe not though: just because you decide to pander doesn't mean it will work. I once said to some friends that there are lots of classical musicians who would love to sell out, but nobody's buying!
Valentina Lisitsa is by all indications a fine musician. Part of being a fine musician is avoiding playing bad repertoire. 'Crossover' is bad repertoire. For her, I think, playing crossover would be an incredibly stupid thing to do because in the very first place the fans it would alienate, those who have viewed her 43 million times on YouTube doing good musical repertoire, are the fans that are the most important, because, unlike the crowd you might get by a momentary pandering, they will stick with her for decades.
N'est-ce pas?
What I look for in a musician is understanding of the music, ability to play it expressively, technical competence and conviction (believing the music is worth playing). Playing crossover seems to put much of this at risk.
Labels: crossover, Valentina Lisitsa
The first thing that comes to mind with the phrase "a little night music" is the delightful divertimento or serenade by Mozart with that name: Eine Kleine Nachtmusik:
In the 18th century 'night music' was frothy, sociable and light--party music. But with the beginning of romanticism it became a time of inner contemplation, of expressive intimacy. The early forerunners were keyboard music by Bach's son C. P. E. Bach (1714 - 1788):
Notice the free, improvisatory nature of the music, a fantasia. By the early 19th century Václav Tomášek (1774 - 1850) was writing Eclogues that expressed the dreamy atmosphere of romanticism. Unfortunately YouTube seems to have none of his solo piano music so this is the closest example I could find. (It is very rare that I can't find the right musical example on YouTube...)
At about the same time, the first decades of the 19th century, John Field (1782 - 1837), the Irish pianist/composer, was writing the first nocturnes for piano, expressing nothing but the inner feeling of the player:
In this music time seems suspended. It is like those moments in opera when an aria is sung, expressing some particular emotion by a character. The narrative time stops temporarily. The transference of this effect to instrumental music is characteristic of romanticism. The idea or effect, is of inducing a kind of trance with music and in so doing taking possession of one's inwardness. This kind of music reached its culmination with the music of Frédéric Chopin (1810 - 1849):
There are a few examples of piano 'night music' in the 20th century, one of them by Béla Bartók (1881 - 1945):
This little survey of 'night music' is almost a history in miniature. In the 18th century the night was a time of sociability, of pleasure, of entertainment. In the 19th century it was a time to go inside oneself, to muse, to contemplate. But by the 20th century, the night had become a strange, threatening place with unidentified sounds of insects and birds and a harmony that, instead of suggesting dreamy contemplation, rather gives the impression of unease, of anxiety...
Labels: night music
Robert Moog
As anyone who has gone to the Google home page today has noticed, today would have been the 78th birthday of Robert Moog, pioneer in electronic music and inventor of the Moog synthesizer. Here is an informative article from the Daily Mail. The very, very, very cool thing about this "Google doodle" is that it is a working synthesizer. If you want to play with the various settings, you can, and try the results by playing the keyboard. You can even use the tape recorder to record your efforts, though I haven't tried it.
This reminds me of a fascinating lecture I went to on recording software a number of years ago. A composer/technician was demonstrating what you could do on a Mac. Previously in order to do professional recording you needed a roomful of racks of arcane electronic devices. He told us that all this had basically been replaced with software. He showed us how you recorded on a Mac with one 'track' or channel. Then he showed us if you wanted two tracks, you just copied and pasted. Four tracks? The same. Sixteen tracks? The same. It was mind-blowing because what he was copying and pasting wasn't just the image of a track on a tape recorder, IT WAS ALSO THE FUNCTION ITSELF! Software had completely replaced hardware. The truth is that now you can download free software that will do everything that $100,000 worth of equipment used to be needed for!
Way back in 1969 or 70 one of the first classical albums I purchased (as opposed to borrowing from a friend's dad) was Switched-On Bach by Walter/Wendy Carlos in which a selection of Bach's music was performed on a Moog synthesizer. Here is a sample:
At the time, putting something like this together was a long, laborious process. It is interesting how well Bach's music survives and even thrives in this sort of treatment. I doubt it would work with Chopin because you would miss the subtleties of rubato. But some Bach, not all, works very well.
Labels: Bach, electronic music
The Social Function of Music
This is such a huge topic that it could only really be done justice to in a series of volumes. This is just a blog! But what the social function of music might be is such a very interesting question that it is worth poking at from time to time.
Historically, it was the troubadours who brought up the question with their contrast between difficult poetry for connoisseurs and clear poetry for immediate pleasure: trobar clus and trobar clar. Here is music by one of the leading troubadours, Bernart de Ventadorn:
Troubadour music had both high and low styles; the high style has, as we hear in the piece above, affinities with the chant of the church. The low style tended to have an affinity with the dance as in the balada or dance-song:
The performers are trying to re-create what a performance in the late 12th century might have sounded like, but you should bear in mind that the rhythms and instruments are all conjectural. All we actually have is the melodic contour and the text.
The first European writer on the social function of music was Johannes de Grocheio or "John the Grouchy" (if we translate literally from the French version of his name). He wrote a book around 1300 that classified music in Paris according to how it was used (or rather, how it ought to be used). For him, as for Plato before him, music was a means of organizing and controlling society. As long as music was largely supported by the aristocracy, this was certainly an important function. The glorious music of the French Baroque, for example, was certainly at least partly about gilding the Bourbon lily:
But with the fall of the ancien régime it was the newly prosperous and numerous middle class that bought concert tickets, pianos and sheet music thereby supporting the growth of the symphony orchestra, concert hall, instrument builders and publishers--not to mention performers and their agents! So music in the 19th century became the expression of the inner life and outer aspirations of the middle class. Romantic music and all its progressive followers exemplify this.
The question of the social function of music became particularly keen for some composers in the 20th century--Shostakovich in particular. After he was severely criticized for his opera Lady MacBeth of the Mtsensk District in 1936 he withdrew from performance the newly written 4th Symphony and composed his 5th Symphony. This was certainly a work that had a social function--a rather desperate one as, if Shostakovich did not successfully demonstrate his adherence to the 'social realist' ideals of the regime, headed at the time by Joseph Stalin, then he might get that knock on the door at 3 am followed by a quick trip to Siberia. So the music had to have a surface ambiguous enough that it could be interpreted as an optimistic tribute to the Soviet system. But at the same time, he wanted to reach out to those people who were suffering under that system. The half hour ovation at the premiere and the restoration of Shostakovich's fortunes by the government testify that he succeeded. Here is the first movement which comes in two parts because of the length:
The 5th Symphony of Shostakovich and, indeed, all his symphonies, have a number of complex social functions that have yet to be explored in much depth.
So one is led inevitably to wonder, what is the social function of music now? Some of it certainly seems to be about selling product:
Popular music, the trobar clar of the troubadours, seems to have taken over. The trobar clus, music designed for connoisseurs and the learned, which seems to be predominant in earlier ages (if only because it was the only music written down), seems now to be vanishing away, found only in music departments at universities, the occasional festival and the ever-struggling symphony orchestra concert. But note that "pops" concerts are common and new and difficult music is programmed less and less except at specialized festivals. Pop music rules the airwaves and public spaces. I'm not sure what the frenetic, mechanical nature of it is designed to serve. Any ideas?
UPDATE: It occurs to me that both the Shostakovich symphony and the song by Rihanna operate on two levels. In the Shostakovich, one level is that of an acceptable 'social realist' symphony, one that ends with rejoicing and rejects Western 'formalism' (i.e. the kind of atonality that was being used in the decadent West). The other level is an expression of the bleak oppression of the system and the toll it was taking on the humanity of everyone. Similarly, we might see two levels in the song by Rihanna. On the one hand, it is a girl trying to come to terms with her unfaithfulness to her boyfriend--this is the surface level. On the other hand, it seems to be an advertisement for make-up, clothing, restaurants and the good life generally.
Labels: sociology of music
In Memoriam Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
I cannot write a personal memoir of this great - truly great - singer and musician who passed away just a few days ago, on May 18. I never met him personally and only saw him in concert on one occasion in Montreal where he gave a Brahms recital in the biggest hall in town. But he has been a presence in my whole life in music. From the earliest days of my discovery of classical music, at the very beginning of the 1970s, I became aware of him. At that time his complete recording of all - ALL - the Schubert lieder accompanied by Gerald Moore was in progress. That amounts to about six hundred songs. Fischer-Dieskau is probably the most-recorded singer of all time. Whole books are devoted to merely listing his recordings.
When I was a young classical musician I looked for models. As a guitarist my models, certainly in terms of virtuosity, which was a big concern of mine at the time, included Andres Segovia, John Williams and Julian Bream. But alongside them and the guitar repertoire I always listened to and greatly respected the wider repertoire. There were a handful of artists that commanded my attention due to their immense musical authority. What is musical authority? It is a bit like moral authority, I think. One of the finest examples I can recall was that concert I saw of Fischer-Dieskau. It was in Place des Arts in Montreal, in the big hall which seated, oh, at least 2,000. Big place for a lieder recital. It was packed to the ceiling. At 8 pm Fischer-Dieskau strode on stage, took his place in the center and began acknowledging the applause. His accompanist, whose name I forget, scurried after him and quickly took his seat at the piano, his fingers curled over the keys and his eyes on Fischer-Dieskau. I wondered at this seeming excessive anxiety. The applause was loud and long, but the moment it showed a sign of slacking, Fischer-Dieskau nodded at the pianist and launched into the first song. He was there to sing, not to bask in applause. This is the kind of authority he had: it came right from the music and that is why it is unmistakable. He, his ego, isn't there, it is instead the aesthetic authority of the music that commands both him and us as listeners.
This is why a great artist like Fischer-Dieskau cannot sing trivial music. That would render the whole exercise meaningless. I see a looming contradiction here for all young artists: they are being told more and more that they have to 'brand' themselves, work out the tricks of marketing, make a name, sell themselves and so on. But the horror of that is that it directly drains away the musical authority that comes from NOT doing those things, from allowing yourself to be the servant of the music instead of merely using the music to further your career ambitions. The music is where your real authority comes from, not from whatever little personal quirk you think you can spin into media attention.
When I was a young classical musician, still learning my trade, the artists who stood out, whose musical authority was evident were few: Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Gustav Leonhardt (who also just passed away and whom I wrote about here), Arthur Rubinstein, and the Guarneri Quartet. The only artist with this kind of stature or authority that I have added in recent years is the great Russian pianist Grigory Sokolov whom I wrote about here. I'm leaving out other artists such as Mstislav Rostropovich, the great Russian cellist, only because I wasn't as aware of them. Let us end with two pieces performed by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. The first is the last song of Schubert's Die Winterreise:
The second is the first movement of Shostakovich's 14th Symphony on a text by Garcia Lorca.
A fascinating anecdote about Fischer-Dieskau comes from his very early career. During WWII he was drafted into the Wehrmacht and spent his time tending horses on the Russian front. Captured by the Allies in 1945 he was held as a prisoner of war until 1947--one of the last to be released because they toured him around to various camps to sing lieder to homesick German prisoners...
Posted by Bryan Townsend at 10:12 AM 2 comments:
Labels: Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
The Lennon 'Trilogy'
John Lennon (1940 - 1980) is, I think, an important composer in the English song-writing tradition. I have no hesitation in placing him beside such great composers of English song as John Dowland, Henry Purcell and Benjamin Britten. He is most famous, of course, for his work with The Beatles, but the sheer magnitude of the social and cultural currents that they were part of tends to obscure, a bit, his individual contribution.
In the early days he and Paul wrote head to head and many of the songs from that time are a true synthesis of two minds. An early example is "From Me To You", mostly written in a bus on the road between York and Shrewsbury, February 28, 1963.
Later on, though each would often contribute sections to the other's song, their writing diverged. Even though Lennon came from similar rock and roll roots to Paul (though in the latter's case there was more influence of pre-rock and roll music via his father), and reverted to them in the 70s after the break-up of the Beatles, there was a remarkable evolution in the 60s that culminated in three extraordinary songs that have no real equivalents before or since. These three songs begin with "Strawberry Fields Forever" released as a single in February 1967 and largely composed in November 1966. Here is a very early 'draft' recorded by Lennon at his home in Weybridge. As you can hear, early on there was just a suggestion of country in the guitar part.
Much of the evolution of the song took place in the studio where it was 'orchestrated' with a great variety of effects including a recording of a high-hat played back in reverse. The Wikipedia article gives a fair idea of the recording process, which took forty-five hours! Compare this with the recording of their first LP, Please Please Me which took a mere ten hours for all fourteen songs. An early indication of the power of this recording was the fact that it seems to have stopped other groups in their tracks with some saying "now what the **** are we going to do?" and caused Brian Wilson to simply shelve the new Beach Boys album. Here is the final version, the melding together of two very different takes. The splice occurs at the one minute mark. This is the original film made to accompany the song (the predecessor to today's music videos), but I'm not sure it adds anything, so feel free to ignore it.
What an extraordinary distance this is from the first drafts! Everyone makes a big contribution to the fleshing out of the song. Paul on the mellotron that begins the song, George on the Indian harp and great nine-note guitar solo at 2:58. Ringo's drumming is amazing all the way through.
The next song in what I am calling the Lennon 'Trilogy' came soon after and was used to end the LP Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. One of just a couple of examples of popular music discussed at some length in Taruskin's volume Music in the Late Twentieth Century from the Oxford history, the song is "A Day in the Life". He describes the techniques used here as well as in "Strawberry Fields" and the earlier "Tomorrow Never Knows" as
virtually the whole panoply of musique concrete devices pioneered in the studios of Paris, New York, and Cologne during the previous decade. ... In a sense, the Beatles were no longer writing songs. Like some of the avant-garde icons of the day, they were creating collages--finished artworks, artifacts on tape that could not be adequately reproduced in other media.
The difference between the work of the avant-garde and the Beatles is, significantly, on the semantic level. The Beatles were engaging in social criticism and, especially in the case of Lennon, explorations of his inner life with an immediacy and frankness that was rare in popular music, which tended to the stereotypical. Nothing here of that, just the individual expression of Lennon, aided in its orchestration by the other Beatles, George Martin and the technical wizards in the control room. Again, Wikipedia has a pretty good article on the song. The middle section, "Woke up, got out of bed" was written by Paul. Here is "A Day in the Life":
That enormous orchestral glissando was recorded by forty orchestral musicians hired just for the occasion. One of the earliest admirers of this music was the fine American art-song composer Ned Rorem who saw in it a resurgence of genuine musical creativity and a renewal of pleasure. The last song in what I am calling Lennon's trilogy was released on the LP Magical Mystery Tour which was the result of a not-very-successful film the Beatles made intended to be shown on BBC television around Christmas 1967. But as Paul has said in an interview, it is the only film anywhere that has a performance of "I Am the Walrus" on it, so there! Here is "I Am the Walrus" which combines all the previous techniques with lyrics that perhaps owe something to James Joyce:
You may want to listen to this song without watching the video as well. From many years of practice, every time the Beatles were in front of a camera they tended to cut capers and fool around. But the music is very much not frivolous the way the film is. In the deep structure of the song there is a blending of minor mode, the Dorian mode as well as the whole-tone scale. The ambiguity in the harmony matches that of the lyrics.
After this trilogy of extraordinary songs, prepared by "Tomorrow Never Knows", John returned to a more conventional kind of writing in the White Album and Abby Road.
Labels: John Lennon
Easiest and Hardest Jobs in Music
Just like in the rest of life, music has its very easy tasks and its very difficult ones. Here are two lists. I hasten to say that these are not to be taken very seriously! So if you are a rhythm guitarist in a reggae group, don't get upset.
Easy Jobs in Music
Rhythm guitar in a reggae group
Piano-tuner in a monastery
Bob Dylan's vocal coach
Eric Clapton's fashion consultant
Psychotherapist for the brass section
Difficult Jobs in Music
Conductor for a Charles Ives symphony
Stage manager for The Who
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau's accompanist
Lady Gaga's fashion consultant
Psychotherapist for the violin section
I suppose a lot of these are "in" jokes. For example, the rhythm guitarist in a reggae group does pretty much the same sort of thing in every song. Monasteries sing a capella so they don't need pianos. The brass section is known for its happy extroverts (except perhaps for the French horns). Charles Ives's symphonies are known for their extremely complex rhythmic textures. The Who used to destroy everything on stage as a bang-up finale and so on.
Here are some clips of conductors conducting Ives' symphonies and a little interview with Gary Call, who devised some techniques to help them.
Why a Piece of Music is Like a Person
Reading in Taruskin's account of the earliest significant collections of written polyphonic music, the four great books of organum from the 12th century composers of Notre Dame de Paris, I came across this passage:
One can only conclude that the identity of a "piece of music" was a far more fluid concept for the Notre Dame cantors than it is for us. An organum as actually performed was essentially a patchwork created more or less on the spot, or after a brief consultation, from the many available parts in the manuscripts we have...
He is talking about the fact that there are many different versions of the pieces in different manuscripts and also that each has a multitude of interchangeable sections. To a somewhat lesser extent, this is true of all music prior to the invention of recording technology and is still true of all live performances of music. [UPDATE: this overstates things. In the Notre Dame repertoire it is the actual text, the notes, that has multiple variants. In music since about 1750, the text is stable, but the variations are on the level of expression and interpretation--which I think is also very important.] Even with simple pieces, every time you sit down to play or sing them, there are real differences in the pacing, expression, dynamics, tone-color and so on. I regard this as one of the great strengths of music.
Compare to some other art forms: differences in lighting and environment aside, all paintings and sculptures are essentially the same over time. There are no 'performance' differences. But in the performing arts, such as theater and music, each performance is different. What strikes me is the analogue with persons. Every time you meet someone and have a conversation with them, there are differences. A different side of them appears--and a different side of you as well. Proust mused that we only really come to know ourselves as we are reflected in others. A piece of music only seems to come fully to 'life' in a performance before an audience.
How great are these differences? Take a famous piece like the Chaconne to the D minor violin partita by Bach. There a many different ways of playing this. Here are a few of them:
Each on a different instrument! All the same piece. But the 'same' in a way akin to the way a person is the same dressed for a formal occasion, or dressed to play soccer, or in an extrovert mood, or subdued and so on. Different facets of a piece are revealed in different performances by different people, even if on the same instruments, similar to the way different facets of a person emerge depending on the situation: at a party, in a job interview and so on. You can only stretch the analogy a little ways, of course. But it is easy to see why a piece of music is a bit like a person: because people are involved in at least three ways. First, the music is composed by a person and due to its unique fluidity and expressive qualities, some of the personhood of the composer is transmitted. Then it is performed by a different person who takes what is there and contributes yet another level of personhood with their own expression. Thirdly, there is an audience receiving this complex of expression and they receive it with their own personhood.
Music is a medium for the transmission of some aspects of being a person. It is the fluidity, the undefined aspects of music that lend it the malleability that is so important.
Now think about recording for a moment. I had to use recordings to give you examples, but I would have much preferred not to. If this blog post were a talk instead, to a live audience, I could have played the beginning of the chaconne in several different ways as an example. Myself on guitar, perhaps some friends on violin or piano. Then the point would be even stronger, because even when the same person plays the same piece on the same instrument, it is different on different days. Just as you yourself are different on different days, in a different mood, and this is amplified when you interact with another person, who is also in different moods on different days.
Recordings are fixed, transportable and saleable, which has made them so hugely important. But they eliminate the aspect of music that I have been talking about: the fluidity of music, the different-each-time-ness of music. A recording is music frozen. Interestingly enough, this aspect is least evident the first time you listen, but with each subsequent hearing of the same recording, the frozenness of it becomes more evident.
Even though I have avoided using the word, this post is really about the ontology of music...
UPDATE: I just remembered an excellent example of this. During Expo 86 in Vancouver, the great Croatian pianist Ivo Pogorelić was a guest artist performing, if I recall correctly, a Tchaikovsky piano concerto with the Vancouver Symphony. There were two evening performances scheduled and a review appeared in the morning paper after the first of them. Vancouver being just a bit of a musical backwater, but somewhat belligerent about it, the critic was careful to find some negatives to mention in the review. I wasn't actually there, a friend of mine, another music critic, related to me the story. In any case, in the first night's performance the critic tweaked Pogorelić for being too something: too subdued or too boistrous, too subtle or too crude. I don't recall which! But let's say, too subdued. Obviously he read the paper the next morning so for that evening's performance he played the piece in exactly the opposite way! This is what we often forget: a great artist can play a piece of music in fifty different ways...
Labels: ontology of music
Favorite Recordings
Alex Ross has a post up about favorite recordings with a link to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's favorites (nearly all opera). This gets me thinking, of course, about my favorite recordings. I realize I don't actually have any! I certainly did in the past. There were records I nearly wore out from listening to them: John Williams' complete recording of Bach lute suites, some lute duets, Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, Beethoven symphonies and string quartets, Debussy's Nocturnes and on and on. Each month or year I would have a new favorite. But I don't any more. I listen to whatever music I am writing program notes for, which is always changing. Sometimes I sit down and listen carefully to a particular piece with the score, for study purposes. Other times I listen all the way through a particular set of pieces like the Beethoven piano sonatas or the Shostakovich string quartets, but I don't keep going back. The last three recordings I listened to were the Quatuor pour le fin du temps by Messiaen, Revolver by the Beatles and Gustav Leonhardt's recording of the Goldberg Variations by Bach. But I wouldn't put them down on a favorite list.
I think the reason is that much of my musical thought these days goes into composition, so there is often some kind of musical idea bubbling around in my head. I don't want to interfere with that, so I tend to avoid hearing music.
The spirit of the age is to be connected with everything and everyone all the time, hence, Facebook. But if you want to do something, particularly something creative, I think you have to focus. This means avoiding any distractions! I mentioned a while back Elliot Carter's retreat to a cabin in the Sonoran desert for a year to write a string quartet. One of the most important years in my life in music was spent in Alicante, Spain where I did nothing but study and practice guitar for six hours a day. At the end of that year, I had become a real guitarist. The secret is focus and avoiding distraction. Now, of course, this alternates or is complemented by, other periods in which you are open to absorbing all kinds of musical experiences: concert going, score study and, yes, listening to recordings, perhaps repeatedly.
Thinking back, while I don't really have favorite recordings, there are a small group of concerts that I attended that were so memorable I would list them as favorite concert experiences:
Nigel Rogers performing 17th century vocal music with harpsichord and astonishing ornaments
Andres Segovia giving a stunning--and long!--concert in 1977 at age 84 with several encores.
A piece by Serge Garant for piano and six percussionists who, at one point were playing 24 gongs so loud that the piano, played fortissimo, was completely inaudible! But, due to the character of the gong, it didn't seem loud, but rather like a blanket of sound.
A concert by the Endellion Quartet a couple of years ago with Shostakovich's 8th Quartet between a lovely Haydn quartet and one of the op 59 Beethoven quartets and it was the Shostakovich that completely won the audience over.
A concert of Brahms with piano accompaniment by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (who just passed away--a great loss...).
Arthur Rubenstein in recital. I remember most clearly the astonishing colors he obtained in the Busoni transcription of the Bach chaconne.
A recital for baroque lute by Jakob Lindberg in which he played his transcription of "Across the Universe" as an encore.
Let's end with some Fischer-Dieskau, one of the greatest singers of all time.
UPDATE: I was at the Salzburg music festival quite a few years ago when Karlheinz Stockhausen brought his whole extended family/ensemble who gave a week of performances - all from memory - of his chamber music. I was chatting with him after one of these concerts, saying that it was a treat to hear his music performed instead of just in a recording and he replied that a recording is like a postcard compared to actually visiting a place. That seems to capture it quite well...
Labels: concerts, recordings
Probably the most surreal moment in all music history was the premiere of Olivier Messiaen's Quatuor pour la fin du temps which took place on January 15, 1941 in Stalag VIII-A, a prisoner of war camp near Görlitz, Germany. Contrary to the Wikipedia article on this piece, the town of Görlitz still exists, though it now ajoins the Polish town of Zgorzelec. I have been to Görlitz, though not to the long-disappeared camp. The premiere was held outdoors, in the rain, attended by an audience of about 400 prisoners and guards.
The jobs of theorist and composer have mostly been divided up--few figures in music history are important in both areas. But Messiaen (1908 - 1992) is one of the exceptions. Messiaen wrote a great deal about his technique, especially in Technique de mon langage musical of 1944. Oddly enough, but fitting with the aesthetic of the time, it deals solely with rhythmic, harmonic and melodic technique, excluding any reference to meaning. I say "oddly" because Messiaen was a very spiritual man and the quartet is a prime example. Messiaen wrote that the work was inspired by a text from the Book of Revelation:
And I saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire ... and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth .... And the angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth lifted up his hand to heaven, and sware by him that liveth for ever and ever ... that there should be time no longer: But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished ....
The titles of the movements bear this out. One particularly lovely movement is the fifth: "Praise to the Eternity of Jesus". Here is the informative Wikipedia article on the quartet. And here is a complete performance with the score:
The work has a very complex structure, mostly hidden away and only revealed through meticulous analysis. Some techniques, such as isorhythmic patterns, come from the Middle Ages, but others are inspired by Indian classical music and birdsong. There are palindromes, modes of limited transposition (Messiaen's own terminology) and possibly other techniques yet to be discovered! These techniques are not meant to be uncovered by the listener, but are a kind of mystical underpinning to the music.
Our professor in 20th Century Theory and Analysis was waxing lyrical about the piece one day when I had possibly my most brilliant inspiration in graduate school. As he paused, I interjected, "yeah, but, captive audience!"
Labels: Messiaen
The Tritone
The tritone is one of those fascinating problems that music theory has dealt with from the very beginning. It is an interval, the distance between two notes, and it has been a problem because it pops up in any scale or mode. The problem is that it has a very harsh sound--is dissonant. The tritone is just three whole tones, hence the name. Like this:
The problem comes up when you try to do a primitive kind of polyphony with two voices in parallel motion.
Several solutions emerged. One is to lower the B natural to a B flat, which is why in the earliest written music the only accidental is a flat on B. This was also the earliest key signature. Another is to avoid parallels and from that came the rule about parallel fifths. Instead, have the voices move in oblique or contrary motion. Another solution which came later was to only move in parallel thirds or sixths, but that had to wait until these intervals, dubbed 'imperfect', became acceptable as consonant. At first the only intervals called consonant were the 'perfect' ones: the unison, fourth, fifth and octave.
Much, much later the tritone became prized as a special kind of intense dissonance and is an essential part of the most important progression that defines tonality: the V7 - I cadence.
It is the very intensity of the dissonance built into the V7 chord with the tritone from F to B, that makes the cadence powerful because this tension resolves into the consonant tonic harmony.
The intensity of the tritone interval can be used in a melody. Leonard Bernstein used it in the song "Maria" from West Side Story. You can hear it in this excerpt right at the 35 - 36 second mark. The tritone is between "Ma" and "ri".
Sometimes the tritone is used just for shock value as in this song by George Harrison, "I Want to Tell You". Listen for the piano part between the 26 and 32 second mark and similar places. Yes, it's that same pesky F to B natural.
Labels: harmony, music theory
The Universe of Music
To me, the world of music is a vast universe of sound with nebulas, galaxies, solar systems, planets and comets. The Balinese monkey chant is a small musical world of its own, geographically close to but musically far from, the world of the Javanese gamelan. The blues of Robert Johnson and its flow, as a river, into the music of the Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton, is another world. The galaxy that is the string quartet, devised by Joseph Haydn, throws out spiral arms in Beethoven, Brahms, Janacek, Bartok and Shostakovich.
No need to continue the metaphor: the universe of music is too vast to comprehend. Occasionally someone tries to hint at this vastness. One such was Charles Ives in the sketches for his Universe Symphony. Here is a brilliant account of the piece. It is hard to think of anything to compare it to. Perhaps Mysterium, an unfinished project of Scriabin that dates from roughly the same period, the second decade of the 20th century. Another comparison might be to Dante's Divine Comedy, a work of art that spans the whole universe of human understanding.
I'm fairly comfortable with most composers and a lot of pop music. I have a fair idea of what is going on in the music and the aesthetic value of it. But there are composers that I have not even yet attempted to come to terms with and Charles Ives is one of these. Scriabin, too, possibly. I just don't know what I think about Ives' music. But I am certainly going to have a very serious look at it. In the meantime, here is the first section of his Universe Symphony realized by Michael Stern and performed by the Rundfunk Sinfonieorchester Saarbrücken under his direction.
A couple of days ago another version of the piece was performed in New York by the Nashville Symphony. Here is news clip with the music director discussing how it was put together.
Five conductors? Makes sense. But poor Stockhausen! Outclassed by Ives decades before he wrote his Gruppen for three orchestras and three conductors!
Labels: Charles Ives
Answers to "The Musical Contest"
Towards the end of last month I put up, just for fun, a little musical contest. But no-one wanted to submit answers! Which was the main reason I put it up. The other day I tried it out on a retired opera producer and he found it very difficult. So I guess it was fun for me, but not fun for you. You shoulda just said: fuggedaboudit!!
Anyway, here are the answers:
Smetana, in 1874 at fifty years of age.
Drums, bass, guitar, organ.
Either none, one, two or three, depending on how you look at it. We have no complete concerto for cello by Mozart. There are two tiny fragments that might indicate lost concertos, or ones he did not complete. There is a concerto in D major for cello transcribed in the 1940s from a couple of oboe concertos by Mozart.
Bass.
Osvaldo Golijov.
Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan (who also can't really play the harmonica).
The viola.
Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Mama Cass.
Richard Wagner (and why is this not really surprising?).
Shostakovich on a bet in either 1927 or 8.
Spike, in the musical episode "Once More With Feeling" from season six.
Mozart.
Labels: musical contest
Artificial Double-Tracking
Thursday I put up a post that talked a bit about the Beatles song "Tomorrow Never Knows" from Revolver. This is the post. I also talked about the song briefly in this post which was about the variety of songs on the album Revolver. It's not called that because it is about handguns. Long-playing records used to sit on a turntable and revolve, hence, an LP is a 'revolver'.
In the second post I linked to above, I talk a little about what makes Beatles' records distinctive. They really don't sound like anyone else. The reasons are many. There is a quote from somewhere that says that genius is nothing but infinite attention to detail. There is certainly some truth to that. The Beatles were a creative group that encompassed not only John, Paul, George and Ringo, but also included George Martin, who contributed a lot to the beginnings and endings of songs, arranged string and other instrumental parts and even played keyboards on some tracks. There were some technical and engineering people that contributed as well. The title of this post, "artificial double-tracking" refers to a technique discovered by Ken Townshend. The Beatles had discovered that if you double-tracked the lead vocal, it had much more presence. So they developed the practice of recording every lead vocal twice. This was very time-consuming so they were delighted when a way of doing this automatically was discovered. It is called "artificial double tracking" or ADT and involves duplicating a track slightly out of phase so it sounds as if two singers (actually the same singer twice) are involved.
But this is just one of many techniques they developed. Others included recording the voice at a slightly slower tape speed and playing it back at the normal speed for an intensified effect. They did the opposite with the instruments: recording them at a slightly faster tape speed and slowing down on playback for a 'fatter' sound. They recorded guitar solos and played them back backwards, they stuffed sweaters in the bass drum for a muffled effect. You name it. The purpose of all this was to find the uniquely 'right' sound for every song. For an example, let's trace the evolution of a single song, "She Said She Said" from Revolver. This is a tune by Lennon that comes from a conversation with Peter Fonda around a pool in LA. Most remarkably, we actually have Lennon's early drafts of this song that he recorded at home with just him singing and a guitar. Have a listen to how the song, especially the melody, evolves in these brief clips:
It starts out as little more than the phrase "he said" (later changed to "she said") and an up-tempo rock and roll accompaniment. But with each attempt, the melody evolves (at the beginning there was almost no melody) and the chords get less generic. Also notice the very ordinary sound of Lennon's voice. It sounds a lot like anyone fooling around at home with a tape recorder. Luckily, we even have the guitar tracks of the final version isolated. Here they are so you can hear how the guitar part evolved:
Now listen to the finished song:
The first words, "she said" are sung by Lennon alone, but with double-tracking. This is answered with harmony vocals "I know what it's like to be dead" in thirds. One nice touch is that this harmony line is immediately echoed in the guitars. Other things that were added are a contrasting section ('bridge') in 3/4 time on the words "no, no, no, you're wrong" and continuing to "everything was right". Oh, and the whole arrangement, of course.
The transformation from the simple, not very interesting, song John was messing around with at home and the finished version is simply astounding. And it all took place, according to session records, in one nine-hour session on June 21, 1966, the day before the master tape for Revolver was due to be compiled. That alone leaves me rather amazed... Anyone can walk into the studio with some lyrics on a napkin, a vague idea of a melody and some chords. But how many can end up with a song like this nine hours later?
UPDATE: I didn't mention Ringo's drumming but here, as in every song, there is no generic back beat. Just listen to the amazing variety of what he is doing and how it changes to suit what is going on in the song. Now compare it to the rather stereotyped drum patterns of most current pop songs.
Labels: recording technology, The Beatles
"Mickey-Mousing" and Madrigalism
For the ancient Greeks, mimesis or imitation, was fundamental to art, which was always believed to imitate nature in some way. Music is the art form which seems most remote from nature as musical notes do not directly denote something. But they can certainly connote a lot. "Mickey Mousing" is one extreme example. In this technique, used widely in cartoon animations which explains the origin of the term, the physical actions of the characters are directly imitated in the music. Here is an example:
A different kind of example would be a Royal Navy warship coming on screen, accompanied by strains of "Rule Britannia".
That connection does not depend on direct imitation, of course, but rather on conventional association and knowledge of the words to the song. In the 16th century the composers of madrigals developed a number of techniques to highlight and amplify the text in the musical setting. One of the most famous madrigals exemplifying these techniques (and a hugely popular piece at the time) is Jacques Arcadelt's Il bianco e dolce cigno ("The white and gentle swan").
To our ears, the effect is rather mild, accustomed as we are to far more extreme harmonies, but Arcadelt sets the word "piangendo" ("weeping"), heard at the 14 to 15 second mark, to an E flat harmony, outside the 'key' of F major. A more striking example is the lute song by John Dowland, "Come again, sweet love doth now invite."
Each verse ends with a repeated refrain in which both the lute (guitar in this performance) and voice ascend, alternating with one another. The voice leaps by fourths while the lute moves up by step. The words give away the meaning: "To see, to hear, to touch, to kiss, to die---with thee again, in sweetest sympathy." In the Renaissance, a bawdy time, both Italian and English were redolent with slang and metaphor. "To die" represented sexual release and the repeated refrain represents it rather well in music. This example, therefore, combines two kinds of representation or madrigalism: the conventional association of 'death' with sexual release in the text and the imitation of this in the music.
By way of contrast, Wagner's Prelude to Tristan is an extended attempt to represent ever-increasing sexual tension without release:
It does this by complex chromaticism and avoidance of cadence. I've talked about the importance of the cadence before. In music with functional harmony, the cadence serves the function of releasing the tension accumulated during the previous phrase or section of the piece. It does this by stating the dominant, the source of musical tension, followed by the tonic, the place of rest and completion. In the 18th century there was usually some sort of cadence every 16 measures or so. Wagner uses this harmonic convention to create a musical structure in which the cadence is always implied, but always avoided. The ways to do this are by extending the dominant and instead of resolving it into the tonic, moving instead to a tonic substitute. This is known as a 'deceptive' cadence and it has a long provenance. Wagner's claim to fame is his extension of these techniques to huge lengths of time and their use to made the drama manifest.
Well, we have come a long way from Popeye!
UPDATE: I forgot to mention the news item that originally gave me the idea for this post. In the Globe and Mail there is a story about a new Canadian opera by Abigail Richardson, commissioned for young audiences on a short story by Roch Carrier, "The Hockey Sweater". The first paragraph provides us with yet another example of mimesis in music:
To perform her most recent piece of music, Ontario composer Abigail Richardson will rely on the strings, the brass and the organ, as well as a pile of ceramic tiles. The tiles, just the regular kitchen-bathroom variety, make a sharp noise when scraped against each other, rather like a skate blade cutting across ice, and that is exactly the sound Richardson needs.
Imitation of the exact sound of an activity in the real world--a musical 'sound effect'.
Labels: madrigalism, mickey-mousing, mimesis
The Wages of Professionalism
I was reading about the minnesinger Neidhardt von Reuenthal (died about 1250) and noticed that he was not only a composer of songs, but also a nobleman and crusader. That gets me thinking. When did ordinary people, that is, non-professionals, stop making music? I think that it must have started sometime in the late 19th or early 20th century. A technological event and an historical trend would be my choices for the causes. The technology is recording, of course. As soon as we were able to make relatively accurate recordings, then the outstandingly gifted professional musicians would increase their dominance. As soon as anyone can buy a recording of Caruso, or Heifetz or Horowitz, then the local artists decline in importance and influence. Before, they could only dominate the concert hall they were playing in that night. The other trend was toward complexity and virtuosity. An amateur pianist can negotiate a sonata by Haydn without too much difficulty. Even lots of music by Beethoven. But with Liszt and Paganini, the whole point of their music is to transcend what an amateur can do.
So, inexorably, the role of the amateur musician declined and diminished more and more to the point where now, the making of music is left largely up to full time professionals and the rest of us just play the iPod. Someone like Condileeza Rice, who is reasonably accomplished on the piano, stands out because nowadays it is so unusual. I think recording technology has been even more crucial than the higher technical requirements. Before everyone had access to recordings, people sang and danced as a regular component of life. They worked and sang work songs, they drank and sang drinking songs, they loved and sang love songs, they marched to battle and sang battle songs.
Here is what we do now:
Not bad, actually. But if they weren't in a war zone, they probably wouldn't go to the trouble. The consequence now is that the vast majority of people imbibe music passively, having little in the way of experience in being makers of music themselves.
Labels: professionalism
Paul McCartney in the Zocalo
Missing TV
A Statistic for Composers
A Trouvere Song
"Ligeti's myriad-minded life and work"
Music, Subsidy and Commercialism
Pre-Literate, Literate and Post-Literate Music
More on "A Very Interesting Program"


What's behind the infamous mugshot smirk of accused killer Jared Lee Loughner?
On Tuesday, conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh ventured a guess, suggesting that Loughner loves the limelight and the "support" he's received from members of the Democratic Party following Saturday's shooting spree.
What Mr. Loughner knows is that he has the full support of a major political party in this country. He's sitting there in jail. He knows what's going on, he knows that…the Democrat party is attempting to find anybody but him to blame. He knows if he plays his cards right, he's just a victim. He's the latest in a never-ending parade of victims brought about by the unfairness of America…this guy clearly understands he's getting all the attention and he understands he's got a political party doing everything it can, plus a local sheriff doing everything that they can to make sure he's not convicted of murder – but something lesser.
The tweets are stunning, disturbing, and downright shocking.
I hate liberals. And this will backfire on them. hopefully, they all go to hell.
looky there...it's been removed off of youtube...LOL communism!


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Hafiz Saeed founded the Lashkar-e-Taiba group blamed for the Mumbai attacks which left at least 174 people dead.
GREEK RAGE
Protests Greet Merkel in Athens
Dimitri Messinis / AP Photo
At least 40,000 demonstrators took to the streets near Parliament to protest against Angela Merkel during her visit to Greece. One small group burned a flag bearing a Nazi swastika and some protesters dressed in Nazi uniforms. Banners at rallies read "Don't Cry for Us Mrs. Merkel" and "Merkel You Are Not Welcome Here." In preparation for Merkel's trip, authorities banned protests in many parts of Athens and launched the biggest security operation since 1999, when protesters broke out over NATO airstrikes. A police spokeswoman said that 217 people have been detained and 24 have been arrested and 7,000 police officers are on standby in the capital to keep order.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Always log into Oracle using Vanderbilt's single sign-on page.
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Esta fue la decimonovena edición del torneo, disputada entre el Club Atlético River Plate, de Argentina, y el Club Nacional de Football, de Uruguay. Ambos equipos habían obtenido el tricampeonato 1955-1957 en sus respectivas ligas.

Debían jugarse dos encuentros ida y vuelta como se estableció a partir de la edición de 1941, pero se realizó un único partido jugado en el estadio Centenario, de Montevideo, en el que River Plate se impuso por 2 a 1. El partido de vuelta, en el estadio Monumental de Buenos Aires, nunca se concretó debido a que el equipo uruguayo planteó no tener fechas disponibles para viajar. Ante esta situación, Nacional reconoció a River Plate como campeón legítimo del torneo. El título es reconocido por la AUF y se está tramitando su reconocimiento en la AFA.

Cabe aclarar que la edición corresponde al año 1957, aunque en algunas publicaciones fue asignada erróneamente a 1955. Debió disputarse en 1958, pero por inconvenientes de agenda se realizó en 1959 antes del comienzo de los torneos locales.

Esta fue la última edición oficial de la Copa Aldao, que volvería a jugarse años más tarde, en 1997, pero ya en carácter amistoso y no oficial.

Clubes clasificados
Clasificaron como campeones de 1957 en sus respectivas ligas.

Partido

Enlaces externos
 RSSSF: Copa Dr. Ricardo C. Aldao

1957
Fútbol en 1959
Uruguay en 1959

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Dysdera concinna är en spindelart som beskrevs av Ludwig Carl Christian Koch 1878. Dysdera concinna ingår i släktet Dysdera och familjen ringögonspindlar. Inga underarter finns listade i Catalogue of Life.

Källor

Ringögonspindlar
concinna


Officials say a Code Blue declaration is made in Burlington County when winter situations pose a threat of significant harm or demise to people without shelter. Economics, politics, the worth of individual liberty, faith, and morals all play a huge function on how public well being responds to the prevention and control of sexually transmitted illness, including HIV/AIDS. For the prevention of STDS, politics has considerably been involved within the intervention in public health. Moreover, these actions are a progression within the authorities's implementation in the wellbeing of the general public well being. The worth of particular person liberty represents the choice by individuals to simply accept support via public well being. Funding for training and prevention continues to still be the number one problem for these international locations.
My year end weight is round 132 kilos (honestly I did not get on the dimensions yesterday!) So in two years that's 36 kilos down. Ingesting a lot of water, consuming filling meals and snacking on fruit, veg and nuts will stop your stomach rumbling. Many people would select to have well balanced meals that might be nutritious though many people really feel that consuming nutritious means now we have to protect rigorous meals listing arranging. Nonetheless, Tuna pasta makes Jamie Oliver is usually a very healthy meals selection, merely created, nourishing, scrumptious as well as tasty too. The following this substances employed are typically healthy and subsequently this dinner is actually nutritious along with delectable.
Should you be beginning to feel as if you are unable to use the bathroom, it's time to obtain seriously interested in taking care of this problem. In the end, you would like to be sure that it is all totally escaping the body within a reasonable period of time. Otherwise, bacteria is going to be caught inside your digestive tract. When this occurs, you will find serious issues that should be looked after.


Scott Solomon leads high profile financial, accounting, compliance, and due diligence investigations around the world relating to allegations of accounting irregularities, improper financial disclosures, fraud, non-compliance, corruption, bribery, theft of trade secrets, and data breaches. He has provided expert testimony on accounting and financial issues in commercial litigation matters and has appeared before the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Federal Reserve Bank, Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, and the US Department of Justice to present findings on behalf of his clients.
Scott has also served as an accounting expert in post-acquisition disputes, a financial adviser to court appointed receivers/trustees and their counsel, and has quantified business interruption losses, including losses resulting from cyber-attacks.
Scott is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists, and the Illinois CPA Society. Scott is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), Certified in Financial Forensics (CFF), a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), and a Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist (CAMS). He also serves on the Board of Directors of two not-for-profit organizations; the Better Government Association and CARPLS.


Crisis guests have greater demands on their feet than the rest of the population and much less opportunity for foot care. The results can be painful and debilitating. Crisis are looking for qualified podiatrists to treat their guests, and podiatry students to help run the service by welcoming guests and preparing them for treatment.
The Crisis Podiatry Service provides a range of treatments and foot care advice for guests, mainly treating corns and calluses, problem nails and blistering.
For further information visit www.crisis.org.uk. You can contact the Crisis at Christmas Services Team by calling 0300 6361000 or emailing ccservices@crisis.org.uk.


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Evangelism Stories
My Husband Just Died
Irina didn't have much. She couldn't even afford enough food to feed her son. So her son spent his days at a government run orphanage. Few people in Russia are Christians so I I knew, when she told me her husband had just died, that she'd be hearing that he just went to hell. I was not looking forward to this conversation.
In sharing the gospel we try to ask questions and let people come to a conclusion on their own. We're not Bible thumpers trying to pound the gospel into people's heads. We follow the model Jesus gave us: be loving, kind, gentle and humble, and ask questions that allow people to see the truth for themselves.
Irina's answer was the same as the answer we get from almost everyone. She said that good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell. So I asked her if she considered herself to be a good person. She said she was,
I asked her, "May I ask you a few questions to see if you really are a good person?" She said that would be fine.
"How many lies have you told?" I asked. She replied that it was more than she could remember or count.
"Have you ever taken something that did not belong to you?" Her answer was, "Yes."
Matthew 5:21 & 22
"You have heard that the ancients were told, 'You shall not commit murder and 'Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.' But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court..."
"And whoever says 'You fool,' shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell."
Most people think they are good people because at least they haven't murdered anyone. So my next question was, "Have you ever murdered anyone?" She looked surprised and said, "no".
"Have you ever been really angry at someone?" I asked. She had.
In Matthew 5 Jesus said that if you are unjustly angry at someone, or call someone a fool, you have committed murder in your heart. God looks at your thoughts and heart, not just your actions.
"Have you ever looked at another person with lust?"
"Yes." She answered.
"Jesus said that if you look with lust you have committed adultery in your heart."
"These are just four of the Ten Commandments." I explained. "You have admitted you are a liar, a thief, a murderer and an adulterer at heart. When you die will you go to heaven or hell?"
"Hell," she answered with a look of concern on her face.
"Do you know what God has done so that you don't need to spend eternity in hell?"
"No," she answered.
John 3:18 & 19
"He who believes in Him [Jesus] is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already...
"This is the judgment, that the Light [Jesus] has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their [your] deeds were evil."
You have broken God's laws and have earned the penalty for breaking His laws. For example, the Bible says that all liars have their place in the lake of fire. But 2000 years ago Jesus died on the cross to pay the penalty you've earned. He died in your place so that you don't have to die. If you accept this gift from God you'll be in heaven with God after you die. If you choose to pay your penalty yourself, you will do just that... you'll be under God's wrath for eternity. It's what we call hell.
As often happens Irina said that this makes sense. It was the first time anyone had explained Christianity in a way that made sense to her. But she wasn't ready to say "yes" to Jesus.
What had happened to her husband never came up in our conversation. I was obedient to God and shared the gospel. Another seed had been planted. She said she had a Bible at home, so I gave her some small books that talked about sin and salvation through trusting in Jesus Christ. She then reached into the shopping bag she was carrying and gave me a package of cookies as a gift to express her gratitude. A very different outcome than I was expecting.
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The Nordman Group
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Granbury, TX Real Estate
Located 35 miles southwest of Fort Worth along U.S. Highway 377 in Hood County, Granbury is situated along the banks of Lake Granbury, a 30-mile-long rural recreational haven. Created in 1969, when the Brazos River was dammed at the DeCordova Bend, Lake Granbury offers plentiful water sports and opportunities for fun and relaxation. Fishing, swimming, water skiing and sailing are enjoyed on the lake. The city of Granbury offers ample country charm. Many of the buildings on the town square are registered historic landmarks, including the Granbury Opera House.
For a list of schools located within the district(s) please click on the link(s) below.
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When do I thin young orange tree fruit and how many shall I leave? We have clusters of many tiny oranges. I am sure the young tree cannot support them all, but I don't know when to thin and how many to leave. Right now each fruit is about 1-2 cm. Last year, the tree produced 4 fine oranges. Thanks for any guidance.


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Federal-State Relations
Arizona AG Sues Biden Administration Over COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate
President Joe Biden speaks at Brookland Middle School in Washington on Sept. 10, 2021. (Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP Photo)
By Jack Phillips
Jack Phillips
Breaking News Reporter
Jack Phillips is a senior reporter for The Epoch Times based in New York. He covers breaking news.
Arizona filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration's sweeping COVID-19 vaccine mandates that affect federal employees, most healthcare workers, and employees at numerous private businesses—likely the first lawsuit that was filed against the policies.
"The federal government cannot force people to get the COVID-19 vaccine. The Biden Administration is once again flouting our laws and precedents to push their radical agenda," Attorney General Mark Brnovich, a Republican, said in a statement on Tuesday.
In a lawsuit that was filed in the U.S. District Court of Arizona, Brnovich's team contrasted the new mandates against the lack of COVID-19 vaccine rules for illegal immigrants who enter via the U.S.-Mexico border, where there has been a surge in encounters since Biden took office.
Biden last week made the announcement regarding vaccine mandates for private businesses with 100 or more employees, all federal employees and contractors, and healthcare workers at facilities that receive Medicare and Medicaid funding. The private employees can either get the COVID-19 vaccine or submit to weekly testing, according to the White House plan.
"Many of us are frustrated with the nearly 80 million Americans who are still not vaccinated, even though the vaccine is safe, effective, and free," Biden said in a speech last week, explaining why the mandates are necessary.
But the Arizona lawsuit argued that Biden's plan violates the Equal Protection Clause by allegedly favoring illegal aliens who have entered the United States over U.S. citizens.
"Although the precise contours of the federal vaccination mandates are not yet clear, the violation of the Equal Protection Clause is already evident and egregious," the brief stated. "In a nutshell: unauthorized aliens will not be subject to any vaccination requirements even when released directly into the United States (where most will remain), while roughly a hundred million U.S. citizens will be subject to unprecedented vaccination requirements."
Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich speaks at a news conference in Phoenix, Ariz., on Jan. 7, 2020. (Bob Christie/AP Photo)
As a result, Brnovich's team argued, the administration's policies display an "unmistakable" and "unconstitutional" bias "in favor of unauthorized aliens."
Meanwhile, the suit also cites a Twitter post from an MSNBC contributor, Stephanie Ruhle, that was shared by White House chief of staff Ron Klain on Sept. 9 that Biden's order targeting private businesses was the "ultimate work-around" for the federal government to mandate vaccines.
"The inadvertent admission in the preceding paragraph makes all of the administration's actions constitutionally suspect," Brnovich's suit said. "These other violations will be the subject of future challenges."
The lawsuit asks the court to declare unconstitutional the administration's allegedly discriminatory vaccine policies regarding illegal aliens and U.S. citizens as well as permanent residents. It also seeks an injunction against the White House implementing the mandate, arguing that any vaccine requirement for citizens and permanent residents should be applied to illegal aliens.
Other Republican attorney generals and governors have said they would file lawsuits against the Biden administration after the mandate was announced.
The Epoch Times has contacted the White House and the Department of Homeland Security for comment.
COVID-19 is the illness caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus.
Dr. Robert Malone Shocked by Pfizer Executive's Stunning Admission in Project Veritas Video | The Larry Elder Show | EP. 118


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Samuel Colt
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Among INVENTORS »
Among INVENTORS In United States »
Samuel Colt (; July 19, 1814 – January 10, 1862) was an American inventor, industrialist, and businessman who established Colt's Patent Fire-Arms Manufacturing Company (now Colt's Manufacturing Company) and made the mass production of revolvers commercially viable. Colt's first two business ventures were producing firearms in Paterson, New Jersey, and making underwater mines; both ended in disappointment. His business affairs improved rapidly after 1847, when the Texas Rangers ordered 1,000 revolvers during the American war with Mexico. Read more on Wikipedia
Since 2007, the English Wikipedia page of Samuel Colt has received more than 1,451,225 page views. His biography is available in 64 different languages on Wikipedia (up from 63 in 2019). Samuel Colt is the 22nd most popular inventor (down from 19th in 2019), the 183rd most popular biography from United States (down from 165th in 2019) and the 4th most popular American Inventor.
Samuel Colt is most famous for inventing the Colt revolver.
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Among INVENTORS
Among inventors, Samuel Colt ranks 22 out of 354. Before him are George Stephenson, Cai Lun, Louis Daguerre, Nicéphore Niépce, John Logie Baird, and Karl Ferdinand Braun. After him are Charles K. Kao, Thomas Newcomen, Antonio Meucci, Werner von Siemens, James Naismith, and Steve Wozniak.
Most Popular Inventors in Wikipedia
George Stephenson
Cai Lun
Thomas Newcomen
Antonio Meucci
Werner von Siemens
James Naismith
Among people born in 1814, Samuel Colt ranks 4. Before him are Mikhail Bakunin, Jean-François Millet, and Taras Shevchenko. After him are Mikhail Lermontov, Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, Adolphe Sax, Julius von Mayer, Anders Jonas Ångström, Henri Nestlé, Hong Xiuquan, and Jenny von Westphalen. Among people deceased in 1862, Samuel Colt ranks 3. Before him are Martin Van Buren and Henry David Thoreau. After him are John Tyler, Jean-Baptiste Biot, Bahadur Shah Zafar, James Clark Ross, Božena Němcová, Alfred I, Prince of Windisch-Grätz, Fromental Halévy, Mikhail Ostrogradsky, and Karl Nesselrode.
Jean-François Millet
Taras Shevchenko
Mikhail Lermontov
Eugène Viollet-le-Duc
Adolphe Sax
Julius von Mayer
Henri Nestlé
Hong Xiuquan
Jenny von Westphalen
Jean-Baptiste Biot
James Clark Ross
Alfred I, Prince of Windisch-Grätz
Fromental Halévy
Mikhail Ostrogradsky
Karl Nesselrode
Among people born in United States, Samuel Colt ranks 183 out of 18,182. Before him are William James Sidis (1898), Tom Cruise (1962), David Lynch (1946), Pearl S. Buck (1892), Sigourney Weaver (1949), and James Monroe (1758). After him are Richard Gere (1949), Carl Sagan (1934), Ray Bradbury (1920), Tom Selleck (1945), Talcott Parsons (1902), and James Madison (1751).
William James Sidis
Talcott Parsons
Among INVENTORS In United States
Among inventors born in United States, Samuel Colt ranks 4. Before him are Thomas Edison (1847), Henry Ford (1863), and Samuel Morse (1791). After him are Steve Wozniak (1950), George Westinghouse (1846), Robert Fulton (1765), Herman Hollerith (1860), Charles Goodyear (1800), William G. Morgan (1870), Willis Carrier (1876), and Isaac Singer (1811).
American born Inventors
Samuel Morse
George Westinghouse
Robert Fulton
Herman Hollerith
Charles Goodyear
William G. Morgan
Isaac Singer


$269,000 is a lot for us...how about condos (are they less expensive?) Or, retirement communities - how much would something like that cost?
Great question Linda! Condos in Colorado Springs can be found at lower price points than single family homes. Most range from under $100k up to around $300k. In regards to retirement communities, we're all over it! We're currently in the process of adding local retirement communities to the site, so check back often!


Stop Snoring Chin Straps – Do They Work?
1 How Are Anti-snoring Chin Straps Meant To Work?
4 Who Should Avoid This Type Of Product?
5 Why Are There So Many Different Types of Anti-Snoring Chin Straps?
6 Should You Buy the Expensive Version, or the Cheap Version?
8 Are Chin Straps Scientifically Proven to Work?
9 Is It Safe to Use an Anti-Snoring Chin Strap With Other Stop Snoring Devices?
10 What Are the Odds That an Anti-Snoring Chin Strap Would Work for You?
Many of them are adjustable, and fasten with Velcro to stay tight. They are designed to be worn during sleep to help prevent snoring (we will talk about how they accomplish this in just a minute), and are, in general, a pretty low-maintenance snoring remedy.
Some of them have holes in the sides for the ears to pop through. But some do not have ear holes. There are quite a few different types on the market. Some are more generic, and some are more like name-brand products. They also range in price… with some of them costing over $100.
How Are Anti-snoring Chin Straps Meant To Work?
The basic idea behind the stop snoring chin strap is that it is supposed to work by keeping the lower jaw closed and pulled forward. This helps to treat the root cause of what they call 'mouth snoring,' which is soft palate vibration.
The stop snoring chin strap, however, is designed to do two things. First of all, it was designed to keep the lower mouth closed during sleep, thus preventing mouth breathing. And secondly… it was designed to help keep the jaw pulled forward slightly… which helps to open up the back of the airway by keeping the tissues of the soft palate pulled just a little bit tighter.
By combining these effects, the stop snoring chin strap is supposed to help prevent (or at least lessen) incidences of mouth snoring.
Keep in mind that mouth snoring is a bit different from nose snoring. Nasal snoring is less common, but the stop snoring chin strap device does not help that type. In fact, it might make things worse if you snore through your nose, by not allowing you to breathe through your mouth.
The stop snoring chin strap certainly has some evidence to support it… but it is also a less technical method than a mandibular advancement device, or a tongue retention device. The stop snoring chin strap basically attempts to use the same basic logic to solve the snoring problem as these other types of devices… but it does so in a less-technical way.
Because of this, it is not quite as efficient.
But, this also comes with some upsides. It is also much less invasive, because it does not require you to put anything in your mouth.
This, in itself, is enough of an upside to make it appeal more to some people.
Overall, we like this type of product if you are not interested in an MAD or a tongue retention device. It isn't quite as good, but it will sometimes help to accomplish the same thing… depending on the case.
Anyone over the age of 18 should be able to use this product. There isn't much that is dangerous or risky about this one. It is surprisingly low-maintenance, so pretty much any adult could use it. People who are nasal snorers, however, will probably notice that this product might make sleeping more difficult.
Also, the main point of the product is that you would tend to use it at night, while sleeping.
Some people say that anti-snoring chin straps are quite comforting to wear, and we can actually vouch for this. They kind of hug your head, which is nice.
You may or may not consider that a 'bonus upside,' but it is still something to keep in mind!
People under the age of 18, and people who tend to nasal snore, are really the only people who probably shouldn't use this product. As this can be difficult to figure out for some, you might need to just give it a try and see if it works for you.
You might also not be a huge fan of this product if you don't want to wear a chin-strap to bed.
With how the stop snoring chin strap works, it doesn't really allow for mouth-breathing during sleep. This is good, in one sense, as mouth breathing has a reputation for being closely associated with snoring. But on the other side of the coin, some people literally cannot breathe very well through their nose during sleep. So for these people, the anti-snoring chin strap is not likely to provide the most favorable of outcomes. It may result in a feeling of 'stuffiness,' or even feelings of claustrophobia if the person using it has a difficult time breathing through their nose.
So that is certainly something to consider.
Why Are There So Many Different Types of Anti-Snoring Chin Straps?
There is a truly daunting array of different anti-snoring chin straps available online.
But why? Why are there so many? Are they all the same, or do some actually work better than others?
We've done quite a bit of research into this, and have discovered that, while there are some differences between different chin straps, most of them actually accomplish pretty much the same thing. The differences do help to appease individual preferences, at least to a point… but in the end, stop snoring chin straps are pretty much designed to hold your jaw closed while you sleep. And that doesn't require anything truly fancy.
Now, with that being said, you will likely notice that the price range of different chin straps is quite large. You can buy generic-brand chin straps online for less than $30 in some cases… but there are also name-brand products that sell for over $100!
Is there any reason to buy name-brand when you can buy something generic for far less?
Should You Buy the Expensive Version, or the Cheap Version?
As a general rule, we usually prefer the name-brand versions of anti-snoring products… mostly because they tend to pack in a lot of quality for the price. There is also something to be said for longevity. In our experience, premium-grade name-brand products tend to last longer.
And this seems to be the case with anti-snoring chin straps as well.
We've tested a few different types, and there is a difference. The more expensive versions are usually made from higher-quality materials, and have subtle design differences that make them more comfortable.
But… still, with that being said, the cheaper versions often work almost as well, if not as well, as the name-brand.
Our general recommendation is to buy a cheaper anti-snoring chinstrap first, just to see if it might do the trick and help with your snoring problem. If you can avoid buying the more expensive types of products, why not go with something cheaper?
We also, however, believe that your odds of success will be a bit higher with a name brand device… so that is also something to take into account.
The best way to choose the best chin strap for you is to read reviews, conduct Google searches, and look at several different models before settling on one that really catches your eye. We've actually posted reviews for a few different chin straps on our website, including the SleepWell Pro and the MySnoringSolution. These are not your only options, but they are two of our favorite chin strap devices.
Review the features, check out what kind of a guarantee they offer, and look at the reviews. A bit of research should yield information that will help you to make the best, most informed decision.
We always recommend trying out anti-snoring devices that come with a money back guarantee first, for obvious reasons. It is always better to have the option to get your money back for a product that didn't work for you! Thankfully, a lot of chin straps offer this perk… which is good.
Are Chin Straps Scientifically Proven to Work?
There are actually quite a few studies that give us insight into how well chin straps work for snoring.
One of the more commonly quoted studies is one called The Efficacy of a Chinstrap in Treating Sleep Disordered Breathing and Snoring. This study basically explored whether or not chin straps could serve as a potential alternative to CPAP. The study actually raises some serious questions about the effectiveness of chin straps overall. In the study, chin straps were found to not be a feasible alternative to CPAP. They also didn't work to relieve snoring or Obstructive Sleep Apnea on their own.
But… with that being said, there are also other cases where chinstraps were reported to work. Take the study Treatment of Severe Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome with a Chinstrap as an example. It was published in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, and detailed how a chin strap was used to successfully treat not only snoring, but also OSA in a 75 year old retired physician. Of course, this is a paper that only really talks about evidence of a single case… but still, evidence is evidence.
So, the jury is out on whether or not anti-snoring chin straps are actually effective from a scientific point of view. It could be said that they only work in some cases, for some patients. It could probably also be said that they are not a definitive treatment option, as they do not work for everyone all the time. But… it could also definitely be said that they are worth a try, as they are absolutely useful in at least some circumstances.
Unfortunately, this is more of a 'trial and error' kind of product.
Is It Safe to Use an Anti-Snoring Chin Strap With Other Stop Snoring Devices?
This is a great question, and the answer is usually a yes. While chin straps may not have a ton of evidence supporting their ability to solve snoring problems on their own, they do offer some unique advantages when paired with other snoring therapy options.
For example, some people use them in conjunction with CPAP masks to help keep their mouth closed while they sleep. They can also be used in conjunction with a Tongue Retention Device or Mandibular Advancement Device to help keep the devices from falling out of the mouth during the night.
Some people even use them to help support the use of products like anti-snoring throat sprays.
Obviously, the results will vary based on the specifics of the situation… but in some cases, pairing a chin strap with a different product can actually help a lot! One of the more common side effects of MAD use is that they can tend to fall out during the night. Sometimes, people get used to the devices and this stops happening. But if you never manage to stop your mouthpiece from falling out during the night, a chin-strap could serve as a remedy to prevent the problem.
This would help to make the MAD even more effective.
What Are the Odds That an Anti-Snoring Chin Strap Would Work for You?
We get this question a lot. But unfortunately, it can be difficult to know the answer until you actually give the product a try. If you have a lot of trouble breathing through your nose, then odds are good that a chin strap is not going to help you. But aside from that, there is always a chance that a chin strap could help to mitigate snoring problems.
Will it work better than an MAD? This is doubtful, as MADs act more directly upon the source of snoring… the soft palate. But chin straps are also less invasive, and may offer a better chance for long-term compliance.
So it really all depends on your situation.
If you prefer the idea of a chin strap to the idea of an MAD or TRD, then you may want to consider ordering one just to try it out. If it doesn't work, you can always upgrade to a better device. Plus, if you order a chin strap that comes with a money back guarantee, you can even get some of your investment back to put towards something that will work.
But at the end of the day, remember this. Snoring may seem like just a nuisance, but it is actually a lot more debilitating than that. Snoring, if left untreated, can result in long-term problems that can seriously hinder your health, life, and level of happiness. It can also affect your relationships and put a strain on your marriage/partnership with a bedpartner.
They may not be a solve-all solution to your snoring problems, but chin straps are certainly worth a try if you feel that they offer the kinds of benefits you would enjoy in an anti-snoring device. They are minimally invasive, comfortable, and generally pack in a lot of benefits. They just don't work for everyone… so you won't know 100% until you give one a try!


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Subscribe To Brad Pitt Bails On The Lost City Of Z Updates
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Brad Pitt Bails On The Lost City Of Z
By Katey Rich
Back in January we were all anxiously eyeing Brad Pitt's goatee and comforting ourselves by saying, no, it was just for his role in The Lost City of Z, and surely he wouldn't let that thing mar his face forever. Well, he didn't-- he shaved it for his role in Moneyball, and quite possibly to find the roll of quarters he lost in there, but now it looks like he grew out the whole damn monstrosity for nothing. After years of waiting for the movie to get a script in place, Pitt has bailed on the project, reports Vulture.
Apparently the problem wasn't the script but what Paramount was willing to pay director James Gray, whose last film Two Lovers suffered financially thanks to star Joaquin Phoenix's pseudo-meltdown during the publicity tour. Vulture doesn't specify how much Gray was asking for, but he's never been a guy who made blockbusters, so it's likely they were trying to lowball him. Now they've lost the star who pretty much was the reason for it to be made, and if they've pissed Gray off too, what do you think the odds are of him sticking around?
Lost City of Z, based on the book by David Grann, would have told the story of British explorer Percy Fawcett's expedition to find the legendary El Dorado in the early 1900s, only to disappear alongside his son during the hunt. Sounds like a good, Herzogian adventure story-- and one hugely unlikely to ever happen now that Pitt has bailed. Better luck next time, James Gray-- between Paramount and Joaquin Phoenix, he's really overdue to find some people to work with who actually deserve him.
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