from Donizzeti's "L'elisir d'amore"
Caruso, remastered. What an interpretation. He created the role of Nemorino.
"O Sole Mio" also sung by Caruso
Jussi Bjorling, such a gorgeous voice.
But my sentimental favorite will always be Tito Schipa.
In my mother's family, Beniamino Gigla was beloved:
Saturday, April 28, 2012
Thursday, April 26, 2012
need some good music to grade by
Grading, grading, grading... need some positive vibrations!
"Batida" from Angola via NPR's Alt.Latino music show.
"Batida" from Angola via NPR's Alt.Latino music show.
Sunday, April 22, 2012
Pulmonaria officinalis, or spotted lungwort.
Vertical Gardens
In honor of Earth Day, an ambitious and beautiful project to help clean the polluted air of Mexico City with "vertical gardens."
VERDMX
Here's a hanging garden project in Detroit, using Wooly Pockets, a system I saw in San Francisco.
Friday, April 13, 2012
a rain garden!
It has been my desire for a few years now to put a raingarden in the space in front of my home, where the runoff has been causing erosion. A few years ago, I attended a workshop by Metro Blooms, and dutifully called the gas company to make sure that we didn't blow up the place by digging. We found out that the gas line ran diagonally through the space where the garden would be, under the silver maple where we have almost full shade for part of the summer. These two obstacles combined were enough to stop me in my tracks for about two years. But with our early spring, my neighbor and I determined that we would do it now. We hired a friend of hers who is a gardener, and I'm thrilled that we now have a plan, and that the first stage of digging, percolation testing, and mulching is complete!
Now we just have to wait for it really to be warm enough to get the plants without worrying about them freezing; I'll go to Out Back Nursery in a few weeks for the perennial wildflowers. The concept for this shade garden is "forest floor" and here are the plants we are going to have.
For the shadiest spot, squill (Siberian scilla) are very hardy and are usually the first flowers I see bloom here in Minneapolis. Periwinkle is also hardy, grows well as a ground cover in the shade and has lovely flowers. Although some people complain that it can be invasive, from what I have read, we probably won't have to worry about it too much in this spot. We'll have a variety of low-growing plants with beautiful leaves: Wild geranium also has light purple blooms; Canadian Wild Ginger is another hardy low plant with glossy leaves.
Pasqueflower is called "prairie crocus" and is state flower of South Dakota.
Jack-in-the-Pulpit grows well in the woods, and is a fascinating plant because what looks like the flower is actually a structure that protects the flower inside.
I know that Maidenhair Fern will grow well here because there used to be some out in back in a similarly shady spot before they got removed in a building project. We'll also have Sensitive Fern.
Some of the taller plants are Virginia Bluebells with its pink to blue flowers. Jacob's Ladder has medicinal properties, Solomon's Seal is supposed to have many healing properties. Another medicinal plant is Lungwort, or pulmonaria; it comes in a variety of colors. Snakeroot, or black cohosh of the variety known as "hillside black beauty," has dark foliage.
I have admitted a single "Krossa Regal" Hosta (leaf texture described as "Glaucous Bloom") because it is one of the few hostas I like: big, big leaves and large, late-blooming flowers. I don't like the piddly little hostas that bloom early and leave dried out stalks all summer.
Now we just have to wait for it really to be warm enough to get the plants without worrying about them freezing; I'll go to Out Back Nursery in a few weeks for the perennial wildflowers. The concept for this shade garden is "forest floor" and here are the plants we are going to have.
For the shadiest spot, squill (Siberian scilla) are very hardy and are usually the first flowers I see bloom here in Minneapolis. Periwinkle is also hardy, grows well as a ground cover in the shade and has lovely flowers. Although some people complain that it can be invasive, from what I have read, we probably won't have to worry about it too much in this spot. We'll have a variety of low-growing plants with beautiful leaves: Wild geranium also has light purple blooms; Canadian Wild Ginger is another hardy low plant with glossy leaves.
Pasqueflower is called "prairie crocus" and is state flower of South Dakota.
I know that Maidenhair Fern will grow well here because there used to be some out in back in a similarly shady spot before they got removed in a building project. We'll also have Sensitive Fern.
Some of the taller plants are Virginia Bluebells with its pink to blue flowers. Jacob's Ladder has medicinal properties, Solomon's Seal is supposed to have many healing properties. Another medicinal plant is Lungwort, or pulmonaria; it comes in a variety of colors. Snakeroot, or black cohosh of the variety known as "hillside black beauty," has dark foliage.
Sunday, April 01, 2012
Adrienne Rich
Adrienne Rich was 82 when she died this week of complications of rheumatoid arthritis. Her partner of decades, Michelle Cliff, and her children and grandchildren will miss her terribly, and so will many, many of her reader who, like me, were influenced tremendously by her words and ideas. Reading her essays when I was in college and graduate school shaped the person I have become. I was fortunate enough to see her read years ago, and I treasure her poems.
This video remixes a reading by Adrienne Rich of her poem with music and images. Created by vlogger Syd the Skeptic.
Diving Into the Wreck
First having read the book of myths,
and loaded the camera,
and checked the edge of the knife-blade,
I put on
the body-armor of black rubber
the absurd flippers
the grave and awkward mask.
I am having to do this
not like Cousteau with his
assiduous team
abroad the sun-flooded schooner
but here alone.
There is a ladder
The ladder is always there
hanging innocently
close to the side of the schooner.
We know what it is for,
we who have used it.
Otherwise
it's a piece of maritime floss
some sundry equipment.
I go down.
Rung after rung and still
the oxygen immerses me
the blue light
the clear atoms
of our human air.
I go down.
My flippers cripple me,
I crawl like an insect down the ladder
and there is no one
to tell me when the ocean
will begin.
First the air is blue and then
it is bluer and then green and then
black I am blacking out and yet
my mask is powerful
it pumps my blood with power
the sea is another story
the sea is not a question of power
I have to learn alone
to turn my body without force
in the deep element.
And now: it is easy to forget
what I came for
among so many who have always
lived here
swaying their crenellated fans
between the reefs
and besides
you breathe differently down here.
I came to explore the wreck.
The words are purposes.
The words are maps.
I came to see the damage that was done
and the treasures that prevail.
I stroke the beam of my lamp
slowly along the flank
of something more permanent
than fish or week
the thing I came for:
the wreck and not the story of the wreck
the thing itself and not the myth
the drowned face always staring
toward the sun
the evidence of damage
worn by salt and sway into this threadbare beauty
the ribs of the disaster
curving their assertion
among the tentative haunters.
This is the place.
and I am here, the mermaid whose dark hair
streams black, the merman in his armored body
We circle silently
about the wreck
we dive into the hold.
I am she: I am he
whose drowned face sleeps with open eyes
whose breasts still bear the stress
whose silver, copper, vermeil cargo lies
Obscurely inside barrels
half-wedged and left to rot
we are the half-destroyed instruments
that once held to a course
the water-eaten log
the fouled compass
We are, I am, you are
by cowardice or courage
the one who find our way
back to the scene
carrying a knife, a camera
a book of myths
in which
our names do not appear.
and loaded the camera,
and checked the edge of the knife-blade,
I put on
the body-armor of black rubber
the absurd flippers
the grave and awkward mask.
I am having to do this
not like Cousteau with his
assiduous team
abroad the sun-flooded schooner
but here alone.
There is a ladder
The ladder is always there
hanging innocently
close to the side of the schooner.
We know what it is for,
we who have used it.
Otherwise
it's a piece of maritime floss
some sundry equipment.
I go down.
Rung after rung and still
the oxygen immerses me
the blue light
the clear atoms
of our human air.
I go down.
My flippers cripple me,
I crawl like an insect down the ladder
and there is no one
to tell me when the ocean
will begin.
First the air is blue and then
it is bluer and then green and then
black I am blacking out and yet
my mask is powerful
it pumps my blood with power
the sea is another story
the sea is not a question of power
I have to learn alone
to turn my body without force
in the deep element.
And now: it is easy to forget
what I came for
among so many who have always
lived here
swaying their crenellated fans
between the reefs
and besides
you breathe differently down here.
I came to explore the wreck.
The words are purposes.
The words are maps.
I came to see the damage that was done
and the treasures that prevail.
I stroke the beam of my lamp
slowly along the flank
of something more permanent
than fish or week
the thing I came for:
the wreck and not the story of the wreck
the thing itself and not the myth
the drowned face always staring
toward the sun
the evidence of damage
worn by salt and sway into this threadbare beauty
the ribs of the disaster
curving their assertion
among the tentative haunters.
This is the place.
and I am here, the mermaid whose dark hair
streams black, the merman in his armored body
We circle silently
about the wreck
we dive into the hold.
I am she: I am he
whose drowned face sleeps with open eyes
whose breasts still bear the stress
whose silver, copper, vermeil cargo lies
Obscurely inside barrels
half-wedged and left to rot
we are the half-destroyed instruments
that once held to a course
the water-eaten log
the fouled compass
We are, I am, you are
by cowardice or courage
the one who find our way
back to the scene
carrying a knife, a camera
a book of myths
in which
our names do not appear.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Ways I use Twitter #1
This morning I am in a cafe where I will begin to work after reading the paper (the physical paper paper that I picked up by the dirty dishes bin) and browsing my Twitter feed for stories that interest me.
Here's the harvest of about five minutes of scrolling back in my Timeline, in the order I clicked on links to open these stories up to read later, after I've been good and brought my Inbox to zero. The mix is both trivial and serious.
I read Alan Sepinwall's reviews of TV shows because he is a big Community fan, and a good TV writer; he is reviewing a new show called Bent. Should I watch it?.
One of my favorite dancers, Harry Shum Jr, is on the cover of Bello magazine (he's also on Glee, but I like him for his work with the online series, Legion of Extraordinary Dancers. He's too young for me, but my high-school self would have been madly in love with his fine self.
DanceSpirit magazine has an article on Bob Fosse's choreography:
"It’s crucial that you develop an ability to control your movement while still maintaining a strong sense of intention." LOL at these captions on his "Mexican Breakfast", the dance that inspired Beyonce's choreo for "Single Ladies." She has always acknowledged this influence, by the way.
Fosse dancing with Gwen Verdon:
RuPaul's Drag Race is one of our new favorite shows! we watched Season 2 on Netflix, and are breathlessly awaiting an explanation of WHY Willam was unexpectedly kick off the show this week for "breaking the rules." DRAMS! Our S2 favorite Pandora Boxx is doing show recaps, yay!
For more serious visual culture blogging, I usual find something interesting on The Sociological Cinema blog: today it's a story on the gender policing of young boys.
I want to watch this documentary on indigneous people in Argentina, Runa Kuti. The filmmakers have generously made it available to watch online, and I'm going to order a copy for our library.
The President of the University of Minnesota drew my attention to the existence of SERU, the Student Experience at the Research University survey, which he is promoting on Twitter (and of course through other means) to get of all undergraduate students to provide insights for both administrators and reseachers. I had never heard of it before; now I plan to check out some of the data from past surveys.
PBS announces its line-up of documentaries in its POV series. There are quite a few of interest from or about Latin America, that might end up in my teaching portfolio. I've already seen the mGraniagnificent film Nostalgia por la luz, and I'm excited to see Granito, a film I missed in a recent film festival, about bringing the Guatemalan dictator Rios Montt to justice.
In Digital Humanities news, the WSJ has story about how the Folger Shakespeare Library is becoming a model of how to combined the traditional archive with digital access and outreach in an article about "Shakespeare in the digital Age.
Why has the Pentagon tried to scrub the web of information about the man accused of massacring Afghan civilians in their beds? His family has had to be relocated for their protection. They are also his victims.
Atlantic blogger Ta-Nehisi Coates digs deeper into how the Florida "Stand Your Ground law," already a bad idea in and of itself, has been further perverted in its application by the courts to mean "the last man standing is right:"Your side is irrelevant if you are dead." Following up, opponents of the law predicted how it could be used to justify racially-motivated killings like that of Trayvon Martin when it was passed.
OK, to work!
Here's the harvest of about five minutes of scrolling back in my Timeline, in the order I clicked on links to open these stories up to read later, after I've been good and brought my Inbox to zero. The mix is both trivial and serious.
I read Alan Sepinwall's reviews of TV shows because he is a big Community fan, and a good TV writer; he is reviewing a new show called Bent. Should I watch it?.
One of my favorite dancers, Harry Shum Jr, is on the cover of Bello magazine (he's also on Glee, but I like him for his work with the online series, Legion of Extraordinary Dancers. He's too young for me, but my high-school self would have been madly in love with his fine self.
DanceSpirit magazine has an article on Bob Fosse's choreography:
"It’s crucial that you develop an ability to control your movement while still maintaining a strong sense of intention." LOL at these captions on his "Mexican Breakfast", the dance that inspired Beyonce's choreo for "Single Ladies." She has always acknowledged this influence, by the way.
Fosse dancing with Gwen Verdon:
RuPaul's Drag Race is one of our new favorite shows! we watched Season 2 on Netflix, and are breathlessly awaiting an explanation of WHY Willam was unexpectedly kick off the show this week for "breaking the rules." DRAMS! Our S2 favorite Pandora Boxx is doing show recaps, yay!
For more serious visual culture blogging, I usual find something interesting on The Sociological Cinema blog: today it's a story on the gender policing of young boys.
I want to watch this documentary on indigneous people in Argentina, Runa Kuti. The filmmakers have generously made it available to watch online, and I'm going to order a copy for our library.
The President of the University of Minnesota drew my attention to the existence of SERU, the Student Experience at the Research University survey, which he is promoting on Twitter (and of course through other means) to get of all undergraduate students to provide insights for both administrators and reseachers. I had never heard of it before; now I plan to check out some of the data from past surveys.
PBS announces its line-up of documentaries in its POV series. There are quite a few of interest from or about Latin America, that might end up in my teaching portfolio. I've already seen the mGraniagnificent film Nostalgia por la luz, and I'm excited to see Granito, a film I missed in a recent film festival, about bringing the Guatemalan dictator Rios Montt to justice.
In Digital Humanities news, the WSJ has story about how the Folger Shakespeare Library is becoming a model of how to combined the traditional archive with digital access and outreach in an article about "Shakespeare in the digital Age.
Why has the Pentagon tried to scrub the web of information about the man accused of massacring Afghan civilians in their beds? His family has had to be relocated for their protection. They are also his victims.
Atlantic blogger Ta-Nehisi Coates digs deeper into how the Florida "Stand Your Ground law," already a bad idea in and of itself, has been further perverted in its application by the courts to mean "the last man standing is right:"Your side is irrelevant if you are dead." Following up, opponents of the law predicted how it could be used to justify racially-motivated killings like that of Trayvon Martin when it was passed.
OK, to work!
Sunday, March 18, 2012
PBS Online Film Festival
I'm really excited about this short film showcase that PBS is sponsoring. The playlist on YouTube is one way to watch these films. Watch them, and then vote for your favorite in each category. The other way is to go to PBS's page where you can also watch the films, and vote for your favorite in each category. Today, I watched the "Girl Power!" category.
Friday, March 16, 2012
Cardinal songs
The trees are still bare, so when I hear one of the cardinals singing, I can often spot it at the highest point. In this video, you get to hear four different calls: the "water sprinkler" song, the "squeaky toy" song, the "pew! pew! pew! pew!" song, and the "bu bu bu chip chip chip chip chip chip chip chip" song.
In this next clip, you can see both the male and the female as they sing together.
Friday, March 09, 2012
Wednesday, March 07, 2012
Music and Neuroscience
Bobby McFerrin is magical. This video is the first of ten parts, which you can find on YouTube.
Here is the description of part 1:
"Notes & Neurons: In Search of the Common Chorus"
Is our response to music hard-wired or culturally determined? Is the reaction to rhythm and melody universal or influenced by environment? Join host John Schaefer, scientist Daniel Levitin and musical artist Bobby McFerrin for live performances and cross cultural demonstrations to illustrate musics note-worthy interaction with the brain and our emotions.
This segment features an impressive display of improvisational harmony from Bobby McFerrin.
This event took place on June 12, 2009 in the Gerald Lynch Theater at the City University of New York. This is the first of ten segments.
Please visit us at worldsciencefestival.com!
Monday, March 05, 2012
canzone
Frederice von Stade sings "Lo, How a Rose E're Blooming"
"I wonder as I wander" and Kathleen Battle "Mary Had a Baby"
Sunday, March 04, 2012
Watch "8: The Play"
The homepage is "8" The Play.
The actual words from the Prop 8 case transcripts are used in this play by Dustin Lance Black. Here's a response to the reading.
Christine Lahti Jamie Lee Curtis and the two actors that play Eliot and Spencer have a wonderful scene at about the 1'30" mark. At the end of the performance, the actual plaintifs, their lawyers, and the real-life Spencer and Elliot are acknowledged on stage.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
"onomatopoeia, every time I see ya"
"Onomatopoeia" by Todd Rundgren 1978.
Onomatopoeia every time I see ya
My senses tell me hubba
And I just can't disagree
I get a feeling in my heart that I can't describe
It's sort of lub, dub, lub, dub
A sound in my head that I can't describe
It's sort of zoom, zip, hiccup, drip
Ding, dong, crunch, crack, bark, meow, whinnie, quack
Onomatopoeia in proximity ya
Rearrange my brain in a strange cacophony
I get a feeling somewhere that I can't describe
It's sort of uh, uh, uh, uh
A sound in my head that I can't describe
It's sort of whack, whir, wheeze, whine
Sputter, splat, squirt, scrape
Clink, clank, clunk, clatter
Crash, bang, beep, buzz
Ring, rip, roar, retch
Twang, toot, tinkle, thud
Pop, plop, plunk, pow
Snort, snuk, sniff, smack
Screech, splash, squish, squeek
Jingle, rattle, squeel, boing
Honk, hoot, hack, belch
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Crows! in south minneapolis
We see something like this on our way home many days. One of my favorite things about the winter in Minneapolis.
Saturday, February 18, 2012
What I learned from listening to the radio
I learned so much about relationships from my favorite songs when I was a girl.
"Don't Play That Song For Me," Aretha Franklin
I know that he lied, yes he did. Hey baby, you lied!
"Gonna put it in the want ads!" Lipstick on your collar, perfume on it, too. Tells me you been lying', Tell you what I"m gonna do..."
"Mr. Big Stuff" Who do you think you are? You never gonna get my love.
"It's a Thin Line Between Love and Hate." Chandra sang this song every day on the bus to high school until I had it memorized:
"Sweetest woman in the world can be the meanest woman in the world...if you make her that way." Annie Lennox did a great cover of this long in 1995 on Medusa.
"Respect Yourself," The Staples Singers
"You cuss around women folk, you don't even know their name,
Then you dumb enough to think that make you a big old man"
Lucinda Williams, Doug Pettibone on the guitar;
You took my joy, I want it back.
"Don't Play That Song For Me," Aretha Franklin
I know that he lied, yes he did. Hey baby, you lied!
"Gonna put it in the want ads!" Lipstick on your collar, perfume on it, too. Tells me you been lying', Tell you what I"m gonna do..."
"Mr. Big Stuff" Who do you think you are? You never gonna get my love.
"It's a Thin Line Between Love and Hate." Chandra sang this song every day on the bus to high school until I had it memorized:
"Sweetest woman in the world can be the meanest woman in the world...if you make her that way." Annie Lennox did a great cover of this long in 1995 on Medusa.
"Respect Yourself," The Staples Singers
"You cuss around women folk, you don't even know their name,
Then you dumb enough to think that make you a big old man"
Lucinda Williams, Doug Pettibone on the guitar;
You took my joy, I want it back.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Women who sing
Today's program of A Prairie Home Companion has three women singing, each of them wonderful in her own way.
The first is Shara Worden, aka My Brightest Diamond, a singer I adore. Her voice is a supple instrument, with an otherwordly fierceness at times. I love her collaboration with The Decemberists on their album The Hazards of Love. I will not be able to see her show tonight at the Cedar, because I'm going to a dance concert, but I'm so glad to have heard her this morning.
She performs "There A Rat" and "high low middle." You can listen to her performances on this weekend's show here.
The video for high low middle features her neighbors from Detroit:
My Brightest Diamond - ALL THINGS WILL UNWIND: High Low Middle from Asthmatic Kitty on Vimeo.
Ann Reed was on the same episode. Like Shara Worden, she has a unique voice, a strong heart, a shining presence. I LOVE her. She sang a song from her latest album, "Where The Earth Is Round," and I fell in love all over again with the lovely timbre of her alto.
We also love her songs about the MN State Fair, of which this is one. She may not want to perform this song over and over, but I used to sing it to my daughter when she was a little one:
I learned from the description of this video that she wrote the song during an MPR show!
The first is Shara Worden, aka My Brightest Diamond, a singer I adore. Her voice is a supple instrument, with an otherwordly fierceness at times. I love her collaboration with The Decemberists on their album The Hazards of Love. I will not be able to see her show tonight at the Cedar, because I'm going to a dance concert, but I'm so glad to have heard her this morning.
She performs "There A Rat" and "high low middle." You can listen to her performances on this weekend's show here.
The video for high low middle features her neighbors from Detroit:
My Brightest Diamond - ALL THINGS WILL UNWIND: High Low Middle from Asthmatic Kitty on Vimeo.
Ann Reed was on the same episode. Like Shara Worden, she has a unique voice, a strong heart, a shining presence. I LOVE her. She sang a song from her latest album, "Where The Earth Is Round," and I fell in love all over again with the lovely timbre of her alto.
We also love her songs about the MN State Fair, of which this is one. She may not want to perform this song over and over, but I used to sing it to my daughter when she was a little one:
I learned from the description of this video that she wrote the song during an MPR show!
"Ann wrote "The Fair" in 1991, on MPR's the Morning Show, a live broadcast from the Minnesota State Fair. At 6:15 am, Ann began to take suggestions for the song from listeners, checking back every 20 minutes to sing what she had written thus far and to take more suggestions until, at 8:50, she performed the completed song."
Tuesday, February 07, 2012
I don't wanna be your cheerleader no more
Seeing St Vincent tear it up at the Walker was one of the musical highlights of last year. What an amazing guitar player! What strange, compelling lyrics! How beautiful she is! This new video goes to one of our latest favorite songs off her new album.
"Cheerleader"
I've had good times
With some bad guys
I've told whole lies
With a half smile
Held your bare bones
With my clothes on
I've thrown rocks
That hit both my arms
I don't know what good it serves
Pouring my purse in the dirt
But I-I-I-I-I don't wanna be your cheerleader no more
But I-I-I-I-I don't wanna be your cheerleader no more
I've played dumb
When I knew better
Tried so hard
Just to be clever
I know honest thieves
I call family
I've seen America
With no clothes on
But I-I-I-I-I don't wanna be a cheerleader no more
But I-I-I-I-I don't wanna be a cheerleader no more
I don't know what I deserve
But for you I could work
Cause I don't wanna be a cheerleader no more
I don't wanna be a cheerleader no more
I don't wanna be a cheerleader no more
I don't wanna be a dirt eater no more
I don't wanna be a dirt eater no more
I don't wanna be a cheerleader no more
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