What Are You Listening To Right Now?

[BarretWallace]

I'm listening to The Old Ways Podcast!

[Tech]

Rapunzel - "The Wind in my Hair"

[Ragitsu]

 

[Ragitsu]

 

[Ragitsu]

 

[DShomshak]

On my evening walk to stretch my legs, I heard a bunch of seals barking out on Cutts Island. My sister did a little research online and found the spit tgrailing off it is a favorite haul-out spot for harbor seals.

 

Dean Shomshak

[Michael Hopcroft]

From the animated biblical epic The Prince of Egypt, a surprisingly inspiring song performed by Broadway legend Brian Stokes Mitchell. The sentiment is quite important to me, although not necessary to anyone else (especially if they despise community in favor of raw, rugged individualism.

 

The movie, as most of you may remember, is the Exodus story that emphasizes the character and internal conflicts of Moses. Moses had been adopted into the Egyptian royal family and was in the halls of power and wealth until a fit of righteous rage made him an outcast. His demand to release the Hebrews upon his return leads him into what becomes a personal duel between him and his "brother", Ramses. It may be one of the best retellings of the story. It performed the remarkable feet of making Moses interesting, a difficult problem for portrayals of Biblical heroes from Jesus all the way down the list.

 

 

[Pariah]

 

[Ragitsu]

 

[Ragitsu]

 

[Ragitsu]

 

 

[tkdguy]

 

[tkdguy]

I didn't know Kenny Rogers covered this song by Lionel Richie:

 

 

[Sundog]

 

[tkdguy]

 

[Michael Hopcroft]

Descendants (one of the staples of Disney+ for tweens is by all accounts a terrible movie. It didn't help that Kristen Chenowith, the original Glinda in Wicked and one of the stars of the short-lived drama GCB (which stands for Good Christian B****s) is horrifyingly mis-cast as Maleficent. The song is interesting in its way thanks to Chenowhith's enthusiastic performance. She really sells the piece.

 

 

[Ragitsu]

 

[Pariah]

 

[Duke Bushido]

I am not.

 

I have scampered away from my son's concert and out to the parking lot because I noticed on the progeam that Feliz Navidad was coming up.

 

I have successfully dodged that abomination against creativity for almost a decade now.  I am not going to give up so easily...

 

Hmmm....  I've dodged Elvis's murdering of Blue Christmas, too, for five years now I think...

 

If I can keep it up foe the rest of my life, I will still have trauma.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[TheNaga]

 

[Pariah]

 

[Michael Hopcroft]

A piano solo version of Rhapsody in Blue that doesn't sound nearly as good as the piano-and-orchestra original and appears to be missing Gershwin's point that composers, orchestras, and soloists must embrace the new or risk cultural irrelevance.  This is a lesson "classical" musicians have a hard time coming to grips with. They have apparently forgotten that Mozart wrote new music, 

 

Eventually I flipped over to a classic recording featuring Leonard Bernstein as conductor and soloist. That oh-so-velvety clarinet riff to open the work wonderful to hear. And Bernstein wrote new music throughout his career -- including scores for West Side Story, Candide, Wonderful Town, and Mass. He was also a brilliant pianist and the best-loved conductor of the late 20th Century. (As a work about Catholicism scored by a gay Jew, Mass wasn't without controversy, and Bernstein pulling no symbolic punches made it a hard work to listen to, even as the criticisms hit hard. In addition, then-President Richard Nixon refused an invitation to the premiere because of the contents of Bernstein's FBI record.)

 

Getting back the Rhapsody in Blue, I am trying very hard to find Seiji Ozawa's versions of Rhapsody and Gershwin's Piano Concerto in F, with the Marcus Roberts Trio serving as the soloists.  The Trio are among modern Jazz' best-known and best-loved piano trios. That I would love to have a recording of -- it's a brilliant take that enabled the who orchestra to turn itself loose -- and is very much the sort of thing Gershwin envisioned with these masterworks.

[Ternaugh]

 

[Ragitsu]

 

[Pariah]

9 hours ago, Michael Hopcroft said:

A piano solo version of Rhapsody in Blue that doesn't sound nearly as good as the piano-and-orchestra original and appears to be missing Gershwin's point that composers, orchestras, and soloists must embrace the new or risk cultural irrelevance.  This is a lesson "classical" musicians have a hard time coming to grips with. They have apparently forgotten that Mozart wrote new music, 

 

Somewhere in my music collection, I have a version of Rhapsody In Blue that includes a piano roll—basically the paper record from a player piano—recorded by Gershwin himself. The orchestra the recorded the rest of the work around it. So this recording, made in the 1990s, featured Gershwin as the soloist long after he had died.

 

As you might imagine, it's really impressive.