music Archives - Page 143 of 265 - Ramblin' with Roger

May rambling #1: Bringing the Invisible to Life

The Daredevils Without Landlines

And Jesus Said Unto Paul of Ryan … “Pious Paul interjected, ‘For the Samaritan’s work is unsustainable and sends the wrong message. It teaches travelers to take dangerous roads, knowing that others will rescue them from self-destructive behaviors.”

Strength Through Unity: How To Spot Fascism Before It’s Too Late

American Identity is Based on Alternate History

The Truest, Meanest Jokes that Bombed at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner

The absurd amount of entitlements that go to rich people and Why cutting rich people’s taxes doesn’t create jobs

Jimmy Kimmel’s Radically Simple ‘Jimmy Kimmel Test’

Torching the Modern-Day Library of Alexandria

Jodi Picoult: Are You Sure You’re Not Racist?

Someone wants to know why there was a Civil War and could Andrew Jackson have stopped it?

George Will: This president does not know what it is to know

Much Ado About Religious Liberty

Heineken ad

Is the special relationship ending? (Australia, New Zealand)

Vlogbrothers: Can You Trust Mainstream Media? and The Life Changing Magic of Thumbs Up

Younger Men, Older Women: A Pairing Becomes More Common

WebMD stands for medically deficient

There Is a Fake IDGod, and He Lives in China

The Daredevils Without Landlines — And Why Health Experts Are Tracking Them

Camsing Acquires Stan Lee’s POW! Entertainment

David Brickman review: Neil deGrasse Tyson at Proctors

Man forced to surrender his ‘offensive’ Star Trek license plate

Tony nominations (yes, I watch)

Now I Know: The Google Maps Invasion and Bringing the Invisible to Life and Lighting Up the Switchboards

Good luck (shhh!) and spam wedding

All of a sudden or all of the sudden

Please type your preferred plurals in the comments box: alumnus, apparatus, appendix, aquarium, cactus, crisis, criterion, focus, thesis, forum, fungus, hippopotamus, index, nucleus, octopus, phenomenon, referendum, radius, stadium, syllabus, prospectus, ellipsis, museum, factotum, status

Music

LISTEN TODAY! Bette Midler stars as Dolly Levi in the Tony Award-nominated revival of Hello, Dolly, before album is released May 12.

Saxa of the (English) Beat, R.I.P.

Princess Leia’s Stolen Death Star Plans, a Star Wars/Beatles fan tribute

TEN HOURS of the Cantina Band

Top 10 Songs About Elvis Presley, not including Elvis Presley Boulevard – Billy Joel, the only Joel single I own (B-side to Allentown)

Chuck Miller: Wake up, you sleeping lion!

Someday My Prince Will Come – Dave Brubeck Quartet

Photos show the world’s biggest rock stars as tourists in 1970s Japan

Forbes: How The Music Industry Is Putting Itself Out Of Business

The Eagles Sue an Actual Hotel California

R is for the Rheingold Beer Jingle (ABC W)

My beer is Rheingold the dry beer.
Think of Rheingold whenever you buy beer.

I was listening to our classical music station early one morning, and I hear the Rheingold beer jingle. OK, it wasn’t, really. But it certainly REMINDED me of it.

I discovered here that the melody I heard was in fact the Estudiantina Valse, Opus 191, No. 4 (The Students’ Waltz), a title I had never heard of.

“The tune was composed by a pair of obscure French composers, the tune itself by Paul Lacome (1838 – 1920); But ironically it is often incorrectly attributed to the man who arranged it in a rollicking Strauss-like arrangement for two pianos — named Emile (“Emil”) Waldteufel (1837 – 1915).

“Waldteufel included it in a set of tunes arranged for 2 pianos, published under his own Opus number, which blurred the issue of authorship right down to the present day.” In fact, I have found almost NO one to attribute this to Lacome, only to Waldteufel.

“The Beer jingle with a lyric by an unknown ad agent, used the melody of this famous light-classical waltz tune.”

The lyric was:
My beer is Rheingold the dry beer.
Think of Rheingold whenever you buy beer.
It’s not bitter, not sweet, it’s the extra dry treat
Won’t you try extra dry Rheingold beer?

I remember the third lyric as “it’s refreshing, not sweet…”, but there are a lot of variations.

“Ironic that this melody, which some may remember as the quintessential German Beer Hall tune (images of people with swaying cups all singing in unison) is actually of FRENCH, rather than German, origin.

The beer sponsored Rheingold Theater, a dramatic anthology series, on NBC Primetime in 1955 – 1956. Rheingold Beer, “despite its Wagnerian opera name, was brewed in a little brewery located in Brooklyn, NY; and which tried to use the early medium of TV to get a little respect — or “brand recognition” at least.

Still, Rheingold Beer, “introduced in 1883, is a New York beer that held 35 percent of the state’s beer market from 1950 to 1960. The company was sold by the founding German American Liebmann family in 1963… Rheingold shut down operations in 1976, when they were unable to compete with the large national breweries… The label was revived in 1998…” but it’s not the same, or so I am told.

WHY do I remember the lyrics to a song for a product I have NEVER consumed? Herwitz Associates suggests “a dozen principles for improving memory, but the concepts can just as easily be applied to making a message memorable.”

Listen to Estudiantina Valse here or here or here or here, featuring a 26-tone Violinopan (thanks, Jaquandor!)

Listen to the Rheingold beer jingle here or here or here or here (modern)

April rambling #3: 100 days (seems longer)

The niece’s new album: Planet Cole Porter. This is a collection of songs sung by Rebecca Jade with Peter Sprague’s amazing arrangements.

Deliver us from Scripture-citers

Pastorized for your protection

What’s Our Story? How do we defend Western values if we no longer believe the story that used to justify them?

‘They Starve You. They Shock You’: Inside the Anti-Gay Pogrom in Chechnya

Racism, Hot and Cold

Women Don’t Need to Apologize Less — Men Need to Learn How to Apologize

Questions You Should Ask Yourself Before Catcalling Someone

Why Traveling is More Important Now than Ever

Gisele Lagace, Canadian comic book artist, refused entrance at the US border

Rapp On This: Raging scum (bull v girl)

For 18 years, I thought she was stealing my identity – Until I found her

Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich has Fairbanks Disease, which causes stunted bone growth. He’s 4’11”. So he was bullied mercilessly in school until somebody stood up for him. An older kid who he didn’t even know began to beat the crap out of anybody who bothered him. It was the foundational experience of his life.
The older kid was Mickey Schwerner. A few years later, Schwerner joined Andrew Goodman and James Chaney and went door-to-door in Mississippi, trying to register Black voters. You know what happened.

This Lawsuit Goes to 11

Harry Potter and The Problem With The Pensieve Memories

Now I Know: The Rise and Fall of the Flivverboobs and An Astronaut’s Most Important Fan and The Time Travel Trap

Weed can play a significant role in your romantic relationships

The 8 Personalities You’ll Meet When Dating in the U.S.

Space Sex is Serious Business

The picture on the top of the page is of actress Gloria DeHaven. Yet it shows up often on the Internet as being a young Frances Bavier, the woman who would eventually play Aunt Bee on the Andy Griffith Show in the 1960s.

Illustrated Guide To Playing Sports As An Adult!

Five Questions for Rick Geary by Alan David Doane

I did not realize this until recently, but I think I’m becoming a devotee of the British way of punctuation. “British usage omits the apostrophe in the plural form of dates (e.g., 1980s)”. Also, “British style (more sensibly) places unquoted periods and commas outside the quotation marks.”

100 days

New York Times: White House Reporters Recall Their Most Vivid Moments

Fourteen per cent of US Christians left their churches after the election

Here Are The National Monuments At Risk

Massive Corporate Tax Cut Literally Cannot Pass Congress

Seth Meyers: ‘For every action, there’s an equal and opposite clip’

Anti-immigrant hotline bombarded with reports of space aliens

‘I thought it would be easier’

Ivanka & Jared: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver

Music

UNABASHED PLUG for the niece’s new album: Planet Cole Porter. This is a collection sung by Rebecca Jade, with Peter Sprague’s amazing arrangements.

Cuba Gooding, Sr., RIP

Pentatonix’s Acapella Spin of Queen’s All-Time Classic

Simon, Garfunkel, Sound of Silence, live

Kermit sings Once In a Lifetime (featuring The Electric Mayhem)

Flapper pie

K-Chuck Radio: The Arthur Baker Groove System and Saturday morning rock and roll!

Not me: Dinner with Roger Green (Formerly of The Czars), Sun, May 28, 2017, 6:00 pm (event ends at 10:00 pm) in Denver
No Cover!

Music throwback: (I Ain’t Gonna Play) Sun City

“Jonathan Demme’s contribution to ‘Sun City’ was pivotal in getting Nelson Mandela released and ending the South African apartheid.”

Jonathan Demme died at the age of 73 from esophageal cancer. The Boston Globe called him a populist of the best sort.

From Rolling Stone: “In 1987, Demme was nominated for a Best Music Video, Long Form Grammy for his work on “Sun City: Artists Against Apartheid.” Van Zandt co-founded the Artists United Against Apartheid with Arthur Baker and they produced the anti-apartheid song ‘Sun City‘ and the album of the same name.

“‘[Demme’s] contribution to ‘Sun City’ was pivotal in getting Nelson Mandela released and ending the South African apartheid,’ Van Zandt added. ‘He was a saint…'”

Also: “[Bruce] Springsteen won an Academy Award for Best Original Song for “Streets of Philadelphia,” which was featured in the Demme-directed film Philadelphia that stars Tom Hanks. Demme also directed the music video for the song.”

Of Demme’s most famous documentary, Wired wrote: “Stop Making Sense Is Still the Concert Film All Others Try to Be.” I’m very partial to that vintage of Talking Heads’ music, since I saw the band at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center on that tour, one of my two favorite concert experiences ever.

I was a big fan of Demme’s breakout film, Melvin and Howard (1980), and of Swimming to Cambodia (1987 Spaulding Gray documentary), but I’ve never seen his Academy Award-winning The Silence of the Lambs, though it was on HBO when I was visiting my parents at one point.

WATCH AND LISTEN to these Jonathan Demme works:

Sun City – Artists United Against Apartheid

The Demme video here and here
The pop-up video here
Just the music here

Streets of Philadelphia – Bruce Springsteen

Jonathan Demme video here and here

Talking Heads: Stop Making Sense

Trailer of Demme film here and here

In The Still Of The Night – the Neville Brothers

Red Hot and Blue (TV Movie) segment directed by Demme here

Systematically listening to the music

LOTS of Paul Simon gets played in October, so the S&G is played in November.

I have something north of 1400 compact discs. I haven’t actually counted them, but the Wife bought some furniture designed to hold 1200 CDs, which is what I guesstimated that I had, but I had CDs left over. Oops.

In order to justify having all those shiny discs, I need to actually PLAY them once in a while. So I have a system: movie soundtracks the month of the Oscars (February or March), Broadway music in time for the Tonys (June), TV soundtracks whenever the Emmys take place (August or September).

I own a number of compilation albums I play, dependent on genre. In February, Black History Month, it’s soul/r&b/et al, except for Motown, which is in November, for Berry Gordy’s birthday. April has jazz; September has folk, in honor of my late father; November is rock and roll, for Dick Clark.

Most of my music, though, is tied to artists. I tend to play them on the artists’ birthday week, and I have a blue binder to check out upcoming natal days.

What if it’s a duo or group? Often it’s the artist I most associate with the group, such as Peter Noone, a.k.a. Herman, of Herman’s Hermits. Or if there’s no single key person, it might be the artist whose birthday comes earlier in the year. Phil Everly’s birthday was January 19, and brother Don’s is February 1, so I play them in January.

Some specific arcane rules

ROLLING STONES:
Mick Jagger’s birthday is in July, so I play the commercial albums I bought. But someone gave me a disc of all their albums up through 1980, so all the albums I ripped are played in December, for Keith Richards’ birthday.

BEACH BOYS:
Brian Wilson’s birthday is in June, so I play the bulk of my BB albums then. But both Dennis and Carl Wilson were born in December, so I play the box set then.

POLICE:
I have a bit of Sting’s music, which I play in October. But the Police I play in July for Stewart Copeland’s birthday, earlier in the year than Andy Summers’ December birth.

SIMON & GARFUNKEL:
LOTS of Paul Simon gets played in October, so the S&G is played in November, for Art’s birthday.

THE WHO:
Since I have a few Pete Townsend solo albums, which I play in May, the group’s output I play in early March, for Roger Daltrey’s birthday.

THE BEE GEES:
Barry, the oldest, is born in September. But the late twins, Maurice and Robin, were born in December; that wins out.

THE MONKEES:
Both Michael Nesmith (1942) and the late Davy Jones (1945) were born on December 30.

CROSBY, STILLS, NASH, AND YOUNG
I have the least solo work by Graham Nash, so the group gets played in February.

THE SUPREMES:
I play the group in early March in honor of longest-tenured member, Mary Wilson, listening to Diana Ross later in that month on her birthday.

THE TEMPTATIONS:
Though it’s untrue, I think of the group with two primary singers in its prime years, David Ruffin (b. January 18), lead singer on most of the early hits, and Dennis Edwards (b. February 3), the prominent vocal on most of the psychedelic soul albums.

THE BEATLES:
Since John Lennon started the group, I play the core British albums, plus the Past Masters, which has the singles and EPs, in October. I also play the collection of Tony Sheridan and the Beatles collection which contains Ain’t She Sweet and Cry for a Shadow.
George was the first Beatle to visit the United States, visiting his sister Louise and her husband. I play the American albums in February.
Paul is one of the two survivors, so in June, I listen to the post-breakup stuff, such as the Anthology, BBC, and LOVE albums.
I don’t play Beatles albums in July for Ringo’s birthday, but I DO play Beatles COVER albums, which almost outnumber my Beatles collection.

There are even more rules, but I’d better stop now!