August 2014 archive

So today the Wayback Machine takes you to the sunny days of the Renaissance (well, sunny in comparison to the Dark Ages or even late Medieval Period) commonly dated to 1400 – 1600 more or less.

Now among the signal advances musically during this time period is the development of recognizably ‘modern’ musical notation, though to contemporary eyes it’s bears about the same relationship to the scores you performed in Band, Orchestra, or Choir (heh, worked in a BÖC reference there) as a First Folio does to an Annotated Complete Works.  For one thing color was used to denote duration in a variety of contradictory schemes, more to the point previously solid heads were opened in the manner of the current whole and half note because of the replacement of vellum with paper which was instrumental in making the printing press so successful.

And you thought it was just for words.

Nope, the systematized notation of music and printing of same made the spread of musical ideas philosophy, science, and theology (the latter of which was pivotal in the political struggles of the period) much easier than previously possible.

But in 1410 – 20 when John Dunstaple was active during the early Renaissance it was still all just one big happy Catholic family though those pesky theological issues would raise their ugly head soon enough.

Early Renaissance music owed much to the sacred music of the Late Medieval where most works were commissioned directly by Cathedrals and Monasteries for performance during services and were rarely exclusively instrumental.  The lyrics taken from prayers (in Latin of course).  The institutions hired or trained their own composers who hardly ever traveled or changed positions and most instruction and direction was personal and transmitted by word of mouth.  As a result musical performance and culture was very insular and idiosyncratic. Because of it’s origins in the Medieval tradition to contemporary ears the music seems droning and repetitive, soporific is the word I’d use to describe it.

Dunstaple was certainly no exception for the most part musically though he is noted for his adoption of tri-tones, thirds, and sixths in harmony, but in other respects he was quite unusual.  That he was a lay person as opposed to a priest or monk we infer by the large number of wives that predeceased him.  His influence on European music was widespread, from his native England to the remotest eastern principalities of the Holy Roman Empire though it had a particular resonance with their Burgundian rivals.  He wrote secular and instrumental music as well as sacred.

The secret of his success?  The printing press and musical notation.  It’s possible we know much of his work, but all music of the period is at best loosely attributed and much authorship disputed by scholars between him and his contemporary Leonel Power, also English.

The musical output of medieval England was prodigious, yet almost all music manuscripts were destroyed during the English Reformation, particularly as a result of the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1536-1540. As a result, most of Dunstaple’s work has had to be recovered from continental sources (predominantly those from northern Italy and the southern Alps).

He’s arguably the most influential English composer of all time, yet very few people today know about him.  About 50 works are definitively attributed to him with the first collection ever published in 1953, 500 years after his death, and those almost immediately subject to scholarly debate (academese for knockdown drag-out fighting).

Not disputed are a collection of 12 Motets of which 6 are easily discoverable on-line.

Quam pulcra es

Did I say soporific?  I’m sure I (yawn)…  Anyway, the other 5 as well as the Obligatories, News, and Blogs below.

 A collection of 20 creative ‘sushi’ rolls that were invented outside of Japan

   Krista Rogers

Love it or hate it, every country has their own take on sushi. While some of the creations, such as the California roll, are fairly tame and are now accepted as part of a normal sushi menu, we’ve also seen some of the odder versions out there, such as Hong Kong’s ‘killer sushi’, Nutella sushi in France, and my personal favorite-the absolutely adorable but sadly inedible cat sushi!

The quintessential component of sushi is vinegared rice, so while these creations can’t technically be called sushi, they’ve definitely taken a stylistic cue from the rolled shape of makizushi. And we have to admit, some of those fillings do look tasty…

I suspect that some of my readers must be wondering by now why I haven’t responded with my thoughts on the recent outbreak in the transgender/TERF hostilities.

In case yoIu have been completely unaware of the issue, TERF stands for “trans exclusive radical feminists,” although I’ve always thought they were more reactionary than radical.  I should note that they don’t like the term, viewing it as an insult, even though it was invented by other feminists…feminists who wanted to distance themselves from the TERFs.

Although the hostility has been simmering for quite awhile, the most recent outbreak can be traced to the publishing of an article in The New Yorker by Michelle Goldberg, entitled What is a Woman?, which presented a very one-sided treatment of the dispute.

To quote a TERF, from the beginning of the rift in 1973:

I will not call a male “she”; thirty-two years of suffering in this androcentric society, and of surviving, have earned me the title “woman”; one walk down the street by a male transvestite, five minutes of his being hassled (which he may enjoy), and then he dares, he dares to think he understands our pain?  No, in our mothers’ names and in our own, we must not call him sister.

–Robin Morgan

Now you may not consider the Gray Lady actual ‘Journalism’ but there is no denying they take themselves quite seriously as do the Washington/Wall Street elites for the most part which is precisely why the Risen case is so very important.

If they can do it to him they can do it to anybody.

Freedom of the Press in Jeopardy As Obama Goes After Times Reporter Risen

James Risen and Phil Donahue on Obama’s War on Press Freedoms

Pulitzer Prize-Winning Journalists Show Solidarity with James Risen in Fight Against Justice Department

By: Kevin Gosztola, Firedog Lake

Monday August 11, 2014 1:56 pm

There is no indication that the Justice Department will not pursue testimony for its leak prosecution against former CIA officer Jeffrey Sterling, and, as a result, fourteen Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists have come forward to declare their support for Risen in his fight against revealing information from his confidential sources.

…

Throughout this ordeal, Risen has never been held in contempt. However, with the Supreme Court’s decision in June to not hear his case over whether he had a reporter’s privilege to protect his confidential sources, he has exhausted his appeals.

President Barack Obama’s administration now has a clear path to subpoena and coerce him into testifying. The administration could threaten him with jail or even fine him in increments that increase each day until he is bankrupt.

…

“Enough is enough,” New York Times investigative reporter David Barstow declared. “The relentless and by all appearances vindictive effort by two administrations to force Jim Risen into betraying his sources has already done substantial and lasting damage to journalism in the United States.”

The Washington Post’s Dana Priest, the co-author of Top Secret America, stated if the US government is so concerned about information Risen revealed about a “now 14-year-old CIA operation against Iran” that went wrong” it would have “moved quickly to resolve this matter eight years ago when it was first published.”

“Instead, it seems obvious now that what officials really want is to hold a hammer over the head of a deeply sourced reporter, and others like him who try to hold the government accountable for what it does, even in secret,” Priest added.

She noted that over-classification of information by Obama and President George W. Bush had made the reporting of journalists like Risen increasingly critical to the public’s ability to “question whether a gigantic government in the shadows is really even a good idea.”

Both Jason Szep and Andrew R.C. Marshall, international reporters for Reuters, suggested it was “scandalous” Risen may face “jail time for doing what every good journalist working in the public interest does: protect confidential sources.”

“President Obama and Attorney General Holder should halt all legal action against James to demonstrate that their ‘war on leaks’ is not an assault on the First Amendment and freedom of the press,” Szep and Marshall added.

“Preservation of a free, unfettered press has a long history in our country, allowing ordinary citizens to learn what their government is up to and to question actions carried out in their name. The Pentagon Papers, Watergate Scandal, My Lai Massacre, warrantless wiretapping of American citizens and many other outrages would never have come to light in a country where reporters must fear imprisonment for doing their jobs. A big part of doing our jobs is giving our word to protect whistleblowers,” Mark Johnson of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel acknowledged.

“By threatening to send a journalist to prison for refusing to name his sources, the Obama Administration makes the whistleblowers more fearful to come forward, and it makes the journalists more hesitant to expose the failures of the government,” Eric Newhouse of Great Falls (MT) Tribune argued. He called what the administration was doing a “grave disservice.”

Gretchen Morgenson of the New York Times quoted George Orwell, who said, “The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.”

“America needs journalists to write the first draft of history without fear or favor, as my colleague James Risen has. It is deeply disturbing that the Obama Administration is pursuing Mr. Risen for doing his job.”

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