Oscar Peterson Trio, "You Look Good to Me"

With Ray Brown and Ed Thigpen ...

 

Surrounded.

From Michael Oakeshott's essay, "The Idea of a University" ...

The characteristic gift of the university is the gift of an interval. Here is an opportunity to put aside the hot allegiances of youth without the necessity of at once acquiring new loyalties to take their place. Here is a break in the tyrannical course of irreparable events; a period in which to look round upon the world and upon oneself without the sense of an enemy at one’s back or the insistent pressure to make up one’s mind; a moment in which to taste the mystery without the necessity of at once seeking a solution. And all this, not in an intellectual vacuum, but surrounded by all the inherited learning and literature and experience of our civilization; not as a sole occupation, but combined with the discipline of studying a recognized branch of learning; and neither as a first step in education nor as a final education to fit a man for the day of judgment, but as a middle. This interval is nothing so commonplace as a pause to get one’s breath; no young man or woman, I take it, would say “Thank you” for an opportunity of that sort; it is not the cessation of activity, but the occasion of a unique kind of activity.

One might, hazarding a misunderstanding, reduce this to a doctrine about the character of a university; one might call it the doctrine of the interim. But the doctrine would be no more than a brief expression of what it felt like to be an undergraduate on that first October morning. Almost overnight, a world of ungracious fact had melted into infinite possibility; we who belonged to no “leisured class” had been freed for a moment from the curse of Adam, the burdensome distinction between work and play. What opened before us was not a road but a boundless sea; it was enough to stretch one’s sails to the wind. The distracting urgency of an immediate destination was absent, duty no longer oppressed, boredom and disappointment were words without meaning; death was unthinkable. But it belongs to the character of an interim to come to an end; there is a time for everything and nothing should be prolonged beyond its time. There eternal undergraduate is a lost soul.

And what of the harvest? Nobody could go down from such a university unmarked. Intellectually, he may be supposed to have acquired some knowledge, and, more important, a certain discipline of mind, a grasp of consequences, a greater command over his own powers. He will know, perhaps, that it is not good enough to have a “point of view,” that what we need is thoughts. He will not go down in possession of an armoury of arguments to prove the truth of what he believes; but he will have acquired something that puts him beyond the reach of the intellectual hooligan, and whatever has been the subject of his study he may be expected to be able to look for some meaning in the things that have greatly moved mankind. Perhaps he may even have found a centre for his intellectual affections. In short, this period at a university may not have equipped him very effectively to earn a living, but he will have learned something to help him lead a more significant life.

CONNECT

Uprose.

Moore, Carol of the Field Mice, 2009

It was a pretty sight, and a seasonable one, that met their eyes when they flung the door open. In the fore-court, lit by the dim rays of a horn lantern, some eight or ten little field-mice stood in a semicircle, red worsted comforters round their throats, their fore-paws thrust deep into their pockets, their feet jigging for warmth. With bright beady eyes they glanced shyly at each other, sniggering a little, sniffing and applying coat-sleeves a good deal. As the door opened, one of the elder ones that carried the lantern was just saying, “Now then, one, two, three!” and forthwith their shrill little voices uprose on the air, singing one of the old-time carols that their forefathers composed in fields that were fallow and held by frost, or when snow-bound in chimney corners, and handed down to be sung in the miry street to lamp-lit windows at Yule-time.

Kenneth Grahame, from The Wind in the Willows

Anyone care to chance the reward of some Lambswool and go wassailing?

Dutilleux.

Maroussia Gentet performs a selection of Henri Dutilleux's Preludes ...

Strength.

Rembrandt, Scholar Reading, 1631

When the farthest corner of the globe has been conquered technologically and can be exploited economically; when any incident you like, at any time you like, becomes accessible as fast as you like; when you can simultaneously “experience” an assassination attempt against a king in France and a symphony concert in Tokyo; when time is nothing but speed, instantaneity, and simultaneity, and time as history has vanished from all Dasein of all peoples; when a boxer counts as the great man of a people; when the tallies of millions at mass meetings are a triumph; then, yes then, there still looms like a specter over all this uproar the question: what for? — where to? — and what then? 

The spiritual decline of the earth has progressed so far that peoples are in danger of losing their last spiritual strength, the strength that makes it possible even to see the decline and to appraise it as such. This simple observation has nothing to do with cultural pessimism — nor with any optimism either, of course; for the darkening of the world, the flight of the gods, the destruction of the earth, the reduction of human beings to a mass, the hatred and mistrust of everything creative and free has already reached such proportions throughout the whole earth that such childish categories as pessimism and optimism have long become laughable.

Martin Heidegger

Story.

Hesselbom, Winter Cottage, n/d

THE SHEPHERD'S CALENDAR: JANUARY WINTER'S DAY

Withering and keen the winter comes

While comfort flyes to close shut rooms

And sees the snow in feathers pass

Winnowing by the window glass

And unfelt tempests howl and beat

Above his head in corner seat

And musing oer the changing scene

Farmers behind the tavern screen

Sit-or wi elbow idly prest

On hob reclines the corners guest

Reading the news to mark again

The bankrupt lists or price of grain

Or old moores anual prophecys

That many a theme for talk supplys

Whose almanacks thumbd pages swarm

Wi frost and snow and many a storm

And wisdom gossipd from the stars

Of polities and bloody wars

He shakes his head and still proceeds

Neer doubting once of what he reads

All wonders are wi faith supplyd

Bible at once and weather guide

Puffing the while his red tipt pipe

Dreaming oer troubles nearly ripe

Yet not quite lost in profits way

He'll turn to next years harvest day

And winters leisure to regale

Hopes better times and sips his ale

While labour still pursues his way

And braves the tempest as he may

The thresher first thro darkness deep

Awakes the mornings winter sleep

Scaring the owlet from her prey

Long before she dreams of day

That blinks above head on the snow

Watching the mice that squeaks below

And foddering boys sojourn again

By ryhme hung hedge and frozen plain

Shuffling thro the sinking snows

Blowing his fingers as he goes

To where the stock in bellowings hoarse

Call for their meals in dreary close

And print full many a hungry track

Round circling hedge that guards the stack

Wi higgling tug he cuts the hay

And bares the forkfull loads away

And morn and evening daily throws

The little heaps upon the snows

The shepherd too in great coat wrapt

And straw bands round his stockings lapt

Wi plodding dog that sheltering steals

To shun the wind behind his heels

Takes rough and smooth the winter weather

And paces thro the snow together

While in the fields the lonly plough

Enjoys its frozen sabbath now

And horses too pass time away

In leisures hungry holiday

Rubbing and lunging round the yard

Dreaming no doubt of summer sward

As near wi idle pace they draw

To brouze the upheapd cribs of straw

While whining hogs wi hungry roar

Crowd around the kitchen door

Or when their scanty meal is done

Creep in the straw the cold to shun

And old hens scratting all the day

Seeks curnels chance may throw away

Pausing to pick the seed and grain

Then dusting up the chaff again

While in the barn holes hid from view

The cats their patient watch pursue

For birds which want in flocks will draw

From woods and fields to pick the straw

The soodling boy that saunters round

The yard on homward dutys bound

Now fills the troughs for noisy hogs

Oft asking aid from barking dogs

That tuggles at each flopping ear

Of such as scramble on too near

Or circld round wi thirsty stock

That for his swinging labours flock

At clanking pump his station takes

Half hid in mist their breathing makes

Or at the pond before the door

Which every night leaves frozen oer

Wi heavy beetle1 splinters round

The glossy ice wi jarring sound

While huddling geese as half asleep

Doth round the imprisond water creep

Silent and sad to wait his aid

And soon as ere a hole is made

They din his ears wi pleasures cry

And hiss at all that ventures nigh

Splashing wi jealous joys & vain

Their fill ere it be froze again

And woodstack climbs at maids desire

Throwing down faggots for the fire

Where stealing time he often stands

To warm his half froze tingling hands

The schoolboy still in dithering joys

Pastime in leisure hours employs

And be the weather as it may

Is never at a loss for play

Rolling up giant heaps of snow

As noontide frets its little thaw

Making rude things of various names

Snow men or aught their fancy frames

Till numbd wi cold they quake away

And join at hotter sports to play

Kicking wi many a flying bound

The football oer the frozen ground

Or seeking bright glib ice to play

To sailing slide the hours away

As smooth and quick as shadows run

When clouds in autumn pass the sun

Some hurrying rambles eager take

To skait upon the meadow lake

Scaring the snipe from her retreat

From shelving banks unfrozen seat

Or running brook where icy spars

Which the pale sunlight specks wi stars

Shoots crizzling oer the restless tide

To many a likness petrified

Where fancy often stoops to pore

And turns again to wonder more

The more hen too wi fear opprest

Starts from her reedy shelterd nest

Bustling to get from foes away

And scarcly flies more fast then they

Skaiting along wi curving springs

Wi arms spread out like herons wings

They race away for pleasures sake

A hunters speed along the lake

And oft neath trees where ice is thin

Meet narrow scapes from breaking in

Again the robin waxes tame

And ventures pitys crumbs to claim

Picking the trifles off the snow

Which dames on purpose daily throw

And perching on the window sill

Where memory recolecting still

Knows the last winters broken pane

And there he hops and peeps again

The clouds of starnels dailey fly

Blackening thro the evening sky

To whittleseas1 reed wooded mere

And ozier holts by rivers near

And many a mingld swathy crowd

Rook crow and jackdaw noising loud

Fly too and fro to dreary fen

Dull winters weary flight agen

Flopping on heavy wings away

As soon as morning wakens grey

And when the sun sets round and red

Returns to naked woods to bed

Wood pigeons too in flocks appear

By hunger tamd from timid fear

They mid the sheep unstartld steal

And share wi them a scanty meal

Picking the green leaves want bestows

Of turnips sprouting thro the snows

The ickles from the cottage eaves

Which cold nights freakish labour leaves

Fret in the sun a partial thaw

Pattring on the pitted snow

But soon as ere hes out of sight

They eke afresh their tails at night

The sun soon creepeth out of sight

Behind the woods-and running night

Makes haste to shut the days dull eye

And grizzles oer the chilly sky

Dark deep and thick by day forsook

As cottage chimneys sooty nook

While maidens fresh as summer roses

Joining from the distant closes

Haste home wi yokes and swinging pail

And thresher too sets by his flail

And leaves the mice at peace agen

To fill their holes wi stolen grain

And owlets glad his toils are oer

Swoops by him as he shuts the door

The shepherd seeks his cottage warm

And tucks his hook beneath his arm

And weary in the cold to roam

Scenting the track that leadeth home

His dog wi swifter pace proceeds

And barks to urge his masters speed

Then turns and looks him in the face

And trotts before Wi mending pace

Till out of whistle from the swain

He sits him down and barks again

Anxious to greet the opend door

And meet the cottage fire once more

The robin that wi nimble eye

Glegs round a danger to espy

Now pops from out the opend door

From crumbs half left upon the floor

Nor wipes his bill on perching chair

Nor stays to clean a feather there

Scard at the cat that sliveth in

A chance from evenings glooms to win

To jump on chairs or tables nigh

Seeking what plunder may supply

The childerns litterd scraps to thieve

Or aught that negligence may leave

Creeping when huswives cease to watch

Or dairey doors are off the latch

On cheese or butter to regale

Or new milk reeking in .the pale

The hedger now in leathern coat

From woodland wilds and fields remote

After a journey far and slow

Knocks from his shoes the caking snow

And opes the welcome creaking door

Throwing his faggot on the floor

And at his listening wifes desire

To eke afresh the blazing fire

Wi sharp bill cuts the hazel bands

Then sets him down to warm his hands

And tell in labours happy way

His story of the passing day

While as the warm blaze cracks and gleams

The supper reeks in savoury steams

Or keetle simmers merrily

And tinkling cups are set for tea

Thus doth the winters dreary day

From morn to evening wear away.

John Clare

Borneo.

Exert.

Davie Bowie, "Little Wonder"

Happy Birthday, Bowie

David Bowie was born on this date in 1947.

"Miracle Goodnight" ...

Beethoven, Ten Variations on Salieri's "La stessa, la stessissima", WoO 73

Vadim Chaimovich performs ...

Resistance.

Gods.

Curtis, Gán askĭdĭ, Zahadolzhá, Hasché̆ltĭ - Navaho, 1904

The LEGEND of the NIGHT CHANT

Long years ago three brothers—the eldest rich, the second a wayward, roving gambler, and the youngest a mere boy—lived together among their kind, the Dĭné̆ people. Their only sister was married, living apart with her husband. The gambler often took property belonging to his brothers, going to distant corners of the land to stake it on games of chance. On returning, he never failed to relate a story of wonders he had seen—the Holy People whom he had met, and who revealed many things to him.  His brothers never believed him, calling him Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ, The Dreamer.

One day they wished to go hunting, but did not want The Dreamer to accompany them, so, going to the home of their brother-in-law, they told him of their purpose, and all three stole away. As the sun began its descent on the fourth day, it occurred to Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ that he had been tricked, so he started in search of the hunters, hoping to meet them returning, that he might help them carry their game and be rewarded with a pelt or two. He travelled far, but had not come upon them when the sun passed behind the distant hills. Near by was a deep, rock-walled cañon, from the depths of which many mingled voices could be heard. Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ walked to its edge and peered over. Back and forth from side to side flew countless crows, passing in and out of dark holes in opposite walls. From below, when darkness had shrouded all, Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ heard a human voice call in loud echoing tones, "They say, they say, they say, they say!"

From the far side came the answer: "Yes, yes! What's the matter now? What's the matter now?"

"Two people were killed to-day," continued the voice just below.

"Who were they? Who were they?"

To which the first voice answered, "Anahailí̆hĭ, killed at sunrise, and Igákĭzhĭ, killed at dusk, by the People of the Earth. They went in search of meat, and the hunters shot arrows into them. We are sorry, but they were told to be careful and did not heed. It is too late to help them now; let us go on with the chant."

It had grown very dark, and Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ became greatly frightened, but he stayed to listen and watch. Muffled strains of songs came from the deep recesses in each cañon wall,—the gods were singing—and just within the openings, discernible in the glow of a fire, could be seen many dancers performing in unison as they kept time with rattles. Throughout the night firelight flickered from wall to wall and singing and dancing continued. At daylight the participants departed in all directions, so Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ resumed the quest of the hunters.

He had travelled but a short time when he came upon his brothers, resting their heavy game packs on their journey homeward.

"Here comes The Dreamer," spoke his elder brother. "I will wager he has something marvellous to relate."

Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ was greeted first by his brother-in-law. "You must have slept near here last night, for you are too far out to have made this distance since daylight."

"I did," he replied, "near a cañon that is surely holy. A lot of people had gathered to dance, the gods sang, and—"

"There, I told you he would have some lie to tell," interrupted the eldest brother, and started on.

"Go ahead," urged the brother-in-law; "tell us the rest."

"It's no use; no one cares to listen to me," said Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ.

His younger brother, also incredulous, took up his burden and plodded off, whereat Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ related all that he had seen and heard.

"You men must have killed those people they spoke about," he accused.

"No, it was none of us," his brother-in-law protested; "we have killed no people. Yesterday morning one shot a crow, and last night we killed a magpie, but there was no harm in that."

"I fear there was; they were hunters like yourselves, in search of meat for the Holy People, for the time disguised as birds," Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ ventured. Then, dividing the pack, the two hurried on to overtake the others.

"Well," asked the youngest, "did you hear a fine story?"

"It is not a lie," his brother-in-law retorted; "we killed a crow and a magpie yesterday, and the Holy People talked about it in the cañon last night. Look! There come four mountain sheep! Hurry, Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ and head them off!" They had come upon the cañon where the strange voices had been heard. Four sheep, among large bowlders near the rim, were carefully threading their way out of it. The three dropped back, while Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ ran ahead and concealed himself near the ascending trail. As the sheep approached he drew his bow and aimed for the leader's heart, but his fingers could not loose their grip upon the arrow, and the sheep passed by unharmed. Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ scrambled up over the rim of the cañon and ran to get ahead of them again, but the bowstring would not leave his fingers as they passed. A third effort, and a fourth, to kill the game brought the same result. Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ cursed himself and the sheep, but ceased suddenly, for whom should he see but four gods, Yébĭchai, appear before him, who had transformed themselves into sheep! Hasché̆ltĭ, in the lead, ran up to him and dropped his balíl—a rectangular, four-piece, folding wand—over him, as he sat, and uttered a peculiar cry. Behind him came Zahadolzhá, Haschĕbaád, and Gánaskĭdĭ; all were masked.

"Whence came you?" Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ asked them.

"From Kĭnní̆nĭkai," Hasché̆ltĭ answered.

"Whither are you going?"

"To Tsé̆gyiĭ, to hold another hatál four days from now. You had better come along."

"No, I couldn't travel so far in four days."

But after a little parleying Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ assented. He was told to disrobe, and doing so Gánaskĭdĭ breathed upon him, and his raiment became the same as that of the gods. Then all took four steps eastward, changing into mountain sheep, and bounded away along the cañon's rim.

The hunters in hiding became restless as The Dreamer did not return, so ventured out where they could view the trail on which he was last seen. No one was in sight. One went to the rock where Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ first hid near the sheep and followed his tracks from hiding place to hiding place until the fourth one was reached, and there he found his brother's old clothes with his bow and arrows upon them. There he traced four human footsteps to the east that merged into the trail of five mountain sheep. The eldest brother cried in his remorse, for he saw that his brother was holy, and he had always treated him with scorn.

The gods and Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ, transformed to mountain sheep, travelled very far during their four days' journey, coming on the fourth day to a large hogán. Inside were numerous Holy People, both gods and men. When Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ entered with his four holy companions, a complaint at once arose from those inside against an earthly odor, whereat Hasché̆ltĭ had their charge taken out and washed with yucca-root suds.

Inside the hogán stood four large jewel posts upon which the gods hung their masks. The eastern post was of white shell, the southern of turquoise, the western of abalone, and the northern of jet. Two jewel pipes lay beside a god sitting on the western side of the hogán. These he filled with tobacco and lighted, passing one each to his right and his left. All assembled smoked, the last to receive the pipes being two large Owls sitting one on each side of the entrance way at the east. They drew in deep draughts of smoke and puffed them out violently. While the smoking continued, people came in from all directions. At midnight lightning flashed, followed by heavy thunder and rain, which Tónenĭlĭ, Water Sprinkler, sent in anger because he had not been apprised of the dance before it was time to begin it; but a smoke with the assembled Holy People appeased him. Soon after the chant began and continued until morning.

Some of the gods had beautiful paintings on deerskins, resembling those now made with colored sands. These they unfolded upon the floor of the hogán during the successive days of the hatál.

The last day of the dance was very largely attended, people coming from all holy quarters. Bĭlh Ahatí̆nĭ through it all paid close attention to the songs, prayers, paintings, and dance movements, and the forms of the various sacred paraphernalia, and when the hatál was over he had learned the rite of Kléjĕ Hatál. The gods permitted him to return to his people long enough to perform it over his younger brother and teach him how to conduct it for people afflicted with sickness or evil. This he did, consuming nine days in its performance, after which he again joined the gods at Tsé̆gyiĭ, where he now lives. His younger brother taught the ceremony to his earthly brothers, the Navaho, who yet conduct it under the name of Kléjĕ Hatál, Night Chant, or Yébĭchai Hatál, The Chant of Paternal Gods.

Edward Sheriff Curtis, from The North American Indian: Being A Series Of Volumes Picturing and Describing the Indians of the United States and Alaska

Technique.

Technique is the proof of your seriousness.

Wallace Stevens

Couperin, Sonata in D minor, "La Sultane"

Christophe Rousset directs Les Talens Lyriques from the insidious clangy thing ...

Freezing.

From Jack London's short story, "To Build a Fire" ...

The man sat in the snow for a moment and struggled for calmness.  Then he pulled on his mittens, using his teeth, and then stood on his feet. He glanced down to assure himself that he was really standing, because lack of feeling in his feet gave him no relation to the earth.  His position, however, removed the fear from the dog’s mind.  

When he commanded the dog with his usual voice, the dog obeyed and came to him. As it came within his reach, the man lost control.  His arms stretched out to hold the dog and he experienced real surprise when he discovered that his hands could not grasp. There was neither bend nor feeling in the fingers. He had forgotten for the moment that they were frozen and that they were freezing more and more. All this happened quickly and before the animal could escape, he encircled its body with his arms. He sat down in the snow, and in this fashion held the dog, while it barked and struggled.  

But it was all he could do: hold its body encircled in his arms and sit there. He realized that he could not kill the dog. There was no way to do it. With his frozen hands he could neither draw nor hold his knife. Nor could he grasp the dog around the throat. He freed it and it dashed wildly away, still barking. It stopped 40 feet away and observed him curiously, with ears sharply bent forward.

The man looked down at his hands to locate them and found them hanging on the ends of his arms. He thought it curious that it was necessary to use his eyes to discover where his hands were. He began waving his arms, beating the mittened hands against his sides. He did this for five minutes. His heart produced enough blood to stop his shaking. But no feeling was created in his hands.

Beware.

Restaurants have figured out how to recoup pandemic losses with a windfall.  It's called the charcuterie board.

Beware.  The house always wins.

Jimmie Dale Gilmore, "Another Colorado"

Released.

Sammy Hagar released Standing Hampton on this date in 1982.

Hang.

"Hang care!" exclaimed he. "This is a delicious evening; the wine has a finer relish here than in the house, and the song is more exciting and melodious under the tranquil sky than in the close room, where the sound is stifled. Come, let us have a bacchanalian chant—let us, with old Sir Toby, make the welkin dance and rouse the night-owl with a catch! I am right merry. Pass the bottle, and tune your voices—a catch, a catch! The lights will be here anon."

Charles Ollier, from "The Haunted Manor-House of Paddington" 

For best results, listen to this ... Keith and the X-Pensive Winos, "You Will But You Won't" ...

The euphony transformed me and inundated my soul in a roguish countenance, the likes of which I had know well in younger days. Such impishness soon drove out the complaints of the day.

Umberto Limongiello

Means.

Society in every state is a blessing, but government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one: for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries by a government which we might expect in a country without government, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. 

Thomas Paine

Gift.

From the amazon.com listing ...

NOTE TO PEDANTS: The wax White House that appears on the surface of this candle is modeled to look like the pre-1814 White House rather than the White House as it exists today. This is our gift to you, pedants!

Jimmie Dale Gilmore, "My Mind's Got a Mind of Its Own"

Private.

Siberdt, Martin Luther Translating the Bible, Wartburg Castle, 1521

He who would preserve the supremacy of natural feelings in social life knows not what he asks. Ever at war with himself, hesitating between his wishes and his duties, he will be neither a man nor a citizen. He will be of no use to himself nor to others. He will be a man of our day, a Frenchman, an Englishman, one of the great middle class. 

To be something, to be himself, and always at one with himself, a man must act as he speaks, must know what course he ought to take, and must follow that course with vigour and persistence. When I meet this miracle it will be time enough to decide whether he is a man or a citizen, or how he contrives to be both. Two conflicting types of educational systems spring from these conflicting aims. One is public and common to many, the other private and domestic.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Jerry Reed, "Don't Think Twice It's Alright"

You can not exceed my need for Jerry Reed ...

Wind.

Wyeth, Jamie, Pine Study, 1960

this ink painting of wind

blowing through pines

who hears it?

Ikkyu

Initiative.

One obvious palliative of the evils of democracy in its present form would be to encourage much more publicity and initiative on the part of civil servants. They ought to have the right, and, on occasion, the duty, to frame bills in their own names, and set forth publicly the arguments in their favor.

Bertrand Russell

Any.

The Flatlanders, "My Wildest Dreams Grow Wilder Every Day"

Done.

Done and done.

Happy Birthday, Stipe

Michael Stipe was born on this date in 1960.

John Prine's "Hello In There" with Natalie Merchant ...

Favor.

If you've never read or seen 84 Charring Cross Road, do yourself a favor.

Townes Van Zandt, "I'll Be Here in the Morning"

Jimmy Dale more than handles it ...

Twilight.

Chatham, Twilight in The Badlands, 1999

From the BBC series Words and Music ...

Twilight can gift us some of the most spectacular atmospheric displays, a riot of shifting colours that punctuate the end of a day, or announce the arrival of a new morning.

The palate and quality of shadowless light has inspired artists, composers and authors from time immemorial and can induce feelings of awe, but also serenity.

These dazzling displays are brought to us thanks to the conjunction of the Earth's orbital and atmospheric characteristics.

Twilight is the time, at the end of a day, between the sun setting below the local horizon and before the beginning of the night.

It is also the time between the end of the night and the sun rising above the local horizon, that marks the beginning of a new day.

From a meteorological perspective, twilight is further subdivided into three categories: Civil twilight, Nautical twilight and Astronomical twilight. These are based on how far the sun is beneath the horizon, with light and colour draining from the skies as night approaches.

CONNECT

Happy Birthday, Stills

Stephen Stills was born on this date in 1945.

"Bluebird" with Buffalo Springfield Revisited ...

Alan Jackson, "The Older I Get"

Thanks for pointing the way, Harvey.

Clique.

People say that specialists are inhuman; but that is unjust. People say an expert is not a man; but that is unkind and untrue. The real difficulty about the specialist or expert is much more singular and fascinating. The trouble with the expert is never that he is not a man; it is always that wherever he is not an expert he is too much of an ordinary man. Wherever he is not exceptionally learned he is quite casually ignorant. This is the great fallacy in the case of what is called the impartiality of men of science. If scientific men had no idea beyond their scientific work it might be all very well — that is to say, all very well for everybody except them. But the truth is that, beyond their scientific ideas, they have not the absence of ideas but the presence of the most vulgar and sentimental ideas that happen to be common to their social clique. If a biologist had no views on art and morals it might be all very well. The truth is that the biologist has all the wrong views of art and morals that happen to be going about in the smart set of his time.

G.K. Chesterton

Turned.

 Monet, The Magpie, 1869

WHITE-EYES

In winter

    all the singing is in

         the tops of the trees

             where the wind-bird

with its white eyes

    shoves and pushes

         among the branches.

             Like any of us

he wants to go to sleep,

    but he's restless—

         he has an idea,

             and slowly it unfolds

from under his beating wings

    as long as he stays awake.

         But his big, round music, after all,

             is too breathy to last.

So, it's over.

    In the pine-crown

         he makes his nest,

             he's done all he can.

I don't know the name of this bird,

    I only imagine his glittering beak

         tucked in a white wing

             while the clouds—

which he has summoned

    from the north—

         which he has taught

             to be mild, and silent—

thicken, and begin to fall

    into the world below

         like stars, or the feathers

               of some unimaginable bird

that loves us,

    that is asleep now, and silent—

         that has turned itself

             into snow.

Mary Oliver

Happy Birthday, Tolkien

J.R.R. Tolkien was born on this day in 1892.

It is easy for the student to feel that with all his labour he is collecting only a few leaves, many of them now torn or decayed, from the countless foliage of the Tree of Tales, with which the Forest of Days is carpeted. It seems vain to add to the litter. Who can design a new leaf? The patterns from bud to unfolding, and the colours from spring to autumn were all discovered by men long ago. But that is not true. The seed of the tree can be replanted in almost any soil, even in one so smoke-ridden (as Lang said) as that of England. Spring is, of course, not really less beautiful because we have seen or heard of other like events: like events, never from world's beginning to world's end the same event. Each leaf, of oak and ash and thorn, is a unique embodiment of the pattern, and for some this very year may be the embodiment, the first ever seen and recognized, though oaks have put forth leaves for countless generations of men.

We do not, or need not, despair of drawing because all lines must be either curved or straight, nor of painting because there are only three "primary" colours. We may indeed be older now, in so far as we are heirs in enjoyment or in practice of many generations of ancestors in the arts. In this inheritance of wealth there may be a danger of boredom or of anxiety to be original, and that may lead to a distaste for fine drawing, delicate pattern, and "pretty" colours, or else to mere manipulation and over-elaboration of old material, clever and heartless. But the true road of escape from such weariness is not to be found in the willfully awkward, clumsy, or misshapen, not in making all things dark or unremittingly violent; nor in the mixing of colours on through subtlety to drabness, and the fantastical complication of shapes to the point of silliness and on towards delirium. Before we reach such states we need recovery. We should look at green again, and be startled anew (but not blinded) by blue and yellow and red. We should meet the centaur and the dragon, and then perhaps suddenly behold, like the ancient shepherds, sheep, and dogs, and horses – and wolves. This recovery fairy-stories help us to make. In that sense only a taste for them may make us, or keep us, childish.

J.R.R. Tolkien

Rameau, Zoroastre, RCT 62

The Overture performed by Les Paladins ...

Excellent.

An excellent album ...

Compete.

Cook, Leaves of Grass, 1913

The known universe has one complete lover and that is the greatest poet. He consumes an eternal passion and is indifferent which chance happens and which possible contingency of fortune or misfortune and persuades daily and hourly his delicious pay. What balks or breaks others is fuel for his burning progress to contact and amorous joy.

Without effort and without exposing in the least how it is done, the greatest poet brings the spirit of any or all events and passions and scenes and persons some more and some less to bear on your individual character as you hear or read. To do this well is to compete with the laws that pursue and follow time.

Walt Whitman

Seeking.

Koppitz, Im Wiernerwald, 1910

SMELLING the SNOW

I’ve heard it said

there are those on such

close terms with night

they can smell the very light.

Not only does the moon,

they say, give off a scent

nothing like the sun’s,

but old moon smells

sweeter than slivered new.

Monks of old claimed sin

took the breath away, while

God was wild onion, lilac, pine.

I know a carpenter who

boasts he can sniff out a maple

in a woodlot of ash and oak.

A stalking cat knows

the unsinging sparrow

from the finch. This day

as it returns to Ohio, like

some feathery creature

seeking the very moon and tree

where it was born,

I can smell the snow,

which seems to me,

against the dark trees

moving in slow procession,

a few birds stark and silent,

an essence close to love.

But any old fool can smell love.

David Citino

Excellent.

An excellent album ...

Mind.

 de Saedeleer, Winter Landscape in Etikhove,  1914

THE SNOW MAN

One must have a mind of winter

To regard the frost and the boughs

Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time

To behold the junipers shagged with ice,

The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think

Of any misery in the sound of the wind,

In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land

Full of the same wind

That is blowing in the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,

And, nothing himself, beholds

Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

Wallace Stevens

Benevolent.

Aldin, They Went Round the House, Playing Under the Windows, 1910

I was in a continual excitement from the varied scenes of whim and innocent gayety passing before me. It was inspiring to see wild-eyed frolic and warm-hearted hospitality breaking out from among the chills and glooms of winter, and old age throwing off his apathy and catching once more the freshness of youthful enjoyment. I felt also an interest in the scene from the consideration that these fleeting customs were posting fast into oblivion, and that this was perhaps the only family in England in which the whole of them was still punctiliously observed. There was a quaintness, too, mingled with all this revelry that gave it a peculiar zest: it was suited to the time and place; and as the old manor-house almost reeled with mirth and wassail, it seemed echoing back the joviality of long departed years.

Sir John Hawkins, speaking of the dance called the Pavon,

from pavo, a peacock, says, “It is a grave and majestic

dance; the method of dancing it anciently was by gentlemen

dressed with caps and swords, by those of the long robe in

their gowns, by the peers in their mantles, and by the

ladies in gowns with long trains, the motion whereof, in

dancing, resembled that of a peacock.”—History of Music.

+ At the time of the first publication of this paper the

picture of an old-fashioned Christmas in the country was

pronounced by some as out of date. The author had afterwards

an opportunity of witnessing almost all the customs above

described, existing in unexpected vigor in the skirts of

Derbyshire and Yorkshire, where he passed the Christmas

holidays. The reader will find some notice of them in the

author’s account of his sojourn at Newstead Abbey.

But enough of Christmas and its gambols; it is time for me to pause in this garrulity. Methinks I hear the questions asked by my graver readers, “To what purpose is all this? how is the world to be made wiser by this talk?” Alas! is there not wisdom enough extant for the instruction of the world? And if not, are there not thousands of abler pens laboring for its improvement? It is so much pleasanter to please than to instruct—to play the companion rather than the preceptor.

What, after all, is the mite of wisdom that I could throw into the mass of knowledge! or how am I sure that my sagest deductions may be safe guides for the opinions of others? But in writing to amuse, if I fail the only evil is in my own disappointment. If, however, I can by any lucky chance, in these days of evil, rub out one wrinkle from the brow of care or beguile the heavy heart of one moment of sorrow; if I can now and then penetrate through the gathering film of misanthropy, prompt a benevolent view of human nature, and make my reader more in good-humor with his fellow-beings and himself—surely, surely, I shall not then have written entirely in vain.

From "Christmas Dinner", found in The Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon, by Washington Irving

Waltzes.

Herbert von Karajan conducts the Vienna Philharmonic's program of Strauss waltzes in its 1987 New Year Concert ...

Ian Anderson, "Life's a Long Song"

Still.

Wyeth, N.C., Fox in Winter, 1935

TO the NEW YEAR

With what stillness at last

you appear in the valley

your first sunlight reaching down

to touch the tips of a few

high leaves that do not stir

as though they had not noticed

and did not know you at all

then the voice of a dove calls

from far away in itself

to the hush of the morning

so this is the sound of you

here and now whether or not

anyone hears it this is

where we have come with our age

our knowledge such as it is

and our hopes such as they are

invisible before us

untouched and still possible

W.S. Merwin

All's.

Homer, The Lookout – “All’s Well”, 1896

Happy New Year.