While perusing photos of David Bowie, who died a few days ago at age 69,
I realized that he kind of had an ANC III vibe going.
Amazing, right?
Well, into paradise may the angels lead thee, David. At thy coming may the martyrs receive thee, and bring thee into the holy city Jerusalem.
We’ll miss you.
Tradition says we must play 1980s 45s and dance at Christmastime. Who are we to mess with tradition?
As you know, I sometimes usually listen to a Christian radio station driving into work in the morning. They are playing a lot of Christmas music now and here’s a new one that I like, which is loosely based on the famous poem written by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in 1863. (It takes a lot of liberties.)
Here’s the poem. It’s rather timely I think.
I heard the bells on Christmas day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men.I thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along th’unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.And in despair I bowed my head:
‘There is no peace on earth, ‘ I said
‘For hate is strong, and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.’Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
‘God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail,
With peace on earth, good will to men.’Till, ringing, singing on its way,
The world revolved from night to day
A voice, a chime, a chant sublime,
Of peace on earth, good will to men.
Here’s a version of the older arrangement by the Civil Wars–I like it, although it’s a little breathy for my taste.
And here’s the version I remember from a Christmas record we had when I was a child.
Did you listen to them all? Which one did you like best?
It’s Friday–enjoy your weekend!
Some of you movie fans may recognize the title of today’s post as a quote from the movie The Wild Bunch (1969). William Holden says it throughout the movie in a screenwriter’s attempt to bind a wandering plot together, sort of like John Wayne saying “We’re burning daylight” or “That’ll be the day”. However, whereas this device worked in John Wayne movies, it does not in this movie–probably because it is never clear where the bunch is going.
Do not confuse these guys with The Professionals, who may look similar, but are like night and day.
They are going to hell, I guess. The movie sure does. What a mess, especially the director’s cut, which I made the mistake of watching this weekend. The cast is good, but they have no idea what is happening either. I felt sorry for them.
This movie is frequently hailed as a landmark, a brilliant western which re-defined the genre, blah, blah, blah. It is just another story of old guys who are out of sink with their time. Their “code of honor” is at odds with society in 1913–but it is a made up code of honor, not unlike the code in Sons of Anarchy. It doesn’t work, it will never work. Once again, the violence is unremitting and boring. Maybe in 1969 it was shocking. Sadly it is shocking no more. Repetitive and bestial, yes. I get it, men–even children–are beasts.
Oh well, I did watch a good movie this weekend–Mr. Holmes (2015) starring Ian McKellen as the aging Sherlock.
Set in 1947, this movie is about an aged Sherlock Holmes, retired now to the English coast, who is trying to remember his last case and deal with the onset of memory loss and senility. It is a marvelous, low-key story about an old man who, unlike the guys in the wild bunch, is ultimately not afraid to change. Ian McKellen is wonderful as is Milo Parker as Roger, the smart little boy who is the son of Sherlock’s housekeeper. I highly recommend you find this movie and watch it–a rarity among this year’s deluge of super heroes and sci fi extravaganzas. No sex, no violence, no vulgarity–only intelligence and subtlety and love. How rare.
In other news, the OM and I went out on a beautiful, balmy Saturday and bought our two Christmas trees. We wrestled the small tree into its stand when we got home after the OM hacked off a good chunk of the lower trunk in order to make it fit. The poor thing has a bit of a Charlie Brown aura about it now, but who cares? It is lovely all decked out in its finery.
I wrapped quite a lot of presents and have my out-of-town packages ready to go. I worked on my Christmas cards. I capped off the weekend with Lessons & Carols at church where we sang all the great Advent hymns.
All in all, a productive and not-too-hectic weekend!
So now let’s go…
…and look East. The time is near
of the crowning of the year.
Make your house fair as you are able,
set the hearth, and set the table.
People, look East, and sing today:
Love, the guest is on the way**
*Pike Bishop (William Holden) in The Wild Bunch (1969)
**Craig Philips, Advent Carol
Okay, get this–today is Neil Young’s birthday
and he is seventy years old!
Well, the fact that he is old, makes me feel old. Zut alors, look at how the time goes past!*
Harvest, you will recall, was the #1 best-selling album in the U.S. in 1972 when I was in the 10th grade. Even I owned it, which is saying something.
So cut me some slack.
Happy birthday, Neil. You’re kind of a tool and a preachy one at that, but I’ll toast you tonight anyway and your survival to the ripe old age of 70.
*Clever inclusion of NY lyric
I went to see The Yeoman of the Guard by Gilbert & Sullivan on Friday night.
The scene of this opera is laid within the precincts of the Tower of London, in the period of the 16th Century.
Admittedly, it was not the D’Oly Carte Opera Company, but I thought our local Winter Opera company was really quite wonderful.
My mother was a fan of Yeoman and we had the record.
I think she liked it because it is the only W&S opera with kind of a sad ending. She could always relate to the fool/jester character in anything and there is a stellar one in Yeoman.
Anyway, I dragged the OM and the boy along (daughter #3 was otherwise engaged) and they enjoyed it also. We were all proud of ourselves for getting out and participating in a cultural activity.
It reminded me of the time back in 1964 when my mother bought tickets to see the actual D’Oyly Carte Company perform The Mikado. She took my brother and me. I was in the second grade, but she thought I was old enough to enjoy/appreciate this opportunity. (She may have over-estimated me.) Anyway, my father took my little sister (who was not old enough to enjoy/appreciate light opera) to see It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. Ironically this film was on TCM last week and I DVR’d it and then watched it this weekend. It features literally every American comedian (plus Terry-Thomas) alive in 1963. It is overly long and drags some, but it does have its moments. Jonathan Winters is great and the scene in the gas station with Arnold Stang and Marvin Kaplan is priceless. There is a lot of yelling in this movie.
Speaking of movies, I also watched From Hell (2001) on Halloween and, despite the presence of Johnny Depp, I thought it was dreadful. Apologies for recommending it on Friday!
Sunday, as you know, was All Saints Day and we had an interminably long service complete with a children’s sermon dissecting the hymn The Saints of God. Oh, did I mention it was also pledge Sunday? Well, it was. On top of this, the woman sitting behind me was a beat behind or a beat ahead during every prayer and every hymn to the point where I was ready to slap her and slap her hard. I hate feeling that way in church.
And now it is November and the long slide to Christmas begins. Deo gratias.
Enjoy your Monday!
Point. I have a song to sing, O!
Elsie. Sing me your song, O!
Point. It is sung to the moon
By a love-lorn loon,
Who fled from the mocking throng,O!
It’s the song of a merryman, moping mum,
Whose soul was sad, and whose glance was glum,
Who sipped no sup, and who craved no crumb.
As he sighed for the love of a ladye.
Heighdy! heighdy! Misery me, lackadaydee!
He sipped no sup, and he craved no crumb,
As he sighed for the love of a ladye.
–Yeoman of the Guard
Hymn #287
Back on July 2 I failed to note that “three prophetic witnesses” were recognized with a feast day on the Episcopal calendar. They are Walter Rauschenbusch, Washington Gladden and Jacob Riis.
Washington Gladden (February 11, 1836 – July 2, 1918) you will recall, was a Congregational minister and early leader in the Social Gospel movement, whose ministry “was dedicated to the realization of the Kingdom of God in this world. Gladden was the acting religious editor of the New York Independent, in which he exposed corruption in the New York political system. Gladden was the first American clergyman to approve of and support labor unions. In his capacity as Vice President of the American Missionary Association, he traveled to Atlanta where he met W.E.B. Dubois and he became an early opponent of segregation.” (Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music)
He was also a graduate of Williams College, class of 1859.
While at Williams, Gladden wrote its alma mater song, “The Mountains.”
“I had been wishing that I might write a song which could be sung at some of our exhibitions,” wrote Gladden in his memoirs, “and one winter morning, walking down Bee Hill, the lilt of the chorus of “The Mountains” came to me. I had a little music-paper in my room in the village, and on my arrival I wrote down the notes. Then I cast about for words to fit them, and the refrain ‘The Mountains, the Mountains!’ suggested itself. I wrote the melody of the stanza next and fitted the verses to it. . . . That it would . . . become the accepted College Song, I could not, of course, have imagined.”
The Mountains
O, proudly rise the monarchs of our mountain land,
With their kingly forest robes, to the sky,
Where Alma Mater dwelleth with her chosen band,
And the peaceful river floweth gently by.CHORUS
The mountains! the mountains! we greet them with a song,
Whose echoes rebounding their woodland heights along,
Shall mingle with anthems that winds and fountains sing.
Till hill and valley gaily, gaily ring.Beneath their peaceful shadows may old Williams stand,
Till suns and mountains nevermore shall be,
The glory and the honor of our mountain land,
And the dwelling of the gallant and the free.
I have fond memories of singing this rousing song while a student there in the mid-1970s. Check it out:
Have a great Wednesday!
Nothing is so beautiful as Spring –
When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;
Thrush’s eggs look little low heavens, and thrush
Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring
The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing;
The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush
The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush
With richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling.
What is all this juice and all this joy?
A strain of the earth’s sweet being in the beginning
In Eden garden. – Have, get, before it cloy,
Before it cloud, Christ, lord, and sour with sinning,
Innocent mind and Mayday in girl and boy,
Most, O maid’s child, thy choice and worthy the winning.
“Spring” by Gerard Manley Hopkins
A friend at work brought this poem to my attention by stopping by my office and quoting, “What is all this juice and all this joy?” He was alluding to the beautiful spring day of course. We have certainly enjoyed an exceptionally beautiful spring with long strings of crisp, clear days in the high 60s. Carpe diem, I say–but I am glued to a desk. Sigh.
Anyway, it is also the birthday today of Sir Thomas Beecham (29 April 1879 – 8 March 1961) who, you will recall, was an English conductor and impresario best known for his association with the London Philharmonic and the Royal Philharmonic orchestras.
From the early 20th century until his death, Beecham was a major influence on the musical life of Britain and, according to the BBC, was Britain’s first international conductor. If you are like me and my dual personality, you were brought up on Sir Thomas Beecham’s recordings. True, some may have considered him low-brow for saying things like, “I would give the whole of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos for Massenet’s Manon, and would think I had vastly profited by the exchange.” But I can’t say I disagree with him.
I remember in particular an LP titled “Beecham Bon-Bons” which included popular favorites by Faure, Delius, Sibelius, Ralph Vaughan Williams and the like.
I wiled away many an hour with Beecham’s music in the background. So a toast to Sir Thomas Beecham! And I think I’ll look him up on eBay and see what I can find.
Beecham’s grave in Surrey
By the way, the painting at the top of the page is by St. Louis artist Frank Nudercher (July 19, 1880 – October 7, 1959)–“Spring Landscape” in the St. Louis Mercantile Library collection. Nudercher is sometimes referred to as the “dean of St. Louis artists.” You can read about him here.
How was your weekend? We enjoyed a glorious mid-winter weather break this weekend with record-breaking temperatures in the low 70s. Wow. After church the OM and I headed down to Ted Drewes only to find it closed with a sign saying it would be open by Valentine’s Day! Why? I have no idea. Confused and let down, we drove back to our flyover town and settled for Andy’s frozen custard, which was good, but just not the same.
Otherwise the weekend was pleasant enough. I did some more work on the basement re-organization project and went to lunch with some girlfriends. Again, we were thwarted in our plans, due to our chosen restaurant being too busy. Everyone and his brother was out and about this weekend!
Since I had finally gotten the DVD back from the boy, I watched Road to Perdition (2002) and enjoyed it a lot.
I was quite struck by the cinematography, so I looked up the cinematographer, Conrad Hall who, it turns out, won his third Oscar for this movie. I found out that he was the son of James Norman Hall, who along with Charles Nordhoff was the author of Mutiny on the Bounty. He was born in Tahiti and studied filmmaking at USC. Nominated ten times, he won Oscars for American Beauty (2000) and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1970) and the aforementioned Road to Perdition, his last film. He was nominated for one of my favorites, The Professionals (1966), but not for another favorite, Cool Hand Luke (1967). Indeed, he was a great cinematographer.
The beautiful musical score is by Thomas Newman, who is the son of the great Alfred Newman (How the West Was Won and many others) and the cousin of Randy Newman. Thomas has been nominated twelve times for an Oscar, but has never won. He composed the music to Fried Green Tomatoes (1991), The Shawshank Redemption (1994) and Oscar and Lucinda (1997) among many others.
Considering that The Road to Perdition is a movie about Irish-American mobsters, there is not an overabundance of violence. (But it is directed by Sam Mendes and not Martin Scorcese.) Bad things happen, terrible things, but first and foremost it is a very low-key film about fathers and sons. Tom Hanks plays the anti-hero who is so screwed up by his upbringing that he cannot escape perdition, but he does the best he can to save his son.
Daughter #1 sent me the link to Bob Dylan’s speech accepting the MusiCares Person of the Year Award. Read the whole thing, because it is quite the speech. Bob is just the Best.
I can not tell you how much I love it that he quotes the old hymn “Stand By Me” in front of all those unbelievers! Testify. When I do the best I can / And my friends don’t understand / Thou who knowest all about me / Stand by me.
The Old Testament reading on Sunday was the wonderful passage from Isaiah 40:21-31:
21 Have ye not known? have ye not heard? hath it not been told you from the beginning? have ye not understood from the foundations of the earth?
22 It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:
23 That bringeth the princes to nothing; he maketh the judges of the earth as vanity.
24 Yea, they shall not be planted; yea, they shall not be sown: yea, their stock shall not take root in the earth: and he shall also blow upon them, and they shall wither, and the whirlwind shall take them away as stubble.
25 To whom then will ye liken me, or shall I be equal? saith the Holy One.
26 Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things, that bringeth out their host by number: he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one faileth.
27 Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel, My way is hid from the Lord, and my judgment is passed over from my God?
28 Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his understanding.
29 He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength.
30 Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall:
31 But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.
So do not faint and grow weary, Kiddos. All will be well. Have a good Monday.
How is it that I missed this wonderfulness?
And this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYaPXeFVbKs
Do you have big plans for the weekend? My only scheduled event is an annual church dinner which raises money for the youth mission trip in June. It is billed as “The Elegant Italian Dinner,” but it is anything but that.
Last year’s big event
They hang twinkly Christmas lights around Albright Hall, turn the lights down very low and serve lasagna. The youth group members wear bow ties and are the waiters. The cool dads serve as the bartenders. (This is an Episcopal Church–there is always a bar.) You get the picture. But it is always fun and the OM even goes.
I’m sure Dolly would too.
Besides this special event, I will be forging on with the basement clean-up. The OM cleaned off his workbench last weekend. Onward and upward.
Friday Movie Pick: Last night TCM featured movies starring Rod Taylor who died earlier this month.
They showed The Time Machine (1960), The Birds (1963), The Glass-Bottomed Boat (1966) with Doris Day, and a few other movies of his. My favorite Rod Taylor movie is, of course, the original 101 Dalmations (1961).
Rod Taylor was the voice of Pongo! I loved that movie! My friends and I in kindergarten “played” it during recess for a long time. Everyone wanted to be Pongo. I would watch it tonight, but I only have a VHS copy!
Oh well. I have a solution. Rod, who was good friends with John Wayne, made one movie with him: The Train Robbers (1973).
Rod is the one in the red kerchief.
It isn’t a particularly great movie, but it works for me! (And, yes, I have it.)
Have a great weekend, y’all!
dual personalities 