h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Posted: Saturday 20 January 2007 01:20:25

Didn't hear Ross N, will record now off LA

Posted: Saturday 20 January 2007 01:22:33

Have the Beeb improved LA? It's got a new logo at the top of the Radio Player and I was getting 170 Kbps just now, never used to get those sort of bitrates.

i think that solon woman is one to look out for.

Who's been modded?

me. only on some boards. i guess this is one of them. sorry, won't trouble you any more.

???Twice???

<>

Me. The Channel 4 Mafia have spiked my account for daring to criticise Big Brothel.

Actually I'm pretty sure it's special someone. It seems a poster on the Woman Sour board has it in for ss and has managed to have a pre-mod put on the account. Bad form in my opinion. I can't imagine ss has done anything that would justify censorship - certainly I've never seen anything from ss that's nearly as bad as the ordinary conversational level of some posters on WH or Today. I don't really know, though, 'cos I only look in on WH a couple of times a week these days and hardly ever post anything there. We'll just have to wait and see what ss has to say - maybe (s)he's just checking if the pre-mod applies to h2g2.

Are you enjoying the Lully, MJ? It's very tranquil but I'm afraid I am rather treating it as background music.

you are right, aitch, on both counts. i do not know myself why i have been put on 'pre-mod' as they do not tell you. i really love your 'big brothel' quip and intend to use it myself as soon as. will you want a credit?

love, spesh.

ps. i won't be pestering you as i can't stand it when my posts do not appear instantly.

Hi H,

>>>Are you enjoying the Lully, MJ? It's very tranquil but I'm afraid I am rather treating it as background music.<<<

Ditto

Did you enjoy the Discovering Music this afternoon? If you missed it do Listen Again - I thought it was very good - Stephen Johnson talking about Sibelius's 2nd symphony. I seem to recall you saying that you like it. Some interesting theories but I won't spoil it by talking about them in case you haven't heard it yet.

I had a £5 Borders voucher to use up by tomorrow so I made a hasty visit this afternoon. Not a husge choice of music but didn't want a book so in the end I chose a CD of the Verdi Requiem in the old 1960 Fritz Reiner recording with Jussi Bjorling. It was more than £5 but I'll enjoy listening to it. Soprano Leontyne Price will have been quite young then.

See you later,

MJ

<>

But you don't recall my recommending 'Discovering Music' to you yesterday (message 249)? As predicted, I recorded the programme whilst listening to Five Live where Liverpool were giving Chelsea a good thrashing! Oops, sorry Mimi - I don't mean to gloat. Well, maybe a little.

I hope you enjoy your Verdi Requiem. I like it better than any of his operas. I don't know the performance you mention but I expect it will be thrilling. a couple of years ago I bought a triple CD set for €5 in Amsterdam. It has two complete historic performances: Carl Schuricht, 1939 and Herbert von Karajan 1949; plus excerpts from a Karl Böhm 1945 performance. The Karajan has probably the most terrifying 'Dies Irae' I've ever heard.

bye for now

H

Hello ss

Yes, Laura Solon could be a lot of fun if 'Talking and Not Talking' keeps up the early promise. I'd never heard of her before, I'm afraid to say.

Sorry to hear of your troubles. I don't know why the pre-mod should extend to here. It could be complete coincidence. These boards all fell over a few months ago and we all sort of re-registered. If you didn't do that they might be treating you as a newcomer. If so, you might have to post lots of hidden messages before you get 'trusted'. If anyone's looking in, this is my page and I trust special someone

Feel free to use 'Big Brothel'. I did think of it independently but it's so obvious that hundreds of others probably did the same. I'm not a proprietorial sort of person anyway.

Still waiting for a proper reply from BA on that business that Richard raised last year. I wonder if they have got something to hide after all. I'll let the folks at WH know as soon as I hear anything.

thank-you for the kind words, aitch.

Posted: Saturday 20 January 2007 22:41:12

Heard some of discovering music this afternoon but I'm just recording the whole thing off LA. There are some good photos of Sibelius on the Discovering Music page http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/discoveringmusic/pip/pg9y4/

He looks almost as grumpy as I do in photos!

And I didn't know he was considered to be "the biggest skirt chaser in Vienna"! Somewhat changes my image of him, don't know why it should. Probably rather like when I read A J "Freddie" Ayer's autobiography and found that he also had an eye for women other than his wives. I always describe him as the well-known logical-positivist and Tottenham supporter but that will probably mean little to any of you.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ayer/

Hi Andy & anyone else around

I recorded Discovering Music from the radio this afternoon. I'll probably listen to it tomorrow. I'm listening to the Cornelius Cardew programme now but, as with a lot of this kind of music, I can't work out why I'm expected to enjoy it! Still, I've heard worse.

I'm really just waiting to switch over to BBC7 for episode 2 of 'Dracula'. It's a superb dramatisation with incidental music by the radiophonic workshop. The contrast with that awful TV adaptation from the other week is stark indeed.

I didn't know Sibelius was a womaniser either. I don't really see that it has a lot to do with his music. It's an argument I often used to have with some gay colleagues. If, say, Britten's or Barber's sexuality was that important, does Brahms's stuff betray the fact that he spent a lot of his spare time in the knocking shop. Maybe it does, but I can't hear it.

goodnight all

H

>>>>does Brahms's stuff betray the fact that he spent a lot of his spare time in the knocking shop. Maybe it does, but I can't hear it.<<<

But Fats Domino could:

I hear you knockin'
But you can't come in
I hear you knockin'
Go back where you been

Thanks for telling me about Discovering Music in your message no249, H! I'm getting a bit worried about my memory - or rather, lack of it.

Night night all or Good morning if you've gone!

MJ

Posted: Sunday 21 January 2007 00:28:15

>>I don't really see that it has a lot to do with his music.

I agree H, I said it changes my image of him, not his music. However I don't think you can entirely separate the two, although I do try to. However with some composers eg Wagner I dislike the composer and the music!

Posted: Sunday 21 January 2007 00:52:24

I listened to the start of the Cornelius Cardew programme, and I've recorded the whole thing to listen to later, because I know Howard Skempton quite well (his Lento was on Pre-Hear at 10-45) and Howard's biog says "He studied in London with Cornelius Cardew from 1967 and Cardew helped him to discover a musical language of great simplicity." I don't see much relationship between the 2 men's music, but will keep trying.

Good morning all

<>

From what we know of Wagner it's difficult to like the person. But, as you've probably guessed, the composer is my favourite of all composers. The odd thing is that much hatred of Wagner arises from the fact that the Nazis liked him; a fact which is sometimes treated almost as if he liked the Nazis. It's a classic case of sloppy reasoning. Wagner was overtly anti-semitic (like a great many prominent 19th/20th century people) and he was popular with the Nazis (like a great many artists). Despite the fact that the latter was completely beyond Wagner's control the two facts are often collated in discussions of his character. Admittedly, his Welsh daughter-in-law did his legacy no favours. But do we scour Schubert's biography to discover why he was a favourite of so many senior Nazis (certainly Heydrich; Himmler and Goering too if memory serves)?

<< don't think you can entirely separate the two, although I do try to>>

You have to try, don't you? Otherwise how could you justify listening to anything pre-1997 by the Vienna Phil. Until that very late date this very great orchestra refused to allow women as full members. Mind you, that gets you out of the Solti 'Ring' on two counts, doesn't it! Personally I can't stand Franz Lehar, who was one of Hitler's favourites; but I don't think the two facts are connected.

Posted: Sunday 21 January 2007 13:21:50

>>From what we know of Wagner it's difficult to like the person. But, as you've probably guessed, the composer is my favourite of all composers.

Hi H, I know that, hence the in my post.

The difficulty arises for me when you like the work of a composer (or author or poet or whatever) but don't like them as a person eg I've always been very keen on Webern's music, but then I heard years ago, possibly on Radio 3, that he was (allegedly) a Nazi supporter and this has coloured my view of him and his music ever since. I've no idea about the truth or not of this and have never investigated further. Does anyone know? His music certainly wouldn't have been liked by the Nazis and was doubtlessly branded by them as "degenerate".

Hi Andy

I don't like Webern's music very much but the idea that he was a Nazi supporter seems a bit daft. The Nazis cetainly didn't like him very much, as you suggest;'cultural bolshevik' was one of the official descriptions of him. There was that mad theory that atonal music was a coding system used to communicate atomic secrets to the Nazis. I can only find a link debunking the theory, so I suspect it's not taken seriously any more even by loonies:

http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/weekly/aa062998.htm

Webern might just have paid the price for not physically leaving the Reich. For some reason artists like Richard Strauss or Carl Orff seem to come under attack for not being heroes of the resistance. Quite why they should have refused to compose music any more than a plumber should have refused to fix the Riechstag bogs is beyond me. Some of them probably were more culpable than others - Karajan joining the party twice springs to mind - but the cathartic zeal with which some people pursue any prominent person who just got on with their life in the Third Reich is a bit distasteful to me.