Down boy. Down!

 

musitorial n a mashup of music, musings and editorials, music and song that evokes thought and commentary.

We are dazed and confused. How does one keep world affairs straight these days, eh? The U.S. Republican administration has opened and shut more doors than an arcade whack-a-mole game.

I’m reminded of an Ella Fitzgerald recording, “Undecided” (1993, First Lady of Song, Jazz Heritage) which, of course, has been spinning in my head these last few weeks. The first stanza goes:

First, you say, you do
And then you don't
And then you say, you will
And then you won't

To that, my unconscious turntable adds “you’re a bad dog, baby” but that’s a line from Gilbert O’Sullivan’s hit song, “Get Down” (1973, I'm a Writer, not a Fighter, BMG Rights Management) which, in part, goes:

Get down, get down, get down
You're a bad dog baby
But I still want you 'round

Try and get those out of your head!

=30=

Link to lyrics of “Undecided,” by Ella Fitzgerald: https://tinyurl.com/4k65fc2j

Link to version of the recording, “Undecided: https://genius.com/Ella-fitzgerald-and-louis-armstrong-undecided-lyrics

Link to Wikipedia article about Ella Fitzgerald: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ella_Fitzgerald

Link to lyrics, “Bad Dog,” by Gilbert O’Sullivan: https://www.songfacts.com/lyrics/gilbert-osullivan/get-down

Link to Wikipedia article about Gilbert O’Sullivan: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilbert_O%27Sulliva

 

Musitorial - See? Elephants do forget!

 

musitorial n a mashup of music, musings and editorials, music and song that evokes thought and commentary.

Today’s musitorial is, as is often the case, inspired by the news.

This morning it was revealed that the U.S. Republican drop-deadline of July 9, 2025, for international actors to negotiate (sic) their trade deals wasn’t really the real deadline.

Apparently the real real deadline is August 1, 2025 (for now?).

Geez, is this wheel of fortune lite? Round and round and round they goes. Where they stops, nobody knows.

So, today’s musitorial is “The Boxer,” by Simon and Garfunkel (1970 album Bridge Over Troubled Waters, Sony), the refrain of which goes, “Lie-la-lie-lie-lie-lie-lie, lie-lie-lie-lie-lie.”

Oh! I forgot. The reference to elephants is to the popular saying that elephants never forget. An accepted graphic symbol synonymous with the Republican Party (The Grand Old Party) is an elephant.

Don’t forget.

=30=

Link to news story about the delayed deadline: https://tinyurl.com/yf4kvmmn

Link to Wikipedia article “The Boxer”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boxer

Link to lyrics of “The Boxer”: https://tinyurl.com/ydvzstvz

Link to Wikipedia article on Simon and Garfunkel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_%26_Garfunkel

Link to article on the Republican elephant (cartoonist Thomas Nast) which first appeared in Harper's Weekly in 1874: https://tinyurl.com/483mamnc

 

Musitorial - Let us eat cake

 

musitorial n a mashup of music, musings and editorials, music and song that evokes thought and commentary.

Today’s musitorial, celebrates “Va’ peniero” – better known as the “The Anvil Chorus” – from Giuseppe Verdi’s (1813-1901) Il Trovatore (1853). This chorus gives me chills – the good kind.

That work of art is reason enough to play it as background music for musing, but a good reason to select it for today’s musitorial is that Verdi was an Italian classical master (those Italians really knew how to do it up big, eh?). But there’s a third reason (are you following this?), and that is that on June 27, 2025, the Italian city of Venice played host to an extravaganza that would be the envy of any self-respecting operatic chorus: the wedding of digi-billionaire Jeff Bezos to high-flying socialite Lauren Sanchez. Wow. Just wow. (Wow to the wedding, not her).

As the world watched, their wedding displaced more mundane media events – you know, like Gaza, Iran, Ukraine – and I couldn’t help but draw a thoughtful line between that wedding (especially the resulting public protestations), Verdi’s anvil chorus and that historically famous paragon of decadence, Marie Antoinette (1774-1792), who famously said of her impoverished and much abused French populace: “Let them eat cake.”

Things ended badly for Marie Antoinette. In a future post I will explore that now-timeless quote in a slightly different light, but for now, I am using it to point to the unmitigated arrogant display by the world’s elite to the down-in-the-dirt plight of the rest of us.

Venice has been a hotbed of restive resistance toward tourism of late. As the wedding spectacle and those protests captured the headlines, I recalled recent protests in Barcelona where “locals” protested that their city was being overrun by tourists, apparently displacing locals from their favourite bars and restaurants. Unlike the gun-slinging heroes of the old spaghetti westerns, or our gun-happy neighbours to the south, Barcelonians began shooting squirt guns at tourists occupying seats at popular outdoor cafes.

Look out world, the peasants are armed and righteous!

You can learn a little more using the links below.

=30=

Link to Wikipedia article (complete with “play” link) about “The Anvil Chorus:” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anvil_Chorus

Link to Wikipedia article about Verdi: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giuseppe_Verdi

Link to Wikipedia article about Marie Antoinette: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Antoinette

Link to news article about the wedding protests (CNN): https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/28/europe/jeff-bezos-wedding-protest-venice-latam-intl

Link to news article about Barcelona protests: https://tinyurl.com/yushyxmw

 

Musitorial - Happy birthday Irving

 

Belated happy birthday Irving. Today’s musitorial is a brief one but does offer you two for the price of one. 

Composer Irving Berlin’s (1888-1989) birthday is/was May 11 but this musitorial is really about a song by Ian Tyson.

“Irving Berlin is 100 Years Old Today” has nothing to do with Irving Berlin per se, it’s just a really, really great song about how life passes us by as we go about our business (with horses, of course). People’s pain goes largely unnoticed by the world passing by. It’s from Tyson’s album I Outgrew the Wagon (1989). Link below.

I suppose it would also be fitting to play something by the composer himself, “Blue Skies” (1926). But  Willie Nelson’s 1978 version, on his album Stardust (link below) is lovely.

Enjoy.

Mike Hunter, West Bay, CB

link to YouTube recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0earQ2wCf0

link to Wikipedia Ian Tyson: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ian_Tyson

link to Wikipedia Irving Berlin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irving_Berlin

link to YouTube version “Blue Skies” rendition by Willie Nelson (CBS, 1978): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SI4ZTXOi6Ew