Ramblin' with Roger

The Lydster: worrying about the Daughter

Teenage boys are annoying creatures.

When I told someone that my daughter was sick in November, for the third month in a row, I was asked, “Am I worried about her?” The answer was, “No, not really.”

In that iteration, it was the same bug that her mother had, only my wife had it a couple days earlier. And other people in church and elsewhere in my circle experienced the same symptoms in the week or two before.

I DID worry that my wife had recovered enough. I was away in Syracuse and Binghamton so couldn’t tend to them.

Now, I WAS worried in October when the treatment of what turned out to be the Daughter’s slowly-developing asthma attack. I felt it was misdiagnosed early, and I felt helpless.

The Daughter wanted to go to the Donald Trump rally in April 2016 in Albany. I said no, not because of his politics – I was rather interested in seeing the phenomenon in person myself – but because I was worried that she (or I) might have been attacked, as some people had been in other venues.

I’m told that some white people see black young people as being older than they are. See, for example, 12-year-old Tamir Rice of Cleveland, who was reported as a man with a gun and ended up dead by police. So I figured my daughter, who was 5’8″ at the time might have been seen, for some reason, as antagonistic to some Trump supporters, and I wasn’t willing to risk it.

Instead, we went to the Bernie Sanders rally that day, and though we didn’t get in, he came outside to give his 7-minute stump speech, one of the highlights of her past year.

Of course, I worry about teenage boys, just by virtue of their boyness. Teenage boys are annoying creatures. Having been one myself, I can testify that this is true.

A buddy of mine wrote about worrying, and I said that it is highly overrated. But worrying about the Daughter just comes with the territory.

Steven Tyler of Aerosmith turns 70

In 2013, Aerosmith’s principal songwriters, Tyler and Perry, were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame

I own two greatest hits albums by Aerosmith. The first collection, unimaginatively called Aerosmith’s Greatest Hits, came out in 1980, and never got above #53 on the Billboard album charts. But it was a steady product, with over 10 million copies sold. I really like it.

The second, Big Ones, came out in 1994, and contains all those 1980s hits, many of which left me cold. It got to #6, and has sold more than four million copies.

Steven Tyler is the lead singer of Aerosmith. He was raised by a classical musician and a secretary, and began his musical career as a drummer in bands as early as 1964.

Meanwhile, guitarist Joe Perry and bassist Tom Hamilton started in a band called the Jam Band, eventually operating out of Boston. They met Joey Kramer, a drummer from Yonkers, NY, who dropped out of Berklee College of Music to join the Jam Band.

“Kramer knew Tyler and had always hoped to play in a band with him.” After the Jam Band and Tyler’s band Chain Reaction played the same gig in 1970, Tyler “wanted to combine the two bands” but “only if he could be frontman and lead vocalist,” which was agreed upon.

Rhythm guitarist Ray Tabano joined what was by then called Aerosmith, but was replaced by Ray Whitford, another Berklee dropout. The band had a “temporary” change of personnel from July 1979 to April 1984, but has otherwise stayed the same.

What really relaunched their career were two things: Tyler and Perry appearing on Run–D.M.C.’s cover of Walk This Way, “a track blending rock and roll with hip hop”; and Tyler getting sober.

Steven Tyler has a famous actress daughter, Liv, who thought Todd Rundgrun was her dad early on.

“Aerosmith is the best-selling American hard rock band of all time, having sold more than 150 million records worldwide, including over 70 million records in the United States alone… The band has scored 21 Top 40 hits on the Billboard Hot 100… They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001… In 2013, the band’s principal songwriters, Tyler and Perry, were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.”

Listen to:

Dream On – #59 in 1973, but a longer version went to #6 in 1976, a song “inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for being one of the most influential songs in the development of rock”

Sweet Emotion, #36 in 1975

Walk This Way, #10 in 1977

Walk This Way – Run- D.M.C., #4 pop, #8 R&B in 1986

Steven Tyler turns 70 on March 26

Music throwback: The Rite of Spring

“The tumult began not long after the ballet’s opening notes — a meandering and eerily high-pitched bassoon solo that elicited laughter and derision from many in the audience.”

In November 2017, my wife and I were given tickets to the Albany Symphony Orchestra by friends who couldn’t use them. Coincidentally, another couple of friends were also given tickets.

The Rite of Spring by Igor Stravinsky was the piece played in the second half of the program. I used to play this music every vernal equinox. I fell out of the habit , but I don’t know why, as it’s one of my favorite pieces.

Andrew Appel’s review in the 20 November Times Union describes it well: “it requires that we listen to music in a way not demanded by any other work… Brutal energy, fragmented melodies, repeated rhythmical figures that are hard to define but impossible to ignore…”

Well, if you put it like THAT, no wonder The Rite of Spring incited a riot in a Paris theater premiere of the ballet in 1913.

“The tumult began not long after the ballet’s opening notes — a meandering and eerily high-pitched bassoon solo that elicited laughter and derision from many in the audience. The jeers became louder as the orchestra progressed into more cacophonous territory, with its pounding percussion and jarring rhythms escalating in tandem with the tensions inside the recently opened Théâtre des Champs-Élysées.”

As often as I listen to CDs and LPs and YouTube videos, there is something especially satisfying about hearing music in person. Even when a piece is familiar, and theoretically boring in the recording – think Ravel’s Bolero, which we also heard at the ASO a few seasons ago – it can really become vibrant in the live setting. After the performance of the Rite of Spring, conductor David Alan Miller rightly required about three-quarters of the orchestra, section by section, to take a bow.

So I loved it, my wife loved it. The guy who had gotten one of the other tickets did NOT love it, but I’m sure he did not riot.

Listen to The Rite of Spring:

Atlanta Symphony Orchestra conducted by Yoel Levi

London Symphony Orchestra – Leonard Bernstein, conductor

BBC Proms 2013 – François-Xavier Roth conducts, after 6-minute introduction

Smart black kids and “acting white”

An article in Vox in 2017 discussed The myth about smart black kids and “acting white” that won’t die, declared it debunked, and that’s that, I guess.

“The ‘acting white’ theory — the idea that African-American kids underachieve academically because they and their peers associate being smart with acting white, and because they’re afraid they’ll be shunned — was born in the 1980s.”

I never “dumbed myself down” when I was a kid in the 1960s. But I did feel that, for a variety of reasons, that I was thought to be “acting white.” Part of it I credit with my father, who, though barely a high school graduate, did not like the use of ebonics, for himself and certainly not for his children.

So I have been told I was “talking white,” which, not incidentally, was generally NOT a compliment. My standard retort that since I’m black, and I’m talking, that I must be “talking black” generally did not fly.

Even as an adult, that’s been an issue. I remember those first six years in my current job, when we were serving a national audience with our research. I talked to people on the phone about their library reference requests. When I went to the annual conference, I’d see in the faces of white people, “He’s black?” and in the smiles of African-Americans, “He’s black!”

When I was in 11th or 12th grade in high school, I attended a few days of a Red Cross training session in Manlius, NY, near Syracuse. I had a lovely time. I even got a standing ovation after I performed on stage. People expected me to sing, I gather, but I played blues on my comb for a couple minutes.

There was a group picture (above), and I got a bunch of people sign the back of my copy. One black girl, who I liked well enough, wrote, “You’re a nice guy, but you’re no soul brother.”

If I had been punched in the gut, it wouldn’t have hurt nearly so much. Not only had people who had known me for a while decided I wasn’t “black enough,” someone I knew for less than a week came to the same damn conclusion! Hell, thinking about it now, it STILL stings a little.

I cried, not just at the time, but for weeks – months? – afterward. It took a good long while to conclude, essentially, that they – whoever – can go sod off.

So I never slacked off academically because of being too… whatever. I didn’t know how to be someone else. But I can understand how it could play out that way for others.

Andrew Lloyd Webber turns 70

Jesus Christ Superstar is one of only a handful of shows that I have seen on Broadway.

A recent PARADE article, 10 Things You Might Not Know About Andrew Lloyd Webber, noted that his new memoir, Unmasked, came out March 6.

#1 on the list: “When Sunset Boulevard joined School of Rock, Cats and The Phantom of The Opera on The Great White Way in early 2017, Webber became the only person to equal the record set in 1953 by Rodgers and Hammerstein with four Broadway shows running at once.”

In our Proctors Theatre subscription packet for 2018-2019, School of Rock is included, and Phantom, the longest play on Broadway ever, is one of the additional musicals being offered. I’ve seen Phantom and Cats (#4 on Broadway all-time) at Proctors in prior years, and Joseph and His Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at the Mac-Haydn Theatre.

Still, my all-time favorite Lloyd Webber piece is Jesus Christ Superstar, written with lyricist Tim Rice. I have noted that it was one of my top 20 albums that came out prior to me going to college. It was the source of great theological debate, especially with my friend Pat, on issues of predestination and the role of the apostles, among many other things.

I watched the 1973 movie. It is one of only a handful of shows that I have seen on Broadway, in 2000.

When I read this review of a production at Schenectady Light Opera Company, described as “amazing”, I tried to get tickets; alas, it was sold out.

I’m sure to record and watch the Jesus Christ Superstar Live! event with Alice Cooper as King Herod, Sara Bareilles as Mary Magdalene, and John Legend as the title guy, scheduled for Easter Sunday, April 1, on NBC-TV.

Here’s the entirety of Jesus Christ Superstar, with Ted Neeley as Jesus, Carl Anderson as Judas, and Yvonne Elliman as Mary Magdalene. Oddly it doesn’t have any of the pops and skips that my well-worn LP has. I Don’t Know How To Love Him was a hit single in 1971, which went to #28 (Elliman), and #13 by Helen Reddy.

Coverville 1209: The Andrew Lloyd Webber Cover Story