Category Archives: COMMENTARY

Gerald Wilson, noted jazz orchestrator dies at 96.

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Gerald wilson early in his career then

 

 

 

 

 

Gerald Wilson now

 

Gerald Wilson has been around forever. He is a link back to the big bands of the 30’s and 40’s. He worked as an orchestrator for some of the great jazz names including Jimmie Lunceford, Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Count Basie, Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington, Stan Kenton, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald and many others. Outside of the jazz realm he arranged charts for Ray Charles, Bobby Darin and B.B. King. He worked prolifically in the 50’s and 60’s composing for film and TV. Along the way he defied the trends of small group jazz and rock and roll. He wrote a symphony and many extended pieces including “State Street Suite” for the 1994 Chicago Jazz Festival; “Theme for Monterey” composed for the 40th anniversary of the Monterey Jazz Festival; “Yes, Chicago is….” for the 2008 Chicago Jazz Festival and in 2009 he wrote “Detroit Suite” for the 30th anniversary of the Detroit International Jazz Festival. He has recorded prolifically with his last CD Legacy released in 2011. He was, at that time in his mid nineties. Like most really creative jazz artists he “bopped ‘til he dropped”. Some of his best work is captured in the MOSAIC 5 CD boxed set The Complete Pacific Jazz Recordings of Gerald Wilson and His Orchestra (1961-1969)

And a concert clip

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A new medical procedure, perhaps a new industry?

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ANKLE TATTOO HEADER   old5-1024x760

There’s a girl with her legs crossed
Got an ankle tattoo
It’s an ugly reminder
In four shades of blue
And the bad boys, the rude boys
They’re into the game
And they keep their eyes open
For the halt and the lame   ANKLE TATTOO – DAVID FRANCY

Jimmy Buffett – Margaritaville      Don’t know the reason that I stayed here all season,
With nothing to show but this brand new tattoo,
But it’s a real beauty, a Mexican cutie,
How it got here I haven’t a clue.

I don’t understand it myself. This urge to be “stapled” and “inked” like a piece of foolscap paper I really find odd. I know it is some sort of fashion statement and as such it has been around for a while. Platform shoes and long hair were fashion statements and they have faded into obscurity. Of course the shoes could be discarded and one could get a haircut. But tattoos, in particular, are way more permanent. I remember the tattoos on old merchant seamen in the 1960’s. They were not only ugly they were almost indecipherable images in one shade of blue. Of course the “art” has advanced since then and the colors are more vibrant and the designs more dramatic. What hasn’t changed is the medium – human skin. Skin is still skin and as such undergoes constant change. That once alabaster canvas of perfection ages, stretches, wrinkles, mottles and become sun damaged and in the end all tattoos start resembling the faded, nondescript patterns of yester-years and they can make you look so, so  old. The fad has been around for more years than I can count and I thought as a fashion statement it would right up there with platform shoes – gone by now and almost forgotten. But not so, In fact tattoos are more popular than ever. It is almost to the point where it seems to be the only growth industry in this area.

But it has not always been about fashion. In tribal societies the tattoo has more than a passing cosmetic significance. In the pacific islands tattoos are ingrained in the culture. Some designs are considered sacred and their appropriation for trivial purposes is frowned 30-maori-face-tattoo-picsupon. The early visitors to the islands must have had their minds severely blown by what must have appeared to be paradise. Great weather, plenty of food, dusky maidens and tattooed warriors. It was a far cry from dingy pre-industrial Europe of the time.  But, westerners, being what they are could not leave well enough alone. They just had to change things and, of course, naked breasts and tattoos just had to go – but not forgotten. From the 1980s on the traditional Maori Ta Moko (facial tattoo) has under gone a re-birth. At that time urbanized Maori youth started to rediscovered their language and culture. Strictly speaking the Ta Moko is not a tattoo – it is more a ritual scaring. The designs are actually incised into the face with a knife and dye is added. It must be incredibly painful and a somewhat different experience from a visit to the local tattoo parlor in a suburban mall. It is not a trivial undertaking.

A recent survey indicated that 45 million Americans have tattoos and of that number there are around nine million who wish they didn’t. “The reasons for the regret were many but included  “too young when I got the tattoo” (20%), “it’s permanent” and “I’m marked for life” (19%), and “I just don’t like it” (18%). An earlier poll showed that 19% of Britons with tattoos suffered regret, as did 11% of Italians with tattoos. Surveys of tattoo removal patients were done in 1996 and 2006 and provided more insight. Of those polled, the patients who regretted their tattoos typically obtained their tattoos in their late teens or early twenties, and were evenly distributed by gender. Among those seeking removals, more than half reported that they “suffered embarrassment”. A new job, problems with clothes, and a significant life event were also commonly cited as motivations. The choice to get a tattoo that is later regretted is related to the end of history illusion, in which teenagers and adults of all ages know that their tastes have changed regularly over the years before the current moment, but believe that their tastes will somehow not continue to grow and mature in the future. As a result, they wrongly believe that any tattoo that appeals to them today will always appeal to them in the future. Society often shuns the tatted. Fall prey to body art and you can find it all but impossible to land a job. And while the condition is reversible, it typically involves undergoing numerous treatments that can easily run north of $4,000.The price is too much for many. Getting a tattoo is painful but getting it removed is another whole level of pain. Tattoo regret seems to take about 10 years to set in and, since tattoos were widely popular in the early 2000s and still are today, my suspicion is that we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg. The option at the moment is Q-switched lasers  that deliver heat to targeted areas in nanoseconds. The lasers destroy the ink particles and allows the body to remove them from the skin. But they often leave residual particles behind that are too big for the body to eliminate and they don’t always work on certain pigments. So there you have it. It is expensive, painful and doesn’t always work. But there is hope. The FDA has just approved new laser technology for acne scar removal that is also applicable for tattoo removal. The company who holds the patent is gearing up for an explosive growth in sales and treatments. Is this an opportunity for a new industry? Perhaps, perhaps not. Medical Professionals are the gate keepers on most cosmetic procedures so it stands to reason they will be the big winners. I don’t think your average tattoo parlor will be offering tattoo removals as part of their services anytime in the future.

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As a film on a related subject check out ONCE WERE WARRIORS – probably one of the best films of that era depicting the re-tribalization of Maori youth.  This is not a pretty movie but it is an incredibly powerful movie. The  full length feature is also available on YouTube. Here is the trailer.

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Two more music legends pass on – Charlie Haden and Johnny Winter

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CHARLIE HADEN – Jazz Double Bass Player (August 6, 1937 – July 11, 2014)

CHARLIE HADEN

Charlie Haden is not a name that many people outside the Jazz world would recognize. But make no mistake he was a giant in that world.(see the wikipedia entry). Arriving on the Los Angeles scene in the late 1950’s he just missed the glory days of the bebop era on the West Coast. Instead he landed in the middle of the halcyon days of the Free Form Jazz movement spearheaded by Ornette Coleman and Don Cherry. It was the beginning of a career that spanned many forms of jazz from the outrageous to the melodically and harmonically nostalgic. He performed in duos, trios, quartets, various combos, large jazz orchestras and even string orchestras. He won many many awards and recorded at least 40 albums as a leader of various configurations. That is not counting the literally hundreds of recordings as a sideman. Of all his recordings my favorites are the QUARTET WEST series where he took a nostalgic look at the music of the Los Angeles area in the mid 1950s. The albums all had a film noir quality that really appealed to me. And of course in that quartet he had two of the finest jazz musicians to grace the planet earth – the Tenor Sax player Ernie Watts and the Pianist Alan Broadbent. Here are some Youtube clips to celebrate the life of Charlie Haden and the soulful sound of Ernie Watts.

For a number of years Charlie had been battling the effects of Post-Polio Syndrome.

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JOHNNY WINTER – Bluesman (February 23, 1944 – July 16, 2014)

This is confusing. The Guardian published an obituary way back in July yet there is no mention of his passing on Johnny Winter’s website. So Mr. Winter are you still out there?

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The Master Cape Breton Fiddler Buddy MacMaster dies at 89

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The Highland Clearances were horrific events in Scottish history. In the 19th Century Crofters were forcibly evicted from their homes in the Highlands of Scotland and those that survived starvation and death ended up scattered all over the world. “It was an ill wind that blew some good” and this “ill wind” was responsible for the Scots settling in Cape Breton. With the new settlers came all the elements of the Scottish Highland Culture. It included the Gaelic language, music, dancing and story telling and some say this transplanation of culture is responsible for the survival of the Scottish Fiddle tradition not only in Canada but in Scotland itself. By the time the CBC aired a TV show called “The Vanishing Cape Breton Fiddler” in 1971 the Cape Breton style of fiddling had been in existence for well over a hundred years. The CBC show lamented the decline of the tradition and predicted the inevitable demise of the Cape Breton fiddler. Boy, were they ever wrong with that conclusion. Within a few short years of the airing of the show the tradition became revitalized and went though a period of explosive growth. As well as a whole cadre of older and younger fiddlers,  part of the positive change can be laid at the feet of at least two master fiddlers, Jerry Holland and Buddy MacMaster. Jerry past away in 2009 and in this past week at the age of 89 he was joined by Buddy MacMaster. Hugh Alan, or simply ‘Buddy,’ began playing the fiddle at the age of 12 and secured his first paying gig at 14. It was the start of a career that would introduce the world to Cape Breton music. In his adult life Buddy had a real job as a station agent and telegrapher for the Canadian National Railways and it wasn’t until he retired at the age of 65 that he became a professional musician. Although by that time the professional prefix was probably just an after thought. His playing was never anything short of professional. Buddy MacMaster died at his home in Judique, Nova Scotia on August 20, 2014. He was 89. His niece Natalie MacMaster is one of the many young fiddlers who have inherited Buddy’s legacy and along with this whole new generation of fiddlers the tradition lives on. MacMASTER

check the links The Vanishing Cape Breton Fiddler  and Natalie and Buddy MacMaster

“Simply amazing how good they are together….Thank God for Buddy MacMaster,if not for him the Cape Breton fiddle may have died…”

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Read any good books lately? (#4) – wandering down memory lane

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I don’t know how I stumbled on these two books. Possibly by net surfing on Amazon or Kindle. Either way both books set up a buzz of resonance in my memory cells. Both books are essentially travel books. The first one caught my eye because it was about recent travels in Australia and the second one because it was about the Old Indian Trails in the Canadian Rockies (just around the corner from where I live).

TRAVELS OF AN ORDINARY MAN – AUSTRALIA by Paul Elliott (published in April, 2013) available on Kindle for 99 cents. At that price how could you go wrong?

All of us at some time or other have become frustrated with our jobs, our life and our relationships and yearn to just toss it all in and head out into great blue yonder. Paul Elliott is one of us. A job that was going no where and a girl friend who was a professional driver (“she had driven me up the wall, driven me around the bend and eventually driven me to the point where I needed to leave everything behind for the foreseeable future”). His answer was to jump on a plane and head down to Australia, specifically to Cairns in Queensland. In this day and age, from Heathrow you fly over Europe, Russia and drop down to Tokyo, Japan and then change planes for a direct flight to Cairns in Queensland.

In Canada if you live in the east you are exhorted to go West. In Australia everyone lives down south so the cry is to “go north young man”. And that’s what I did in the mid- 1960’s. I had worked in my first real job for nine years and life was passing me by. I didn’t have a relationship to jetson but I did have a yen to surf the fabulous beach and point breaks of Northern NSW and Southern Queensland. So why not do that and also take a wander around a part of the country where “even the bananas bend to the right”. This was the red-neck republic of Bjelke Petersen. Bjelke, a God-fearing Lutheran minister, was the premier of Queensland at the time and was the perfect example of that curse on mankind – “A Self Made Man” – whose motto in life was “my way or the highway”. Queensland was no place for unionists, left wing agitators, surfing bums or, then new on the scene, hippies.  So after some time tooling around the surf spots, including an epic birthday surf at a place called Broken Head, and some gainful employment for a few months in Lismore it was  on “To the North! to the North! The last place God made / The contract unfinished, lost, stolen or strayed ”  (an old traditional song). I had a vague idea of maybe making it all the way to New Guinea. I arrived in Cairns from the south 30 odd years before Paul arrived from the North. I think things must have changed somewhat in the intervening interval of time. In my day Cairns was a sleepy country town on the north east coast of Australia. Not exactly the end of the earth but pretty dammed close. You would have to go further north to Cook Town to get closer to the edge. The Japanese seem to like Cairns as a tourist destination, hence the direct flight. It is a gate way to the Great Barrier Reef so that may explain it. In my day it was as hot as Hades and that doesn’t seem to have changed. Cairns no longer seems to be sleepy and through Paul’s eyes it is pretty well a party town over run with backpackers who require ample opportunities to drink beer. His adventures included bungy jumping, beer drinking, a trip to the Great Barrier Reef, beer drinking, a road trip to Cook Town, beer drinking, avoiding predatory women, beer drinking, a trip to the Daintree Rain Forest, beer drinking, a trip to Lake Barrine, more beer drinking ……. you get the general idea. Memories of the area are still in my mind. Picking tobacco in the Atherton Tablelands, the launch “milk run” to Cook Town to what seemed like the end of the earth. In reality then, and I suspect now, it is the ends of the earth. Looking north from the jetty in Cooktown the country stretches for thousand of desolate miles before tumbling into the Torres Straight and then onto New Guinea. It  was place where you meet the odd characters that always seem to populate areas on the edge of settled society.  Paul finally hooked up with some fellow travelers in a shared vehicle and headed off into the interior to get first hand experience of the “real outback”. I don’t think he was disappointed. Despite the thousands of miles of dust, desert and flies and the lonely townships on the way the spectacle of Ayers Rock and the Olgas seem to have made it all worth while. I hadn’t traveled that route so I had no actual first hand knowledge of the terrain. However, he headed south to Port Augusta in South Australia and that is an area I knew. I had passed through it several times. Once on a hitch hiking trip from Sydney to Perth and again on a road trip to the Flinders Ranges. I distinctly remember standing at the end of the sealed road outside Port Augusta as it headed north to Alice Springs. Standing there and seeing the gravel road stretching north as far as the eye could see until it was no longer visible in the shimmering heat of the day. That road is now a sealed highway. The rest of his travels through South Australia and Victoria were also over country that I had traveled so, so many years ago. In my case they were mostly solo adventures in Paul’s case he seemed to have the knack of hooking up with any number of interesting fellow  travelers. Upon reaching the “big smoke”  (Melbourne) he toyed with the idea of heading back up North to MacKay and the Whitsunday Passage. I wish he had of done that because there could have been some very interesting comparisons. In my day getting to MacKay required traveling over hundreds of miles of “The Crystal Highway” so named because of all the glass from shattered windshields that sparked in the sun at the side of the road. I distinctly remember waking up at 8 am in a truck stop outside MacKay on top of picnic table. The temperature was in high 90’s (F) and the sun was beating down and me and my monumental hangover from a re-hydration attempt at a local pub. I also distinctly remember everybody in the pub drinking beer from 5 oz glasses.The idea was to drink the beer before it got too warm.  The tables were a sea of empty 5 oz glasses. Having said that the area off the coast is one of spectacular beauty – straight out of Treasure Island. For Colin that was not to be. He was running out of time and he decided to fly to Brisbane and travel down the coast and see “The Real Australia” – the one that is most familiar to most suburban Aussies. The coastal strip is one of unending seascapes, coastal communities and empty beaches galore. He spent some time in one of my old stomping grounds, Byron Bay, just around the corner from Broken Head. He finally ended up in Port MacQuarrie. This a community somewhat the same size as Cranbrook. His experiences ambling around Port MacQuarrie sparked a lot of memories. The truth be known that he was there probably only a few years prior to my last visit to Australia. Eventually Colin made it Sydney for an opportunity to explain why his visa had expired. Luckily for him he was on his way out of the country.

Old Indian Trails of The Canadian Rockies by Mary T.S. Schaffer (first published in 1911). ” Mary T.S.Schaffer was an avid explorer and one of the first no-native women to venture into the heart of the Canadian Rocky Mountains, where few women  – or men – had gone before.” at $1.99 this was another steal of deal on Kindle.

There were not many of them around in the19th Century and early Twentieth Century but they were there. Women of adventurous spirits that defied convention and did what they felt they had to do. There were probably more of them out there than we will ever know but unless they documented their efforts they have faded into the blank pages of history. We are fortunate that Mary T.S. Schaffer chose to write a book about her adventures of two summers of horse pack explorations of the Canadian Rockies. Anyone travelling the Ice Field Highway these days between Lake Louse and Jasper are pretty well traversing the main route of her explorations. But, remember their trips were done  around 1911. Over two summer Mary and her guides and companions explored a significant number of side trips (left and right) travelling up the Rockies. If you spend any time checking the The Canadian Rockies Trail Guide (Brian Patton & Bart Robinson) it doesn’t take you long to realize that that these are the Old Indian Trails of her travels.

I moved to the East Kootenays in the mid-70’s. Over the years I had done a number of day trips both with the family and solo in the nearby National Parks but it wasn’t until I had been in the area twenty years that I realized that time was slipping by and this marvelous area required some personal exploration. I figured that I had about 15 years of hard core hiking and back packing left before the ravages of age and common sense slowed me down. I know it is not a sensible idea but the only way for me to achieve my desires was to go it alone. Over the next fifteen years I embarked on many day trips and and least one extended eight over-night night back packs per summer. Usually I set aside the the last two weeks of August and the first three weeks of September to take advantage of the good weather (not too hot and sometime cool to very frosty) and the diminishing summer crowds. The early trips were in the Kootenay, Assiniboine and Banff Parks with at least one foray into Yoho Park. Each summer I ticked them off the list until I needed to move onto Jasper Park. Reading Mary’s book is very Deja Vu. I was virtually following in her footsteps, maybe not in the same direction but essentially the same routes. The trip into Athabaska Pass, The Skyline Trail (Shovel Pass) to Maligne Lake and down to Jonas Pass and Brazeau Lake, Nigel Creek and so on. And of course the big trip into Mount Robson. Every summer was another adventure. Despite the fact that they were solo trips I experienced no sense of loneliness. I may have been alone but I was not lonely.

For anyone contemplating hiking in Jasper Park, Old Indian Trails of The Canadian Rockies by Mary T.S. Schaffer is essential reading.

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“Vinyl’s great, but it is not better than CDs”

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I can remember the first time I heard a CD. It was in a high end audio store in Victoria, B.C. in the early 80’s. Needless to say I was blown away by the clarity and dynamic range of the sound produced on the in-store system. But that’s not what really convinced me of the validity of the format. I had collected recorded music for many years including 78s, 45’s, LPs and even pre-recorded reel to reel tapes. What really convinced me was the silence. Prior to the CD there was always background noise; the crackle and pop of static, dust, the sound of the needle tracking and, even with reel to reel recordings the sound of tape hiss. When a music track came to an end on the CD there it was – glorious silence. I had not ever experienced that before. So, in those early heady days of CDs there was lots of discussion in the audio magazines comparing data, charts and  the sound quality of vinyl and CDs. As we all know the CD won the battle and in the end dominated the market. That is, until the MP3 format came on the scene and changed the rules of the game. It was no longer about sound quality it was about quantity. The MP3 allowed for music in a compact format – more music in a smaller packet. For listening to music while riding on the subway, while working away at a menial job or just screening out the ambient surrounding noise it is not an unreasonable solution. Besides most of us couldn’t tell the difference in quality anyway. A number of audiophile formats (SACD, DVD) have been launched over the intervening years and have basically failed in the market place. The latest salvo in that war is Neil Young’s PONO device that, despite it’s audio claims, is probably also doomed to failure in the market place for no other reason than it’s awkward physical footprint. (“is that a Toblerone in your pocket or do you really like me?”). There is little need to go beyond the sound quality of a well produced CD and the market place has virtually confirmed that. In truth most popular music is not recorded to an audiophile level anyway and does not even take full advantage of the CD format.

However, quality is back into the discussions with proponents asserting that “Vinyl is better than Digital”; “it is a warmer sound” or “it is a truer reproduction of the original sound”  “it has more soul”. In fact most of the discussion points are hog wash. However, the sentiments seem to have initiated a movement back to vinyl in pop music with a limited number of releases in both a vinyl and MP3 format. Even the bench mark Jazz recording label BLUENOTE has re-issued a limited number of their classic recordings in Vinyl. Also in the jazz re-issue market Mosaic Records has always had a limited number of heavy weight vinyl format recordings in their catalogue. There is one sector of the recorded music industry that appears to have shown a complete disinterest in returning to a vinyl format. That is the Classical Music sector. I think that, in itself, says a lot.

The fact of the matter is that vinyl and digital (CD) are just different. The article in the link  Vinyl versus CDs  is probably one of the best explanations of the whole issue. Rather than recap the article just click on the link and read for yourself. However, there are a number telling points that have surfaced in this article and in recent discussions on the net. They include the following:

“Let’s not fool ourselves, though. Vinyl is great, but the idea that its sound quality is superior to that of uncompressed digital recordings is preposterous. They sound different, and that’s exactly the point.”

” Each format has its charms, and their overall differences in quality are often overwhelmed by differences in the quality of initial recording equipment, in mastering approaches, and in playback setup. But if you’re a vinyl collector, you also shouldn’t go around telling your friends how much purer your audio is. First off, that’s generally “dickish” behavior, but more to the point it’s false. Digital recording just is more accurate. That’s not the only thing worth considering by any means, but it does make the Puritanism of some vinyl true believers look rather ridiculous”.

“What difference does any of it make? The music being made today all sucks, so high resolution audio is just like putting lipstick on a pig”

What more can I say. Do a Google search on the net and you will see that most of it has already been said. In the meantime I have stacks of vinyl in my basement that I never play. If it is something I really like I endeavor to find it on CD.

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1685 was a very good year

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Why? Well, first off that was the year that Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) was born. Then there was George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) born in that year. Also in that same year Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1757) was born. In 1685 Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741) was 7 years old. There were probably other important individuals born around that time but in the world of Baroque Music these gentlemen became the musical giants of the era. All of these men were working musicians in the real sense of the word. Their role was to provide music for the church, the aristocracy, students and, to a lesser extent, for social events. The demands were intense and, as a result their output was prolific. To give some idea of the volume of music we are talking about here, Arkiv Music, the on-line source for classical music lists 7,840 Bach recordings, 3,314 Handel recordings, 658 Scarlatti recordings and 2,318 Vivaldi recordings. So collectively that is over 14,000 recordings. Of course there are duplicates in there but that is still a lot of music to digest. Bach wrote a lot of instrumental, vocal, choral and church music but my particular focus of interest has always been with his keyboard music. My first acquaintance was with the Rosalyn Tureck vinyl recordings of the “Keyboard Partitas”, my second brush with the inevitable was with Maria Tipo’s recordings of the same works. The knockout blow came with Glenn Gould’s recordings of “The Goldberg Variations”. Glenn has been described as “a nutcase” but there is no doubt his interpretations of the music of Bach may never be surpassed. Fortunately, a complete box set of the Columbia recordings; GLENN GOULD – THE COMPLETE BACH COLLECTION has recently been released. At a modest cost of $72 + shipping the 38 CDs, and 6 DVDs (less than $2 a disc) is a formidable body of music to enjoy. If that is too much for an average soul then maybe his recordings of the Goldberg Variations are worth a listen. He recorded it twice in his career. Technology (stereo and Dolby sound) overtook his landmark 1955 recording and he revisited the studio again in 1981 to re-interpret and re-record this masterpiece. This was an exercise that was well worth the effort. The session was recorded on video and the resulting DVD is spectacular. Here is a link to Glenn Gould performing the Goldberg Variations  (48 minutes – but well worth the time). “Quite possibly one of the best recordings ever made of any piece of music in the history of recording performances in the studio” – YouTube comment.

I am not overly familiar with the music of Handel. I would not be alone in that thought. The music of Bach and Mozart frequently over shadowed Handel’s achievements. Although, like Bach, he is a Germanic composer he is best known for his English Music. Particularly the “Hallelujah” chorus in “The Messiah” and the orchestral suites “The Water Music”. Further explorations of his music is on my bucket list.

Domenico Scarlatti was born in Naples and served Spanish Royalty for many years. He is best known for the over 500 Keyboard Sonatas that he originally composed for harpsichord. A significant number of these have migrated to the piano and these one movement sonatas are recognized as cornerstones of the keyboard repertoire. They demonstrate Scarlatti’s facility at adapting the rhythms of contemporary Iberian popular music to the keyboard. Or, if one likes to think of it in a particular way then it could be seen as a first taste of flamenco music. This may explain why transcriptions of the sonatas have found their way into the repertoire of just about every classical guitarist of the past 50 years. If one has an appetite for harpsichord music then the 555 sonatas are available in a landmark recording by Scott Ross – the ERATO 34 CD box set ($104) Scarlatti: The Complete Keyboard Sonatas. They were recorded by Scott Ross before he died in 1989 at the age of 38. I include this link to a harpsichord performance by Scott Ross while being fully aware that harpsichord music probably comes across as very harsh to modern ears  A Scarlatti Sonata on Harpsichord .   On the other hand when transcribed to guitar Scarlatti’s sonatas are very pleasing – here is a link to John Williams performing one of the most popular guitar transcriptions of  a different sonata –  The Scarlatti D minor Sonata .

Last, but not least, is the Italian composer Antonio Vivaldi who is mostly famous for his “The Four Seasons”. This composition is probably one of the most recognizable pieces of music on the planet. It is forever on radio, TV, in films and concert performances. It is a shame in a way because Vivaldi’s focus in life was opera music and he would have probably preferred to have been remembered for that. But let’s not forget that the working musicians of that era were not writing for prosperity. They were very much in the moment, composing music for the immediate needs of their employers, patrons and students. As a composer he had an enormous influence on the baroque instrumental music of his day. The content and style of his sonatas and concertos were even emulated by Bach. In unkind moments critics have accused Vivaldi of writing the same sonata over 200 times. My first acquaintance with Vivaldi’s music  was with his concerto for mandolin. To this day it is still one of my favorite pieces of music. Despite the fact that there are over 2,000 recordings of Vivaldi’s music in the Arkiv catalogue my choice is the I MUSICI 19 CD box set of VIVALDI: CONCERTOS AND SONATAS Opp.1-12 (Newton Classics) . With the exception of one Oboe Concerto and one disc of Flute concertos this is predominantly violin music in many, many, configurations. From the first disc of Trio Sonatas right through to the end of the last disc in this 19 CD collection this music is a revelation. The music does not repeat it self. The only possible duplication I detected is a fragment of the mandolin concerto that showed up in one composition. Currently one of my favorite pastimes of the day is to make lunch and kick back for about an hour and let Vivaldi’s music fill my sonic space. At around $60 this boxed set is one of my best investments ever.

The time of their birth, 1685 or there about, is a long time ago. They were all dead by the time 1760 rolled around. That’s before the American War of Independence and the founding of the United States of America. That’s over 250 years ago and yet their music is still very much apart of modern cultural life. That’s a formidable achievement.

Here are some additional links with Rosalyn Tureck playing the Prelude from Bach’s Partita #1   (audio only) and Maria Tipo playing the same piece Prelude from Bach’s Partita #1  (audio only) .  Here is another version by Andras Schiff – he starts with the Prelude then follows through with the entire Partita #1 . If you are unfamiliar with Bach’s Keyboard music the Partitas are a great place to start.

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THORIUM BASED NUCLEAR ENERGY – Too good to be true?

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The dropping of the atomic bombs on Japan at the end of World War II ushered in a new age and my generation is a child of that age. We have seen the horrific effects of the bomb, lived under the cloud of “mutually assured destruction” and witnessed the massive accident at Chernobyl and, more recently, the tsunami demolition of a nuclear power station in Japan. We are aware of the hazards of nuclear waste and how it will continue to accumulate with the current nuclear technology. It is not an understatement to say that we have a paranoid fear of anything nuclear and that includes “peaceful” development of nuclear energy. We are filled with “nuclear fear” and as a result research and development of nuclear power has been stalled for years. I believe the last nuclear power station to be built in North America was in the 1970’s and that was based on technology developed in the 40’s and 50’s. By today’s criteria that is very, very old technology.

The development of nuclear power stations was totally predicated on the need for weapons grade radioactive materials. As a result a whole industry has been developed to fill those demands. Research into alternative nuclear power flies in the face of military needs and the current Uranium based nuclear establishment has a strangle hold on the political process.

Alvin Martin Weinberg (April 20, 1915 – October 18, 2006) was an American nuclear physicist and administrator at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory during and after the Manhattan Project. He came to Oak ridge in 1945 and remained there until his death in 2006. He is virtually the God father of what is the accepted design of Light Water Reactors (LWR) for nuclear power generation. But that was not his final word on nuclear power station design. In response to a request by the American air force to match the American navy’s nuclear power capabilities he was asked to design a suitable nuclear power source for aircraft. A foolish request perhaps, and one that was ultimately cancelled, but it is one that led to the design of the Molten Salt Reactor (MSR). After 18 years as the director, Weinberg was fired by the Nixon administration in 1973. He was fired because he continued to advocate for increased nuclear safety and the adoption of MSR reactor designs to replace what he thought were design flaws in the LWR concepts. Weinberg’s firing effectively halted development of the MSR. Under various administrations some research and development continued sporadically over the years and the concept has been proven in a pilot plant that was built.

In discussions about Nuclear power what is forgotten is the fact that current power stations are based on designs that are over 50 years old. Is there any technology of that era that has survived without major redesign and, in most instances, actual replacement with bigger, brighter, more efficient designs? As we all know technology is currently rolled over at an ever increasing rate. So why not nuclear power designs? Current reactors are based on the use of Uranium 235 as the fuel source. This is a relatively rare, limited resource that is only utilized at about half of 1% efficiency. It produces significant amounts of radioactive waste materials that, as a disposal problem, have yet to be solved. And there is the spectra of nuclear proliferation always hanging the air (witness the paranoia associated with the Iranian efforts to develop peaceful nuclear power).

Thorium could be used as a nuclear power source. “What is Thorium? Thorium is a naturally occurring radioactive chemical element with the symbol Th and atomic number 90. It was discovered in 1828 by the Norwegian mineralogist Morten Thrane Esmark and identified by the Swedish chemist Jons Jakob Berzelius, who named it after Thor, the Norse God of thunder. Thorium produces a radioactive gas, radon-220, as one of its decay products. Thorium is estimated to be about three to four times more abundant than uranium in the Earth’s crust, and is chiefly refined from monazite sands as a by-product of extracting rare earth metals” – Wikipedia. (That last mentioned fact, extraction from rare metal earths, is a subject with profound economic implications for North America. Most of the rare earth extraction, development and subsequent expansion of high tech industries are occurring in China.) Thorium can be used as a fuel in Nuclear power plants. It is so abundant that it could power the world for thousands of years. It also offers a unique and innovative way of disposing of existing stocks of radioactive waste and spent fuels.  Plutonium can be safely disposed of by being mixed with thorium, used as a nuclear fuel and “burnt up” in conventional Light Water Reactors.  The Norwegian company Thor Energy is running a 5-year test program on mixed thorium-plutonium fuel at the OECD Halden Test reactor in Norway.  Thor Energy is working to commercialize the fuel by 2020. The thorium fuel cycle has been successfully demonstrated in over 20 reactors worldwide, including the UK’s ‘Dragon’ High Temperature Gas Reactor which operated from 1966 to 1973.

China and India are investing heavily in Thorium reactors and will have prototype power stations on line in the next few years. In the meantime North America appears to be doing nothing. That is kind of ironic. The plans for the prototypes comes from old research efforts at the Oak Ridge Laboratory. No, they were not stolen in some clandestine spy operations. The Chinese asked for the designs and they were given free access to gigabytes of PDF files that they took back to China. In 2011 the Chinese government launched a $350 million program to develop thorium-fuelled molten salt reactors, with a goal of reaching commercial readiness by 2035. India is also pursuing a comprehensive thorium fuel plan with a first commercial thorium-fuelled reactor scheduled for 2025. It has large reserves of thorium which it plans to utilize in Prototype Fast Breeder Reactors, two of which are under construction.

Prosperity is based on access to cheap electrical energy (“every woman on the planet deserves a washing machine” – before you dismiss that as a frivolous comment just think about the implications click on the TED link). At the moment prosperity is based on cheap coal, natural gas and oil technology with the attending prospect of runaway pollution and global warming. Although the idea of alternative sources such and wind, tidal and solar are attractive the truth of the matter is that with the projected growth in energy demands these sources, while useful and advisable, will never fill the demand, and despite their attractiveness, they also come with environmental costs. How much of the earth can you “put under glass” (solar panels) and how many wind and tidal power stations can you spread across the landscape? Not enough to supply our needs. Having said that the options have to be explored and developed. You can’t have too many eggs and too many baskets.

If we want a sustainable energy source then Thorium would appear to be the answer. Despite the significant technical challenges that would have to be overcome the substantial safety and environmental advantages would make the effort worth while. As always, nuclear power requires “humungous” amounts of capital but given the political will it can be done. Just look at the capital that is being expended on the Alberta Tar Sands, Liquid Natural Gas developments and the proposed pipelines that can only take us in the wrong direction. Couldn’t that be better spent on a hydrocarbon free future? As always with a new nuclear option there will be cost over runs, political scandals, and long lead times. But do we really have any choice? The Thorium Nuclear Energy option may be too good to be true but the whole scenario looks more hopeful than the alternatives. So perhaps we should go for it at an accelerated pace. The Chinese, Indians and Norwegians seem to think so.

I have freely plagiarized numerous sources and for that I apologize. There is so much information out there and I encourage you to check the YouTube videos and the Wikipedia entries to become fully informed. There is an absolute landslide of information out there – click on the following links:

Thorium and the Rare Earth issue  – this examines the Rare Earth Metals issue and the potential surplus of Thorium for nuclear energy production.

Thorium Molten Salt Reactors  – Why hasn’t development gone ahead – 36 minutes of tech talk.

Nuclear Energy and Climate Change –

Kirk Sorensen’s presentation – This is rather long but as a complete overview it is well worth the time.

I would also encourage you to check the related link that Dave Prinn put out there recently on Solar panels    http://blog.petflow.com/this-invention/

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Is the Era of the Screaming Electric Guitar over?

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If the popular press is any indicator then maybe so. Mind you the press is not usually in the fore front of news, views and cultural phenomenon. Usually they are behind in their reporting of movements etc.

The first article of note by Jenny Lee in the Vancouver Sun March 8, 2014 – “A real acoustic revival is going on now ………. guitars, mandolins banjos and ukeleles are making a comeback. The sales of high-end and custom acoustic guitars have risen by 39 percent since 2009 while electric guitar sales have plummeted, according to the National Association of Music Merchants. More than half of the guitar sales are now acoustic  as trends in popular music shift from rock to more acoustic-focused country, according to the Music Business Journal”. 

The second article, by Francois Marchand in the Vancouver Sun this past weekend in the Arts and Life Section (Saturday May 10, 2014) had a two page spread “PLANET BANJO – From Bela Fleck to Mumford and Sons and Steve Martin , five strings rule the world.”  That certainly seemed to re-enforce the notion that electric guitars no longer rule the music scene.  Maybe it is about time. The Beatles, the Rolling Stones and the whole British Invasion thing virtually invented the rock and roll quartet (lead guitar, rhythm guitar, electric bass and drums). Admittedly they took elements of popular American roots music and invented or re-invented a whole genre of music that has now held sway for around fifty years. In the process the normally quiet guitar was electrified and “amped” up to volumes that surpassed even the largest of conventional orchestras. In normal circumstances you would be hard pressed to hear an acoustic guitar across a normal sized room. The electric guitar changed all that. In the evolving popular music scene the electric guitar stepped out of the sonic shadows to dominate the landscape. The standard rock quartet or “power trio” (guitar, bass and drums) ended up featuring the likes of Jimmy Hendrix, Carlos Santana, Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page. In the 60s, 70’s and beyond a whole slew of virtuosic guitar Gods became the idols of just about every teenage boy on the planet. The electric guitar became an instant “chick magnet” and what teenage boy would not want to be part of that? Time marches on and things do change. Classic Rock still rules the air waves and yet, if you look around, maybe the younger generation of musicians are looking in a different direction.  And, if you take another look you will notice that the average age of most local rock musicians is now probably over forty and even, possibly, over fifty. The rock touring circuit seems to be dominated by musicians well past their best out date. There is a reliance on nostalgia rather than musicality and innovation.That should tell us something. In most of the social musical gatherings I have participated in over recent years the scene has been dominated by acoustic instruments. The music has returned to human scale and stepped away from the magnitudes of a rock-arena. At a recent square dance (yes, they are still happening) the dominant instruments in the hands of the under twenty five crowd was actually mandolins and banjos. In the young bands around town an electric guitar is a pretty rare sight. A young fiddle player of my acquaintance, in commenting on rock music, succinctly put it that “there are too many guitar players”. Maybe he is right and the music scene is returning to one of sonic diversity. I welcome that.

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Quote of the Week – Leonard Cohen

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When journalist Beryl Fox talked with Cohen for CBC-TV  on May 8,1966, you couldn`t miss the twinkle in his eye. He`d told Fox he pondered getting a tattoo and when she asked “Where? “ he deadpanned, “There`s this place on Saint Lawrence Boulevard“.

From the recently published Leonard  Cohen on Leonard Cohen: Interviews and Encounters, Edited by by Jeff Burger, Chicago Review Press, ISBN 978-1-61374-758-2, year 2014

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