A Psalm

The Messenger; Laurence Hobgood, piano; Bob Amster, bass; Paul Wertico, drums; Kurt Elling, vocals

“Hosanna to the son of David!” cried the children on Palm Sunday. That really ticked off the priests and the scribes. “Do you hear what they are saying?”, they asked of Jesus. He replied, “Yes. Have you never read ‘Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings you have created praise’?” Christ quoted the second verse from Psalm 8, the great creation Psalm of David.

Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordered strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.

What doting mother, aunt, teacher or innocent bystander hasn’t blurted out “Out of the mouth of babes” when inadvertent yet ardent truths have spilled out of the innocent worldview of a youngling? Oddly enough, few people who make the utterance realize the source from which they quote.

I, personally, think of this portion of scripture when I hear the words of “Nature Boy”.

There was a boy

A very strange enchanted boy

They say he wandered very far, very far

Over land and sea

A little shy

And sad of eye

But very wise

Was he

_____

And then one day

One magic day he passed my way

And while we spoke of many things, fools and kings

This he said to me

“The greatest thing

You’ll ever learn

Is just to love

And be loved

In return”

Nat King Cole introduced us to this song in 1948 in D Minor, which, so I hear, is the saddest of all keys. The arrangement sways to an exotic beat with an almost Indian (India Indian) chant from the flute in the breaks, laying down a mattress of wonder on which the bewitching lyrics may lie.

Mr. Kurt Elling doesn’t meet the Nature Boy in the remote setting that Mr. King Cole does. Nature Boy and Mr. Elling rendezvous in a hip jazz club with rhythmic word play and inventive melodies, cousins to the original tune by George Aberle.

Before Mr. King Cole could release his famous recording of the song, he had to track down Mr. Aberle. They discovered him and his family living under the first “L” in the famous “HOLLYWOOD” sign above Los Angeles, subsisting on three dollars a week, sleeping outdoors and eating vegetables, fruits and nuts.

Of course, they found him there. I’m frankly surprised that they didn’t look there first. Where else would YOU look for the composer of a song like “Nature Boy”?

More than fifty versions exist of this song out there in the great discogrosphere. Grover Washington, Celine Dion, Sarah Vaughn, Woody Herman, Bobby Darin and Jose Feliciano probably give some of the more respectable performances of this treasure. But if you’re looking for something else, try Leonard Nimoy’s version from his album “The Touch of Leonard Nimoy” from 1969.

Credits: To David, for the Psalms. “God is our refuge and strength; a very present help in trouble.” I don’t need trouble in order to be comforted by Psalm 46.

The Neighborhood

Richard Strauss; Don Quixote; Death And Transfiguration; The MET Orchestra; James Levine, conducting

I don’t think a single person on this beautiful earth could remain forever immune to the charm, charisma and spell of the gentleman millions of viewers know as Mr. Rogers. With a song in his heart and a smile on his face, he burst through the door of his – house? – to hang up his coat, change into his tennie runners and talk to me. Me. He looked me full in the face and knew all the things that I wanted to hear him talk about.

And he knew almost everything. If he didn’t know about something, well, he took us on a field trip to find out about it. The bakery, the theatre, the music store, the candy shop, the post office, the bank and a host of other unorthodox locations became surprising educational venues.

I remember the day Mr. Rogers came through the door with no smile on his face. He didn’t take off his coat and he didn’t change his shoes. He just sat on the bench at the foot of the small staircase and finished the “Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood” song. I thought, Oh, no! What’s wrong with Mr. Rogers? Did he forget to hang up his coat? Is he mad? Did he have a fight with his producer and is he going to quit the show?

Fred Rogers had set this scene up brilliantly. With years of consistency behind him, he only had to change his routine just a little bit to give the young people who watched his show the impression that something was wrong. It certainly got my attention. What happened? Mr. Rogers had received a traffic ticket. He didn’t back away from the truth. He was angry. I don’t recall how he explained it to his viewers; mostly from the standpoint, I would guess, of how it made him feel. He took us to the police department to pay his fine and he showed a cross-section of America’s young people how to handle a frustrating and helpless situation with dignity, grace and an air of respect for both themselves and the perceived source of their discontent.

When Mr. Rogers talked, he had serious things to say but always in a pleasant manner. The Neighborhood Of Make-Believe, however, revealed his creative and humorous side. A cat who lived in a schoolhouse up in a tree. A cranky woman who lived in a museum-go-round that owned an Ogden Nash-like Boomerang-Toomerang-Zoomerang. The proprietor of a rocking chair factory named Corny Cornflake S. Pecially. A tap-dancing telephone operator named Miss Paullificate. A shy introverted tiger who lived in a clock and wore a watch because “when you live in a clock, you really should know what time it is.” But the best good-natured practical joke Mr. Rogers played on his young audience was a donkey named Donkey Hodie who found a place in the “Neighborhood” to build a windmill. King Friday XIII didn’t want it so close to the castle, so Donkey Hodie built it a little further off in the nebulous Someplace Else.

Richard Strauss wrote his grand “Don Quixote” in 1897 for cello, viola and a very large orchestra. He wrote it in the form of theme and variations. The cello soloist represents the esteemed Don Quixote and the solo viola, along with the tenor tuba, depicts the comic Sancho Panza. Each variation portrays a scene from the novel “Don Quixote de la Mancha” by Miguel de Cervantes.

For a while in the 1980’s, Joan Rivers hosted The Tonight Show on Tuesdays. On one of her shows, she invited Fred Rogers to appear as a guest. He agreed. I know nothing about her pretense in offering the invitation, but it seemed like she intended to ridicule him as the interview started. In two minutes or less, she was putty in his hands and he proceeded over the next fifteen minutes to charm the pants off of her, the result of which he graciously established himself as a man who could talk to adults about children in a serious yet entertaining way on a late-night talk show. While Ms. Rivers stood in the gaze of two and a half million television viewers not wearing any pants.

Credits: To Mr. Fred Rogers, for teaching children how to be people. I liked it when you fed the fish.

History deficiency

Fresh Aire VI; Mannheim Steamroller; London Symphony; Cambridge Singers; Chip Davis, composer

I never took a world history class. Not in high school, not in college. In the second grade, Mrs. B. taught a unit on Mexico. She put a big green map on the board and each time we found out something interesting about the country she would let us write it on the map. I don’t remember very much about what we learned, but I suppose it’s important that I remember that she told us that there was a Mexico.

In the fifth grade, Mrs. O. introduced us to each of the fifty states of the United States of America. I did well in that unit. Mom had bought that famous fifty states jigsaw puzzle for my sisters and I where you had to put the states in the right place. K., D. and I were among very few fifth-graders who knew the shape and placement of each state within the boundaries of our country. In the sixth grade, Mrs. O. spent several weeks teaching us about South America; each country, its capital, major cities, population, religion, biggest industry, a little history and various interesting tidbits and sundry statistics.

But as far as world history is concerned, I haven’t a clue. The bits of history that I have acquired over the years hang on a wall in my mind with no rhyme nor reason as to design, formation or chronological order. I don’t know how they relate to, or influence, each other. I suppose I should find a world history book that can shape a sound foundation on which I can rebuild my wall and bring order to chaos in a mosaic fashion, finding the gaps and, in the process, discovering where and how to fill them in.

Royal Cruise Line provided me with most of my travel opportunities. After solidifying my very first travel plans as a cruise ship musician, I acquired an itinerary from a travel agent to see the ports of call that the ship would visit. I saw some big names on that list: Venice, Rome, Monte Carlo, Naples, Barcelona and Athens. The itinerary also noted that the ship’s crew wasn’t so much international as much as it was mostly Greek. We would spend a good part of our time meandering around the islands of Greece.

Greece. Greece. What do I know about Greece? Hmmmmm. Cradle of Civilization. Home of Plato, Socrates and Aristotle. And they have that … big … Acropolis … thingy. And they eat gyros. That’s really pathetic, isn’t it? I wandered around the wonders of Greece in Rhodes, Mykonos, Santorini, Crete, Piraeus, Corfu and Athens. I encountered their culture by virtue of the warm-hearted crew on the ship and through their music. And, yet, walked away knowing essentially nothing significant about their history. In the immortal words of the great American H. Ross Perot, “Now that’s just sad.”

But I have this CD made by an American, Chip Davis, in land-locked Nebraska … I don’t know, maybe across the street from the Nebraska Navy … that captures what we, who live thousands of miles from Greece, would like to imagine as the spirit and essence of Greece and Greek mythology. I suppose this is all akin to Russians, in Russia, tapping into the American experience by listening to their local Dixieland band play sad Russian folk songs. I would say that it’s all Greek to me. Except that I don’t know if it is.

Credits: To Mrs. B. and Mrs. O, for showing us Mexico, the fifty states and South America. My state in our parade of state floats was Vermont. And the capital is Montpelier. I won’t ever forget. I promise.

On the air

Horowitz At The Met; Vladimir Horowitz, piano

Mr. D. said, “If you understand and retain all of the information that I’ve taught you in this class, then there’s no reason that any of you shouldn’t be able to test out of the first year of music theory class in college.”

I started taking piano lessons from Dr. P. in March of 1983, my junior year in high school. In addition to teaching Music Theory I and ear training at SDSU, Dr. P. was head of the piano department. Around the time when enrollment at SDSU proved inevitable, I broached the subject of testing out of the first year of music theory with Dr. P. I had never seen such a mild, conservative man turn into the stark-raving, teeth-gnashing, savage, vicious, monstrous, snarling beast that stood in front of me in my entire life.

“NEVER!! … growl … NEVER!! NOBODY, AND I MEAN NOBODY GETS OUT OF MY THEORY CLASS!!! YOU’RE MINE – ALL MINE – D’YOU UNDERSTAND?!?! … huff … puff … NOBODY’S BEEN MUSIC THEORIED UNTIL I SAY THEY’VE BEEN MUSIC THEORIED!! RRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!” Okay.

About three months later, Dr. P. said, “I’ve been thinking about you and music theory. Judging from some of the things you’ve said at your lessons of late, we may be able to test you out of the first semester of music theory. After your lesson next week, I’m going to give you a little quiz. If you pass, we’ll have you start music theory at the second semester.”

My first semester excluded Music Theory I. But I did have to take Music History and Literature. I didn’t mind that. We got to listen to music; what’s not to like?

I met Dave D. in that class. Very nice fellow. He liked Music Lit. class. But music theory was getting him down. He couldn’t understand the subject, his grades were suffering as a result, and he viewed a failure in this music class as a failure in the whole music field. He changed his major at the semester. He played tuba in the Symphonic Band throughout the year, but put it away in May.

Dave was industrious. He found odd jobs here and there that he systemized with his class schedule. He drove a school bus for the Brookings Public Schools. He also loved fiddling around with audio equipment and landed the responsibility of recording recitals and concerts for the SDSU Music Department. My favorite job of his had him taking the evening shifts on the weekends as a radio host at KESD FM on South Dakota Public Radio. On Fridays and Saturdays, I would check the radio to see if he was ON-THE-AIR, and when I took a break from practicing, I would stop in the studio to see him.

On one visit, the selections that he’d chosen for airplay came up five minutes short to the top of the hour. “Erik, do you want to choose something for the South Dakota Public Radio audience to listen to?” Umm … Okay. “It can only be about four minutes long.” I didn’t have very much time to choose, but “Horowitz At The Met” lay right at eye-level. For years I had held up the Prelude in G Minor, Opus 23, No. 5, by Sergei Rachmaninoff as an exciting favorite but had never had the opportunity to hear Vladimir Horowitz play it. “My good friend is visiting the studio this evening and he thought that you might enjoy listening to this ….”

In the summer of 1986, Dave D. married his sweetheart in the tiny town of Woodstock, MN. He asked me to play at their wedding. I don’t know, I said. What kind of piano? He grinned. “It’s a Steinway.” So, I played the wedding … on a Steinway baby grand piano that only had eighty-five keys. Isn’t that weird? It must have been an old piano. Oddly enough, I kept making mistakes with my right hand. What is going on, I thought to myself. On my way home, it dawned on me how much a pianist relies on his or her peripheral vision for accuracy of notes. I had been trying to play the higher notes a certain distance from the right edge of the keyboard and that’s where the three extra keys were missing. Oh, well. Small price to pay for being granted the privilege to say that I had played at Woodstock.

Credits: To my friend Dave D., for sustaining his love for music and for purchasing a Steinway for his funeral home. “My good friend is visiting the studio…” Good friend, indeed. Thanks, pal.

Ag class

Prelude a l'apres-midi d'un faune; London Symphony Orchestra; Michael Tilson Thomas, conducting

During the spring of 1980, Mr G., our principal, met with each one of us eighth-graders to help us choose our classes and make up our schedule for the following year. Dad had looked at the syllabus and asked me if I would, during my freshman and sophomore years, take Agriculture I and II. Well, what to you say to the man who buys the groceries and heats the house?

So, I took the classes. And I found them interesting.

At the end of my sophomore year, when we looked at the syllabus for our junior year classes, a bunch of musically savvy girls came to me and asked if I would join them in a music theory class the next year. I had seen it included in the other two years’ syllabi and hadn’t given it much thought. But Mr. D. had said that he hadn’t taught it for years because no one had signed up. Nine of us registered for the class.

During the summer, I got to thinking about the Agriculture III class that I hadn’t signed up for. It fell outside of Dad’s Ag class recomendation purview. He had only asked for two years. But I liked the class. I talked to Dad about it. The first thing he said was God’s honest truth: “You know, you’re not much of a farmer.” Nope, I don’t think I am, either. “Why don’t you go talk to Mr. G. See what he says.”

Mr. G., I think that I would like to try to fit Ag III in my schedule. “Ah. Well, there we have a problem.” What’s that? “Music Theory I meets at the same time as Ag III.” Ah.

Dad, Music Theory I meets at the same time as Ag III. “Ah. I see. Well, son, I’m thrilled that you attempted to continue beyond what I had requested, but I think that you know what you need to do in this case.”

That was the proverbial fork in the road. Every dad yearns to posses that wisdom that allows him to advise, and advise well, his son or daughter on a career path. Dad had always been somewhat hesitant to allow this “music thing” to get too serious. His conservative side would have approved more of a “music as a hobby” approach and make the living with more of a sure thing.

Not only did Dad NOT stand in the way when I made my music decisions, but he also had my back, every step of the way. I suspect Mom had a lot to do with most of that. She had and has my back, too.

The Music Theory class went great. Since that first time at the piano, at the age of three of four, things have made sense to me. I figured out the inner workings of music theory pretty quickly by myself. When I took the class, I knew what Mr. D. was talking about instantly; it was just a matter of applying labels to the things that I had already worked out on my own.

Mr. D. included a unit on music history and literature for about eight weeks. We learned about all of the composers and the era in which they wrote. He also taught us what each composer brought to the composition table that hadn’t been there before.

On Debussy Day, Mr. D. wrote “Prelude To The Afternoon Of A Faun” right underneath “Claire De Lune” on the chalkboard. What? That’s absurd. I don’t get it. What can a baby deer do over the course of the afternoon that would warrant eleven minutes of music to acknowledge it?

“Prelude a l’apres-midi d’un faune” presents a fork in the road. The work, hauntingly rich, beautiful and exotic, barely hangs onto tonality and harmonic function; at least the tonality and harmonic function that the previous eras had known. Chords, that for so long only followed two routes to a limited selection of other chords, suddenly existed in a different dimension and stasis. In a moment in time, and forever after, Mr. Debussy had changed the operation of harmony, and set upon a new course to accomplish great things in ways unimaginable to the composers before him.

After hearing this wondrous work on the cheap stereo system within the cinder blocks of our band room, I suspected that I would never look at Bambi in the same way again. Then, when I got to college some know-it-all informed me that Debussy's faun didn't look so much like this as it did like this. Okay, well, now that’s just weird.

Credits: To Mr. G., for twenty-six years as a dedicated principal at Sioux Valley Schools. Thank you for your wisdom and your thoughts for the day.

A pretty good fantastic symphony

Hector Berlioz; Symphonie Fantastique; Orchestre Symphonique de Montreal; Charles Dutoit, conducting

Here is a CD that I love to listen to if only because it’s big, loud and bombastic. Hector Berlioz wrote the Symphonie Fantastique in 1830. And Mr. Berlioz actually was fairly arrogant and conceited but that’s not why he called his symphony fantastic. He was thinking of the bizarre, weird, far-fetched, grotesque, surreal and strange.

I don’t have a story to go with this one. But it is part of who I am. I bought this CD at a pawn shop in Las Vegas, NV. Okay, maybe kind of a story.

Credits: To you, dear reader. I don’t tell you often enough how much it means to me that you read what I have to say. Thank you.

The Seasons

Winter Into Spring; George Winston, piano

It’s not just Bach. I really don’t care for the whole Baroque Period. Bach, Handel, Schutz, Albinoni, Telemann, Rameau, Corelli … it’s not that their music isn’t pretty or beautiful. I just find it boring. It all sounds the same to me. I have the same reaction that my sister K. has to acoustic guitar music: after fifteen minutes, we’re done. A little goes a long way.

I will grant some exceptions. Handel’s “Messiah”, J.S. Bach’s Well Tempered Clavier and Brandenburg Concertos, Purcell’s “Dido and Aenaes” and Domenico Scarlatti’s sonatas for keyboard. Having said all that, however, allow me to say that I really like Antonio Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons”.

Each season is a three-movement concerto for violin and chamber orchestra. And each concerto has little devices that characterize the season with the concerto. “Winter” has staccato notes in the upper strings to bring to mind stinging sleet and sharp flakes. “Spring” has bird calls. “Summer” has a thunderstorm.

It’s generally accepted that major and minor keys can evoke an emotion. At the basic level, it’s as simple as this: major is happy, minor is sad. If you apply this uncomplicated formula to the key sequence in “The Four Seasons”, you get the following

1. Concerto No. 1 in E Major, “Spring” – happy
2. Concerto No. 2 in G Minor, “Summer” – sad
3. Concerto No. 3 in F Major, “Autumn” – happy
4. Concerto No. 4 in F Minor, “Winter” – sad

With one slight exception, Mr. Vivaldi and I see eye to eye. I am at my most jovial in the spring and in the fall. “Happy” is my default setting during these two seasons. Summer brings profound misery. I can’t take the heat. I prefer the colder temperatures. And that’s where we find a difference of opinion between Mr. Vivaldi and me. Winter brought him anguish. I like winter because it’s not hot in winter.

I enjoy George Winston’s close association with the seasons. His first six albums reflect perhaps a predilection for the outdoors, reflecting in his music some of Mother Earth’s extreme seasonal scenes. In particular, I relish “Winter Into Spring”, released in 1982. The change from a season of frigidness to a period of renewal brings joy and optimism. Happy. Although, the joy and optimism, at least in my mind, are tempered by the inevitable arrival of the overwhelming heat of summer. Sad.

Irving Berlin wrote so many songs for holidays (“White Christmas”, “Easter Parade”, “I’ll Have An Old Fashioned Wedding”, “For Your Country And My Country” and “God Bless America”) that it’s been said … You can’t have a holiday without Irving Berlin’s permission. Well, you can’t have a season without Antonio Vivaldi’s and George Winston’s permission.

Credits: To Winter. I’m sorry to see you go so soon. But I’ll see you around the bend after my birthday. Goodbye, old buddy.

Chad's fifth-grade class

Jean Sibelius: Symphonies No. 2 and 3; City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra; Simon Rattle, conducting

My friend Chad H. asked me to accompany him to Sioux Falls. He wanted some help picking out some classical music CD’s. Well, who wouldn’t jump at the opportunity to spend somebody else’s money to buy CD’s. He figured that he had enough money to buy five recordings. Of the five, I only remember one specifically.

I don’t remember when I first became aware of Jean Sibelius’ Symphony No. 2. As much as I love the entire work, the last two movements take my breath away. Mr. Sibelius treats the third movement as a six-and-a-half-minute long introduction to the fourth movement. With the exception of two chorale-like sections that bring the musical aerobic heart rate down, the third movement smacks of anticipation, like waiting for the parade, getting ready for the prom or the last few days before for Christmas. Something’s coming and you just KNOW it’s going to be great. And Sibelius is with you all the way on this one, baby. In fact he can’t wait. He caved. No pause … right into the fourth movement.

And what an entrance! Heroism, pageantry, majesty, gravitas, decorum, honor, glory, praise, solemnity and stateliness – for fifteen sublime minutes. Sometimes the Fins dub this work as the “Symphony of Independence” as Mr. Sibelius composed it at a time of Russian sanctions on Finnish language and culture. I don’t know how much tangible Finnish nationalism Sibelius injected into his most famous symphony, but it certainly stirs the soul in the direction of national pride – for anybody’s country, really.

Chad told me on the way home that he intended to play these CD’s during quiet time in his fifth-grade classroom. That brought me to the verge of tears. We never had anything like that during my entire elementary education. I asked him some months later how his fifth-graders liked the music. He said that they loved it; sometimes asking, in fact, if he would turn the music on. How encouraging!

I took a trip during April of 1997 out to Yellowstone National Park, then south to Jackson, Wyoming. I needed a place to stay for the night. So I found a swanky condo up on a hill that faced northwest toward the Grand Tetons. It had been a long day of driving and I needed to create a relaxing moment. I had a pizza delivered to my little corner of paradise, took it out on the patio as a thunderstorm prepared to pass over the mountains, unpacked my discman, armed it with Sibelius’ Symphony No. 2 and donned a set of Denon headphones. I watched the mountains and the storm, munched on pizza, listened to programmatic music, considered all of the elements that created this faultless scene and thought to myself, Is this much perfection legal?

Credits: To the Grand Tetons. What beauty! Thank you for my moment.

Gypsies

Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Sergio and Odair Assad; Nodja Salerno-Sonnenberg, violin; Sergio Assad, guitar; Odair Assad, guitar

I don’t know how to talk about gypsies in a politically correct way. The nomadic nature of their lifestyle forbids a thorough understanding of their worldview; they pick up and leave before anyone gets to know them. When observed from a distance, their culture and mores can seem attractive and alluring. Why not? Lots of travel, no worries, no cares, living an insouciant life on the raw nerve of a free spirit. Grabbing life with both hands, shaking it up and holding on tight. Isn’t that the way life was meant to be? I don’t know the answer to that question.

My parents, my family, my friends and colleagues keep me grounded pretty hard. God grounds me pretty hard. And I ground me pretty hard. I buck at it for sure. I so desperately desire that unshackled and soaring pneuma that thrives on immunity from the consequences of excess. Am I wrong or does it sound like I’m talking about Heaven?

The passionate heart that lies on the emotionally charged sleeve of the instrument-bearing gypsy rover inoculates the music of the soul. And when that music comes out to play through the bow of a violin or on the strings of a fervid guitar, modesty, moderation, subtlety, restraint and sobriety evaporate in the fire. “Maybe you can cook a hamburger with a match,” the gypsy says, “but I don’t have that kind of time. I want you to know the magnitude of my ardor, the degree of my fervency … and the width, breadth and reach of my love. Right. Now.”

The gypsy influence in the dazzling arrangements on this CD cannot escape the notice of the listener. With the virtuosic playing on both violin and guitar and the disciplined stylistic approach to, among others, Eastern European, Turkish, Brazilian and Spanish world music, we have a fusion of classical and gypsy music rarely encountered on this outrageously high level. If you ever wanted to pretend to be a gypsy, this is your best chance.

The only actual hands-on gypsy experience in my young years occurred with my friend Joe M. when we had a few hours of “parole” from the cruise ship in Rome, Italy. I had just attended a lecture the day before on what to see and where to go in the Eternal City. During the lecture, Frank Buckingham – Yes, that was his name. Do you like it? – cued us in to the latest tactics that the gypsies employed to attain what they wanted from your pockets. The gypsy children would approach you with newspapers, splay them out in front of you at waist level or higher and start asking questions while they fish through your pants pockets. And it happens in about five seconds.

About six young boys approached me, right outside the Coliseum, and I just grabbed their newspapers, wadded them up and threw them at them. A different group of boys, two seconds later, did the same thing to Joe, but he hadn’t attended the lecture. I yelled, “Polizzi” and they took off down the street but not until they’d shown us the blessed “fickle finger of fate”. I wanted to give them a “Sock it to me”, but I probably would have ended up hearing an Italian version of “Here come ‘da judge. Here come ‘da judge. Here comde ‘da judge.” A bad first gypsy impression? You bet your sweet bippy.

Credits: To Rome. You’re beautiful. Can’t wait to see you again some day.

The Girls Medley

My Friend The Piano; Dave McKenna, piano

I loved the Blugrass Student Union barbershop quartet. They won the international barbershop quartet competition in 1978. My Uncle D. introduced me to their recordings sometime in 1982. He also gave me a Harmonizer magazine, the official periodical for the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America. Yup. SPEBSQSA. Dad used to call it the Society for the Prevention and Elimination of yeah, yeah, yeah… In the magazine, I saw the BSU’s advertisements for more of their recordings. I sent them a letter and a request for autographed copies of their LP’s “After Class” and “The Music Man”. I was thrilled. On “After Class”, they included a live performance of their prize-winning rendition of “The Auctioneer”. And on “The Music Man”, as you can imagine, they put all of the music from Meredith Wilson’s “The Music Man” through the barbershop arranging machine. They absolutely cut the rug with "Ya' Got Trouble". It all sounded so fine.

I grew close to all of the arrangements on their “After Class” album and transcribed many of them for my barbershop quartet. They had one arrangement called “The Girls Medley”. It included “Margie”, “No No Nora” and “My Blushin’ Rose”. They put a cute original introduction to it:

I never thought that I would fall in love with you

I never thought that you would fall for me

Of all the boys you could have chosen, you chose me

Of all the girls I could have chosen, why did I choose … three?

In the summer of 1988, I served as the music director for Prairie Repertory Theatre’s production of “The Drunkard”, an old-fashioned temperance play from 1844. The director of the play had me include music wherever I could, during the play and between acts. Cast members volunteered to sing and I suited ‘em up with period pieces like “Cuddle Up A Little Closer, Baby Mine” and “I’m Looking At The World Through Rose Colored Glasses”. But I needed something else. So I put together a barbershop quartet to sing two numbers between the acts: “Darkness On The Delta” and “The Girls Medley”.

The real fun came when Russ and Marge B., neighbors from our farm, came to one of the performances. I knew where they were sitting in the house and I got the whole quartet to look right at her when we sang:

Margie. I’m always thinking of you, Margie.

I’ll tell the world I love you.

Don’t forget your promise to me.

I have bought a home, a ring, and every little thing for

Margie. You’ve been my inspiration.

Days are never blue.

After all is said and done

There is really only one.

Oh, Margie, Margie, it’s you.

Over the course of the song, the whole audience turned their heads to look at Marge and smile. Marge smiled, too. And blushed.

Through the years, I have come to play the song “Margie” as a standard with all sorts of musical artists. I particularly like the way that Dave McKenna plays “Margie”. He has her as the opening act of his album called “My Friend The Piano” and she sets the standard by which all of the treasures behind her are compared. All measure up just fine, but she didn’t make it easy for them. Mr. McKenna makes it sound so easy. I appreciate, most of all, his full-bodied sound. Though his music nowhere suffers from busy-ness, his hands seem to reside in all registers of the keyboard; he doesn’t leave anybody out. He treats us to a full orchestral palette.

The Bluegrass Student Union retired three years ago after thirty-two years of performing together as a barbershop quartet. They came from Louisville, Kentucky. When I worked on the Delta Queen steamboat, we annually steamboat raced with the Belle of Louisville as part of the city’s Kentucky Derby festivities. I always took the opportunity, when we floated through Louisville, to play “The Girls Medley” on the calliope, as close to the way that they sang it as possible, and wondered whether the BSU could hear me playing their songs. Never heard.

Credits: To the Prairie Repertory Theatre at South Dakota State University, on the occasion of their fortieth season. Thank you for your contribution to the level of culture on the plains of South Dakota.

Master of short

Blue Tango: Symphonic Pops; Cologne Radio Orchestra; Pinchas Steinberg, conducting; Leroy Anderson, composer

I have a friend, E.S., who makes the claim that Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky isn’t all that great a composer. In fact, he frequently proselytizes on the premise that Leroy Anderson can put more music into his two and a half minute vignettes than Mr. Tchaikovsky can put into an entire symphony. While I don’t necessarily share that supposition with my friend E.S., we do have in common an admiration for the creative compositions of Mr. Leroy Anderson.

If you haven’t heard of the plainly named Leroy Anderson, you have heard his music. “Sleigh Ride” put the composer on the map in 1948. He hadn’t intended for this piece of music to land in the Holiday Music repertoire. But that’s where it landed. Mitchell Parish, the man who wrote the lyrics to Hoagy Carmichael’s “Stardust”, penned words to “Sleigh Ride” in 1950. Nowhere do the lyrics specifically mention Christmas. In fact, the mention of pumpkin pie could imply Thanksgiving.

The SDSU Symphonic Band always performed for spring semester graduation ceremonies. Dr. W. frequently chose “Bugler’s Holiday” as a feature number at this event. A set of triplets in South Dakota, all three of them young women, studied trumpet with Mr. C. at SDSU in the 1990’s. Sooner or later, probably sooner, the math dictated that these young women would play this piece. They did; frequently and expertly.

I heard a snippet of “The Waltzing Cat” for the first time on a Sylvester and Tweety cartoon. “The Syncopated Clock” served as the opening and closing music for a South Dakota Public Broadcasting program that we watched in elementary school. Mom bought the sheet music to “Trumpeter’s Lullaby” and it sat on the piano for a number of years. “Forgotten Dreams” provided musical backdrop for a series of photographic scenes that Sesame Street would use for filler on their broadcasts. On the Delta Queen, drummer P.B. often told me that “The Belle Of The Ball” was his favorite Leroy Anderson selection. I associate “The Typewriter” with Jerry Lewis.

It surprises people when they discover that Mr. Anderson composed as a hobby. A well-paying hobby, I am sure. He studied at Harvard University, working towards a PhD in Germanic and Scandinavian languages. He grew up speaking English and Swedish, but through his studies developed fluency in Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic, German, French, Italian and Portuguese. When he joined the Army in 1942, they assigned him to Iceland as a translator and interpreter. In 1945, he took on responsibilities at the Pentagon as Chief of the Scandinavian Desk of Military Intelligence. During this entire time, he composed tirelessly, initiating a relationship with Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops as early as 1938 with “Jazz Pizzicato”. When he passed away from cancer in 1975, he had composed and orchestrated nothing less than one hundred compositions.

The structural integrity and musical virtue of these fantastic little gems are solid and sound. There will always be a need for something light on a classical concert. A Leroy Anderson piece will always make an excellent and timeless choice. Although, in a few years, we may have to explain what a typewriter is.

Credits: To the Boston Pops. Thank you for your friendship with this magnificent American treasure.

Trivia

You're A Mean One, Mr. Grinch; Thurl Ravenscroft

It’s amazing the amount of trivia that any of us have be-boppin’ around inside our heads. I love to play Trivial Pursuit with my cousin W. and anyone else who happens to get pulled in by our TP tractor beam. I frequently lose. But I have had my moments.

The one that outshines them all occurred when I had landed on the blue chippie spot five different times without answering the question correctly. Geography questions should not have posed any problems for me. Yet here I was on my sixth question. W. looked at me, with both sympathy and bleeding-heart compassion, by the way, and said, “You’re not going to get this one either. ‘What does Fort Payne, Alabama, make more of than anybody else?’” SOCKS!! Gimme my chippie!! I stunned the cuz.

When I worked on the Crown Odyssey and the Star Odyssey, one of the vocalists, S.K., came from Fort Payne, Alabama. After he performed the second number of his show, he would always tell the audience a little about himself. “I come from Fort Payne, Alabama. There are only three things that ever came out of Fort Payne. Socks, the country band Alabama, and me.”

I lost the TP game, though. In well over one hundred games with W., I think that I have won only twice. I’m not bitter. It’s her house, it’s her game. If she wants to memorize the cards in the middle of the night, it’s her prerogative. I honor her game-winning strategy, it just makes me work all that harder, that’s all.

I have a fascination with cartoon voices. For years, as a young cartoon watcher, I would relish the animation and the madcap antics that suffused themselves into the plot. After a while, though, I began to develop an intrigue with the voices of the characters and the people who brought them to life. Mel Blanc, of course, had a career for the ages with Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Yosemite Same, Sylvester, Pepe le Pew and Foghorn Leghorn. And June Foray associated herself with a number of studios voicing witches, grandmas, Rocky the Flying Squirrel, Natasha Fatale, and sweet, sweet Nell, daughter of Inspector Fenwick on Dudley Do-Right. I enjoyed the work of Daws Butler who brought many of the Hanna-Barbera studio characters to life like Huckleberry Hound, Yogi Bear, Snagglepuss and Cap’n Crunch. Jim Backus did Mr. Magoo. Bill Scott did Bullwinkle and Mr. Peabody. Don Adams did Tennessee Tuxedo. Casey Kasem did Shaggy. Alan Reed did Fred Flintstone. And now I’m just showing off.

And I was probably showing off in December of 2007 when a bunch of us in the Annapolis Chorale had the post-rehearsal munchies. We were able to get a table at Chili’s. At some point during the merriment, “You’re A Mean One, Mr. Grinch” took its turn on the background music lineup. “Who sings this?” someone asked. “Boris Karloff,” someone claimed. Actually, I said in my best Mr.Peabody voice, it was Thurl Ravenscroft. “No, Boris Karloff’s name is credited at the beginning of the show.” He does the narration, but the song was sung by Thurl Ravenscroft. “Who’s he?”

I’m glad you asked. He was the voice of Tony the Tiger. He sang the part of the pig in the animated farm scene in “Mary Poppins”. He sang “No dogs allowed” in “Snoopy, Come Home”. I heard him singing a solo at the end of “There Is Nothing Like A Dame” in the film soundtrack of “South Pacific”. He had a huge voice-over career over the course of sixty-five years. He passed away in 2005.

“Well, I remember Boris Karloff’s name in the credits. I’ve never heard of this Thurble Cravensloft.” I couldn’t leave well enough alone. I had to look it up. So, when I got home, I found the information that I needed on the ol’ world wide interweb and e-mailed it to everyone who had been at the table. In retaliation for my overkill tactics, I unwittingly acquired a new nickname: Thurl. For crying out loud. The price you pay for knowing a little something. Next time, I'm just gonna' stick a sock in it.

Credits: To Bill Scott. I love Bullwinkle. And to Daws Butler. I love Quickdraw McGraw and his alter ego El Kabong.

Morning Has Broken

That Day; Dianne Reeves

This particular Dianne Reeves CD doesn’t prompt a story. “Erik Apland’s Tome of Life, Love, Music and Stories” would stand incomplete, though, if I didn’t include “That Day”. Ms. Reeves brings as much to the table on this CD as she does on any other of her albums.

I note, as an item of interest, her selection of “Morning Has Broken”. This song has found its way into a fairly exclusive club whose constituents include “Amazing Grace” and “Just A Closer Walk With Thee”. For some reason, one that eludes me, artists who sing and/or play these songs in a secular "environment" seem to believe that they stand in some “religious safety zone” when they perform them. They feel, and probably the audience with them, that they don’t have to be held accountable for the words they sing and the sentiments they express. They would claim that these songs stake a claim inside our American musical culture, one which would somehow negate any necessary conviction when singing or hearing the songs.

My rant here, of course, presents the darker side of religious song performance in a secular world. Naturally, as a Christian, I honor any performance of any hymn anywhere within the earshot of a non-believer as a furtherance of the good Lord’s kingdom. Once the words and sentiments come out of your mouth, God takes over. He’ll take the message to wherever he needs it to go.

I’m glad Ms. Reeves sings this song. She brings such grace to Eleanor Farjeon’s words:

Morning has broken, like the first morning

Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird

Praise for the singing, praise for the morning

Praise for the Springing fresh from the word

____________

Sweet the rain’s new fall, sunlit from heaven

Like the first dewfall, on the first grass

Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden

Sprung in completeness where His feet pass

______________

Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning

Born of the one light, Eden saw play

Praise with elation, praise every morning

God’s recreation of the new day.

I remember when this song got included in the Lutheran Book of Worship in 1978. I wanted to sing this song every Sunday.

Credits: To John Newton, for Amazing Grace. “When we’ve been there ten thousand years…” I can’t get past those seven words without tearing up.

Bluegrass!

Soundtrack to "O Brother, Where Art Thou?"

During my high school years, my peers opted to re-brand the two prominent styles of music of our generation. We needed labels that penetrated the very heart of each music’s modus operandi that reached out to each individual’s subjective musical needs. No more did we listen to country and pop/rock. We, instead, tuned our ears to Twang and Pot-head music.

My musical tastes diverged enormously from those of my fellow students. Though Classical music, by this time, filled a void, I seemed always to search for something that most everyone else either carelessly or purposefully overlooked; something interesting rhythmically, something interesting acoustically, melodically, harmonically. Something that didn’t allow the “Billboard 100” to dictate the terms of what’s “hot” for how long. Something that didn’t simply grovel at your feet, looking for love, but something that floated above, extending a hand in an effort to pull you up. For the most part, I found what I sought.

But now, some twenty-five to thirty years later, I find joy in the music of my generation; the music that has withstood the test of twenty-five to thirty years. Isn’t that marvelous, reader? We can change! We are the works in progress that I talked about on blog entry number one. We fly in the face of our very natures if we remain static, if we devote ourselves to a single way of doing things only because we haven’t tried any other, if we refuse to check now and then to see if we still don’t like the taste of peas.

For years, Mom, Dad, my sisters and I deprived ourselves of the fine-tasting fare of Pizza Hut because, on our first visit, Dad thought the temperature inside was too cold and we had to wait thirty-five minutes for our food. Dad made a vow that evening. “Never again.” One warm day, on the spur of the moment, Mom, Dad and I went to Pizza Hut when they had no crowd. Dad got turned around on the issue. He changed.

In the spring of 2002, my friend James F. invited me over to watch a movie with some friends. He had rented “O Brother, Where Are Thou?”, produced, directed and written by the brothers Joel and Ethan Coen. It had been a long day of rehearsals with the Marine Band that day. I truly feared that I would fall asleep during the movie. And I did doze off a couple of times. But I was totally unprepared for the music they used for the soundtrack. Bluegrass! What? No. No, no, no, no. No. Bluegrass was my enemy by virtue of its association with Twang.

But, guess what. Somewhere along the line, I had changed. I heard spiritual music in this movie. Spiritual from the standpoint that the music bore the brunt of the work in describing the timbre of the scene, the clouds in the sky, the color of the gravel in the road, the shimmer of the dew on the leaves and the grass, the haze rising from the pond that served as a baptismal font for the masses. The KKK was scarier. The sirens were prettier. The chain gang was stripier because of this awesome music. Virtually the entire bluegrass community came together to create this soundtrack, awakening a whole new generation, or generations, to the full impact of the uniqueness, emotional depth, genuineness and simplicity of this rare American musical art form.

I love this movie. It’s one of the fifty or so movies that I keep on my list of top ten movies. Neither of my sisters like this movie. They say that it’s too weird. I hope they change some day.

Credits: To Pizza Hut. You make great pizza. Putt, putt, putt, to the Pizza Hut.

Christmas music in March

A Celtic Christmas: Peace On Earth; A Windham Hill Collection

I lied. Last December 9, I implied that Celtic Christmas IV concluded the Windham Hill Celtic Christmas series. God bless ‘em, they made another one … and I have it. And … y’know what? … They even made another one after that … And I have that one, too.

I don’t have much to say about this one. It’s more of the same. But with the high quality that Windham Hill has delivered, more is definitely better

Irish musician Michael O Domhnaill produced this album and released it in 1999. Mr. Domhnaill played with four Irish bands over the course of fifty-four years: Skara Brae, The Bothy Band, Relativity and Nightnoise. “Flight Into Egypt” and “No Room At The Inn”, on this fifth Celtic Christmas album, feature the band Nightnoise. “Green Fields Of Amerikay” pairs the keyboard work of Mr. Domhnaill with the fiddle playing of Paddy Glackin.

Michael O Damhnaill died from a fall at his home in Dublin in July of 2006. He came from a family of musicians. His sister, singer Triona Ni Damhnaill, joined him in the formation of his band Nighnoise. From all that I’ve read about this wonderful recording artist, his musicianship was world class. The world-wide fan base of traditional Irish music considered him quite a hero.

Guitar duo William Coulter and Benjamin Verdery perform a lovely version of “Flow Gently Sweet Afton” on this album. Americans know the tune better as “Away In A Manger”. Scottish author and poet Robert Burns wrote the evocative words that fit this tune.

Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes,

Flow gently, I’ll sing thee a song in thy praise.

My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream,

Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.

Though stock-dove whose echo resounds from the hill,

Ye wild whistling blackbirds in yon thorny dell,

Thou green created lapwing, thy screaming fore-bear,

I charge you, disturb not my slumbering fair.

_________________

How lofty, sweet Afton, thy neighbouring hills,

Far marked with the courses of clear winding rills.

There daily I wander, as morn rises high,

My flocks and my Mary’s sweet cot in my eye.

How pleasant thy banks and green valleys below,

Where wild in the woodlands the primroses blow.

There oft, as mild evening creeps over the lea,

The sweet scented birk shades my Mary and me.

__________________

Thy crystal stream, Afton, how lovely it glides

And winds by the cot where my Mary resides.

How wanton thy waters her snowy feet lave,

As gathering sweet flow’rets, she stems thy clear wave.

Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes,

Flow Gently, sweet river, the theme of my lays

My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream,

Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.

Forgive me, Great Ireland, as I honor you with this Scottish poem. I am sure that your picturesque River Shannon possesses all of the charms, and more, of the sweet Afton of Scotland.

Credits: To the strong shoulders of Michael O Domhnaill, upon which the tradition of Irish music will stand for years to come.

Nelson is gone!

Mel Torme and Friends; Recorded Live At Marty's, New York City

One Wednesday morning in the spring of 2001, I went out the door of my apartment to get in my Durango to pick up my friend Shawn. He had drifted from the snow-clad hills of South Dakota to attend a convention in the Washington, DC, area and wanted to wind down for a few days afterward before heading back to the "other" Sunshine State. I locked the door to my apartment and headed toward the direction of my truck. Guess what. No Durango.

NO DURANGO!!!

I stood stock still for thirty seconds or so, trying desperately to make sure that I had thought through everything. When had I last driven it? Had I parked it somewhere else and just forgotten? Had I parked it where I shouldn’t have and did a towing service come and take it away? I answered all of these questions and others in such a way that led me to suspect the worst: Someone had abducted Nelson!

I called the police and they arrived in five minutes. I called my friend James F. and he arrived in two minutes. I gave the officer all of the information he needed and he assured me that he would do all that he could. He also told me that stolen cars don’t turn up very often. I called my friend A.D. and asked him if his car had been stolen. “No.” Well, I told him, that makes one of us.

An auto rental facility just across the road from my apartment complex set me up with a boss set of wheels within an hour after discovering the theft of my truck. So, I hit the road to pick up Shawn. The days flew by while my friend was here. But, all during his visit, I tried to remember what of my own stuff had been in the truck and wondered whether I would see it again.

On the last day of Shawn’s visit, I got the call. They found Nelson! They told me when and where I could pick him up. What a celebration dinner we had that night! I took Shawn to the airport the next day. And after some friends had dropped me off at the vehicle reclaim agency, I saw that Nelson looked pretty tough. And he had a nice big gouge in the radiator. He had to be towed back to Annapolis; poor little guy.

After ten days at a couple of car spas, he looked as handsome and operated as good as he ever did. The stuff, though, was gone; some sheet music, a couple of CD’s and a microphone.

Nelson’s abductors had no taste in music. They never bothered to listen to the CD in the CD player. They had set the radio to some acid rock station with the volume pumped all the way up. But I consider that a gift. Why? They didn’t bother to check if the CD player had a CD in it. It did.

Of all of my Mel Torme CD’s, I like “Mel Torme and Friends” the best. He recorded it live at Marty’s Nightclub in New York City in June of 1980. The musicianship, all the way around, from each of his combo players to his “friends”, and especially the “Velvet Fog” himself, is absolutely first rate. Mr. Torme can scat with the best of them. I’ve always felt that Mel sat second chair only to The First Lady of Song, herself, Ms. Ella Fitzgerald. On the last track, “Love For Sale”, Mr. Torme cracks me up with a chorus of scat in Yiddish. “Splee-bee-yiddle-dah-ohhtundeee voyl”. I was grateful that it didn't get stolen.

How did they find my car? The Einsteins that stole my truck had ripped the license plate off. That’s right, poor Nelson was driving around naked without his South Dakota “Great Faces/Great Places” license plate. They tore off the famous Marine Corps bumper sticker from the back window. They relieved themselves of the little sticker that reminded me when to get the oil checked. Why they never bothered to strip off the vehicle identifying

Department of Defense sticker

in the

middle of the windshield

will confound me until Jesus comes. When the police found Nelson, the Einsteins had installed The Club on the steering wheel. I just don’t know what to say to that.

Credits: To the men and women who serve on our nation’s police forces. Thank you for finding my truck.