21. June 2011 · Comments Off on MQOD · Categories: Quotes

…artists are certainly not necessarily the most stable strata of human society.

-Peter Gelb

RTWT

21. June 2011 · 2 comments · Categories: Books

Um … I might have even be tempted, although the price is far too high, but when I read the description I had to laugh:

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Opera San José is the professional opera company in San Jose, California, United States, founded in 1984 by Irene Dalis. In 1988, it formed a resident company of principal artists, for which it has purchased fourteen apartment units to provide rent-free accommodation. Until 2004, the company performed in the Montgomery Theater in San Jose’s Civic Auditorium complex. One of the keys to the company’s success over the years has been its fiscal prudence. The company opened its 2004-2005 season in the 1,119 seat California Theatre, a former vaudeville and film theatre designed by Weeks and Day. On opening day in 1927, this 1,848 seat movie palace was said to be the finest theater in California. With its magnificent Jazz Age décor, it was part of a wave of ornate theaters built to define downtowns all over the country. For nearly 50 years the theatre showed films, until it’s closure in 1973.

REALLY! This is absolutely ridiculous! They put a book together by grabbing info off the internet and then they charge $49 for it?

Yeah, I’m sure it’ll be a best seller. After you read the copy you buy may I borrow it? (And if they took things from my website, I wanna know!)

I love reading “High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles!” on the front.

Okay … if you really want to buy the book, you go right ahead. But don’t say I didn’t warn ya!

21. June 2011 · 4 comments · Categories: Movies

… can you guess? (At the beginning of this clip.)

I just finished the film “Tous les matins du monde”. The visuals were lovely, but boy do I have issues with music & movies!

(Btw, if you watch it, it isn’t rated, but there is nudity so if you are uncomfortable with that, please don’t watch!)

Listening to the music in the movie was wonderful. Thank you, Jordi Savall!

21. June 2011 · Comments Off on FBQD · Categories: FBQD

i want to thank the b-52s for writing one of my favorite summer songs ever, topaz, i do not know when they recorded it, but for me it means summer,’city by the sea’, and that first note, what is that, an oboe? a claire annette? whatever it is, for me that note means the start of summer, thank you b-52s, i hope you and everybody everywhere has a glorious summer

21. June 2011 · Comments Off on Remembering, And More · Categories: Ramble

On Sunday we attended the memorial service for our dear friend Phil Zahorsky. What a time! So many memories — SO many friends, some of whom we hadn’t seen for over twenty years, and one we hadn’t seen in over thirty. Wow. Is this the way it will be now, I wonder? Will we only run into our friends at memorials? I do hope not.

After the service a friend — one I DO see more frequently, Deb, a fabulous oboist and great all-round person — thanked me for something I had up on my blog. I wasn’t honest with her (sorry, Deb) … I should have said, “Did I blog that?!” (NOT in my best Urkel voice, mind you.) but of course being me I was too embarrassed. So today I finally looked it up and it was an “AH YES!” moment. I had written about some correspondance Phil and I had here. Check it out!

And of course going to the service, hearing the stories, saying “goodbye” to Phil, all brought back other memories. So here are two of mine (hope you find this blog entry, Deb!):

When I was a freshman in college, sometime in October of 1974, I believe, Phil invited me to a lounge that was at Reed Hillview airport to hear a friend — I believe her name was Suzanne — sing there. I think it was his way of getting Dan and me together, as it was pretty obvious I had a crush on the guy. So off we go. now I was young, and I didn’t drink, but dear Phil introduced me that night to my first whiskey sour. Yep, I liked it! On the way out the door Phil laughed and said, “We should go back and tell them you’re only nineteen!” or some such thing. I laughed back and said, “Well, I’m actually seventeen!” The LOOK on his face … and then the response, “SEVENTEEN!?!?” Well, I heard that cry of “SEVENTEEN!?!?” several times after that when we ran into each other at school. He also called me “Patty pureheart” on occasion. I loved that.

Much, much later (just a few years ago, actually), Phil asked something like three questions of the maestro at one of the rehearsals. I just HAD to reprimand him. I explained that one question was plenty, but that really, for a bass trombone player, no question was better. We had a good laugh — we did love to tease each other — and from then on, whenever he asked a question, he’d come up to me and apologize (as a joke, of course!). Sometimes he’d tell me he refrained because of my words.

Yeah, Phil was fun. I’ve never met a nicer man. A friend at the service said she saw him very angry once, many years ago, at another person. Even that he got over, because later he was totally into having that person back with our orchestra, thinking there was no finer person for the job.

Miss you, Phil.

21. June 2011 · Comments Off on TangoTime™ · Categories: TangoTime™

From the movie Scent of Woman (so I’m assuming this is by the composer Thomas Newman)

Galant-quartet: oboe Alexey Balashov; violin Varvara Balashova; viola Andrey Utushkin; cello Svetlana Demidenko

21. June 2011 · Comments Off on ACappellaTuesday™ · Categories: ACappellaTuesday™

Ah! dolente partita! From The Full Monteverdi
I FAGIOLINI

I’m buying this film. Gotta have it! I

21. June 2011 · Comments Off on TQOD · Categories: TQOD

After this summer I’m never going to want to hear an oboe again.