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Andrew Lindemann Malone's Internet Playpen |
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Saturday, June 28, 2008: Public Service Announcement This blog post goes out to the person who yelled at me for, while walking on a sidewalk, crossing a driveway into which he wished to turn this morning. I feel he may need this blog entry because after I informed him that I had the right of way, he whined, "No you don't!" Really, though, it addresses a topic on which many people seem to be ignorant: Who has the right of way in such a situation. Let us examine the Maryland rules of the road on the subject, as enshrined in the Maryland state code. Within Title 21, Subtitle 6, § 21-604, paragraph (b) states:
Now, it's a pretty clear presumption that "reasonable safety" includes "not hitting people." But just in case this is unclear, the Maryland State Highway Administration has helpfully provided its own plain-English interpretation of the law, from which the following extract is drawn:
Having established the actual controlling legal authority that gives me the right of way when I stroll down a sidewalk and must cross a driveway, let us examine the circumstances pertaining to the actual incident. I had not disregarded the prohibiion, under Subtitle 5, § 21-502, paragraph (b), that I may not "suddenly leave a curb or other place of safety and walk or run into the path of a vehicle which is so close that it is impossible for the drive to yield." Rather, I was at the far end of the driveway and had thus been clearly visible as I walked for about ten feet, with no parallel-parked cars next to me. It is worth noting also that there was absolutely no oncoming traffic, meaning that the driver was not attempting to duck in before a long line of cars came, a situation for which I have sympathy. No, this guy just couldn't stand to wait five seconds for me to clear the driveway, pointed his crappy Toyota at my knees, and when I kept walking, decided to yell at me. So this is perhaps not a person whose behavior will be changed by the law. In case there was any ambiguity on the subject, though, I hereby post this information.
Thursday, June 5, 2008: I Hear a Symphony Here's a little Express featurette on the National Orchestral Institute. I really like the NOI concerts and plan to go to at least one this year. They're everything I say they are! Best quote from James Ross that I couldn't quite fit into the article:
Best quote from violinist and NOI alumna Emily Barkakati, who didn't get into the article at all even though I interviewed her and everything:
Enthusiastic, talented people learning to harness their talents and continue to be enthusiastic. Sounds good to me!
Thursday, May 15, 2008: Back in Print Here's a little feature thingie on the Bach Sinfonia's awesome-looking upcoming concert. It features a modern premiere (Biber's "Stabat Mater") and an oratorio with my favorite early-music soprano, Jennifer Ellis Kampani, on whom I have an artistic crush. The article used to be longer. Today as I walked from work to the Metro, I wondered: Is it more honest to think you're expressing your real inner voice for a publication that you know reserves the right to hack your stuff up if necessary — and I would never ever deny that they have every right to do so, and that there are circumstances in which it's wholly necessary — or to work for the government, where what you write isn't perceived to be "yours" in any way except that you actually typed it into the computer, but no one can ever do anything to it unless you agree? I guess it depends on what you mean by "honest." Then when I got home, I discovered that "Dr. Gridlock" (aka Bob Thomson, the Post's traffic reporter) printed my letter about the intersection of Georgia Avenue and Colesville Road in beautiful downtown Silver Spring. Let this be said: I did not use a hyphen in the phrase "single most dangerous intersection." It ain't my fault! Maybe whoever copy-edited that took the buyout and was distracted.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008: Inaccurate Racial Profiling Stuff White People Like (which could more accurately be called "Stuff Liberal, Urban, Unbearably Precious White People Like") has made its first major misfire. They have listed a handful of questionable Casucasoid love objects (architecture? Living by the water?), but they have always at least had a glimmer of truth. Now, however, they have listed "Grammar" as thing no. 99 on the honkyphilia countdown, and to quote James Brown, "That ain't right!" Liberal, urban, unbearably precious white people think they like grammar and then crap all over its many rules just like everyone else. (You'll notice the hamfisted use of commas throughout the blog...) And this points to a larger truth about liberal, urban, unbearably precious white people: They like rules right up to the point where the rules pose any sort of inconvenience to them, at which point they rail against them with all the detatched ironic hipster ferocity they can muster. This is because liberal, urban, unbearably precious white people are all for societal change as long as it does not imperil their own relatively elite societal position. SWPL occasionally hints at an understanding of this truth (see: #62: Knowing What's Best For Poor People), but then retreats into the consumer-choice paradigm of identity pretty quickly (#63: Expensive Sandwiches). Some folks have taken SWPL to task for not emphasizing this more, but I have never minded their limited-focus cracker crackin', because it has been extremely amusing. With the Grammar entry, though, we are once again reminded that even the gentlest satire requires the ring of truth at its core. It seems the blog's author has forgotten that most basic of authorial maxims: Write what you know. That, or the author thinks he actually knows grammar, which, based on this randomly selected passage:
is really sad.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008: Tidbit I was reading Desson Thomson's summer movie preview in the Post a bit ago, and it made me think of this little extract from my summer movie preview back in 2001, when writing was fun and I wasn't as good as it as I am now. But this foreshadowing of "Planet of the Apes" is one of my favorite things I ever wrote:
Obviously, the first sentence, and then there's something that just tickles me to no end about the "collectively boast an unmatched expertise" thing. I don't like to write as much as I used to. Something about the pressure to flense all my baggy, dilatory sentences to fit in newspapers that (unlike the Diamondback, my home at U-Md) wouldn't just make room for them somehow. My prose is cleaner and more precise and probably more vivid for it. But I rarely if ever have that feeling I used to have all the time, where I would sit down at the keyboard and let it rip and feel a visceral excitement in making the argument, capturing the experience, tossing out the idea. I miss it a lot. The Web is supposed to provide room for such shenanigans, and occasionally I have taken advantage of its capaciousness. But unlike when I was in college, I now spend my days doing work that's actually challenging, and I have less energy when I come home to lay down the verbiage. For some reason, unlike when I was in school, a bunch of people seem to want to hang out with me, which further decreases the hours and power I can bring to bear on writing for fun. And, trying to keep the needle on the scale from moving up on the dial (not to mention trying to keep a smile on my face), I spend a lot more time exercising than I used to. And I need more sleep than I used to. I don't see a solution other than winning the lottery and thus not having to go to work. If you have any ideas, e-mail me.
Monday, April 21, 2008: Not Proud to Fly On American Last weekend I was eagerly looking forward to flying on an American Airlines MD-80 aircraft from National Airport to O'Hare for a weekend in the Windy City. How disappointed I was. But I did eventually get out, 11 hours later than I was originally scheduled to depart, and landed only 12 and a half hours late. Here's a few paragraphs I wrote while waiting in Terminal C for my flight to depart. I have no idea why I wrote them in past tense. I think I might have thought that eventually I would write some more. Circling idly among the various food purveyors, I overheard coming from "Jet Rock," the bar, a snatch of Chicago's "I've Been Searching (So Long)," which made me smile from its coincidental appropriateness. I viewed some more menus, trying to get a sense of what might be a likely candidate for a meal were I to be stuck in the airport for an even longer term tan that to which I had already willingly condemned myself [by arriving at National at 7 pm for a flight that would ultimately not take off until 9:30]. I drifted by Jet Rock again, and the song had progressed to full power-ballad mode: "GOOD THINGS…IN LIFE…TAKE A LONG TII-IIIME!" This was so funny I had to sit down to fully contemplate it. I took a seat at a window facing east over the runways, with a view of the Potomac. Many-windowed tour boats streamed steadily, yet with no hurry, up the river. Beyond, the Capitol, that stately pleasure dome for the fat and slothful. Cars making their way home down 295 made a constellation of headlights that slowly dissolved and reformed as traffic rambled round the bend. Those little stupid toothpick-with-wings regional jets operated by American Eagle got in and out of the damn gates fine. I speculated on when the FAA would ground them for unperformed inspections, my thoughts running slow like a maple syrup tap (if hardly as sweet). I was screwed, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it, except wait for the situation to unscrew itself somewhat. So I waited. I can be good at waiting if it is my only option. Then I had one of those Auntie Anne's pretzels and listed to my new iPod a lot. Then the flight was really late. But it was an excellent weekend, in the end.
Sunday, April 20, 2008: How Europe Regulates Due to new occupational noise regulations, European musicians now can't play Mahler without special safety equipment! This is what happens in Europe, where a bunch of experts get together and promulgate regulations with very little public involvement. Then the Europeans complain about the amount of time it takes to promulgate regulations in the United States. You can do this right or fast, but not both. (Of course, taking a long time is no guarantee of an optimal regulatory decision!) I personally will not mind if this results in less Mahler in concert halls, but I realize this is a minority view.
Thursday, April 9, 2008: Me in the Post (Sort Of) Here's an article in the Food section that, at the end, mentions a rule I wrote. The paragraph there misses a lot of amazing subtleties that went into the rule — just like reviews of classical music concerts! Anyway, this is the second rule I've written that was mentioned in the Post, and both involved irradiation. They just can't get enough of the modern phytosanitary treatments, I guess.
Sunday, March 23, 2008: Telemann in Silver Springg Last night the Bach Sinfonia played a bunch of Telemann, and when I got home, I decided that writing up my impressions of the concert was way more important than watching the NCAA tournament, so here's my review. You'll notice it's about three times longer than a typical Post review and also makes jokes. This is how I write for fun.
Saturday, March 22, 2008: This Week in Baseball History at Work A.k.a. "Andrew's enjoying his scanner." Here's me with Babe Ruth when the Sultan of Swat visited our office last December. I expect the fact that he's been dead for a number of years explains his pallor, but he was really polite about his desire to eat my brains.
Also, did you know that "Vinegar Bend" Mizell became Assistant Secretary of Agriculture for Governmental and Public Affairs after his illustrious pitching career? (Hey, he won one more World Series than A-Rod has.)
Friday, March 21, 2008: Doodlerama Yesterday I was giving training at work, or rather I was helping to give training, which meant that there were some times when people were standing up at the front of a room and discussing stuff I already knew (engagingly, but still). As my attention drifted but my desire to appear professional remained unflagging, I came to the obvious conclusion: It's doodle time! First I did this one (sorry for the cutoff — I can't get it to scan properly):
I took some unaccountable joy in this setup, which meant I immediately had to duplicate it:
Because I don't see why cyclops pyramids shouldn't be able to find love, if stars can. (Although you'll notice the ominous crack at the left edge of the happy star romance's heart. Perhaps those stars are going to cross after all.) I need to find more time at work to doodle, so I can bring other happy things together in multiple-exclamation-point romance.
Monday, March 3, 2008: I've Quit Posting Here's the last review I'm going to write for the Washington Post. (Perhaps appropriately, my cutline is on the next page, after the second review.) I realize this fine piece of journalism dates from two weeks ago — I had originally thought I was going to have something in the paper last week, but I didn't, and then I wanted to get the Peter Pertis thing up, and then I was preparing for a party and had no time. The concert itself was both high-quality and fun, which makes it a fitting way to go out — I basically enjoyed most of the concerts I covered for the Post. Two reasons drove the decision to quit. The first was that I wasn't enjoying the reviewing process as much as I had — the challenge of getting everything worth saying about a concert into that little hole, scrounging your internal thesaurus for better words and untying the knots in problematic sentences as the deadline approaches, remembering to check the spelling of people's names and confirm whatever factual statements you make to avoid embarrassment and confusion. And don't forget the rather basic challenge of making sure I knew what I was attending when, which brings me to the other reason for quitting: I want to do other stuff with my free time. While the people I worked with at the various venues and concert series around town ranged from helpful and pleasant to really helpful and pleasant, it still took a good while to get everything straight with them, as it did to get everything straight with the Post with regard to assignments and necessary edits. This labor was necessary to do the job, and I want to explore doing other things with the time it took. I'll still write about classical music occasionally, because I love it and I love writing. I'll let my words expand over the infinite space that the Internet provides, giving me room for as many digressions, hedges, cavils and superlatives as I damn well feel like. And I'll write things that don't have anything to do with classical music, which is something I haven't done in a long time. And I'll rest, and enjoy that too. We'll see what else there is out there.
Tuesday, February 26, 2008: The Big Comeback Here's an interview/review of Peter Pertis' concert at Strathmore on Sunday. Maybe it's a holdover from In the Shadows of History, but I always enjoy a good Escaping the Iron Curtain yarn, and Pertis has one of those. He also took ten years off from playing publicly before his return to the stage on Sunday. The Post's Patrick Rucker had a different view on the concert than I did, so you may find it edifying to read that also.
Monday, February 10, 2008: When the East is In the House Here's a review of Japanese pianist Aki Takahashi, whose concert was not only really good but also made me get out of the house so I could hear the conversations described directly below. So everybody wins!
Thursday, February 7, 2008: Other People's Talking Wednesday I heard two interesting conversations. The first was conducted by a young man and three (good-looking) young women who were walking north on 22nd St. NW between I St. and Pennsylvania — in other words, the heart of GW country:
The second took place on the Metro going from Gallery Place all the way until I got off at Silver Spring (and it was still going as I disembarked), between a man and woman, both white, well-appointed yet casually dressed, and 50-something. The man hailed from North Dakota; the woman tolerated his frequent mentions of this fact. The funny thing for me (even as I tried to soothe a splitting headache and write a review of the concert I'd heard earlier) was that the man (at least) was deeply interested in the USDA, damning our regulations and praising any administrator who attempted to counter what he generally characterized as the career employees' muddle-headed decision-making. For the reasons earlier delineated in the parentheses, I didn't transcribe anything while I was riding, but here's one paraphrase from the man:
I always think it's funny how much crap farmers talk about the USDA when the main thing farmers ask the USDA for is more money with fewer restrictions. Some county wisdom about the hand that feeds you should be applying, except we're profesionally obligated to be nice to all our regulated parties, which everyone knows. Also, if you can find your way around the South Building the first time you go in there, you should be exploring deep space or charting the ocean floor or something that really capitalizes on your evident talents.
Saturday, January 26, 2008: Homer Simpson on My Feet Makes My Cipher Complete
I am so much more awesome than I used to be, because I own these slippers. Thanks to Becca and Vince! Probably I should link to the last review I wrote for the paper, which covered the "Let Freedom Ring" concert. Except it's not online, apparently. So I'll just post it here: It is inevitable that, at a concert held to commemorate the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, people will give speeches to emphasize and elaborate on the tribute the music provides. But devoting over a third of Monday's one-and-a-half hour "Let Freedom Ring Celebration" to such speeches seemed excessive, especially when the only memorable remarks came from Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D), upon her receipt of the Coach John Thompson Jr. Legacy of a Dream Award. Co-hosts Georgetown University and the Kennedy Center had brought a bunch of fine performers to a full Concert Hall, plus some folks watching a simulcast on the Millennium Stage — why not let 'em make music? The hip-hop violin duo Nuttin' but Stringz, with an unenviable spot on the program between two long stretches of talking, nevertheless got the crowd amped with exhortations to celebrate the day and hard-driving, sometimes acrobatic fiddling. Denyce Graves, D.C.'s own star mezzo-soprano, gave operatic inflections and well-judged shape to a few choice gospel songs and spirituals. Even with a microphone, she sometimes had trouble projecting over the orchestra, but her emotional directness ultimately shone through, especially in "Give Me Jesus." Rev. Nolan William Jr. led the "Let Freedom Ring" Celebration Choir in a bracing reading of "Done Made My Vow to the Lord." Later, he told the audience to join hands (the compliance rate was high) before leading them and the choir in an overwhelming, fervent "We Shall Overcome," with a solo verse from Graves. Another local, Dennis Sawyers, made the first verse of the finale, "Battle Hymn of the Republic," into an electrifying gospel solo, after which all the performers joined in the hymn with an exuberance and strength befitting the occasion.
And heeeeeere's the marginalia:
Monday, January 21, 2008: The Sweetest Thing Here's a review of Sweet Honey in the Rock's annual children's concert. Lacking a child of my own, I brought my mom and allowed myself to assume my natural mental age. This worked remarkably well, or at least I thought so. The only problem was sitting next to a real kid who couldn't decide whether he wanted to be in the aisle watching the group or retreat to his parents' arms. Actually, that wasn't the problem; the problem was that sometimes he would make up his mind while leaning on my leg, wondering whether to fully reenter the pew or stay in the aisle. That was genuinely annoying. But he was a young'un, so I forgave him immediately. If you have a child or childen of your own and you are Christian, you need to pick up Sweet Honey in the Rock's new CD. The first track is pretty awful, but the rest is good-to-great and shines with the kind of positivity that today's kids need to deal with their socially rapacious peers on the Internets. Or so I hear.
Friday, January 18, 2008: Because Rhmying on the Mic is the Number-One Trade Informed today that the Lindemann the MC page is actually receiving public attention, I have undertaken to spruce it up and add some more content. You'll now see a whole other produced song, the MP3 version of the Biggie parody, and a heartfelt plea regarding the Benazir Bhutto song. Ch-ch-check it out.
Sunday, January 5, 2008: Prime Causes This afternoon I decided to take advantage of the unseasonable warmth by walking over to Beautiful Downtown Silver Spring to purchase some things at steep discounts. First up was Borders, where I had a 30-percent-off coupon that I was just itching to use on Junot Diaz's newish novel "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao." I hit the "Literature" shelves first but found under Diaz's name only "Drown," his much earlier collection of short stories, which I devoured at age 20 and then tried to send in a birthday package to a young woman on whom I had a crush and who was studying in Paris for the semester. The package never actually made it to her, and for some months afterward I thought of it as being lost at the bottom of the sea somewhere, although my incompetence at filling out the international shipping forms was probably what prevented it from entering Gaul. Back in Borders in America, I investigated further and found that they had a copy of the novel on the "New Fiction" shelf at the front of the store. I shaved $8 off "Oscar Wao"'s price with the coupon, a good use of it since I would have ended up buying the novel anyway. After failing to find the running socks I wanted at Pacers, and feeling in a bookish mood and still enjoying the strange balminess, I sat down on one of the benches on Ellsworth Drive (the heart of Silver Spring's redeveloped area) to read. One of the books I've been reading lately is "The Best American Essays 2007," and paging through it I came upon an essay called "Fathead's Hard Times," by W.S. Di Piero. It begins with a wonderful sentence: "When I'm standing at the opera — at ten dollars a ticket, it's the best cheap show in San Francisco — I look along the balustrade and think on the kinds and degrees of backache people will tolerate in exchange for a certain order of beauty." So I kept reading, and Mr. Di Piero took me on a journey of meeting pain through music. The essay's transitions came off so effortlessly that they must have given him inordinate trouble in the writing, and its subjects gradually grew darker and darker until he closed by extolling whistling in the face of death. (Since I'm a big whistler, this earned him major bonus points with me.) But throughout the tone was as gentle and wry as his ideas were piercing, and the evocations of music always hit the mark — at one point he remembers feeling "as if I was listening to [Bartok's] Concerto for Orchestra with my stomach." While I was reading, a curious thing happened: I felt myself breathing musically, in rhythm, in and out on a steady 2/2. My breathing, implacable and unhurried, served as accompaniment for Di Piero's words as they semi-sounded in my head; at times, my attention would lift to snatches of conversation that emerged from the fog of chatter around me on Ellsworth. I felt palpably present in the moment, undistracted by what had come before or would come after, as I read (and vaguely dreaded the eventual end of) Di Piero's essay. But of course it did end, and I wanted to go to Safeway to get four boxes of Nature Valley Granola Oats & Honey cereal for $6 ($5 with coupon). So I rose and walked to the end of the block, then up Fenton Street. As I approached the golf store, a large (not fat, large) black man with close-cropped hair and a cool leather jacket came out with a shopping bag. He glanced at me, grinned, and exclaimed, "My man! Why you look so sad?" Not realizing at first that he was addressing me, I had kept walking. But right then, for a split second, I thought about turning around and telling him that the blank, distant look on my face didn't mean that I was sad at all, that I was beautifully present and full of contemplation and deeply satisfied with everything around me. Then, before I could even make a decision on whether to turn around, he finished his thought: "Cause you ain't get no pussy?" I went on and bought the cereal. (Five bucks — can't beat it!)
Friday, December 28, 2007: Standards I'm watching the Champs Sports Bowl, waiting for it to end so that ESPN will show me the Emerald Bowl, featuring my beloved Maryland Terrapins. The crew just broke away from the game to show Jon Misch, a freshman linebacker for the Michigan State Spartans, playing Chopin's Fantasie-Impromptu at a team dinner. Like Samuel Johnson dissing women preachers back in the day, the announcers were surprised to find it done at all, especially by a linebacker. And I guess I agree. But the first thing I said when listening to what was admittedly a very brief excerpt of Misch's performance was "Uh, rubato?"
Wednesday, December 26, 2007: Your Spam-O-Matic Year in Review Merry Christmas to all who celebrated the holiday yesterday. I got a nice haul of toys and books. Not so many CDs, but I will be rectifying this deficit my ownself at CDepot tomorrow. Mostly, though, I was happy to be with my family and sittin' around watching other people be happy (even if I had to take a nap in the middle to clear my head). Here are the top 10 concerts I saw this year (in chronological order):
Last year I had much less trouble figuring out which were the top 10 concerts. Basically, have a moment of transcendence and you were in. But several more than 10 concerts this year had a moment or three of transcendence (even if they were mixed in with more pedestrian stuff), and so this year we have honorable mentions:
Resolutions for the new year:
Wednesday, Decemeber 19, 2007: August Personages in Classical Music Talk to Me: The Continuing Series PLUS Your Half-Assed Holiday Gift Guide Amazing how people who wouldn't necessarily think to give you the time of day in a normal context make themselves available for phone interviews when you say you'd like to write an article about them. Here's Christopher Rouse talking with me about "Karolju," his Christmas piece. I love Rouse's music a whole lot, so this was a big thrill for me. Reader, I would suggest that "Karolju" would be an excellent last-minute Christmas present for the classical fan on your shopping list. Here are some other things to think about picking up:
Monday, December 17, 2007: Last Concert Review of the Year! Unless something odd happens. Here I review the Washington Chorus' Christmas program. (You have to jump to the next page to see my name. They must be ashamed!) Marginalia:
Monday, December 10, 2007: Combattimento Kathleen Battle screwed up her own concert on Friday, and I blamed her for it in the paper today. Marginalia:
Wednesday, December 5, 2007: Let's Get That Fire Started I forgot yesterday to wish a Happy Hanukah to all my Jewish peeps. Olive oil: It's not just for food preparation, it's for miracles too! Yesterday the local weather mavens predicted snow, and lo and behold today we actually have snow. Not a great deal, but since this is Washington it was enough to snag traffic to the point where it took one of my co-workers four hours to drive about 15 miles to work. Nevertheless, this was the day I had determined to begin running on my lunch hour, and run I did. It was OK. All that forcible stabilization of my footfalls tore up my ankles a bit, but they feel fine now, and the snow doesn't feel like much more than a light rain when you're running. I'm going to try to run outside three times a week now (Wednesday or Thursday, plus Saturday and Sunday) and do only two gym-exclusive workouts during the week. (This is serious blog-style minutiae, isn't it?) My goal for the holiday month ahead is to take as much time as possible to do the following things:
Because I know I'll have plenty of opportunities to party, celebrate, freelance, work, etc. I don't need to court those! I need to court aloneness.
Monday, December 3, 2007: Stratospheric Here's an interview with Aaron Jay Kernis that ran on Thursday, then a review of a concert mostly of his music that the Baltimore Symphony did on Saturday. I was very happy to be able to do both. Kernis is one of my all-time faves and "Newly Drawn Sky," which was new to me, is really powerful stuff. Also, here's my holiday choral preview that I did for Express. Now I am well and truly caught up. And yes: The fact that I referred to Mozart "pimping out" the "Messiah" is one of my proudest moments as a professional writer. Also that I got to refer to the "secret weapon of Lutheran chorales."
Tuesday, November 27, 2007: Caught Up Here's my review of the Sanctuary Project, which attentive readers will remember is what I interviewed Steve Antosca about earlier. Yes, this review ran last Tuesday, not today. I can't actually create time in front of the computer. But I swear this is the very last publication out there for me...until Thursday!
Monday, November 26, 2007: August Personages of Classical Music Talk* to Me, Part 3 Here's a feature dealie with Alex Ross, the New Yorker's classical music critic, which was written in advance of his appearance at Politics and Prose last Tuesday. The asterisk is there because I had very little time before my deadline when I finally was able to wade through the armies of publicity people and actually contact Ross, and that was when I was trying to finalize that rule below and staying late at regular work, which last time I checked pays me vastly more to write than do my freelance masters. (Not that I don't love my freelance masters!) So we did those lists via e-mail, me selecting the categories, and I wrote the opening encomium. Here's Ross' blog of the P&P visit. If you click on the photo, you can see a blob that is me. Just look down from the EXIT sign and then over to the green blob with black backpack strap stripes up and down the torso. I swear that's me. Who else would cop to wearing that shirt? Come on.
Monday, November 19, 2007: The Plus-One Here's a final rule that I wrote allowing the interstate movement of citrus fruit from areas quarantined for citrus canker, subject to treatment, packinghouse inspection for visible symptoms of the bacterial disease, and a prohibition on the distribution of the fruit to commercial citrus-producing States. Yes, I capitalized "States," 'cause that's how I roll in the Federal Register. Reasons why regulations are better than reviews:
My computer will be unavailable to me over Thanksgiving, so I will not be able to post my thankfulness list on the day itself. I will do it eventually, though.
Saturday, November 17, 2007: The Trifecta Three publications in the two days prior to this one. Thursday: I had an interview with Steve Antosca, artistic director of the Contemporary Music Forum, in Express. It's partly to spotligh CMF and partly to showcase this big ole Roger Reynolds premiere they're having tomorrow at the National Gallery. Stephen Brookes' article for the Post is now up on their site. I knew his was going to be better than mine when he told me he was writing one. But mine is shorter! Friday: I had two reviews in the Post. One was of a double-reed concert on Wednesday out at my alma mater (school song: "Rock and Roll Part 2 (Amended Remix)"). That concert was really good. The other was of the National Symphony Orchestra, on Thursday, where they normally play. That had one really good piece and two disappointing ones. Unlike last time I had two reviews on one day, the Style section folks did not put the reviews on the same page of the newspaper. That time, it looked like if I had a couple lucky rolls, I would have had the entire southeastern corner of the page and been ready to challenge Carolyn Hax for domination of D8, or the Western hemisphere, or something. The Washington Post site has solicited comments concerning these reviews for two weeks ending Friday, November 30. So far it has received no comments on the double-reeders and one comment (submitted twice) on the NSO review. I'll let them know that I'm a professional in this comment-response game in case they feel like they want someone to lay the smack down on the commenter's ass, like I did on Public Citizen. The last part of that sentence is a quote from an awesome rap about regulation writing that I wrote but for which I have not been able to make a beat because I spend too much of my time reviewing concerts and writing features. I'll link to my most awesome publication in months when it comes out on Monday. (Hint: It's a regulation!)
Tuesday, November 6, 2007: Special Dedication Going Out to the Old School You know how sometimes, it seems like a pair of performers will be awesome live when you listen to their records, and then you see them in person and…they're exactly that awesome? Such were Andrew "The" Manze and Richard Egarr on Sunday night at CSPAC. I am privileged to have gotten to attend and write the review of two of my very favorite period instrumentalists. Marginalia:
Sunday, November 4, 2007: Another Sunday in the Park Today I achieved a long-held goal of running through Rock Creek Park to the National Zoo and back. This achievement was delayed by the events described in "Sunday in the Park," so I thought it would be good to provide a little update, which you can see by clicking on the link.
Friday, November 2, 2007: Someone Else's Marginalia Here's Tim Page's typically fine review of the NSO concert last night. Because Tim doesn't have a website on which to post marginalia, and because I went to this concert also, I'm going to post some marginalia from it here:
Wednesday, October 31, 2007: Bring It Back Now I have been unforgivably lax in my duties of linking to myself. Last Wednesday I had this piece on the Mancuso-Suzda Project in Express. They are 100 percent the real deal: experimental jazz with a pervasive sense of fun. Plus they're both from Silver Spring! The show I previewed drew a whole bunch of middle schoolers to whom they had given an educational program as well as hipper older folks, and everyone left thoroughly entertained. I still intend to review it, perhaps sometime when the computer feel more comfy. (I just don't like to be on the computer right now for whatever reason.) Monday we had a review of the Fred Hersch concert at the Library of Congress on Friday. The only notable non-review detail is that Randall Hodgkinson, pianist of the Gramercy Trio, played from score in the "Lyric Piece for Trio," and the score absolutely would not lie flat for two seconds. The drama of him trying to get the score to lie flat was more gripping than the "Lyric Piece" itself (although not as pretty). Today brought a review of the Contemporary Music Forum concert at the Corcoran on Sunday. I wrote about only four of the works because I didn't like the other two. It's not especially earthshattering news that some modern works aren't to everyone's taste, is it? I thought it would be much more fun and educational and frankly relevant to talk about what I liked. Also, female musicians need to think about whether they want everyone in the audience to see their brightly colored thongs before they squat to pick up a cable. Not that I object, necessarily — certainly not in this case — but I'm pretty sure that I wasn't supposed to see that. I also have a whole list of things about which I am supposed to blog. When I come home lately, all I want to do is rest. But I love writing so much that I know I'll be back.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007: Pick One Nov. 4: 4:15 pm, Patriots at Colts, CBS; 7:30 pm, Andrew Manze and Richard Egarr at CSPAC Nov. 11: 1:00 pm, Eagles at Redskins, Fox; 3:00 pm, Washington Chorus performing Haydn, "Mass in Time of War," at the KenCen Nov. 18: 1:00 pm, Redskins at Cowboys, Fox; 4:00 pm, violist Kim Kashkashian at Congregation Beth-El I kind of hate the fall for making me make these choices. I have leanings on all three, though.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007: Living Just Enough for "The City" Here's a review of the Post-Classical Ensemble playing Aaron Copland's score to the documentary "The City," which features Greenbelt, which we must mention because we totally represent the Maryland suburbs. (Whaddya mean you dont?) The items below are not marginalia this time — more like "facts I would have put in the review if I had been given a higher word count." However, they are presented as marginalia, because I would have put them into various unconnected places within the review:
It's possible I wouldn't have put that last one into the review, I guess.
Friday, October 12, 2007: Raisons d'Etre Lately I have been completely obsessed with the Isley Brothers song "Footsteps in the Dark," mostly because it is a perfectly silky groove on the themes of infidelity and resignation and also partly because it is fun to do the rap from Ice Cube's "It Was A Good Day" over the instrumental parts, since the latter is (ahem) musically dependent on the former. Indulging this pastime this evening, I was struck once again by what is either the incongruity or the dire logic of the following passage from the first verse of the rap:
In Rap Translations jargon, having saved some leftover food for future repasts, Ice Cube ponders his potential for survival in the wider urban environment, but ultimately considers that it is necessary to exit his domicile and enter the agora, solely because he owns a vehicle with a convertible roof and an aftermarket hydraulic suspension that enables vertical gyration of the car's rear. I'm not sure that made anything clearer. The question remains, though: What does it mean that you risk your life so that you can drive your cool-ass car? The only possible explanation (from my white suburban non-hard perspective) is that the cool-ass car is the purpose of life, in that a life in which it is not used is worse to contemplate than the risk of death that awaits Ice Cube outside his home. When you put it that way, it kind of makes sense, at least if you would be as pleased to drive a drop-top with hydraulics as I would. Personally, a life in which I could not eat cranberry sauce when the weather turns cold is one that I do not want to contemplate for too long. Every year when I see the first bags of cranberries in the grocery store, I let loose an excited exclamation and then buy the two best ones I can find in the pile to cook up as soon as possible. I favor the following incredibly simple recipe:
This amount of sugar (less than Ocean Spray recommends on its packages) tames the sourness of the berries just enough to make their unique tart flavor vividly present without being unpleasant. Every year I try a cranberry recipe or two with orange zest and some other flavors, and I always enjoy the change of pace, and then I go back to eating basic sauce every single day at every possible excuse to do so. The flavor, and the mix of cranberry-infused liquid and chewy boiled cranberry skins, seems fresh and compelling to me no matter whether it's my first bite of the night or the 50th. Sometimes I think I only stop eating it because I'm full or I want to save some for tomorrow. Tonight was the first sauce day of 2007. Tonight, I am more satisfied than I was yesterday. It'll be OK to live another 24.
Tuesday, October 2, 2007: It's Getting Hot in Here In the constant rush of linking to things that I have written, I occasionally forget to take time to link to cool things that other people have done. Such is the case with the "CO2 Music Video," probably the greatest environmental advocacy song since "Mercy Mercy Me," at least that I've heard. As in their ridiculously famous "802," X10 once again knocks at your door and drops mad science, only this time the word "science" is actually used literally, as they explore the various ramifications of global climate change in Vermont through rhymes spat in a cow pasture. Elizabeth Malone, internationally renowned climate change scientist and my mom, says that the facts spit by C$, Run Rhymz, P Nasty and Dr. K are all accurate, and X10 certainly states them more forcefully than they are expressed in the IPCC reports (and over an original beat this time). Check it out. If you like that, you should also view the live version, which proves that, unlike some rap acts, X10 is no mere studio creation — they bring it hard even without a beat! And at the State House, which is not a venue that typically rewards bringing it hard! If, on the other hand, you like being bored, you may also want to check out the mystifying "802 Music Video Comment Analysis," posted by a pretty girl who apparently thinks she can develop a business by posting videos that discuss, haltingly and repetitively, comments made about other, much more popular videos. She also says at one point that "we're living in the 20th century, so we might as well go electronic." Good luck with that.
Monday, October 1, 2007: The Route 50 Blues Here's a review of the Annapolis Symphony Orchestra. There is going to be a lot of marginalia after I drop the colon, so just remember that I thought the Naptown Symphony did a really good job as you read this: Soovin Kim looked like a total badass in his skinny suit with a yellow patterned tie so wide it almost looked like an ascot. Nevertheless, during the hairier moments (technically) of the concerto, I found myself wondering whether what I was hearing, the prosaicness I cited in the review, was actually happening. One thing I'll do sometimes when that happens is close my eyes and try to imagine the sound I'm hearing coming from a performer who looks different, to see if the appearance might be distorting my opinion. In this case, I had theorized that, because Kim looked like a badass, I expected him to be playing like a total swaggering violin god, instead of the indifferent playing he was actually giving us. The imaginative exercise didn't move the needle. While this was one of the better concerts I've seen this year, it was also one of the least enjoyable for me personally. I had had a panic attack while driving over to Naptown, as I had once again become convinced that my tires were going to blow out on the Beltway and doom me to careening into something. So when I got there, I wanted to clear my mind of all distractions and try to come back from the panic attack and pay the good attention to what was transpiring onstage. My efforts toward this end were disrupted by two patrons of the symphony, who I have nicknamed Rockin' Grandma and the Jingling Lady. The Jingling Lady had showed up at the symphony with a number of metal bracelets on her left wrist. Not surprisingly, whenever she moved her wrist, a chorus of little tinkles arose, which was not exactly an intended effect in any of the pieces played. After the first movement of the Brahms, I told her that I could hear her tinkling every time she moved her left wrist. "I'm sorry," she said. But she didn't take her bracelets off and put them in her purse like a normal polite human being would do. She just kept making noise. For this she earned the oppobrium of Rockin' Grandma, as conveyed through dirty looks, which was just about the only thing I liked about Rockin' Grandma. RG's problem was that she enjoyed the music too damn much, moving forcefully hither and yon in her seat to express her body-level satisfaction with the rhythms being played, not realizing that her seat was connected to mine and that her movements thus jerked me back and forth in my seat as well. She rocked back and forth every time the music had any kind of a consistent pulse, even when, as in the Bartok, her rocking displayed absolutely no understanding of how that pulse worked. But that was not all Rockin' Grandma did. She clasped and unclasped her hands as she rocked. She waved her arms about in some wild imitation of actual conducting during moments she found exciting. And she had the freaking temerity to try to talk to me as I was in the process of spending the whole concert trying to ignore her behavior so that I could, you know, listen to the music and formulate an opinion that I could later send to the Washington Post for money. At intermission, when I turned my back on her — I believe this is normally considered to be a sign that one does not want to have a casual conversation — she tapped my shoulder repeatedly until I turned around and she asked, "Are you Tim?" I'm not even going to relate the rest of this conversation. I hate when people appear to assume that, because I have chosen to attend a concert alone, I must be lonely and therefore need to be talked to. I double hate when annoying people do this. And when this happened, after I had been running through every ounce of mental energy I had in order to do my job properly, I was about to go through the roof. Instead I walked away, and I walked away from her after the show when she tried to engage me in conversation again. Then I had an even more massive panic attack on 495 and ended up leaving the highway five exits early and driving home over surface roads just because visions of tire blowouts and my consequent, fiery demise wouldn't stop dancing in my head. So how is this review even accurate at all, given the distorting effects of circumstance on my perception? The best answer I can give is that I have developed two different kinds of memory: Emotional memory and fact memory. As much as I could, I recorded the ASO performance in both, but there was a lot of emotional noise. As I wrote the review, I was able to sift through all the fireworks of my feelings to find what I think were the nuggets of truth. (Strangely, this is how I realized that Soovin went out of sync with the orchestra a few times during the faster passages; I kept replaying what had happened until I figured out what had gone wrong.) Then I sent them to the Post to put in the newspaper. For those of you keeping score, this means I deny the postmodernist postulate that there is no objective reality; in fact, I not only believe there is an objective reality, but I believe I am aware enough of the way my emotions, biases, and predilections color my perception of it that I can actually correct for those influences. Yep, I'm arrogant in some ways.
Saturday, September 29, 2007: August Personages of Classical Music Talk to Me, Part 2 PLUS The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face Basically, I didn't do Update #1 on Thursday when I should've and then another update ran up on me. Since I seem to be sitting down to do an actual update, I better strike while the updating iron is hot, is my thinking. August Personages Etc.: features Marin Alsop, the new music director of the Baltimore Symphony and someone who I actually interviewed five years ago when I was at Maryland. (Was it that long ago? Man, I'm experienced.) This version here on the Web is the uncut version, and we all know that uncut versions are way cooler than edited versions, especially since my uncut interview doesn't feature Seth Rogen coming up with 47 synonyms for "hairy." Plus Marin says "Here! Eat some lead!", which is not quite as menacing in context. Big ups to my editors at the Express for being open to the idea of actually publishing an uncut Web version. The First Time Etc.: Here's a review of Roberta Flack in concert with the NSO. Ms. Flack was lovely and magnetic and all them good things, which I hope I was able to capture in my prose. The NSO's part of the program deserved the scorn I heaped upon it. If I had heaped a bit more scorn on, in fact, I wouldn't feel bad. Everyone who was in the audience on Thursday deserves to get back the seven minutes of his or her life that was spent listening to that disco medley.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007: Top 10 Rejected New Yorker Theme Issues In honor of last week's "Style" issue, which seems like the fourth one of those this year.
#10 was rejected despite the strenuous advocacy of John Updike.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007: August Personages of Classical Music Talk to Me, Part 1 Here's a feature I did about the Guarneri Quartet. I got to talk with Michael Tree, who is a really nice guy and who speaks in fully formed sentences, as you will see after clicking on the link. Plus it alerts the general populace to a neat tradition out at Maryland. So I'm happy with it. Part 2 coming on Thursday, though I don't know if I'll be able to post it that day.
Friday, September 14, 2007: Quote of the Day Overheard from a man talking on a cell phone while waiting to cross East-West Highway:
Wednesday, September 12, 2007: Happiness is a Warm TV Some of the day-to-day things that make life bearable are so tiny that you don't notice them much until they're gone. Example: Ever since I moved out of my parents' house and into my own apartment, lo these nine years ago, Fox 5 DC has presented a full hour of reruns of "The Simpsons" in the early evening. Feeling the dinnertime conversation with myself to be somewhat drab, I substituted that of America's favorite family. They provided me with diversion aplenty. When, a few years back, Fox 5 moved the block of reruns from 6 to 6:30, I basically moved dinner a half-hour forward as well. Now Fox 5, in its infinite wisdom, has removed one of the two "Simpsons" episodes that used to grace the evening (as well as one of the "Seinfeld"s, which doesn't bug me at all). At 6 pm, Fox 5 now presents "Fox 5 News Edge @ 6," which apparently involves news and edge somehow. At 6:30, meanwhile, we get TMZ TV, the show based on the website that provides all the inside dish on Hollywood supercelebs and a show I personally need in my life about as much as I need a cider press. At 7, we are finally served some "Simpsons," followed by an equally token "Seinfeld" rerun. I can't push dinner back past 6:30, because I get up at 5 in the morning most days during the week, because I must exert myself tirelessly to maintain the pudginess that makes the ladies swoon. Eating at 7 is just too late if I am to have a prayer of doing anything much after dinner and before I go to bed, and I almost always am doing work after I come home. When Comedy Central moved the "Daily Show" next-day reruns to 8 pm rather than 7, I just flat stopped watching the "Daily Show," because it no longer fit into my block. (Those days when the "Simpsons" ran from 6 to 7 and were followed by the "Daily Show" next-day rerun were halcyon days indeed.) Now I've got to remember to turn on my thin gruel of one daily "Simpsons" rerun after dinner. Dunno how often that will happen. I have written Fox 5 to complain, but even my letter of complaint sounds resigned to my fate. Another small yet consistent piece of levity will likely disappear from my life, and momentary amusement will suffer another loss in its eternal internal battle with existential anomie. Hey, wait, it's on now. (Oh, man, it's that stupid one with Moe having treasure.)
Thursday, September 6, 2007: Priming the Pump Tomorrow I leave for the shining city on a hill that is Detroit, Michigan, to watch a bunch of baseball games, see some folks from an Internet forum whose company I heartily enjoy, visit my grandmother and one each of my aunts and uncles, and celebrate my 29th birthday. The latter of these activities will take place exclusively on Saturday, commemorating that portentious day on which my mom's extraordinarily lengthy labor trying to get me out of her belly finally came to an end. As I have noted previously, over the years, my enthusiasm for my birthday in particular has decreased in inverse proportion to the enjoyment I am taking from life overall, and I am looking forward to this birthday mainly as a chance to enjoy some kickass seats at Comerica Park and down a few more beers than normal. It should be noted, however, that this birthday promises one benefit that will last throughout the year: My age is finally a prime number again. Let us review the grandest happenings for me personally that came about during my 23rd year on this great ball of stress that they call the Earth:
With the exception of that last one, these were not triumphs that burned briefly and left naught but ashes; they provided essential pieces for a foundation on which I have built other major successes. (If you don't understand how a national championship can give the devout fan a warm, fuzzy glow that never consumes itself, you obviously have never spent six months wandering around College Park with the suitably modified "Rock and Roll Part 2" banging mercilessly in your head. Perhaps you are better off for this. But we won the national championship. Juan's Dixon your mouth! And if you don't understand why having asked Meth and Red that question sustains me to this day, I just can't help you at all.) So as I turn 29, I look forward to what I hope will be a year with one or two of these major capstones to hard work or strokes of good fortune. I would expect no less from an age that is evenly divisible only by itself and 1. But in the unlikely event that primeness does not augur fell deeds and giant piles of luck, I've got 30 coming up, which is only built from 3, which is the magic number, and 10, which is merely the number that serves as a basis for our entire counting system, and then another prime, 31. And THEN my age will have an whole-number 5th root. You gotta love it. If you read all the way to the end of this, you just gave me my birthday present. Thanks! And please keep on reading. Lots of great content coming up, or so the numbers would indicate.
Thursday, August 23, 2007: Update Troika Update #1: My knee is at about 90 percent. It only hurts a little bit when I climb or descend stairs, or when I run, and it didn't hurt enough when I ran last weekend to stop me from clocking 10 miles total. I'd really like to be able to descend stairs without pain, but you can't force these things, unfortunately. Update #2: Spam-O-Maticker Robert Kahn reminded me of some things I left out of the Stan Kasten letter, so it too has been updated. The updates are incorporated into the original letter, of course; look for the "Stop singing 'God Bless America,' period" and "Encourage us to develop our own cheering methods" sections. Update #3: I said a few weeks ago that I couldn't find my Bugs Bunny symphony thing on the Internets. Well, I did, and it's here.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007: A Nationals Malaise I've been to a lot of Nats games these past three years. A lot of games. And I have some ideas on how to make attendance at Nats games better. I could have just sent my letter to Stan Kasten in the postal mail, but because I love you all so much, I put it on the Internet too. Let me know if you have any additional suggestions.
Sunday, August 19, 2007: Back to the Regular Type O' Blogging During the Kapell Competition and then while I was staggering around my apartment, I forgot to tell the Internet about some things it might have enjoyed. But there's still time! So this next week I'll try to do some quick hits on neat things. Today's is D.C./Maryland rapper Wale!!!, who currently has a hilarious graphic on his MySpace page and who has a blog post thereon linking to a place where you can download "100 Miles & Running," his latest mixtape. It's worth all the clickthrough. Wale (Wall-ay, not Wall-ee) has a flow that owes something to Jay-Z but has a mercurial aspect all its own. He can ride any beat and turn it to diamonds — and he's particularly adept at doing so over go-go tracks (check "Ice Cream Girl" on the MySpace or on the mixtape). And he's verbally dextrous, imaginative, and funny. He's so unpredictable that you have to listen to the cuts multiple times to catch everything, but he keeps paying you back with punchlines and puns and all those other rapping goodies that you tend to miss in a radio environment in which that Yung Joc coffee shop song actually gets played. (The one in which "like a coffee shop" is rhymed with "like a coffee shop." Repeatedly. In the chorus. Yes, it's catchy.) Those of you who consume mixtapes regularly can rest assured that this sounds like an actual album, some of which just happens to take place over other people's beats — there's not all those sirens and shoutouts that cut off tracks just as they're heating up and disfigure the actual music. With room to breathe, Wale drops one-liners aplenty ("Like Milhouse I/Blew your head") and creates whole narrative dealies when called upon to do so; a particular favorite of mine from the album is a remix of Lily Allen's "Smile" where Wale provides the voice of the jilting paramour and manages to hang with the cold-blooded cutdowns the scorned Allen dishes out. Those of you who don't follow sports may not be particularly interested in the relentless sports references, but they are awesome. "I switch the game up like Manning at the line/I roll from the dome like I'm playing for the Lions," he drawls in "Nobody," and follows it up later with "I'm mellow like Camby/Y'all come up short like Boykins/I will anoint them with ointment." In the opening "Let's Ride," he even warns everyone just how mercurial he can come: "Home of the Terrapins/Man, fear the Gilchrist." Now that's dangerous. Summarizing: Wale is the most exciting rapper I've heard in years, he's living in Prince George's County, and he says "Home of the Terrapins" in like every fifth song. Oh yeah, and he champions go-go beats and can actually flow over them, which means that its trippily powerful percussion polyrhythms will get national exposure when Wale inevitably blows up. I cannot say this strongly enough: If you like hip-hop, you need to get on this. (Whether you need to believe a classical music critic on this matter is irrelevant. I know I'm right.)
Saturday, August 11, 2007: Lessons Spam-O-Maticker Robert Kahn read the "A Sunday in the Park" thing and said that the lesson I should have learned from my misadventures was to sleep in and watch TV more often. This would be a reasonable alternative lesson except that, at age 28, I appear to have lost completely the ability to sleep in. I get up later on weekends than I do during the week, but I normally get up at 5 during the week, which means "later" ends up being 8. If I'm out until 3 or something I can manage to sleep until 9. Sometimes. Maybe this would be different if the Post hired me and put me in charge of going to parties or something (not that that would happen, with the Reliable Source gossip goddesses having that scene on lock, but it's a hypothetical. Don't make me justify those). Thinking back on the incident, I was struck by one thing. I often mock my own maturity level, or specifically its incredible lowness. And it is true that fart jokes still make me laugh pretty reliably, as long as they are presented in the proper social context (beer). But there are other facets to maturity — for example, the ability to roll with the punches and keep a smile on one's face. In light of that, I am a little proud of myself that I had thought of the punchline that ends the "Sunday in the Park" thing as I was running out of the park, with my knee bleeding and aching and everything. I love the sweet painful comedy of life.
Wednesday, August 8, 2007: Doin' It in the Park — Oh Yeah! What in the world could possibly merit a Blackbyrds reference? "Nothing!" you say, and I feel you. But as a close second, take this 1300 words on how I spent my Sunday. Rock Creek Park is both awesome and mean.
Thursday, August 2, 2007: What's Golden Looking for info on the Nats' site about batting practice (specifically, how to watch it), I saw an entry in the A-to-Z guide to RFK Stadium about "ball retrievers." It took me a minute to realize that they mean ball boys and ball girls. This is modern society in a nutshell: As part of an effort to avoid gender-specific, potentially infantilizing language, the Nats website makes everyone sound like a dog. Today I have a lil' thing about Bugs Bunny cartoon scores in Express. Santiago Rodriguez is pretty cool for letting me us his quote, which certainly was not made in the context of an in-depth discussion of Warners Bros. cartoons. (He gave me permission.) But I cannot find the thingy on the Web site, so you'll just have to believe me when I say it's there. (Update: It's here.)
Sunday, July 29, 2007: Satisfaction Both the Beethoven 9th and the Simpsons Movie were awesome. More perhaps later. Also, Alex Ross linked to me, making me feel like one of the cool kids. And I had two good friends in town over the weekend, and we did a bunch of fun stuff. Actually, I've been hanging out almost entirely with cool people lately. Good times indeed.
Thursday, July 26, 2007: I Expect an Epochal Evening, or, What Time Is It?
It's time for the Simpsons movie! It comes out on Friday, July 27, and I will see it at 12:00 am, Friday, July 27. Plus earlier in the evening I will see the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra play Beethoven's Ninth, so it's high culture all around! You may be aware that the 7-Eleven in Bladensburg is now a Kwik-E-Mart in honor of the movie. I have been there twice now, to pick up Simpsons merch including the donut I hold in the picture above and to generally bask in the awe-inspiring ambiance. Here's me hanging with Marge outside the Kwik-E-Mart:
I'll put all of the photos up eventually. The Internet needs them.
Monday, July 23, 2007: It's Over, For Real Here's the Post article. Commentary on the blog here.
Sunday, July 22, 2007: We Can Make It Better I could tell you all about the finals last night, but then I'd be scooping myself, since that'll be in the paper tomorrow. Instead, I put up a whole bunch of ideas to improve the Kapell competition for the next iteration in 2011, plus some rambling thoughts on the impossibility of judging a competition. All's here.
Saturday, July 21, 2007: The Start of The Ending Tonight is the last day of Kapell competitiveness, which doesn't mean that the blog will end. Here are my thoughts on Thursday and Friday's events. There's a review of Thursday's concert here, but I recommend you go to the blog first to read about it. Also, for completeness' sake, here's a little preview thing I wrote for Express about Paquito D'Rivera. He is hilarious.
Friday, July 20, 2007: Put 'Em on the Glass A review of Philip Glass' solo concert on Wednesday is here. I put some marginalia on the Kapell blog.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007: Bust a Kapell Some musings on the chamber round I saw here.
Monday, July 16, 2007: Hard as Kapell This Kapell Competition prose just keeps coming and coming. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that I'm not editing it! Saturday's semifinal round here.
Saturday, July 14, 2007: More Ivory Tinkling Thursday's concert and Friday's open piano night here.
Thursday, July 12, 2007: Semi-Toughness Three more competitors plus the semifinalists here.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007: Dutilleux! Quickie reviews of the first three pianists I saw in the competition here. Spoiler: I got to hear Akiko Tominaga do Henri Dutilleux! And it was awesome.
Monday, July 9, 2007: Because I'm Number One, Competition is None I'm going to do a little blog-type thingy on the Kapell International Piano Competition & Festival. It's over here. First up: Scouting report on the field.
Sunday, July 8, 2007: Crushin' Competition Like Italians on Grapes Here's an article about the Kapell International Piano Competition & Festival. I think it's pretty good. It took a lot of work. A lot a lot a lot. Well, probably in the context of a full-time job, it wouldn't have been too much work. But in the context of having a different full-time job, it was a lot of work. This is to say: I currently don't plan to ever do one of these again. So enjoy it. Although I mentioned every single thing I thought it was crucial to mention in the article, there's a whole bunch of stuff that I would have liked to mention in a perfect world, in which space is infinite and time is only a matrix of probabilities. I direct you to the Kapell website for information about every single possible thing. For example, from 11 am to 1 pm on Friday, you can learn about Felix Mendelssohn's pedagogical ways and the current vanguard of Asian women composers, all for free. If I didn't have a full-time job, I'd totally be there. I will be attending a lot more events than I'll be covering for the Post, as well, and I'll probably cover those on this site somehow. And yes, I am proud of myself for getting an "Addicted to Love" reference into an article about classical music in the Washington Post. If you don't get it, you don't get something else that we will also refer to as "it" for the purposes of this slogan.
Wednesday, July 4, 2007: Today Will Be All of Our Independence Day It's time to sing the Independence Day song again!
Today I saw baseball fireworks, movie fireworks, and regular fireworks (plus a New Orleans-style jazz band playing at the corner of 7th and Pennsylvania NW), all with people I really like. It was a good sampler of some of the things I am happiest that America offers. We need to work on that whole habeus corpus thing, plus the lingering, festering inequality along racial, gender and class lines that continues to wrack our society. And I can't wait until January 20, 2009. But what America tries to be is better than any other place, as far as I'm concerned. Michael Gerson, with whom I don't agree too often but who is always thought-provoking, was very eloquent on the subject today.
Tuesday, July 3, 2007: Two Reviews I Wrote Like a Week and a Half Ago It has been a rough few weeks in terms of spare time. Review #1 is of the National Symphony and Cathedral Choral Society at the National Cathedral. It is noteworthy that I was sitting about six feet from the front of the orchestra, on a level plane with them vertically. This was an attempt to put me in seats in which I could hear the goings-on, which obviously did not work. But it did result in me being able to make eye contact with all the string principals. I sometimes break into a smile if performers play a passage with particular felicity, and this happened a couple times during the "West Side Story" extracts, and for the first time in my life I got some smiles back. I am not sure this is good, exactly, but it did happen. The fact that the face value of my tickets was $65 per means that everyone in my section got ripped off with a vengeance. Review #2 is of the Gay Men's Chorus of Washington. I messed up the title of one of the songs — the one about the gay man who can't visit his partner in the hospital is "A Wall of Glass," not "At the Window." I blame the fact that they are both about windows, though obviously I should have gotten it right in any case. For what it's worth, I wasn't any more uncomfortable at this concert than I was at, for example, the Kazakhstan concert, or the Greek-music concert, or any other concert for a special-interest group of which I am not a part. (No, they are not going to have a concert for heterosexual deracinated white males.) It was a nice twist that the men's room was the one with the longest lines, though. Update: I screwed up the NSO review too, in that I blamed the Cathedral's marble interior for the many acoustic problems, when it is actually constructed mostly of Indiana limestone. I knew that. I am like a litany of incorrectness.
Sunday, June 10, 2007: Don't Worry If I Don't Write Rhymes — I Write Books This dissection of references to fat dead rappers in recent novels is pretty pointless, but also entertaining to me, and because I'm my own editor, all this stuff gets posted.
Saturday, June 9, 2007: Straight Outta Montgomery County Here's a review of a performance by Jessica Krash, doubtless Chevy Chase's finest composer. I had some mixed but generally positive reactions, which I was able to actually articulate because I got way more words to discuss the concert than I normally do. Here are some additional comments:
Sunday, June 3, 2007: Just Readin' the Times and the Post Yesterday X10, featuring my homey C$, was profiled in the New York Freaking Times. Yeah, that's right, the Gray Lady is down with the 802. One note on this article: The rap is two minutes and 20 seconds long, and Katie Zezima [if that's her real name] manages to misquote part of it, incorrectly stating that X10 rhymes "extra sharp" with "roof tarp." The actual couplet is "I like my Cabot cheddar, extra sharp/Our roofs have leaks so we patch 'em with a tarp." "Roof tarp" sounds incredibly stupid, whereas the actual line is cool. Don't get it twisted. On the Post side, today, I learned that Grover Norquist and I actually have something in common: We both collect barf bags. Also, here's my (Virgo) horoscope for today:
If I had the opportunity to remove one delusion from the heads of my fellow Americans, it would be this unjustifiable and dangerous idea that the world centers on each of us personally and that everyone else in it is either a helper or an obstacle. It's just this kind of thinking that leads people to attempt right turns from the left-turn lane, yell at airline representatives when flights are delayed due to weather, or start a war in another country with no plans for cleaning up after ourselves. It is inevitable that we all begin with ourselves in our experience of the world, but it is incumbent on us to recognize that everyone else in the world is doing the same thing. When their desires and actions conflict with ours, it is mostly likely because they are just trying to get their stuff done and not because they wish to inconvenience or martyr us personally. Not that I typically look to the horoscope for moral guidance, but people who do are getting some incredibly crappy moral guidance.
Monday, May 28, 2007: Express Myself Here are links to the two pieces I wrote for the Express website that were posted last week:
I learned several things during the process of writing these features, most notably that I find it hard to establish a rapport over the telephone with people I've never met. This is obviously a character flaw. Also: These feature things take a really long time to do properly. In fact, they take an amount of time I am reluctant to give them, what with the full-time job and everything. But I was happy to highlight the efforts of two groups whose music-making I really like.
Sunday, May 27, 2007: VT State of Mind I was kind of aware of this when I went up to Vermont last week, but it really hit home when I got there: I was staying in the home of a new rap god. The person in question is C$ (pronounced "C-Money"), part of the group X10, whose song "802" has been burning up the YouTubes (over 50,000 views!). The song has also been featured in news spots (including the front of the local paper one day), and it's been getting major radio airplay as well (really!). Plus (I swear) Sen. Patrick Leahy sent C$ a letter commending the song. The song is another data point to support my contention that every group should have a rap song or a movie or something in which to make numerous community-establishing and -lionizing references. It's also pretty good, especially the smooth jacking of the beat from "Shook Ones Pt. II," the smooth drop of the word "fustigating," and the line "The only thing we hustlin' is the granite rock." I am so glad that the former Colin Arisman is using the rap name I gave him lo these many years ago to do good. Persons who enjoy the song should also be sure to check out X10's MySpace page, which is not subliterate or unreadably designed like most MySpace pages. Somewhere in there is the history of the group, which I believe is fabricated but still makes for a good read.
Thursday, May 17, 2007: Distracted I had an interview with Peter Schickele in Express last Thursday, which I didn't link to because my hard drive crashed again. At least this time Apple gave me a new one (for free, under warranty). And I'll have a couple things on the Express Web site next week, but I'll be out of town. My favorite word of the last few days is erumpent. Words that sound dirtier than they are make comic gold!
Wednesday, May 9, 2007: This is How They Do It in the A-Town Annnnd if you don't know, this is how it's going down! Specifically, the Annapolis Symphony Orchestra had a good concert on Friday that I am only now linking to, due to being tired and not wanting to on Monday or Tuesday. Music director Jose-Luis Novo is a funny guy, as you can tell because he promised the audience that, despite "Sensemaya"'s source in a poem about killing a snake, "We are not going to be sacrificing any animals on stage...or musicians." I wish I could get more of this stuff into the reviews. In fact, it occurs to me, I probably should have tried harder to get it into this review. (I do think I ultimately made the right decision, though, in not including in my Dvorak review below a part making fun of Martin Goldsmith for the line "In the starting lineup of the great composers, Dvorak was the natural." First of all, I don't know who actually puts Dvorak in the great-composer ranks other than me, and second, hello, Felix Mendelssohn? And third, the starting lineup?! "Well, the Wolf's leading off, with I-Strav in the second slot, John "Pronk" Bach hitting third....") Jennifer Koh apparently knows some other friends of mine, which creates the funny situation in which JK could conceivably tell my friends, "That was your friend who thought the rhythmic pulse occasionally disappeared? He's a moron." You may think making a Lil' Jon reference in the title of this post is me straining to be comical, but I had that damn couplet in my head all night. There's a problem I have where the synaptic distance between certain stimuli and certain responses (especially when the responses are me quoting rap songs) is way too short. Like every time someone tells me to "hold up," I want to say "Wait a minute!" even when it's completely inappropriate; or when people say "I was walking down the block," I immediately think "I had my cutoff shorts on, right, cause it was crazy hot!" Keeping my mouth shut, as always, is a proven recipe for not sustaining any damage.
Sunday, May 6, 2007: It's Getting Hot in Here This site normally celebrates my awesomeness, but from time to time, people I know exhibit such outlandish awesomeness that it must be celebrated here as well. Such is the case with my mom, who appeared on the latest "Science Friday" episode of NPR's Talk of the Nation. As one of the authors of the most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, she's discussing global climate change. Have a listen here. My mom is awesome.
Saturday, May 5, 2007: Microphone Czech This year's NSO Composer Portrait depicted Antonin Dvorak, who's one of the composers I consider Chronically Underrated. Taking the high points of his corpus and putting them up against composers typically considered better than him, I think Dvorak actually beats Schumann and Liszt cleanly. People who only know Dvorak from the "American" string quartet and the late symphonies need to get on the bus. So the NSO had a head start in getting this positive review out of me, and when they did a good job, there it was. This was done in the overnight fashion, meaning I took a cab to the Post and wrote the review in an hour. I'm developing the proverbial phenomenal swag with regard to my ability to do this. Behind me were some young people (two of whom were cute young women. Cute young women, come to the symphony more often!). "I'm glad Dvorak liked America so much," one said after intermission. "Especially Spillville [, Iowa, where Dvorak summered one year]." I'm glad too. If Martin Goldsmith wants a straight-up rave, he should do a composer portrait of Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov or Sergei Rachmaninov. I'd be all over those. (NOTE: Not a guaranteed rave.) Yes, I appear to have an unslakable desire for Slav music.
Friday, April 27, 2007: Went Down to Bali and What Did I See Here's a review of the University of Maryland Gamelan Saraswati. I mentally refer to this review as "Andrew's Amateur Ethnomusicology Hour," except that if it takes you an hour to read this, you have some problems. This is a special shoutout to the Maryland ethnomusicology department: If you want a reviewer to put the names of the people who played gamelan garden in the paper, put those names in the program. Tomorrow I will not be in any newspapers. For some reason this gives me great relief.
Thursday, April 26, 2007: Tell Me What You Feel Like Doing, Y'all/Feel Like Writing A Feee-ature! My employment with the Express news organ has begun with a feature about Chuck Brown's new CD and upcoming concert at the 9:30 Club. (Look: The first time anything I've written has been featured at the top of anything!) Thorough readers of this site already know about my amazing fondness for Chuck Brown, so getting to talk to the man was a great thrill for me. He's a wonderful guy too, gracious and patient with the interviewer who had 45 minutes notice that he was going to conduct an interview with him. I should say also: Sometimes, people writing features pump up the artistic value of the artist who they are profiling, or at least present the best possible case for it while ignoring any objections. This is not the case here. We're About the Business is super super crankin'. If you like go-go at all, cop it now. The Express has consented to feature my ramblings occasionally in the future as well. We'll see how much they actually want to print me when I start pitching things like Mikhail Pletnev interviews. Thousand-word reviews of Chuck Brown shows will almost certainly remain the exclusive property of this here website.
Wednesday, April 25, 2007: Marines Invade Latin America With Stylish Results That's a historical allusion that I couldn't figure out how to fit into this review of the U.S. Marine Band at Strathmore, playing Latin rep (plus "Carmen," which is honorary Spanish music). Marginalia:
Thursday, April 12, 2007: Let's Go Maryland The Terrapin School of Music did it up right on Tuesday, and I was there with my National Animal Identification System pen. Marginalia:
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