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Sunday, February 15, 2015

Musical Interlude

(If you must have politics, please scroll down)

I'm longing for spring! We're enduring a brutal cold snap right now — after such a warm day only a week ago (70 degrees then).

Ottorino Respighi's The Birds.


About Respighi and The Birds

12 comments:

  1. WOW! I'd all-but-forgotten-about Ottorino Respighi. Toscanini was great champion of his work. We don't hear much Respighi today. Don't know why. He was a dynamic highly imaginative composer who created vivid images in sound.

    I look forward to listening to this a bit later.

    The French composers Dacquin - "Le coucou" - and Rameau (or was it Couperin?) - "La poule" - wrote harpsichord pieces based on bird calls as did Schumann much later in his Forest Scenes for piano - "The Prophet Bird." I'm sure others did too. Painters, Poets and Composers traditionally have drawn endless inspiration from Nature.

    Thanks for his completely unexpected treat.

    I probably would have chosen Debussy's "Pas sur la neige" (Footsteps in the Snow_ at this time of the year. ;-)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. FT,
      We have very little snow right now or I might have used Pas sur la neige for today's blog post. Bloggers living in New England should be posting that piece like crazy.

      Last weekend, there were robins hopping all over our lawns here. So warm for two days -- now this misery with sub-zero temperatures. I dread getting our vehicles started today.

      Delete
    2. In New England today we would have to compose a new piece called Dans la neige engloutie (Buried in Snow ;-) for surely with drifts already seven to ten feet high -- and reportedly more on the way (;-o -- no mere "footsteps" could survive long enough to leave a visible trail -- unless one used SNOWSHOES, perhaps.

      A great secret to living with a measure of contentment is always to know when we're well off. ;-)

      Delete
  2. A good day to feed our feathered friends as they endure.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Bunkerville,
      I put out bread and bird seed this morning. Our feathered friends flocked in. A real horde of them!

      Delete
    2. You and my dear, late Mama! She used to put on galoshes, throw an old raccoon coat over her negligee, and go out after a fresh snowfall with pocketsful of seed and suet which she'd place on windowsills and in several bird feeders on the property, an THEN she'd walk out into the middle of the yard, and toss more seed all over the ground for the squirrels and chipmunks who quickly flocked around her. They knew she was their friend, so had no fear.

      She's been gone 33 years this month, but I can still see her out in the snow with her nightie floating beneath that raccoon coat and above her galoshes. She was wonderful.

      I wish I'd told her that more often back when I still could.

      Delete
    3. FT,
      I don't usually bundle up to feed the critters. But this morning I did! Even though I merely have to toss the food from the shelter of the front porch.

      Back when our cats wen outside, I didn't feed the critters because I didn't want them to end up as kitty dinners.

      I also went out and got the vehicles started. The Crown Vic protested at first, then revved right up.

      Another brutal night tonight. Ugh.

      Delete
  3. We have so much snow that I feel perfectly safe getting on the roof to shovel it off. The fall is only a few feet and in some places, it's more like a few inches! At least no one can say I'm not getting enough exercise lately. My hands are starting to take on the shape of snow shovel handles.

    Looks like the feces is about to hit the rotating blades in Iraq. ISIS is readying to attack our Marine base over there--if they haven't already. I posted a clip from Israeli TV about it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Average American,
      So good to see you here again!

      Be careful with all that shoveling.

      BTW, I haven't given up on posting about the threat of Islam. I'll have a post about that matter tomorrow -- Copenhagen, of course.

      Delete
  4. Lovely piece, AOW. I'd long forgotten about it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Baysider,
      I'm deliberately trying to ferret out some lovely music that we might have forgotten. God knows that we need a respite from the current news!

      Delete
    2. Not just "News," AOW, but from the degenerate popular culture that has coarsened and perverted our tastes, our behavior towards one another and our general outlook on life. [Please see the article on Jon Stewart at FT's blog today]

      Delete

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