Musitorial – The Magic Touch

 

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

Today’s musitorial calls attention to a 1964 film in the early Bond (007) franchise: Goldfinger (Eon Productions, Guy Hamilton, director, United Artists).

The eponymous theme song refers to the villainous Auric[1] Goldfinger, a master criminal whose penchant for gold dominated his very being – at the expense of all else, including morals. The theme song, refers to Goldfinger as “the man with the Midas Touch,” a reference to legendary King Midas.[2]

Based on the 1959 novel of the same title by Ian Fleming, the film's plot has Bond investigating the gold magnate Auric Goldfinger, who plans to contaminate the United States Bullion Depository at Fort Knox.[3]

Goldfinger was defeated, of course (dare I say ‘foiled’), and of course 007 (James Bond, played by Sean Connery) got to bed a voluptuous gold-painted beauty – his reward for a job well done, and the audience’s reward for enduring the predictable plot.

As I write this, a portion of the USA’s opulent but functional national treasure, the White House (a national treasure, not a king’s treasure) is being razed to make way for an opulent golden ballroom.

Let us not forget that King Midas, of “Midas Touch” fame, came to hate the gift of his god-given golden touch and convinced the gods to rid him of it (it gets complicated thereafter but it is relevant to this musitorial). And let’s note how close the word bullion is to the word bully.

THIS JUST IN: While writing this, news broke that the US Republican White House has suddenly terminated trade talks with Canada, following some TV ads that resurrect Ronald Reagan’s (1911-2004) cautionary negative reflections on trade tariffs. So, the White House has taken its ball[room] and gone home.

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Link to Wikipedia article on Goldfinger, the film: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldfinger_(film)

Link to Wikipedia article on the song, “Goldfinger” (composed and arranged by John Barry, lyrics by Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley, performed by Shirley Bassey) including a link to a recording (EMI, London): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldfinger_(Shirley_Bassey_song)

Link to news article about East Wing demolition and ballroom construction: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/white-house-east-wing-demolished-new-ballroom-rcna239399

Link to CBC news article on USA’s withdrawal from trade talks (October 2025): https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-trade-negotiations-tariffs-ontario-ad-9.6951469

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[1] According to Google AI, the name Auric means "golden" or "of gold," derived from the Latin word "aurum."

[2] Ancient moral mythology says King Midas was favoured by the gods with the gift of turning everything he touched into gold. Hence the saying, “The Midas Touch.” Link to Wikipedia article on King Midas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midas

 

[3] Link to Wikipedia article on Fort Knox: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Knox

 

Musitorial – Golden Girls Take Flight

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

Today’s musitorial is a nod to a popular family television show called The Flying Nun (1967-1970, Executive Producer Harry Ackerman, ABC Screen Gems), starring the vivacious Sally Fields.

Screened in the days of truly family entertainment, the show was immensely popular. I can’t say whether or not it launched Sally Fields’ screen career, because it seems like she’s been around forever, yet seems forever young. The premise of the show was the naïve serial antics of Sister Bertrille (Sally Fields) and the chagrin of superior nuns. Of course, wholesome naiveté wins the day (doesn’t it always) and the hearts of the entire cast and viewers alike.

Anyway, those sisters are not the focus of this musitorial. Instead, I call your attention to a recent case of some nuns who flew the coup, as we say. In Saltzberg, Austria, three octogenarian sisters who had been retired to a nearby nursing home (against their will, apparently) and who escaped from said home to returned to occupy their former – and now derelict – convent where they had previously lived most of their lives.

Let me repeat, three nuns are occupying their former convent against the wishes of the owners of said premises, their former overseers. Wouldn’t Bea Arthur et al (The Golden Girls be inspired?! Granted, not all the characters on the latter show would qualify to reside in a convent, but the reference is hard to resist.

You go girls!

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Link to Wikipedia article about the show, The Flying Nun: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Flying_Nun

Link to a YouTube clip of the theme music, “Who Needs Wings to Fly?": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Jcx1xWE8qQ

Link to Wikipedia article about Sally Fields: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sally_Field

Link to CNN (c/o CTV) new item on the incident: https://tinyurl.com/4h89k3m6

Link to Wikipedia article about The Golden Girls: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Golden_Girls

 

Musitorial – A Beaver Tale

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

A soft news item on CBS The Daily Report, August 11, 2025, dealt with the behaviour of beavers (link below). I don’t think there was any ulterior motive behind the story (i.e., no sideways glance to Republican environmental policies).

Once threatened with annihilation by greed (beaver pelts were and are prized) and by would-be land developers, the uncanny and tireless determination of beavers to create water hazards that are the silent envy of golf course architects everywhere, beavers are making a comeback in the eyes of foresters and farmers alike.

The likeness of a beaver seated on its lodge is the longstanding emblem of Parks Canada – indeed, of Canada. It rivals the prairie bison as emblematic of our country. Eagles probably outnumber beavers (they certainly do around here) but as a national symbol of the supremacy of natural strength and resilience, the mature eagle is already spoken for. But if beavers could fly there would be no contest.

Readers of past of my musitorials will be wondering what musical surprise I have in store today, and wondering what it has to do with beavers (with only that casual mention of eagles).

Today we celebrate the history-inspired work of singer-songwriter Johnny Horton (1925-1960), whose oeuvre includes many a rousing, knee slapping, heel kicking, lung busting and genre bending shanties on the hit parades of the 1950s. Horton had multiple successes in 1960 with both "Sink the Bismarck" and "North to Alaska", the latter used during the opening credits of the John Wayne film. Horton died in a traffic collision in November 1960 at the peak of his fame.

But it’s Horton’s hit song “The Battle of New Orleans,” which won a Grammy for best C&W recording of the year, that is my focus today. In the song (as in history), U.S. military resolve resulted in repulsing British forces more or less ending the war of 1812-1814. But I choose to focus on a different event of that war, and of that year.

On August 25, 1814, British (Canadian) troops sacked Washington, DC, including, of all things sacred to the USA, burning down the White House. Of course, I’m not suggesting any such similar action on anyone’s part – I needn’t, for it appears to me that the Republican Party is already doing a bang-up job and likely to burn it down themselves, metaphorically speaking of course.

Why the reference to beavers? Another Canadian invasion?  Let me just point to the tenacity and perseverance of that quintessentially Canadian emblem, whose mission in life is the restoration of the laws of nature and of landscapes scarred by battle.

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Link to Wikipedia article on Johnny Horton: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_Horton

Link to lyrics of “The Battle of New Orleans”: https://tinyurl.com/bde5k62u

Link to Wikipedia article on the Battle of New Orleans: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Battle_of_New_Orleans

Link to CBS News article about the “reintroduction of beavers”: https://tinyurl.com/49nnbujj

 

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!

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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